afternoon if everyone can turn on their pros, council members that are present, welcome. Are we streaming yet? Connie let me know when you're ready. I'm ready do you want to hit start? Ready as well. All right good afternoon welcome to the one o'clock public portion of the closed session of the January 25th, 2022 meeting of the Santa Cruz City Council. If you'd like to comment on a closed session item now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen. In this part of the meeting the council will receive public testimony thereafter the public line will be closed and inaccessible. Please mute your television or streaming device once you call in and listen through the phone. Please note there is a delay in streaming so if you continue to listen on your television or streaming device you may miss your opportunity. I would like to ask the clerk please call roll. Okay mayor, council member Cemetery Johnson, Boulder? Here. Connie? Yeah. Vice Mayor Watkins, Mayor Brunner. President. Okay at this time are there any members of the public who would like any of the items listed on the closed session agenda? You can raise your hand by either dialing star nine or pressing star nine on your phone. Select raise hand in the webinar polls on your computer. When it's your turn to speak you will hear an announcement that you've been unmuted. The timer will then be set two minutes and you may hang up once you've commented on your item. Tendies list. We have zero attendees at this time so I will pull it back in that there are no attendees and no public comment on closed session agenda. This meeting will then go into adjournment and council will go into closed session. Thank you mayor. This is Laura. Give me a minute to put people into the holding room. We've got quite a few on. Pretty quick are you ready? We will begin. Good afternoon. Welcome everyone to 05M session of the January 25th, 2022 meeting of the Santa Cruz City Council and I would like to ask her please call roll. Members, voluntary Johnson. Here. Here. Thank you. I have a few announcements and then we will move into our regular meeting. Today's meeting is being broadcast live on community television channel 25 and streaming on the city's website cityofsantacruz.com. If you wish to comment on an agenda item today, call in at the beginning of the item you are wanting to comment on using the instructions on your screen. Please meet your television or streaming device. Call in and listed on your phone. Please note there could be a delay in streaming so if you continue to listen on your television or streaming device, may miss your opportunity to speak. When it's time for public comment, raise your hand here by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar polls on your screen. Please note that the public comment is heard only on items council is taking action on and not regular updates and reports. The items that will be open for public comment during today's meeting are numbers five through 29 on our agenda with the exception of item nine. I'd like to ask council members if there are any statements of disqualification then I'd then like to ask the city clerk to announce any additions and deletions. Okay, there was the deletion of item nine. The packet has been updated for if like that. Thank you so much. Okay, moving on to oral communications. This is an opportunity for members of the community to speak to us on items that are not on the agenda. Oral communications will occur at 6 p.m. If you wish to make a comment during oral communications, please call in at 6 p.m. I'd like to call on the city attorney to provide a report on the closed session. Yeah, the council met in closed session labor negotiation. It's labor negotiators, fast labor negotiations. The council also met with the city's attorneys to discuss one item of initiated litigation and during that session the council authorized to initiate litigation against T. Santa Cruz and the UC Regents rising out of their approval of their 2021 long range development. The council also met in closed session to discuss one item of current litigation. He's Tessner et al versus the city of Santa Clara et al at Santa Clara County Superior Court. In that case, after the Santa Clara County Superior Court granted cities motion dismissed based on the proper venue, the council approved terms of a settlement by agreeing to a waiver across consideration of the right to appeal. And there was no other report of action from the council's position. Thank you very much. The city council will now review the meeting calendar attached to the agenda and revise it as necessary as I call on the city clerk to provide any update. How are you? Thank you. There is a special meeting that we scheduled for March 29th, CBRA, one of the required public hearing. That was not added during the packet. March 29th for the California voters writing a right time. But council member coming. I know that myself and many of the council members have been receiving communications about the item that's going to be on the RTC's agenda related to the adverse abandonment of the roaring camp rail line. It's supposed to be considered by the RTC on February 3rd. I've been getting some concerns that people in the city of Santa Cruz, for example, are in opposition to the adverse abandonment and many people wanting to see the city take some kind of action. Initially, members of the community were asking if we could have emergency item placed on this agenda. However, I've been reaching out to the mayor and staff and I know staff has been in communication with some folks in the RTC and was wondering if council is willing to consider today potentially either putting on a special meeting for February or having this item heard on February 8th. The reason why members of the public have had interest in hearing having this item come before the RTC meeting is that there is the potential for RTC to take action on this item on February 3rd. Should the RTC move in that direction, it would be in our best interest to try to have the city's position expressed before that meeting. However, I know that some members of staff have had conversations with RTC and that it sounds like there might not be any action taken on the 3rd. So I'm wondering if there's an opportunity for us to just take a minute to determine what makes the most sense in terms of being able to put this item on the agenda and then have it discussed so that we're meeting the needs of the community in the terms of the community in a timely manner. Thank you, council member Cummings. I'd like to call on city manager Matt Huffaker to respond with the latest information of the regarding that item. Thanks Mayor Burner, potential reason that council member Cummings in response to some of the concerns that were being raised by the panel brought forward by some of the council. I didn't have an opportunity to check in with RTC's staff to make clarification on exactly what actions should maybe be taken at their February 3rd meeting relative to the Roaring Camp adverse management considerations. Their plan is to bring forward an information item of that meeting and ensure us that the commission will not be taken action at that meeting with regards to considerations around rail banking or adverse contaminants as well as what implications that may have for Roaring Camp's operations. So what I'd like to suggest is scheduling and I've had conversations with the mayor with this program scheduling a general business item for February 8th. I've invited Mike Preston, the executive director for the RTC to kind of speak on the issue. It's complex. I imagine it's got lots of moving parts and he's agreed to do so and we would do that in coordination with our own staffs so we could bring all that relevant information on this complex issue to the council or direction. And I think the timing will allow us to do so given that the commission will not be asking for your favor. Thank you. I didn't know if I still had the floor but I was going to ask city manager I'm happy to make a motion if that's necessary for us to put that on the agenda sure that it goes on and just we'd like to see if that's the direction you'd like us to provide for this item. I don't think that's necessary that item is already scheduled to be on the February 8th agenda based on information as of this morning. Councilmember Brown. Thank you. So I just wanted to say a quick thing since I am your representative city of Santa Cruz representative to the RTC and I talked as well this morning with folks. Can I hold my stop for a second and would this be more appropriate in the updates from council in our group? It's a quest it's just a quick question. So in terms of the follow-up I just wanted to ask Matt if you in that conversation because I do want to say that is intended to be an informational item and we have a commission that may or may not proceed with that recommendation from the staff about taking information versus taking action. So if something does happen at our meeting on the 3rd is your intention Matt to still have an item and have a request and come because I mean I think it would be useful for folks to hear about what's happening and get a little more information this is going to be an issue of concern ongoing. So would we still do that that you're thinking? I think that makes sense Councilmember Brown. Again RTC staff is a choice because it's an information item and I'm happy to just for the for the record state what what they plan on discussing and if you don't mind I will read it. I got several moving parts to it so it'll be information report on potential preservation and accrues branched line by rail bank to future potential adverse abandonment actions for heavy freight only termination of the ACL agreement. So that's what they plan on discussing as an information only item and I think allowing that meeting to take place whatever happens at that meeting will make sense for us to bring forward a discussion on it. Thank you. Councilmember Cumming. Just final question I've been in as I mentioned before I've been in conversation with a number of community members who are concerned about this some of whom are going to be bringing letters forward regarding this issue and I know some union members were interested in providing language for resolution what would be the appropriate way for us to help include that information as the end of packet is being drafted so that you know because it sounds like this is moving more towards something that's going to be brought forward by staff rather than council members. So I'm just curious as to the appropriateness of how we should be bringing items to be included on this agenda report forward. Councilmember Cumming, I would think it would happen as with any other report that the information that's submitted in advance of the item or letters to that effect would be included in the public record and attached to that item. Of course we would welcome any public comment when we bring that forward. So as to whether this would be something brought forward by staff would still be the council request but it started we can sort it out between now and then but we will also be in its mind to include the staff report that RTCs can be forward on the third a lot of relevant backgrounds will attach that for as well and yeah that's my thoughts. Great and I'll just I'll follow up with any other questions or concerns I have regarding the agenda item. So thank you and thank you for putting this on the agenda on the 8th. I'll let folks know who've been contacted about it. City Clerk Bonnie Bush. I was just had a question if RTC has information from their meeting on the third that is the date the packet goes out. Thank you. Okay thank you so much. We will move on. This is this is the time now for council members to report out on actions at external boards, committees and joint powers authority meetings. For future meetings please come prepared to provide an update on any meetings or actions that have occurred since the last council meeting so that council and public can be informed and I will begin with council member Cummings. Thank you mayor. I'll start with Ambag. So at the last Ambag meeting the board was tasked with bringing the first draft of our regional housing needs assessment numbers and there's been a bunch of discussion. This item actually supposed to be active on in November but had been brought back in December because it was about the numbers back again in January in order to not have a further delay board took action on this item and adopted option Z which was somewhat unfortunate for the city of Santa Cruz because and for the jurisdictions within Santa Cruz County because of the 33,274 units that need to be distributed throughout the Ambag region Santa Cruz County received 12,979 units of city of Santa Cruz being allocated 3,736 which is and I will say that city of Santa Cruz has done a really great job of trying to meet their numbers. I think of all the cities we were number one in meeting those goals with producing 78% of our target numbers and that was you know in the order of close to 800 units that were that we were tasked with creating and now we've been first draft ground is allocating 3,736 so this isn't the final arena allocation this will go to HUD and then the ACT board but that's just an update on kind of where we're at and of the cities in the Santa Cruz County region Capitola Santa Cruz and Scotts Valley all go to the proposal. One of the other missions I'm on have not that yet and Santa Cruz County Lafko be just voted in our new chair and vice chair and I guess it's a significance first time in history that there are two women who are their vice chair of Lafko that's very exciting for us and I think it was the special meeting we had recently regarding the climate action report that's a good enough update on where the climate action task force is at probably the most adequate update I have to take for that and with that I think that foods um oh and the um the public safety committee will be meeting on the 31st and thank you folks I believe it's at 6am and I don't know if somebody can staff believe me. Thank you. Okay I will move over to councilmember Brown. Thank you mayor. Uh so I'll start I guess I'll start with the RTC um already on there today uh so I currently the chair of the RTC uh in the um for the 22 2022 year and um so settling into that role uh interesting the uh the RTC did vote at its last being in closed session to place an item on the agenda the title of which you heard um from uh from our city manager just just passed and um the so the item is that are um an adverse abandonment decision for freight on the Felton line which has generated a significant number of messages from the community it's part of the reason that we talked about trying to get this on our city council agenda and I'll just say that when this you when this became clear to folks in the community um to generate a lot of interest and I personally as an RTC commissioner have received almost 3,000 messages in opposition and so it's clearly something that is uh generated community interest and so that will be on our agenda uh for February 3rd and so folks who are interested that is also a great opportunity to make your voice heard about your perspective on that um it's not intended for action and like I said possible action it's possible action will be taken um but the idea is to hear more about it and try to provide more information to the community so a good opportunity to learn more and weigh in uh the uh area agency on aging at our last meeting we had uh a conversation about our platform for this coming year and really the areas that we want to work on and so I'll just give you a sense of what those are the first area is really addressing and combating ageism and and equity