It was the nice subtle way of telling us not to make fun of the Raiders too much in Tom because everybody can hear us, right? Everybody can hear and see you Hey Jack, all right, we are gonna go ahead and get this thing started Welcome everybody to this Tuesday afternoon city council meeting. I'm gonna call the meeting to order here at 130 Madam clerk. Can you call the roll? Yes Councilmember Alvarez Councilmember Fleming Councilmember Sawyer Councilmember Schwedhelm Councilmember Tibbets here vice mayor Rogers present Mayor Rogers and I am here as well let the record show that all council members are present All right. Thank you Stephanie council. Just as a reminder keep your audio on mute Unless you are asked to speak or are speaking at the end of each item You also can mute yourselves though. I know Stephanie and Dean are quick with that button as well Staff are going to stay muted unless they are doing the presentation or answering questions from us And for members of the public who've joined the meeting, they'll be participating as attendees Your microphone and your camera will be muted and only the panelists are going to be viewable during today's meeting If you're calling in from a telephone and choose to speak during the public comment portions of today's agenda For privacy concerns. The host will be renaming your viewable phone number to us as resident and the last four digits of your phone number City of Santa Rosa is very committed to creating a safe and inclusive environment where we want people to openly participate Our meetings, but that means that we will also not tolerate any hateful speech or actions And we will be monitoring that everyone is participating respectfully. Otherwise, we will remove people Uh, madame clerk, would you like to go over how the public might better engage with us in today's meeting? Yes. Thank you, mayor After each agenda item is presented They may the mayor will ask for council comments and then open it up for public comment The host and zoom will be lowering all hands until public comment is open for that agenda item Once the mayor has called for public comment The mayor will announce for the public to raise their hand if they wish to speak on the specific agenda item If you are calling in to listen to the meeting audibly You can dial star nine to raise your hand The mayor will then call on the public who have raised their hands Public comment will be limited to three minutes and a timer will appear on the screen for the council and the public to see Once all live public comments have been heard the meeting host will play voicemail public comments If you provided a live public comment on an agenda item But also submitted an email e comment or recorded a voice message public comment Your email e comment or voice message public comment will not be duplicated read or played during the meeting Additionally, there are two public comment periods on today's agenda to speak on non agenda matters Items 13 and 17 This is a time when any person may address the council on matters not listed on this agenda But which are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council All right. Thank you so much And with that mr. City manager, let's go ahead and open up our first study session on item 3.1 Item 3.1 consideration of a reusable and compostable food wear and litter reduction ordinance joey henowitz administrative analysts presenting Good afternoon. Can everybody hear me? Yeah, okay, so good afternoon, um mayor rogers and congratulations to your appointment and the rest of the city council My name is joey henowitz. I am an administrative analyst in the transportation and public works department For those of you that are new to the council welcome and just to kind of give you a little idea of what I do I oversee the solid waste management collection services agreement with recology and I'm also the project manager for the zero waste plan that was recently passed by city council or that is here So I'm I'm kind of all things solid waste If you get a little bit of background of where where this item is coming from this reusable compostable food wear ordinance We do understand that the city of santa rosa has passed a climate action plan as well as a climate action emergency one of those components in helping to reduce You know global warming and g hg emissions is solid waste specifically in the name of Composed materials and trying to divert those from from the landfill We recently passed a zero waste resolution Our zero waste plan, excuse me zero waste master plan earlier this year And one of those main elements objective elements for us to focus on In trying to help us reach our goal of 75% diversion by 2030 as well as reducing Pounds per person per day, which is the amount of pounds per person per capita. Each person throws away in santa rosa Less than one pound per person per day One of those goals was to institutes a a food war ordinance. And so We've been kind of going back and forth a little bit at the subcommittee level the climate action subcommittee Discussing this option There was a model that was put forward by zero waste sonoma, which I'll go into more detail As the information progresses And I was asked to try to come forward with options for a potentially What a compostable fully compostable food war ordinance would look like I will tell you that I have developed an ordinance just so that you can kind of take a look at it It's a living document I do intend for that to change based off of feedback and any suggestions that council members have after today And I also want to let you know that there are some some significant potential hurdles or challenges