promoting equity for elderly and disabled community members through a variety of of panels and secondly to support developing a local playbook for the state's master plan on aging heard me talk about age-friendly communities and the possibility of Santa Cruz becoming an age-friendly community the state has gone through that process and has we are now officially an age-friendly state using the um the A or B tools and as a result of that we're coming out of that work uh have developed a um a master plan on aging tenure plan and which will come with some hopefully significant resources uh it's looking good for uh for funding in the coming years and so uh we want to develop a local playbook I am going to be talking with uh I talked with council members uh council member Myers and vice mayor Watkins about this so you'll hear more from us on this as we move forward with things we can do at the city kind of integrate and you know and collaborate on on those topics um as well uh we got to have a report with some data about uh you know responses to what's happening with seniors in our community and one of the things that just stood out to me that I wanted to share um was that um the fastest growing population of unhoused people in our community are seniors and um so it this is an area that is you know obviously on everybody's minds and just wanted to put that out there and let you know that that's something that I'm very much committed to working on as part you know as the city's representative to the AAA um and then uh with the agenda item that will be forthcoming and I think yeah the airport isn't meeting till February so I'll leave it there thank you thank you council member Brown council member Goldert so um we met as an ad hoc um uh council member Myers vice Watkins and I in regard to district thing and and discuss some different scenarios and we'll be seeing bulls and I think they might already been in lock but I'm not sure if they're available to public get but full maps and meet again I don't really have any more to update other than that at this time so I'll see if anybody else add on but the map will be very shortly maybe today I'm not sure if that can please your that's all okay and um let's see council member Myers so one of my reports done by I did attend the meeting number um there was a great adjustment in action that was decreases in crisis uh those are corrections uh that will she had basically have a lot of lives and those were really valid out um in the fourth there is also already started effort workshops um work with member agents to give you um uh track tons of various projects within hopeful so there are a number of there's a special I know our uh policy board I know those are uh another it was not announced it was the other meetings um not held or so I think that district the holders covered that council member Calentari Johnson thank you um I will report that our newly reformed health and all policies committee met this week and we are looking at implementation of many of the racial equity action steps that were adopted last November um which are very much aligned with the health and all policies work plan so just met that just was just yesterday it's already been a long week um so we met yesterday and there's a great implementation plan um for working with wise bus and team to put that forward so that's really exciting uh we also have the oversized vehicle ordinance ad hoc committee with myself and their runner and member golder we met a couple weeks ago and got um update from staff around the various years working diligently on tier two and tier three of safe parking program and we really are a piece that we can work with providers in the community and there's more details on that I'm sure the homeless response team can provide that and then this is not a formal committee but a small group of us did meet to discuss the children and youth bill of rights uh just to make sure that that the actions identified in there um have a home and that we are with towards implementation none of my other committees and board met yet hey thank you so much and uh vice mayor why thank you mayor and thank you my colleagues for the updates a lot of great work is happening in the community and I appreciate all that you do I honestly feel most of mine have been covered the only um you know specification in regards to public safety is that that meeting will happen on the 31st at 5 30 so to clarify what comes when we're coming to broad app the other additional input I can provide is that that ad hoc revenue committee is meeting on a regular basis although we did not meet last week but that we are moving forward with full so city residents if you get a phone call or a request to participate in the poll we'd love your your input and we will continue to do our work um and do diligence around revenue opportunities for our community and um and then also just the two by two conversations I was able to in that with a number of our county uh partners and continue trying to work together and collaboratively on how to best leverage resources and um address some of the nuanced challenges of our homeless issue in our community and I think that covers all that I've written on it thank you vice mayor Watkins and um I think everything uh has been covered for me as well I will also just mention that our visit Santa Cruz board meeting is tomorrow at the clock so we have not met with that our last meeting and um our health and all policy committee meeting was the first um very first meeting mister and so we also will be meeting every other month and we've had that kind of draft agenda for the year um so I'm hopeful with that that work we made a lot of progress and um the ad hoc revenue committee we have authorized the poll as vice mayor Watkins mentioned and I believe that poll has been to a select random group of voters so might be getting that call to ask questions and that's the report out thank you so much for those updates and uh we will now move on to the portion of the consent agenda and these are items six through 15 on our agenda with the exception of item nine for members of the public for streaming this meeting now is the time to call in to speak instructions around the screen please remember to mute your streaming device and raise your hand by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar control from your computer listen for the cue saying that you have been unmuted all items will be acted upon in one motion unless an item is pulled by a council member further discussion are there any council members who wish to comment on or pull any item I have council member brown I have a comment on item 11 okay brown item 11 and council member talentary john comment on the same item okay then item 11 is accepting the library new right gift agreement for the alice and dirt memorial children's room at the branch supporting branch library okay are there any questions or comments from council members on any of the other items okay so we go right into your comment when I am 11 right thank you mayor thank you mayor so this item is about the naming rights for the alice and under children's room at the branch 40 public library this is the result of an amazing campaign fundraising campaign to make this happen and I have a couple of things I wanted to say but I also was in communication with Rachel Dan a very close friend and co-worker of Allyson's who really spearheaded this piece of the fundraising campaign did tremendous work and she can't be here today so she did send me a quick statement and I'd like to just read that and share it with you all as well as the public so I'll just do that right now good afternoon mayor and council members I'm writing in reference to item 11 to accept the library naming rights gift agreement for the alice and dirt memorial children's room at the branch 40 branch library as you know the Santa Cruz public library has been engaged in a system-wide fundraising campaign to supplement the voter measure as funds to improve our public libraries throughout the county the campaign provided an opportunity to honor and recognize exceptional community members in Santa Cruz who have made this community a better place allison entered was one such woman for the last 25 years beginning with her time at UCSC allison dedicated her career social justice supporting the public schools equity for all we lost allison a year and a half ago and we're still heartbroken today however I would like mayor council and Santa Cruz public libraries the opportunity to honor allison by naming the children's room after her and recognize the hundreds of individuals who donated to this campaign to help keep her memory and her work alive and I would just add as you know I met allison 25 years ago working on local social justice campaigns when she was a student and I was just out of school and I just her her spirit and her her commitments were just so unparalleled profound she was really a force to be reckoned with and and I'm so glad that we have the opportunity to honor her in this way as well and so thank you thank you for sharing that councilmember brown councilmember Calantari Johnson thank you mayor and thank you council member brown I share your comments and sentiments I just wanted to know how beautiful it is to have this item before us in memorializing allison entered in this way I haven't known her for 25 years but I've known her for a long time and her commitment to children and youth and families in our community was always inspirational to me and I think so many in our community so I'm just really touched and heartened and want to thank Rachel Dan and want to thank everyone else for a lot of work thank you okay is there any members of the public that would like to see any item on our consent agenda now is the time to do so please press star nine on your phone raise your hand when it is your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been admitted timer will then be set minute if anybody has their hand raised okay I don't see any hand raised why we'll bring it back I'm now looking for a motion and I have vice mayor Watkins oh sure I'm happy to move arc hello motion by vice mayor Watkins and councilmember Cummings let's second the second by councilmember Cummings the consent agenda passes unanimously we didn't vote on it thank you we will now vote and if our speaker can give a roll call vote our councilmember Calentari Johnson holder vice mayor Watkins hi motion passes unanimously we will now move on to our agenda and that ends our consent agenda so we'll move on to item number three which is the establishment of per city relationship between Geerit's front and the city of Santa Cruz for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you'd like to comment on that was the time to call in using the instructions on your screen first the order will be a presentation of the item from staff followed by questions from council we will then take public comment and then return to council for deliberation so I'd like to introduce Rachel Calsten recreations superintendent of the parks and rec the perfect presence welcome Rachel thank you mayor and good afternoon council members I always expect you to hear me okay so okay uh Rachel Calsten recreation recreation department and liaison committee today I'm pleased to be here to present the recommendation from the city's committee to add Barrett's branch as a to the city of Santa Cruz I am joined by Prince these committee chair and chair to the Barrett friendship city Doug Hall I'll provide just a quick background on the two-year friendship community relationship party and Santa Cruz then I'll turn it over to Doug for about two parties here it is including the recent mayoral nation as well as both future topics the first just to ground us for the discussion the purpose of the Santa Cruz's city's program is to encourage the people of Santa Cruz and the people of its district cities to understand one another as individuals members of their community citizens of their country and part of the family of patients the boss for continuing relationships of mutual concern the people of Santa Cruz and the people of its currently the city of Santa Cruz has five these relationships you can the school of auntie italy Ukraine the type of Nicaragua and for to look at us should be noted that the relationship for the list really is currently and I reached France on September 9, 2019 first committee unanimously approved recommendations soft body France as a as a friendship city and to establish a formal relationship then on October 8, 2019 city council house resolution designates the city of buddy's France friendship city so this action as well as letters support from both mayors officially started the friendship relationship and according to the Santa Cruz friendship as sister cities adoption policy a friendship will be two years at which time it can be wide evaluation better the concept that the adoption policy is conditioned prior to the grant or status I would say at the start of the friendship relationship the delegates with some provide artists by the city fair dug hole discussed a variety of topics shared exchange that included water quality control seasonal activities ocean erosion and life-guarding programs over the two-year period a variety of sessions and how you can place in the two cities unfortunately due to covid and travel restrictions and limited to virtual platform so a virtual delegation on June 29, 2021 representing Santa Cruz for then mayor Donna Myers 50 wise best three Bryant grant Hodges did the waves and he's a city member of the hall representing party for the mayor of buddy vice chair Richard Tardis as Pfizer refers to environmental sports as travel restrictions lifted thankfully a planned mayoral delegation was able to move forward then mayor Myers I'm an action coordinator to twice but just shared on all hands remember vice chair Martin that's traveled by brands and was welcomed by the body and from September 21st, 26, 2021. So again, don't call will expand on the shared expenses over the three in this comment and then I'll just you know on November 8, 2021 the subcommittee on various grants presented a full report both city regarding this friendship relationship full report is attached in the packet then at the city's committee meeting on January 10th to the species devoted and approved recommend to consult a resolution adopted by France as the 9th members paper when opposed there's one print vacant in terms of health and all policies the item before us council strongly supports the health and all costs for sustainability as both cities have identified in this change over ideas climate change and its impact so now turn it over to Doug for about three. Hi mayor, council member thank you for this time. We are extremely lucky that Barry accepted our initial invitation two years ago because it's a incredibly good fit the city that a lot in common with Santa Cruz including as a coastal city but also as a city that attracts tourists and a very very active surfing probably one of the most active surfing in Europe and also active in the tech startup we went in September and received an absolute boiled treatment reception from the mayor and staff. We were introduced to the tourism director for the city, San Sebastián in Spain, we don't know if you know but Yadid is just a few miles from the Spanish border on the Atlantic one of their major partners is the city of San Sebastián and this is relevant also because their long-term interest is in establishing a marine sanctuary work with us in our own experience we do the same thing in India there are a lot of really good overlaps in the two cities and what we did is get together and agree on focus of all events coming up this coming September but all future events on an annual basis we focus on sustainability in particular climate change adaptation coastal erosion and green food economic or job economic the first event first week in September that is an event organized with the participation of UCSC and the an international non-profit called the Ocean Climate Platform its initiative C ties which happens to be located in behind and the groups provides a platform for scientists share information as well as with the elected officials on strategies to manage coastal erosion ocean quality that will be the first week there is a there are a lot of tech startup that match in some cases almost exactly some of the tech startups here at Santa Cruz and we're working with Doug Erickson fashion follow-up event through the forum the science based forum sometime also in the first 10 days September and then finally last major event that will take place at the end of September and regards elite junior surfers lifeguard members or elite junior lifeguard turns out that in the area there's a very active lifeguard community of yachts there's only 25,000 lives there from the summer they swells to about 300,000 but they have a lifeguard club that has 1600 members which 600 are very active when we were there we see them every day training and they're very excited the possibility of establishing contest or competitions as part of the exchanges of junior or 17 to 19 year old elite members both of the surfing community and the lifeguard the overall that's a beautiful match we're extremely lucky so it'll be the first new relationship established in Santa Cruz in 35 years and the only fourth city that guides lists as a assistive city so you can like answer any questions we're looking for is to start in September rather small scale events to grow them each year with the participation of eventually corporate sponsors we've already mentioned an interest because it turns out that a lot of international insurance companies very very all in mitigating risk or coastal cities facing coastal erosion issues happy to answer any question we have great support about it from the side thank you Douglas and thank you Rachel the information and the presentation I will bring it to council members for any questions or comment that's a member of my errors yeah I just had a member of the delegation that wanted us on a quick trip and pretty exhausting there and back two days but yeah I echo Doug's Doug's comments that it you know we explored many many topics of overlap other additional that they're very interested in work they have a pledge to develop they're very interested in our certain a lot of energy and also also a great interest and I was just very impressed with their delegation with all the representatives of various various topic tourism or kind of really great they'll take especially learned a lot driving the very big national designation risk coastal policy potentially develop their grant by play a lot of that just a lot of the other activities will dovetail from that whether there is a aspect it's I think it'll be a really productive also recognize always hurting okay the motion then I would love to make the motion if possible I will bring it out to public first I have to think about my process or is the time I will bring it out to public comment if anyone is interested in commenting on establishment of specificity relationship between Vera France and the city of Santa Cruz now is the time to raise your hand by either dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer when it's your turn to speak it will hear an announcement that you unmuted and the timer will then be set for a minute so let me take it out to our attendees we have some attendees if you don't anybody with their hand raised comment on item number 16 nine raise your hands we'll bring it back there is any further discussion as I see hands council member minors and then council member folder I'll just yeah make the motion because our dues and council member Boulder is a former sister cities committee member and half a second okay we have our first by council member minors and a second by Boulder and I would like to ask the city clerk to please call roll mayor um I just want to clarify that it's to adopt a resolution establishing um as um council member calentary John's nice mayor watching thank you so much Rachel and thank you so much Douglas thank you thank you all thank you okay our next item is item number 17 this is a downtown recovery programs update and resolution for members of the public who are screening this item if this is the item you would like to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen first the order will be a presentation by staff by two of our staff here and then we will it'll be followed by questions from our council members and then we will take public comment and return to council for deliberation and action so I'd like to introduce rebecca unit economic development manager and Bonnie Lipscomb economic development director thank you mayor and good afternoon mayor and council um before our economic development manager rebecca unit um provides update on our recovery programs I wanted to just provide free context for our effort um you're going to hear about and they're linked to our interim recovery plan that's also on the agenda today um but I want to say that the last have been um in no way business is normal both obviously for businesses but also for economic development professionals and doing traditional business protection attention and how we do our work so um you're going to hear about a program today um but I want to just say that um the last two years of the pandemic have really put a strain on businesses and local economy we're all aware of this but um I just think it's it's really important in this context really talk about that for a minute we have incredible a billion businesses do opportunities creative adaptations over the last two years and even new businesses start during the pandemic and while we've even most recently seen some improvements in sales tax numbers and transient occupancy tax um in the city the unpredictability of the pandemic most recent surge you know is a really good example of this along with the longevity and the unknown nature of just how long will this continue um it's really put this unprecedented strain on and really an increase to be to external fact something that we're really experiencing with businesses right now there's an overall increased risk for businesses even the most resilient um and I just wanted to frame that because you know while we have programs and we're providing the update there's a real need for us to be responsive in real time and there's a real need for us um that's pretty unprecedented to look at individually some cases what businesses need long-term businesses that we all know and love so well in Santa Cruz are feeling things at this point because of the just how long the pandemic has gone on that you wouldn't necessarily expect so um recovery is going to be a really long prospect and I believe we need to do everything we can to support these businesses going forward and I you know we really do that and and you know it is an ongoing process um listening to the needs of the business community it's really critical to developing and adapting um any successful recovery plan and that's really what we've had to do is it's it's we're adapting in real time we will continue to listen um and be flexible um for our business community going forward and you're going to hear in addition to the updates today Rebekah's going to introduce a new ordinance for your consideration to uh sorry a resolution to extend the commercial use permits and again that's something that um has been a real identified need particularly over the last few months um so she's going to tell you more about that today there's a number of things that we're doing that you won't hear about today um but you may hear out out and about in the day-to-day you know we're here to answer questions that you have um and just wanted to provide that context some of the things that you'll with that I'll turn it over to Rebekah um going to find an update on these programs thank you great thank you Bonnie good afternoon mayor city council great to be with you this afternoon to provide an update on what we have been working on and um sort of what we're going into uh in 2022 as we enter our unfortunately third year of the pandemic year um we have a lot of great work that we've accomplished and I'm really excited to sort of share with you where we're at so um as we've talked about in our response to COVID-19 and support for businesses you know we've sort of looked at this recovery and rebuilding period that um we entered in 2021 and as we've seen with the variants and just the different um fluctuations with the pandemic things have changed and you know this is an ongoing process and we're learning every day as things continue to adapt so um this afternoon I'm going to be covering uh five different items for you in uh that covers sort of the different programs and activities that we've been doing in the downtown over the last year and that are continuing into 2022 um so I'll start with our downtown popped program this is our vacant storefront activation pilot program that you'll approve for us last year and we were able to get underway in the summertime um so last year I presented this map that showed a lot of the vacancies that we were experiencing downtown some of these as I mentioned during that presentation existed prior to the pandemic and many of them did about in a response to the pandemic when we launched downtown pops which is our program that's intended to activate vacancies provide opportunities for new businesses local businesses to have their chance to get started in downtown um as we sort of explored these different spaces we really got an understanding of um what's behind the scenes and sort of when you're walking down the sidewalk you see a vacant storefront there's a lot more going on behind the scenes in terms of different scenarios and sort of what stage these spaces are at so um it's been really great to just learn a little bit more about that and really focus in where we can be most beneficial and and help improve those conditions so I made some modifications here to that vacancy in terms of what we've learned um and you'll see that um there's been some activity in terms of the private sector in leasing these spaces and activating them really exciting to see new businesses um take advantage even during these challenging conditions there's also a lot of spaces that are sort of looking at potential tenants they're in the inquiry stage they're in the lease negotiations so considering the permit process and so we've been able to sort of support those conversations and connect with those businesses to help move things along um and then we also have had a few applications through downtown pops that I'll tell you a little bit more about and more in the works that we're hoping to bring online in 2022 um and then there's additional vacancies that are still out there for various reasons if it's tenant improvements that the space needs if they're sort of a shell that's new construction um or just different scenarios that might be impacting the ability to build those spaces and so we continue to work on those conditions to help get them into the pipeline and ready for activation um and then of course we have a lot of construction that's occurring in the downtown currently and will be coming online as well um that's not all reflected on this map and that's something that we're actively tracking as well um just to be aware of sort of where businesses are going to be shifting around how that impacts the businesses as well and how that impacts sort of the current retail and real estate landscape downtown so I'll go into a few of our downtown pops space activations which I'm really excited you have been able to connect with these businesses um one of our first spaces that we were able to bring online in September was 703 Front Street graded by the sea this is a art gallery um in a beautiful space she's made a lot of improvements to the space um she was previously operating uh this Melissa crisis a business owner she was previously operating on a month-to-month lease um and through downtown pops we're able to get for a six-month lease that gave her a lot more certainty in terms of you know knowing that she would have the space and have the ability to build her business so um with that timeframe she's been able to uh really schedule out artists and appearances and have many special events participated in first Friday um had music and just create a really um successful art gallery seen there and has also partnered with a lot of the other galleries throughout the city too for some really cool events um so we're talking with her about an extension of that lease again to just continue that runway and get her ready to you know build her business further and get into a longer term lease with the property owners who have also been very very supportive and been great to work with all the parties in that project our next activation was 1349 Pacific which is a company called Rev and they launched a holiday pop-up um they started in November um and have continued on we're also talking with them about an extension they uh this husband and wife team and they have been operating on the west side they do a lot of really incredible handmade products really craftsman type of products and they've been doing more of the wholesale side and wanted to try retail all right so this is a great opportunity to get them into a pretty small retail spot um in the heart of Pacific Avenue and test out their concept um it's been going really well and so we're looking to give them a little bit more of a lease length here to continue to model um we also were able to partner with the downtown association in activating the pop-up space next to snap taco to be able to support their downtown Santa visits um so with COVID conditions being able to have a space and room to have out for lines and things this is a really good partnership um an opportunity uh so we're able to get that going and we're also looking at the potential uh future activations of that space as well um as the pop-up space was intended for those purposes so we want to keep that going uh into this year um and then some of our future downtown pops activations spaces that we're hoping to bring online this year our planning to bring online this year today um 11 22 Pacific Avenue this is our Del Mar theater retail space this is a city-owned space that um has been ready for renovation and to be able to just get that construction started and we're currently doing the tenant improvements we're hoping to bring that space online in the spring and uh connecting that with downtown pops tenant uh we've also been working with swanson on uh an activation for five to the big avenue so this is the last remaining um retail space in the 555 mixed project dumps of the avenue so we've got a lease agreement in place and we're just um working on connecting it into that space they're also finishing up a few last-minute tenant improvements there as well and then we're also looking at ways to creatively use the former low-go space so uh you know this is an unfortunate vacancy for quite some time in the downtown and there's been some negotiations with various tenants and so we're looking at seeing if there's some uh creative weekend uses makers markets or other type of events that we could bring into that space on a temporary basis to keep that active and give the 1100 blocks some more interest um so that's a little bit of an overview of sort of the results of downtown pops so far we're continuing to work on some of these um so i also wanted to highlight some of