In the current environment, which I will go into detail here after The presentation is over so we can go to the next slide please A little bit of background I think it's pretty much obvious for most folks is that the production of management associated with with single-use food wear We use it once and we throw it away. It has significant environmental impacts Those impacts are listed there on the second bullet A little more locally here to kind of Lay out the the degree of why this This ordinance could be necessary and why it would help to achieve some bar zero waste goals is A 2011 study of Bay Area street litter Which is running into the San Francisco Bay found that oh about 67 of all litter items found There's 12 000 of them or single-use food or beverage packaging next slide Bringing that analysis a little bit closer to home There was an analysis in 2017 performed on the russian wherever watershed where they collected over 2,500 litter items and as you can see a similar kind of percentage 60 percent Of these items found were single-use plastics of some variety wrappers plastic bags styrofoam food packaging lid straws, etc In 2019 our stormwater and creeks cleanup programs removed over a thousand cubic yards of trash deposited into our our creeks here in santa rosa And i've also heard and spoken with some of the stormwater and creek staff who say that Polystyrene also known as styrofoam is a persistent litter item found along with just plastic food packaging And styrofoam especially is a Significant problem because it often breaks down into very very small pieces and is almost impossible to retrieve Next slide So it's just more kind of understanding of The origination of this ordinance is 80 percent of marine debris originates on land primarily as urban trash runoff This marine plastic can cause animal disease and mortality and has been found in Human consumption items such as fish bottled water honey sea salt and more and there's even some more updated recent reports where they're finding You know micro plastics in the environment not even in the ocean but just out in the environment in general in the middle of Forest so it is definitely concerning The practice of giving out single-use food wear automatically encourages customers and food vendors to to pay little attention to the quantity Of disposable packaging that they are receiving and that they're consuming Especially in today's environment where we're getting a lot of to-go food wear Given out for folks who can't eat obviously indoors or inside This is this is especially concerning. They're seeing a significant rise in these products and oftentimes you're bringing this food home You don't really need, you know the extra fork the extra knife. That's a plastic fork the napkins Unless you're eating on the run most of the times folks and bring that stuff home and they can use their own reusable food wear Which is really going to be the most zero waste impact As I did mention the city council did adopt the zero waste master plan in january of 2020 with A with a food or ordinance of some nature being one of the plan's central strategy recommendations Next slide So as I mentioned this Ordinance has been being kicked around at this at the climate action subcommittee level Just to kind of give you a background on where we've been with this zero waste Sonoma has developed a model ordinance And I'll go into details about that a little bit later on in the in the presentation but we've we reviewed that ordinance and we've uh been asked by Some city council members to to check into how we might be able to go above and beyond that approach that zero waste Sonoma has developed and potentially doing some models that are similar to what Berkeley and San Francisco Alameda and the jurisdictions like Santa Monica have have done So we came back to the climate action subcommittee with that follow-up report and um, it was uh directed by the climate action subcommittee to Explore and put together a model draft ordinance of what a fully compostable Food wear ordinance would look like and to bring that forward to the full city council for Discussion and review and that's where we're at right now next slide So as I did mention zero waste Sonoma has developed a model ordinance for jurisdictions to consider Which was titled. I won't read the full thing. It's up down the first bullet But the model ordinance does address five areas It does prohibit polystyrene foam food wear from being distributed by food and beverage providers Prohibits polystyrene foam food wear from and specified products. Excuse me being sold by retail stores Uh, it does require food and beverage providers and special events to to use either compostable or recyclable disposable food service wear And it requires the food and beverage providers to provide accessories and single-use products like straws lids cutlery to go condiment packs Upon request only as I was mentioning earlier, you could probably save a lot of A lot of a diversion of waste from the landfill from from simply just instituting that policy right there Where you're only giving it if they ask for if the customer asks for it It does encourage the use of the reusable Right now there is some concern with reusable and food safety, especially with The the pandemic going on. And so this this one is is an encouragement. It's not necessarily An action item asking or I'm telling folks that they have to use reusable next slide So as mentioned, um There were some there are some jurisdictions like Berkeley, San Francisco, Alameda San Juan is is also one of those that have instituted additional food wear measures aimed at increasing diversion