the private sector activity that's been happening and just some really incredible entrepreneurs who have you know taken the chance during these challenging conditions and really invested in our downtown so um one space at 1519 pacific avenue a new retailer elliott this is a sister store to uh shilshul which is a leather goods store on look history currently expanded into this space they actually applied to downtown pops and expressed interest in this space and was able to just negotiate with the landlord on her own and get a long-term space which is the absolute goal that we want it's really great to see that happen and then i love this that santa cruise food scene is always so creative we have a new santa cruise waffle shop that's opened up at the metro center i haven't checked it out just yet but it's definitely on the list um so that was really cool to see you pop up um especially in that section of pacific avenue just seeing these creative ideas come about um and then on walnuts avenue um there's been quite a change over on walnut avenue with a lot of vacancies that sort of popped up in 2021 2020 um but there's been a lot of new interest and a lot of new activity so uh twig's tap house is coming soon currently in the permitting process and they would be going into the former 99 bottles space uh so similar type of operation and also local owners so we're excited to see that i come together and then on the other side of walnut avenue we also saw arslan's turkish street food come in where the falafel house was previously so it's great to see um that transition of businesses and being able to mean in that presence here um and then at 117 walnut j-15 located from their locus street uh into this larger space that was previously striped men um and that was also a great opportunity because wallflower boogie who's also on locus street was able to then expand into these former space um it's really good to see those businesses sort of be able to accept their offer and then finally in 2021 walnut avenue a new vintage store uh loved me two times as um so it's really nice that that whole stretch of walnut is almost entirely filled up oh i'm just good to see those investment so if that is a quick run through a downtown pop um more it will keep updated uh we're working on we're finding some of the processes and and starting to match the intent again as we enter this new year and new shopping season uh so on the perclet program a few updates uh as you all know we did extend this program the temporary outdoor expansion program to the end of this year december 31st 2022 uh we have brought villain designs on board with us a local landscape architecture firm to help us do uh two perclet design models so helping us actually build out the schematics for what a permanent perclet would look like as pre-approved designs to make it easier for businesses uh to get back through that process we're currently looking at those internally and then we'll bring it out for external feedback as well um and then we are also working with any department to do an assessment of the private property after practices so um this was basically looking at sort of what are all of what's the current process that these businesses would have to go through what permits would they need would they be allowed to make that transition and from that assessment uh figuring out if there are changes that we need to make the code or to the permit process um to help them be successful and so my department's working away on our quite long list there and so we're doing that it's going to be complete at the end of this month so we can start doing that analysis of and next steps moving that forward and then also we have direction to reopen the 1100 block of avenue in early 2022 so now that the holidays are behind us we're working with the um percolates that are currently operating there to make the necessary revisions to their uh you know how far they exceed into the street so we can get that feel so we're hoping that'll be resolved uh in early February so we can get that moved okay and then we did uh our next program is the top cruise holiday so this is building on the work that we did in the summertime to just promote our shop Santa Cruz uh campaign with our banner program that are up in all of our commercial districts and we partnered with the downtown association on this program and to really push local shopping during the holidays um so it included a variety but the bridge signage the banners in downtown that the downtown association produced we did some paid advertising on radio and in local press and then we also had a really great opportunity to do some advertising in the San Francisco Chronicle holiday guide so we were able to get several local businesses um bought in for ads on this guide and it went out to the whole bay area um and just really we were able to promote the shopping local and shopping and fanfares and inviting all of our neighbors to come to Santa Cruz during the holidays and so it was really great to see that come together and downtown association hosted a lot of really incredible events that they're well received so it was really nice to see the streets busy uh during the holidays downtown okay and then on our card program this is our city arts recovery design program just want to give a brief update on some of the uh progress that's been made there so our arts program is looking at uh 20 double ready projects um and looking at matching them with uh different partners for implementation uh many of these are plated for the downtown so we'll be bringing those forward and just excited to see uh these are really great proposals um come to fruition okay and then our final item this afternoon um is a new approach and a new um strategy for our sort of recovery toolbox and we want to bring forward for your consideration um so one of the challenges with pandemic is that um you know with the changing business conditions there's been so much uncertainty businesses have had to close businesses are wanting to reopen but the economic conditions are still very challenging and just um the goal so one of the things that we can control at the city is the life of use permits and the length of time that businesses have to sort of make decisions and take action so um what we're looking at with this resolution is um providing a more sure timeline for the length of use permit um the goals of this would to provide more time for businesses to receive the use permit but we're not able to act with it because of the uncertainty of the pandemic provide an extension of the life of use permits to allow business owners to resume operation after closure of more than six months and provide a streamlined permitting process for businesses who want to take over the operation for their previous use after business closed during the pandemic um these are just some of the major examples of what the benefit of this resolution would be um but basically in our current scenario if a business uh basically you know planning department issues commercial use permits that says you can do your business operation in this location um and if a business goes on and you know begins to operate if they were to close typically they would have there would be six month period from when they closed to another business or for themselves needing to in operation again for that permit to stay act um so through this resolution we're hoping to extend that period to be one year beyond the end of the emergency declaration so that we can just have those continue to be available businesses can take action really quickly and just resume those operations and fill these vacant sore fronts or or get back to business if they had to close for whatever reason so there's um two main components here that we're discussing and proposing this resolution the first is the extension on the use permit expiration so that scenario is if someone were to get a commercial use permit between March 4th and up to the expiration of the local health emergency we would give them an additional one year from the expiration date of the emergency declaration to act on that so that's if they got a use permit and they didn't start business we give them that longer time period to act on that and then the other major piece of this is an extension of these permit abandonment period that's that six month time that I mentioned that um basically stamped expired you know cannot pass unless it you know the use permit expires after that time period uh so the uh in this scenario all active commercial use permits and non-conforming uses that have ceased operation between March 4th 2020 and up to the expiration of the emergency declaration would have the six month abandonment period automatically expended to expire one year from the expiration date of the emergency unless otherwise extended um what we're seeing from this uh is it's really a benefit to our recovery in that it streamlines the entry process for businesses wanting to take over a business a previous business operation it provides a longer runway and assurance for businesses recovering from COVID closure impacts it makes vacancies more marketable as well to have approved use ready for businesses to take on that operation and it reduces the cost and timeline we've had quite a few businesses and I really want to thank the planning department and city turns office for helping pulling this resolution together fairly quickly and just being really responsive to some of the inquiries we've had but we've had businesses come to us that say hey this was previously uh you know a restaurant use and I'd like to just take that over but the time period has passed so they would have to go through that whole process again and we want to support those businesses we know that we want that type of use happening and we allowed it previously so this is just a simple mechanism to make that happen and be able to uh really can you know create an easier process easier access for business so our recommendation for you today is to accept the report on the status of the downtown recovery program activities and to adopt the resolution of the city council of the city of Santa Cruz authorizing the temporary extension of commercial use permit abandonment period in connection with the COVID-19 summer and I will open it up okay um council member question that looks like council so now we have council member questions uh council member Cummings and then council member Boulder thank you mayor um I just want to thank uh the economic development department Rebecca doing your team over there um for all the hard work you've all been doing with this project really helped know not only keep our our downtown vibrant during this really difficult time but also providing opportunities for people who may not have had the opportunity to kind of get their business into some of these spaces and kind of get their businesses off the ground so I think it's providing a really huge benefit to the community and I just want to express my appreciation for all the work that you all have been doing and great um it's this my question is kind of related um it's not really um specific to the work that's been done downtown I'm just curious because um I have been noticing more businesses for example in other parts of the community that have been going out of business and some of those storefronts being left vacant and so I'm just curious if there's any um discussion around expansion of this kind of program into spaces that are not in the downtown and I'd imagine you know capacity is always an issue I'm trying to work on these kinds of projects but I'm just wondering if there's any efforts underway for any discussions being had around expanding these kinds of programs other areas yeah I mean it's it's definitely we could definitely consider that um we've really been targeting the downtown because there's been such a concentration of vacancies but absolutely recognizing that you know we need to keep our other commercial district areas full it's something we can look at um I'd be interested to yeah have my team look at um you know what those vacancies are and really map that out again um we haven't studied that just as closely as downtown but definitely worth looking into and um yeah expansion and it's been a great test run as a pilot program just learned a lot over you know the last few months of implementing this so I think I you know it's good to look at those areas great yeah and I think it and you know at that point just really helping the people who normally couldn't get their businesses launched I think it's great because there you know people with that entrepreneurial spirit out there it's a great way to see if we're moving forward we can you know keep this going but like really help gets so I just want to thank you thank you thank you thank you council member golder and then council member kawantari johnson I want to echo council member coming um expression of gratitude to the economic development department and Rebecca and Bonnie and everybody big office up and running and pivoting so quickly to support our local our local person um it's really you know great to see I did a lot of shopping down there through the holiday season and downtown seems really vibrant and um you know it was great to see and I just want to ask actually my questions for me at bruner because you spend more time down there than many of us what would you say is like the foot traffic like this time of year compared to this time of year last year or the year before a typical year you know what I mean is it even after the holidays is it typical or continuing to be on an upward trend from your perspective um I'd be happy to talk about that more with you um outside of the council meeting but in general I will just say the international tourists are probably the most noticeable reduction and more regional um visitors what we've been seeing and foot traffic this this pre-study well thank you that's all I don't know if Rebecca has any additional comments on that I'd be happy to add to that um yeah I mean I guess just sharing sort of what we saw with our most recent returns on bill tax numbers for the third quarter of 2021 just got a really strong increase especially in our food and restaurant categories and I think we saw that in you to be a high foot traffic and high presence in the holidays downtown um I think right now we're sort of in the post-holiday dip you know we have the shoulder season now but I'm hoping that once the you know the most recent searches come down I can use to pick back up with folks here and um just continue to give it yeah it was really good I think this holiday season um definitely a lot busier thank you uh council member commentary johnson thank you mayor thank you Rebecca and Bonnie for that great presentation and all the tremendous work that you're doing um I had a couple of questions actually one was around the the sales tax brought up and it kind of relates to interim appropriate as well but do we have a comparison um with the appendages pandemic and so it's great to see the increases that's really encouraging and do we have a comparison with them they can how far are we from getting back to baseline yeah I mean I think what we saw most recently for the third quarter so it's always a delayed reporting for the sales tax um but the some of the categories we're getting close to the pandemic levels um and definitely much higher than 20 levels um we do have quite a few public reports that we can share with you um that you know track those trends over the year so we could pull that together um uh an update of where the sales tax and and I would just add to that for back to my comments at the beginning as we look at the latest surge um you're likely to see a impact of that as well and that also carries through I'm not for our you know brick and mortar you know retail business but for our hotels as well but on the positive side of that there's always an incredible destination to visit and a lot of people who aren't willing to fly are willing to drive and a cruise and enjoy activities outside and including you know shopping downtown and eating outside and going to her so I think we'll still tend to be very resilient through this but people like impacts when we compare this current quarter um to thank you um my other question is around the downtown pops really it's really nice to see them and visit them and get the report uh I'm just wondering if you can touch on like do we have um how many how many are we hoping to end do we have a number I can't remember that and then I know that there was a component that part of the strategy is to encourage diversity in our businesses in the downtown area so have we seen that how are we tracking that and what are some of the strategies that are being used to encourage diversity with these top-up participation yeah great questions um so I think when we originally presented this we were hoping to get about eight and 12 activations um and so I think that's definitely still the goal um and you know we'll just continue to try to activate more spaces and use this program creatively um when we did the initial launch of the application we did definitely collect demographic information we're really you know trying to reach a broader diverse audience in terms of potential tenants um and so the we also realized that our process was a bit too complex and it probably needed to be or you know you're using our sort of standard RFP template and so as we're entering 2020 we're looking at really um tearing that down making a lot more approachable making it really easy for businesses to fill out and express their interest and really trying to build that applicant pool so that we can you know really go through and and select candidates that we um want to target for this program so we get that diverse piece that we're that we're interested in getting into okay thank you that's it um I will ask I'll insert myself and uh ask a question um can you you have a number or an estimate of the use permits like how many citywide we're looking at that fall into the category of potentially needing extension um so with this resolution that you know be available to all potentially permits like apply across the board the inquiries that we've received so far I would say we have about five different spaces that this could be kind of official to um and they range from fitness studios restaurant is lots of restaurants actually since they were so hard to hit but yeah we have about five that we know of that have uh reached out and you know been interested in these spaces and kind of fit from this I can uh guarantee there are many more out okay are there any other council member questions so now bring it out for public comment if you are interested in commenting on downtown recovery programs update and resolution raise your hand either by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer when it is your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you've been unmuted and the timer will then be set two minutes go out to attendees and I have hands raised the first one is I am watching you that's star nine hello yes I'm full of these temporary extensions of the COVID accommodations to mitigate the harsh COVID restrictions but I mentioned your resolutions whereas it is clear that the longer the emergency declaration is in place the more difficult it will be for operators to return and reopen their businesses this could not be true or it's soon time to end the emergency declarations and not be part of the continuing decimation of America at the hands of the corrupt immoral and enough politicians and corporations peddling fear and free money as if we won't be paying for that forever in inflation loss of individual freedom are totally unnecessarily damaged to the memory of more denied treatment dead and the other shuttered business I call attention to the fact that the UK and other countries have ended most all COVID restrictions by today and the final few in place will be removed in total by March alpha and delta COVID are becoming a memory and over from is like the flu or cold and I speak with cases dropping by 500,000 in the last two weeks you do not have to be part of all the continuing emergency declaration you do not have to enforce bad regulation you do not have to deny the power of natural immunity you do not have to use the following orders excuse let the county state are fed do their own dirty work the back peddling on the misguided in that and probably correct motivated COVID response has begun as the truth is hard to suppress forever and there are those now fear brainwash that will never evaluate your information and should not reinforce that state of mind for instance blockbuster now finally acknowledges having been near useless Fauci is losing approval the end of COVID the unraveling of the fear narrative and some recognition of the enormity of the malfeasance will probably take place by March don't be any part of the continuation of the failed response that is taken and will take unfold lives the economy was destroyed by the government and it loaded the American people with printed trillions in debt economic ruin while treatment for sick people was repelled and the toy are five favor of not so effective not so safe not so long as to be legally mandated jobs are healthy we're calling in public comment I will now to get out to Udra Hamilton or unmute yourself can you hear me yes welcome thank you um I won't take up much of your time I do want to climb in on the resolution that's before you today I am a hundred percent in support of the resolution I think that the businesses that are are hearing sort of speak between they're not people open themselves and the people who are looking to reopen there it's very difficult because we are looking at a very long expensive permitting process because it's taken a while for the negotiation for the lease for the preparation of plans all of the things that go into having to submit to get approval for such businesses so I have talked to Rebecca and I talked Bonnie and I've actually talked to you as well mayor about a particular situation in the downtown area and this particular resolution though 100 percent go to help resolve the issue that we're having in terms of the use permit not currently being acted so if I could raise two hands I would support the passage of this resolution and anything else that you can think of to help these businesses get back on their feet or if they are moving on for the new businesses that are interested in revitalizing our downtown amen and takeover I'm also supportive I'm all ears and um hoping to see more of the same so just thank you thank you thank you thank you for calling in are there any other attendees for a public comment on item 17 downtown recovery programs a seat and resolution okay I will pull it back to council and vice mayor Watkins and then council member commentary Johnson thank you mayor and um you know thank you and a thank you to our development department for all the hard work that you're doing for our community and to all the businesses that are choosing to stay and hopefully survive here and following it there's you know comments I'll I'll raise two hands and um make the motion to support the staff recommendation which is twofold one to accept the report on the status of downtown recovery program activities and two to adopt the resolution authorizing the temporary extension of personal use use permit abandonment creating thank you we have a motion by vice mayor Watkins and uh council member commentary Johnson yes thank you a second by council member Calentari Johnson and uh I'd like to ask the clerk to take a roll call vote member Calentari Johnson hi holder hi vice mayor Watkins that motion passes unanimous and thank you so much to Bonnie Lipsom and Rebecca unit for that update and information presentation okay moving on to item number 18 on the agenda re-envision Santa Cruz interim recovery stand update for members of the public we're streaming this meeting if this is an item you'd like to comment on that was timed all in using instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation by staff followed by questions from council members we will then take public comment and return to council for deliberation I'd like to hand it over to Laura Schmidt assistant city manager thank you mayor I'm here to present to you your fourth update on re-envision Santa Cruz our interim recovery plan for building a future for everyone together it seems like just yesterday we started this update to our strategy but it's been a year and there are about six months left in the interim recovery plan but that was before we knew about Delta and Omicron and everything else that was happening so I will keep my presentation here today fairly brief we coordinated with economic development and one of the main focus areas for downtown and business revitalization you've just received a great and extensive update from our economic development department and that has a lot of information related to the recovery itself so we'll cover some accomplishments at the high level and our metrics and then a brief mention of the equity relationship of the metrics moving forward just a reminder of our three focus areas their fiscal sustainability downtown and business revitalization and infrastructure and within infrastructure the city council had an innovative include in the infrastructure and that are our parks and open spaces so our natural infrastructure here in Santa Cruz is included in this piece and it's not just the traditional facilities and brick and mortar that you might see in other municipalities our accomplishments and our accomplishments run one quarter ahead of so our metrics and the numbers lag because we wait for the statistical data from especially from our consumer sales tax information so these accomplishments are for the quarter ending December 31st of this last calendar year so on the fiscal sustainability all this information is in the attachment in the agenda packet probably the major highlight that council members have already reported in is this past Monday we started a poll related to a recommendation to explore a possible ballot measure from the current council ad hoc revenue committee so that poll is in process and that revenue ad hoc committee anticipates coming back to the larger council in February with an update as far as how that went on the downtown and business revitalization front again you've heard a lot of amazing programming that we're doing from our economic development department and helping our local businesses I think the other fundamental focus area here is foundational policy updates and that's related to mandated housing and other development policy infrastructure that we need so planning and community development is looking at the downtown expansion plan objective standards as well as a mandated housing element update so those are all making strong progress and then on the infrastructure side we have a nice myth of sustainability and green economy climate action work as well as vegetation and open space management and then core infrastructure work like our new will create dam and let an outlet project with the water department that's approximately 70% complete on the metric side and just as a reminder these lags so these are numbers and updates from July of 2021 through September of 2021 I think at a holistic level as you step back from these figures we're rebounding fairly strongly on the consumer and revenue front our businesses locally continue to struggle with key programming from our economic development department to help with that we're still seeing some closures and our occupancy rate downtown remains flat the consumer indexes for the transient occupancy tax sales tax and admission tax rebounded strongly especially during this time frame because it's our peak tourism months from July through September you'll see the amazing admission tax is 82% as compared to the previous report's trends and sales tax is higher as well as transient occupancy tax so those are all doing well we can anticipate probably a continued mix back of tricks moving forward because Omicron hit and that has impacted all of our abilities to continue to go out and try to resume our quote unquote standards slash normal lives so we'll see probably some uncertainty still reflected in the numbers moving forward on the health and all policy side related equity lands this is just re um celebrating ourselves back from the last update so when last you heard from us on this um three months ago we had anticipated in fiscal year 22 Q4 reporting in for the first time the equity aspects of these selected metrics the departments are still working do that but in order for us to hit that fiscal date of reporting for the first time in Q4 we will need to have those numbers available in Q3 and we're still targeting that staff is working very diligently on that but it is a really tough set of data to figure out and start to collect because these are all brand new collections for the departments so I just wanted to hedge a little bit let you know that the departments are doing their best to get this information but it is it is a tough road to hoe at this point and then additionally as a reminder data point that we won't have any competitors to um being back to for these because these are all new data factors for us as a state with that I said I was going to be brief and that's pretty brief so that's the update and your request of the council is motion to accept our most recent quarterly progress report for reinvision Santa Cruz and provide feedback as desired thank you thank you Laura for that presentation uh let's I will bring it out to the council member questions and I council member Meyers followed by council member I know the other part of it an actual method because was sort of the uh are uh basically our legislative platform of last year hitting a time you know with the state budget plus could we have a method that shows sort of um grants that have been it is not one of the metrics that we chose to track at the beginning when we develop the plan we do have a grants quarterly report of grants that we are have been awarded and our tracking that comes from the finance department but that does not have the net net of five four versus one of those yeah I'm just curious like have you had any revisions you know it's just with the amount of funding coming in you know the large project my head you know a lot of money I mean all of those grants resources we bring in to those project city those obviously it looks odd so I'm just wondering if with the infrastructure investment housing just being missing sort of a urban economic um you know the piece that you know helps us understand how those kinds of processes you know play out I know just something to think about maybe recovery but also you know maybe with of trying to realize an understanding of development jobs all those just seems that we you know you know our our departments are yeah they're bringing in really hundreds of dollars fighting so great but then we'll we'll take a look at that thank you great and thank you for all for thank you thank you thank you um thank you for that presentation Laura I have a question that's kind of tangentially related to this around infrastructure and just some projects moving forward that can have impact on the local economy as we're working through recovery um main question is you know there's been we've also received communications around the Murray street bridge and I was wondering and this might be something that