And and reducing environmental impact It was mentioned in one of the climate action subcommittee meetings that, you know, Santa Rosa could definitely look into the possibilities of enacting one of these More similar features. And so what the ordinance that you will see here Explained later on is going to be reflecting elements from these jurisdictions And the climate action subcommittee favorite pursuing an ordinance that looks with the goal of Excuse me the goal going fully compostable and banning food wear containing polystyrene foams styrofoam single-use plastics and materials containing fluorinated chemicals known as per poly polyfluor alcohols Also known as PFAS PFAS Next slide So there are definitely some considerations when it comes to compostable food wear Compostable food wear is still relatively new in the marketplace I mean depending on who you talk to some people think it's great and others don't really necessarily think it's the best thing so um One of the things with the compostable food wear is just to make it Actually work for the food providers so they can provide these materials To their customer and they're not have to worry about anything leaking or or you know the breakage of of a container per se they do Have either a polylactic acid which is also known as PLA or a purin polyfluor alcohols which are known as a PFAS chemicals The these products they act as a grease and a liquid proofing agent And they're designed to essentially prevent the the grease your liquid or um, you know, wet based foods beverage based foods from leaking out of food containers PLA is generally made from fermented plant starch usually corn or um sugarcane And these products are designed to be biodegradable But this process can often happen slower than what commercial composters permit in their process And they're generally the the PLA products do need to be You know, um disposed of in a commercial composting operation. They do need to have that hands-on You know a man-made element where there is somebody looking over that to make sure that the conditions arrive There's enough moisture. There's enough nitrogen. There's enough there's enough airflow going through it and so They do need to be put into those commercial composting operations that will be able to accept those materials Next slide On the other hand the PFAS chemicals These are family thousands of chemicals that are generally found in common household items such as stain in water repellent fabrics non-stick products like teflon polishes waxes cleaning products Most of the time these products the PFAS products are used in paper products used for the food packaging and obviously as I said they're used for treating water and grease resistance While there isn't a whole lot of information out there right now They're they're they're currently doing some studies currently into the potential effects of of PFAS There there is some evidence out there that that exposure to PFAS can lead to adverse human health effects And some of these studies indicate that PFAS can cause reproductive and liver and kidney immunological effects in laboratory animals and in some consistent findings in human epidemiology of increased cholesterol levels effects on immune system cancer and thyroid hormone disruption So there is there is some concern obviously of of allowing these products In in to go food wear it can also obviously get into our food stream into the water into the ground and Kind of continue that cycle there next slide so this is this is really this is kind of really important here this slide is Considering whether or not we can go to a fully compostable option commercial composters At least if they want to have the designation of organic compost They they they can't sell their compost material in their feedstock as as organic If it contains any synthetic materials And the national organics program which designates that does consider PLAs and PFAS as synthetic materials So in effect if These these operations these compost operations were to accept Compostable materials that have PLAs or PFAS in them They would no longer be able to resell their compost, which is a significant Business detriment up to about 75 reduction in the retail sale of of that compost product another important aspect to consider is that the These products are currently not accepted and Generally are going to be screened out of the composting process where Santa Rosa delivers our material We do have a harmless a handle. We have three compost facilities where we deliver our material Obviously right now we are working on a helpful Local option here in Sonoma County, but currently we do outhaul all of our compost out of the county And obviously there are concerns some concerns with that, but that's that's kind of a whole different conversation, but What the the thing here is is we would either go to Up in New Kaya cold creek compost we deliver to Richmond and we also Are going to deliver it on on the weekend some of our commercial foodways to the facility out in Napa and Know not one one of these three facilities currently accept What you would what you would call these or these compostable materials So they would be essentially being screened out from the process So we decided to go down down that route for a fully compostable option And as I said, we did get the direction from the climate action subcommittee to to do our best to explore this fully compostable option Recognizing that you know, we do want to move away from the single-use plastic We understand the detriment to to kind of having everything in our world, you know Have plastic on it so to say And looked for me to provide that