um we're fiddlers somebody from public works could answer but um I know there's been a lot of concerns around the fact there's going to be work on so fell work on how we won and then also the Murray street bridge and then with the recent tsunami um there's been some impact the harbor and so climbing around um when the Murray street bridge project might be moving forward has come up into question so I'm just wondering if you might be able to speak to that because kind of as we're talking about um kind of um moving forward past the pandemic and the impacts we've experienced and folks have been concerned about how that might impact tourism in the summer and folks are just kind of wanting to know um where things are at um with everything that's been going on sir I'd like to address that more general director of public that's a great question um the Murray street bridge project is a the last bridge in the city for that needs seismic retrofit and it is coming the design is finished uh with PC funding um we should be able to uh did that project most likely towards almost summer i was getting a summer and then we would start rocking in the fall as the rest um we're waiting on the permit and once the permits are received we're ready to go so um that is a major uh construction project will affect traffic in the west direction obviously the public works director for the county and myself as well as the art director will be having um conversations uh probably monthly to look at schedules and coordination so that we don't have closures have same uh direct same day and try to schedule those to minimize the impact of it there will be impact that's a major project um keep it open probably a 30 month project to look at what would it be if we close that bridge and um if it can speed up the construction so we'll look at all those all try to reduce the traffic great and are there any concerns with the recent tsunami and unusual um structure probably no i the construction at the harbor they um they lost a lot of their electrical um work because of the flooding salt water to the transformers i don't think that's going to have a major impact um on the brush of the bridge that we won't slow their construction and they really thank you mayor you're muted thank you for those questions thank you for the assist vice mayor walk in thank you for the update and for the and in the work that's gone into the plan i i my question i think kind of dovetails a bit off of uh uh councilmember meyers question in regards to grant tracking and one of the things i know we spoke about was also capacity to seek grants and have a well positioning and i think that came up for me when hearing the needs around the equity indicators so i just wanted to touch base and see if you had any updates on um some of the grant support that the city could access for some of the funding that's available sure um i can definitely give you an update on that um tiffani wise west who is our climate action program manager is also helping lead uh pilot grant writing process with a managed service provider so we are working with that provider um we did a request for quotation and they were the successful company selected so she's in the process of working with that company and based upon the um results of that pilot grant application with them we will determine whether or not and the scope and the extent to which we will work with them moving forward so that is in process she is also putting together and coordinating across all of our departments right now to basically get the um demand signal so trying to understand the different projects out there that the departments have that they are targeting for grants and then putting together a plan and a roadmap for us over the course of the next months and year or so of what are the key target areas that we want to go after so that we are basically primed to be able to then work with some people to get assistance in those areas right yeah no i appreciate the update and i you know just sort of thinking about also a real heightened interest in equity and understanding some of these big equity indicators particularly for a government institution um i think there's potential there for some support as well and so i'm happy to hear that update thank you welcome thank you what's a member calling tary johnton thank you mayor and thank you so much laura for the work and the presentation my colleague stepped on some of my grant comments but i but i will just kind of plug in as well that um there is definitely going to be a lot of opportunities and thinking outside the box as it sounds like we're doing is going to be really important um because i think we can thread across departments and across some of these initiatives um i also just i wanted to comment really question but these metric the metric grants i geek out to um some members i love looking at those but they're great to see and i wonder if and if we have the capacity to do a simple sort of dashboard and we were talking about this a little bit in our health and health policies committee but a simple dashboard that's sort of some of the key metrics you know how have we done on sales tax revenue between now and eight months ago i'm just using that as an example but just pull out some key indicators and do a simple dashboard for us to see up down that would be helpful as a visual and then my last question is so so the year has gone by very quickly and so six months more on this plan and what next and i'm sorry if you already touched on i had to step away from it what do we do um what's our what's our plan moving forward so currently the plan as you know with um our bear change over at the end of December and then we also had our new city manager start in january currently the plan is for us to coordinate with the council a retreat in the spring and then dovetail that retreat to create an updated strategic plan that would transition and take over as the re-envision Santa Cruz 18 month window closes so that's in process we're starting we've already got that on the radar and starting to have conversations among the city manager the mayor and staff to get some feelers out there find a facilitator for that process so we will we will get you all together in the spring and we'll get an update then excellent thank you so much you're welcome thank you Laura thank you councilmember calentary johnson are there any other questions from council members at this time i will bring it out to public comment wait i say oh sorry i i'm jumping the gun but i will bring it out to public comment if you are in the public and interested in commenting on re-envision Santa Cruz interim recovery plan update please raise your hand now by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar polls on your computer and it's your turn to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted and the timer will then be set two minutes see it in our attendees i have one person there are hand raised phone number ending in one seven nine eight go ahead and press star six and mute yourself great good afternoon everyone this is Judy Grunstra and um it's a very small point that i wanted to make um but it speaks to the idea of misinformation that is spread around on the quarterly report bullet point five about the mixed-use project secured approval of a two-story library with over 40 000 square feet of programmable space but just last night bonnie let's go spoke at the library advisory committee meeting and he mentioned 30 to 35 000 square feet so i mean when people see 40 000 square feet you know it just gives a wrong impression and so i just you know say when you see numbers like that be skeptical because you know hard to know what's the real back these different members so thank you very much good afternoon thank you for your public comment uh let's see are there any other members of the public that would like to speak to item number eight being done we'll bring it back for deliberation and emotion uh i see council member mires and then council member coming yeah i'll make a motion progress for public safety thank you we have a motion by council member mires and council member comings by council member comings for any further comment or deliberation and we'll um ask the clerk to do a roll call vote thank you mayor council member scolatori johnson holder nice mayor one that motion to accept the city's most recent quarterly progress reports on re-envisioned santa cruz 12 to 18 month interim recovery plan and provide feedback as desired classes thank you thank you laura moving on to item number 19 this is an ordinance repealing chapter 16.03 public plumbing fixture retrofit regulations of the santa cruz unison code for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you'd like to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation item by staff followed by questions from the council we will then take public comment and return to council for deliberation and action so i'd like to uh call rosemary minard and then neal christin water conservation representative and rosemary minard our water director presentation good afternoon mayor and council um we get to do something we don't get to do very many times uh in this world we get to stop doing something because we've achieved a major uh goal so i think that that's what this particular item is about we have um been working on this program for a really long time i'm going to let neal give you a brief a very brief um kind of overview of what the program is and what it's achieved and um then we're going to um this is the first reading of an ordinance so come back the next time final act so with that um let me introduce neal christin who is a water conservation rep in our water department good neal all right thank you rosemary mayor council members good afternoon i'm honored today to have the opportunity to introduce for publication every skill ordinance or santa cruz municipal code chapter 16.0 chapter 16.03 was enacted in 2003 established the authority for water department to implement the plumbing fixture rich fit regulations in city neal if you want to spare your screen or do you want me to do it oh please i could also grab that or not i'm trying to get and let's go one slide up okay great thank you rosemary sorry for that uh chapter 16.03 enacted in 2003 established the authority for water department to implement the mutual retro regulations within city the regulations required retrofit upon resale any applicable plumbing fixture toilets shower heads or urinals that did not meet a minimum standard the goal of the program was to accelerate conversion of high water using plumbing especially the old 3.5 gallon to ensure the uniform application of the program about our service area water conservation staff coordinated with county and city of capitol staff to establish county code 7.69 city of capitol municipal 13 since 2003 the pfr program is highly effective proving water distribution throughout our service area next slide during the nearly 20 years of administering water conservation staff have facilitated the certification of 10386 properties and documented the replacement of nearly 1,000 toilets over 7,000 shower heads next slide this is a recently updated program activity map with the certified parcels highlighted in within our service area this map tells a compelling story of a highly effective program that was dependent on a high level of outreach education in addition to the collaboration between water conservation staff real estate agent professionals property next slide proceeding with the repeal ordinance formally in the administration make applicable state regulations senate bill 407 the state regulation applies to the same scope of plumbing fixtures and efficiency standard and requires the disclosure of the requirements private parties to sell or limit and does not require a safe service the repeal ordinance would also eliminate recent costs of inspection property and and eliminate the procedural burden ensuring thank you for your consideration leaving me out of time for public comment thank you neil so much for that presentation thank you rosemary uh i will ask council members for any questions okay i will bring it out through public comment for any attendees questions we have one hand raised is i am watching you please press star six and mute yourself a minute yeah sure yeah it was i was hoping i'd see an obsolete costly and publicly burdensome ordinance removed someday nice i hope to see more i would have you consider though a change in existing property ownership by itself never justifies any permanent holding coercion to achieve some unrelated objective nevertheless the government taxes and charges fees anyway like having to pay a small fee on a newish car even when no small cash is required many times mandates and fees are really just lazy and different government overreach think developer child care impact the type of disconnected justification similar to probably a lot of kind of sale inspections like sewer laterals didn't the construction age or previous permitted replacement or time since the last section or sale figure into it doors could last 50 to 100 years but some properties are new or both fight off and making repeated inspections redundant and expensive and others may go unsold for a lifetime new construction is a different story but even their design mandates like requiring ev charging stations or who knows what else to come vice to kill let's go green anything go mandate eat a hard look for lack of respect for individual private property rights which i'd say has not always been the case this ordinance had a similar redundant intent for the 2016 plumbing code but even there that code seems like an unconstitutional overreach there is a requirement there that if a remodel of one bathroom takes place requiring code upgrades all the other plumbing fixtures in the house also have to be upgraded including expensive smart hot water 125 degree regulators in bath showers to me that seems like an illegal ex post back to a retroactive law since the other perfectly good fixtures were legal when it's called such as government overreach using the permit process but no one's going to the supreme court over a car or a shower i guess some regulators skip the biggest problem your recent climate action study section gave me the willies when you're resident climate action activist manager preferred to permit leverage as the process to force the public to stop using natural gas leverage being the polite buzzword for coercion i'm not allowed the time here to explain the current hypocrisy of carbon neutrality the natural gas is the last not the first fossil fuel one would eliminate in a green currently fantasy land world thank you so much for your public comment yet there are any other public comments on item number nine this ordinance repealing after 16.03 plumbing fixture retrofit regulations of the standard municipal i see none we'll bring this back to council for deliberation and a motion council member mires item okay we have a motion from council member mires introduced for publication and ordinance repeal after 16.03 plumbing fixture retrofit regulations of the standard municipal code there a second i'm happy to second that there comes some by Sarah Watkins okay and is there any further comments or discussion on this item i will ask this for a roll call vote please member talentary johnson by Sarah Watkins hi hi that motion passes unanimously thank you so much neil for the presentation thank you rosemary boots that item we will now move through advisory body appointments and reappointment for members of the public for streaming this meeting now is the time to call in if you would like to comment on items 20 through 28 on the agenda the advisory body appointments and reappointment instructions are on your screen please remember to mute your streaming device and raise your hand thereby dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar on your computer when it is your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted the timer will then be set in minutes i'd like to call on this first playing the nomination and appointment process thank you mayor council members every year you know we have the annual appointments who had your interviews last um tuesday uh the mayor will um move through the commissions alphabetically and council member will have a chance to begin the nomination period so please go nominate up to the amount of openings there are so if there are vacant you can provide your nomination if your nominee has already been named you don't have to nominate them again they're already nominated um after we go through and all the nominations are done i will then go council member to council member and get your sort of a roll call vote who are voting for it out of the nominee i won't be back there unless anyone has any questions sometimes it takes the first question for people to kind of hang up it so there are no questions to go on and then see how we do with art thank you so much okay let's begin we will begin with the arts mission this is alphabetically there are two openings on the arts mission one with a term expiring on january 31st 2023 and the other with a term expiration of january 31st 2026 may please have nominations starting with council member calentary johnson no problem i would like to nominate elizabeth burnbaum and everett osillin council member golder like to nominate rob blitzer and your second has already been named council member coming i too have been named but i had a question for clarification um so when we get to the point where we're voting or like how are we going to distinguish who takes which seat since there's two seats open and they um end in different that's a great question because there is a question where we'll come up against that but the difference between this one is we have um somebody who is getting reappointment uh reappointment she's seeking reappointment so she would get she would continue on her term she wouldn't there there is not the option of person getting reappointed getting shorter term okay so the reappointment will take 2026 and the new appointment that's right yeah that will just continue for the whole careful to continue their term okay thank you um my two have been named thank you council member brown uh mine as well council member mires might have been named as well vice mayor walken might have been named as well and mine have also been okay so now i'd like to ask the city clerk to do a roll call when i call your name you tell me i've put two people who are voting for um council member commentary johnson elizabeth burnbaum and everett osillum elizabeth burnbaum and rob blitzer elizabeth burnbaum and everett osillum brown elizabeth burnbaum burnbaum and um everett elizabeth burnbaum and vice mayor walken name elizabeth and everett mayor brunner elizabeth burnbaum and everett osillum elizabeth burnbaum has been reappointed and everett osillum has been okay so that concludes that mission and so we did good on that first round that was great job everyone we will now move on alphabetically to the board of building and fire of schools i would like to call on the city clerk for now um as a reminder staff has requested that council possibly hold off on appointment for the vacancy on this item in order to participate for a bit um if that is because council would like to state that i would like to add that for a future meeting okay thank you if uh if council decides to make a motion to postpone the appointment uh uh let's see if there is a motion to postpone vice mayor walken i'm happy to make a motion to postpone the statement okay vice mayor walken i'll second that and council member brown second uh like to call city clerk to call roll call vote council member calentary donton hi vice mayor walken and mayor brunner okay up next is the commission for the prevention of violence against women there is one opening council member calentary johnson's nomination on the commission for the prevention of violence against women with a term expiration of january 1st 2023 so may i please have nominations for the commission for the prevention of violence women starting with council member coming um back at this is our our error uh there it's um council member calentary johnson's nomination so we don't need to do the roll call vote sorry i apologize it's appointment thank you my turn i'd like to appoint rachel kippen through the um commission for the prevention of violence against women and we can either do a roll call vote or decide if we want to approve her nomination we have all thumbs up on that appointment so that appointment is approved and uh congratulations to rachel kippen thank you we will now move to the downtown mission i would like call on the clerk to make an announcement on this item thank you um this is the commission where um we do have two different terms expiration the person with person out of the two appoints with the less amount of the lesser amount of votes we'll get the shorter okay say that one more time there are two expiration on the firm so the person out of the two with the lesser amount of votes we'll get the shorter great thank you okay so one term will expire on january 21st 2023 and it looks like the other term will expire on january 31st 2000 please have nominations starting with council member brown i would nominate fennelly dollon vice mayor watkins there isn't a two opening sorry uh council member brown do you have a second uh i i do not okay at this moment vice mayor watkins i will add to the nominee uh the nominees thirland book and my second has already been okay uh i will insert myself and i nominate jannelly dollon and raffa sun himself council member colin tarry johnson kind of the name thank you council member golder i'm going to add bub raider and council member cummings might have all been um right and now ask us to start the roll call council member mayors i might have been might have been mayor please for roll call thank you there's a lot of writing here so the four um nominees that you have are caroline both heli jannelly dollon bub raider and raffa sun himself and you can vote that council member calentary johnson i'd like to vote for caroline book heli and jannelly dollon this is really hard i really um jannelly dollon and raffa sun afield jannelly dollon and bub raider jannelly dollon and bub raider caroline book heli vice mayor watkins name jannelly dollon and caroline book heli can i change mine or is it too late i believe uh i believe jannelly dollon and bub raider okay noted i've already no give yours okay uh so i nominally uh or i vote for jannelly and my second uh well did you say did you say raffa sun himself yes i think cut out okay so we have jannelly dollon who gets the full term of um expiring january 31st 26th and raffa sun sub raider um we'll get the january 21st 2020 can i just confirm uh there were three for caroline and three for bub oh yeah right we're gonna have to re-vote right thank you i accidentally put yours in our bus so we'll have to now re-vote for that shorter term between caroline and bub start over caroline and bub calendary jonston caroline book heli holder sub raider heli operator frown sub raider vice mayor watkins name caroline book heli mayor brunner caroline book heli okay i'll rephrase what i said earlier so um jannelly dollon has full term of january 31st 26th as the expiration date caroline book heli has the shorter term expiring january 21st 20th thank you we will now have the historic preservation commission there are two openings on the historic preservation commission both terms expired january 31st 2026 may please have nominations starting with council member meyers okay vice mayor watkins those are my nominees as well okay council member carolintari jonston uh and i nominate same council member golder same council member comings no new addition and council member brown no new addition okay to finalize that we will i will ask the city clerk we can do it by consensus okay we don't need to wait we're done with that thank you timeline process now we have parks recreation commission there are two openings on the parks and recreation both terms expire on january 31st 2026 and please have nominations starting with vice mayor watkins where i would like to nominate jane meo as my first nominee and i will also nominate you know okay i have the same nominations council member carolintari jonston same nominations council member golder i'd like to nominate bridley angel and jacob call it council member comings new addition council member brown no new addition council member meyers okay so now we will go to a vote for the two openings may the city clerk call a roll call vote you have four nominees that she's from bradley angel jane meo you know pollock jacob call it council member calentari jon jane meo and bradley angel jacob call it jane meo and jacob call it jane meo and jacob call it vice mayor watkins i'll go with the same jane meo and jacob call it mayor bradley jane meo and dino call it and jane meo and jacob call it congratulations okay thank you that concludes parks and recreation commissioners and outgoing alphabetically that brings us to planning commission i think this had the most out there are two openings from the planning commission both terms will expire on january 31st 2026 this time i will start by nominating charles pro grace and pete kennedy council member calentari johnson i would like to hold on one second sorry we have a lot of names to go through for us check mark who did you say there charles pro grace and kennedy i would like to add mark you didn't alert council member golder mine have been named council member cummings and sarah wickel and ron promaren council member brown uh my selections have been named council member mires and vice mayor watkins mine too have been named okay we have it looks like five nominations but in the city first follow roll call vote so your options are pete kennedy mark the city miller ron promaren charles pro grace and sarah wickel and council member calentari johnson pete kennedy and mark missy miller golder mine are the same me ron promaren since sarah i believe it's actually i looked in my note wickel i believe she pronounced her name when she was with us nice mayor watkins mine are the same mayor brooner kennedy and charles pro grace we have pete kennedy and mark beauty miller okay congratulations thank you and your planning commissioners we now move on to sister city's committee i would like to call the city clerk as an announcement regarding this item thank you same as um the board of building staff has requested to postpone filling the third it has three openings um they're hoping to postpone the third still on today okay can we have a motion it's our motion to postpone one of the vote the third vote uh vice mayor watkins i'm happy to make that motion to that third nomination and council member mires we have a first by watkins to postpone the third vote and second by mires uh roll call vote on that motion calentari johnson hi sir vice mayor watkins hi mayor brooner hi motion passes union in this okay so there are still two openings on the sister city's committee that we will appoint and vote the terms will expire on january 31st 2026 may i have nomination starting with uh council member calentari johnson i'd like to nominate andrey etan i'm pronouncing that incorrectly and thomas stelling council member golder mine has been named coming a new addition council member brown same council member mires vice mayor watkins same and uh my nominations are this so that so by consensus it'll be andrey kikov and thomas stelling great kikov and thomas stelling congratulations thank you and um that leaves us this is our last commission the water commission there are two openings on the water commission looks like both terms will expire january 31st 2026 may please have nominations starting with council member boulder um i'd like to nominate diana alvaro and darrett rolf council member coming by council member brown my nominations have been named council member mires vice mayor watkins i too have been named also mine have also been named and council member calentari johnson kind of a name okay the city clerk to roll call vote on the nomination nominees you have three nominees diana alvaro steams meccan and garrett rolf um calentari johnson diana alvaro and garrett rolf sir same as pre johnson coming jim meccas and diana alvaro diana alvaro and jim meccas morrow and garrett rolf vice mayor watkins same mayor bruner at diana alvaro and jim meccas and it's diana alvaro and garrett rolf hey congratulations that includes our two water commissioners and our advisory body appointment here if i could just really quick um you skip while i'm forgetting public comment and it it's unfortunately we should have done it before all of this i think we have some applicants in the pending but yeah and i didn't i don't see any hands up but i am sorry if i skip going out to public comment there is a hand raised is it too late um a hand just went up okay so i will go out to public comment and the first hand raise is vain neo a star six so unmute yourself i just wanted to thank you so so much for giving me another firm under park and vick commission thank you thank you feel great that's all that i wanted to say okay that looks like that concludes the public comment portion for agenda items on advisory body commissions and those were agenda items number the numbers i can state it 20 through 28 so that concludes those agenda items it looks like we can restass uh councilmember calentari johnson thank you mayor i'm not sure if this is appropriate time i just want to take a moment and thank all the applicants um and everyone who wants to serve our community this was really really hard there were really amazing all the applicants were amazing and you took time last week to show up and and speak um so thank you for wanting to serve and um i'm excited that we'll all be working thank you thank you for that comment thank you everybody thank you to all our new commissioners new staff and thank you council members we will return here at 6 p.m and we will dive right into oral communications and our um evening agenda which includes item number 29 public hearing on 130 center street appeal of the planning approval of a non-residential demolition authorization permit so i look forward to seeing you back here thank you we will begin in about one minute right is this city clerk ready all right then we will begin welcome everyone welcome to our 6 p.m session of the january 25 2022 meeting of the city council i have a few announcements and then we will move on to our meeting today's meeting is being broadcast live on community television channel 25 and streaming on the city's website cityofsanitruz.com if you wish to comment on an agenda item today call in at the beginning of the item you are waiting to comment on using the instructions on your screen please also mute your television or streaming device if you call in and listen through your phone please note there is a delay in streaming so if you continue to listen on your television or streaming device you could miss your opportunity to speak when it is time for public comment raise your hand either by dialing or pressing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand on the webinar controls your computer when it is your time to speak during public comment you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted the timer will then be set to two minutes you may hang up once you have commented on your item of interest and i would like to ask the clerk please call the roll here come over to the commentary john president here thanks for watching here airburner president thank you now we will move into oral communications for members of the public streaming this meeting if you would like to comment on oral communications now is the time to call in oral communications is an opportunity for members of the community to speak to us on items that are not listed on today's agenda if you're interested in addressing the council for oral communications please raise your hand by dialing star nine or selecting raise hand on the webinar controls you will have two minutes to speak please remember this is a time for council to hear from the public we are not able to engage dialogue with each member of the public but when we are able we will address the questions raised after oral communications let me go to the attendees and see if there are hands raised for oral communications to speak on items not on this agenda okay i see one hand raised by the name of i am watching you please press star six to unmute your speakers okay my big everyone especially those so inclined to blindly follow orders our favorite extreme coercion or punishment of others refusing covid mandate to watch all five hours all five hours of yesterday's senator ron john star studded world-class health experts in the hearing on the government's malfeasance covid health care response on rumble dot com called covid-19 second opinion it remains to be seen if the cdc will ever admit to a single death from vaccination although data would suggest over 9 000 here 20 000 worldwide so various unnecessary vaccine health risks educational and emotional damage young people continues suppression of information continues the treatment withholding of the ill still goes on who will feel the inflation of reckless government post lockdown stimulus money printing forever and maybe the worst part is the shift away from informed science-based health care informed choice to a now blended leftist fascism giving support to corrupt regulators and is mostly all centered in the democratic party a dangerous shift in american politics is revealed revealed by a rascals and poll that the following democratic opinions are all too similar to early dots Germany claiming jews for all their problem well the democrats go highly endorsed this frail of fellow americans but that is not the point the survey shows 78 support vines now struck down a legal job or no job mandate 75 still approve of how to despite his flip-flops and lies 55 endorse the notion of fines on unjobbed americans 59 favor house arrest for the unjob 45 favor forced resettlement of the unjobbed a government operated facility 48 favor either finds or imprisonment for those who justifiably question the efficiency of the job on any media 29% want kids taken away from parents who are unjobbed lastly 45% of democrats they were big brother unjob tracking program while the birthplace of fascism germany and austria go to full course of mandatory vaccination similar to oppressor regimes like communist china and australia other nations like sweden and uk have essentially removed all mandates acknowledge zero covid is unattainable and covid itself has moved on thank you for your oral communication thank you for calling in are there any other colors in the public who would like to speak to any item not in this world communication okay seeing none other all right so we will now move on to the next item on the agenda which is also our final item of this evening item number 29 public hearing for 130 center street an appeal of the planning commission's approval of a non-residential demolition authorization for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you want to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen this item is an appeal which will be conducted as follows first staff will present their report and it looks like ryan bain is here okay uh the appellate jillian green site with tana cruise tomorrow will have 15 minutes to speak and present evidence in support of this appeal okay jillian is here okay the opponent jessie briscoe of swenson builders will have 15 minutes to speak and present evidence and then we will have questions from the council and then i will bring it out to public comment the appellate will then have five minutes to rebut but no new information could be provided at this time and appellate may only rebut information only raised already raised sorry but then we will return to council for deliberation i'd like to hand it over to ryan bain please and ryan is the senior planner with our planning permit okay i'm just gonna bring up presentation here just give me one second should i do this correctly okay i guess one can you guys hear me and two can you see slide yes yes great thanks okay good evening uh yeah my name is ryan bain i'm senior planner of the community development department and uh what we're discussing tonight is an appeal of a planning commission approval for one project at 130 center street just give a little background so the planning commission heard this application at the october 21st hearing so i can see a little better so after much deliberation the commission unanimously approved the project and on november first of 2021 an appeal of the planning commission's approval was received from san agus tomorrow via appointed representative green side as you have mentioned the appeal expresses concerns regarding the environmental analysis and quest a secret review which would address possible soil contamination issues plus mentions a traffic study which they would like to have inclusive of weekend counts and we'll kind of get into some of that a little later on so following the middle of the appeal staff directed um our community development department's environment consultant to prepare a full secret categorical exemption review to detail how the project needs the secret guidelines that staff had concluded as a as an infill project so their the review really addresses many of the concerns expressed by the appeal and including traffic noise pollution air quality and soil contamination so just before we get to the appeal items i was just going to give you a little background um and description of the project so uh it's approximately a 1.19 acre site um it's located on the eastern side of center street you can see here um there's commercial and residential uses surrounding the project site it's bounded by an auto body shop to the north tell to the south uh multifamily residential to the east and commercial as well as deeper park across center street to the west um as you can see there really aren't any trees located on the site it's mostly just paved over in buildings so the project involves a proposal to construct a six-story mixed use project consisting of one level of underground parking a ground level commercial space and 233 single family um or i should say single room occupancy or sRO so the general plan designation for the site is rvc or regional visitor commercial and this general plan designation applies to areas that emphasize a variety of commercial uses that serve santa cruz residents as well as visitors mixed use developments such as this are strongly encouraged in the rvc district so specifically the general plan um rvc designation calls out the south of plural areas intended for mixed use residential development along with visitor serving and neighborhood commercial uses to connect the beach area the downtown area um the general plan also allows the floor ratio of 0.25 to 0.5 um and this particular project is 2.94 which falls with that ring um it's the zoning for the properties rtc um which is tourist residential beach commercial and that's basically purposes to establish standards for development and residential uses mixed with neighborhood commercial um motel and regional tourist commercial um see but pursuant to the rtc does basically state that commercial developments non-commercial uses on the ground floor subject should be subject to the rta district regulations so that's also applicable for single room occupancy so even though it's located in the rtc zoning based on the proposed project uses as part of that project we're applying the rta development standards so the rta standards basically the height the height limit is 36 feet however as you'll see density bonus that's being requested as part of this project so they'll be requesting a height waiver to allow to 75 to accommodate the density bonus units um see one incentive is that applicants can utilize a waiver or modification development standards if those standards would physically preclude the construction of the density bonus so height is obviously one of those that would limit that as well as setbacks so setbacks is also another waiver that's being requested so um the project has kind of kind of gone over project is consistent with general plan policies um the beach and south of the rural comprehensive plan policies and design guidelines as well as the rta development standards and there's also a section of our ordinance that uh that is specific to single room or sro development it meets all of those sro development standards as well so um the project permits that are involved with this um there are two commercial buildings on the site that are proposed for demolition so that requires a non-residential demolition authorization permit there's a design permit required for the new mixed use structure the project is in the coastal zone so it requires a coastal permit it's in the czo coastal zone overlay overlay zone and then both the single room occupancy or sro use um and the mixed use with commercial development um or i should say non-commercial development on the ground floor uh both require special use permits in that zoning and then as i mentioned the density bonus request so um it's kind of unconventional shaped lots generally flat 132 sorry 182 feet of frontage along center and the parcel is not located with any mapped sensitive habitat or resource areas so the proposed mixed use consists of six stories above one level of under parking um with a foot perfect a footprint that really covers the majority of the site area it's kind of a u-shaped building with access to the project site right if you drive away center street and the driver provides access to both grade level parking for all of us the underground parking here's a look at the north elevation here's a look along center street so there's a third foot sidewalk right away in addition to a 15 foot setback so combined there's the project or the structural actually be set back approximately 28 feet from the back of her so it kind of provides a wide expanse of sidewalk and a public closet feel um here's the underground parking and and there's also storage involved well um the first floor consists of uh commercial spaces two commercial spaces that can be used as retail or restaurant in addition to a lobby and leasing for residential use also located on the first floor areas that do not front on the public street is a bike cafe storage units as well as nine residential units that open on to a shared community open space so there will be residential uses primarily on levels two through six with the second floor that we have shown here including residential menus such as a game room fitness center a large podium level open space with seating and landscape so like three four and five are all residential units the six floor is residential units but also contains a community room and a larger outdoor recreation deck that faces center street so the proposed uh 233 s our units are broken down into basically three configurations there are 78 what they call micro units that average 295 square feet there are 65 standard units that are averaging about 328 square feet and an extended unit that's averaging about 400 square feet so between the three unit types the average unit size will be about 345 square feet which meets the requirements of the sro development standard so as i mentioned there's a parking garage with two levels so the parking requirements for sros one space for each dwelling unit and under the assumption that the commercial spaces are calculated at a higher restaurant parking requirement which is higher than what a standard retail would be a total of 20 parking spaces required for a total of 253 off-street spaces however our city's density bonus ordinance as well as the state density bonus allows for reductions in parking for rental housing developments with very low income units also when they're within a half mile of a major transit stop which this is and have unobstructed access to that for transit stop so based on that the parking requirement is 0.5 spaces per bedroom so with the 233 bedrooms posed the project meets these standards by providing there's 117 parking spaces required for the residential portion and then with the 20 required for the rest say assuming a restaurant higher parking requirement for restaurant 137 off-street spaces are required for project so with providing 209 spaces the overall project has a surplus of 72 spaces so um i know we've been getting quite a few density bonus projects lately so we're becoming more familiar with it so but just for those that are not so to address california's need for affordable housing state enacted density bonus law back in 1979 to encourage provision of affordable housing units by offering a combination of benefits to developers so if a project meets the requisite number of affordable housing units on the request of an applicant cities are required to allow more market rate units to be built and otherwise allowed by the applicable zoning designation um cities are required to provide incentives or concessions such as use development standards as well as waivers or modifications of development standards that would physically include the project constructed and also allow reduced parking requirements as we had talked about so cities really have very limited discretion when reviewing density bonus applications and are generally obligated to grant a density bonus and incentives for waivers in this case to the development standards so to determine whether a project qualifies for a density bonus percentage of affordable units is based on the maximum number of units that would be permitted under the city's zoning code so that's what we consider the base density so in areas where there is no agency range like for instance this one the zoning ordinance requires an applicant to submit base plans or plans showing a project that fully conforms to the objective standards being height setbacks providing open space all those type of things so the applicant has provided plans for a base project all of those rta development standards including height setbacks etc and the determined base density is 155 units so for market rate projects providing certain percentages of affordable units uh deeper levels of ability are entitled to an increase in density of 50 percent of the total number of units that are allowed under the zoning ordinance so with the additional units what these additional units do is they help offset increased costs associated with the increased number of affordable units so by law percentages of afforded units that qualify a project density bonus are based on the project only and not the base project plus this unit so pursuant to our SRO development um in a rental residential project for SROs our ordinance requires 20 percent of the single room occupants units being made available for rent to very low income households at an affordable rent so for the base density of 105 that's 31 uh the residential units will be required to be provided as affordable units very low level which is 50 percent m i um i just wanted to mention uh this was brought up we accidentally attached the wrong staff report a planning commissio