direction as what what what a excuse me what a Ordinance might look like they'll be fully compostable. So I'll go into some of those details here on the following slides Next slide So who would be affected? This applies to all food vendors who sell or distribute disposable food wear This includes food and beverage providers retailers and special events Special events that would have a permit with the city of Santa Rosa Examples include restaurants bars convenience stores grocery stores deli's food trucks, etc And the ordinance would also apply to our to our city facilities as I mentioned the special events that require Permit from the city next slide So in the working definition of this model ordinance that I've developed a compliant food wear would be Bpi certified. This is a biodegradable products institutes. They they are a An organization that certifies the compostability of products And so we they are a trusted verified Organization that that we would be able to trust and verify those products that they they are bpr certified that they are Compliant food where they are compostable We need to be commercially available to food vendors There are some products out there that are difficult to source just in looking for them. For example Finding food wear that isn't completely PLA based plastic that would be you know bamboo or fiber based only There's not a whole lot of options available out in the market currently as well as lids lids I also found to be difficult for potentially food vendors to to procure so We would need to ensure that if we were going to put this forward that those products would actually need to be available to food vendors And if they weren't then we wouldn't we obviously wouldn't enforce on those on those elements Another important point here with the compliant food wear is it would need to be made up of paper or natural plant fibers And as I mentioned, you know, it would be great if we could go fully compostable without any sort of You know synthetic lining in them with the PLA with the corn starch It's just in my opinion. This is not realistic to ask food providers to to go, you know Completely fully fiber based route because it's not going to be realistic for them to you know Put food in there that has any sort of grease or or condensation and not expect that to leak out So for the purposes of this model ordinance, the natural fiber based food or beverage containers with the PLA coating Would be considered compliant But I would just remind you again that I'm unfortunately with the current situation of where we do Where we potentially would be taking these products these products wouldn't be accepted into the green compost stream To the three locations where we currently take where Santa Rosa takes its compost Compliant food wear accessories So with this we're talking about, you know, your forks or napkins your your stir sticks Everything else that would come other than the container We would be asking that to be made up entirely of paper or plant or natural plant fibers And that it would have to be commercially available to to food vendors Next slide So these are just some kind of general pictures just so you can kind of get a visual look of what, you know Compliant food wear would look like We do have up in the upper left corner there a couple options with the container some cups You will see that they do kind of have that little bit of a shine and a sheen to them I don't look like my forehead right now bad joke, but uh They those ones have the PLA lining in them And so you'll be able to tell you can kind of feel it as well If you look into it, that's the coating in there, which actually has the grease and the The liquid barrier you'll see that also in the second one with the container We have some food wear accessories there with the fork and the Compostable excuse me straw The bamboo fork down below and then there's some additional some additional options that you can see as well For the for all the compliant food wear could look like I'm moving to the next slide, please So there are some items within the proposed ordinance that would be prohibited and Food vendors within the Salem Santa Rosa would not sell any food wear that contains polystyrene, which is the styrofoam Plastic which includes compostable plastics as well fully compostable plastics and and and products with with PFAS I would just mention that The biodegradable products institute as of january 1st of this year No longer certifies products on their website the bpi certified Compostable products that and that have PFAS in them. And so in that sense it would make it a little bit easier to To implement that policy letting people know that, you know, this doesn't have PFAS in it. If you get it from this site Otherwise, you know Finding out exactly what products may have may or may not have PFAS in this current Current environment might be potentially potentially difficult Next slide So kind of getting an idea and a visual look at, you know What we're looking to potentially prohibit here with this reasonable compostable food ordinance upper left you have your classic kind of clam shell which is made out of styrofoam And we definitely want to try to get these products out of out of our out of our environment We have some plastic options as well plastic silverware and One of the issues that we have as well is You know We were looking to allow the PLA line products that are fiber based Considering that we do think that those potentially could be a better option if we wanted to move that direction Then what you see down in the bottom left hand corner, which is what they would call a compostable plastic Um, it does need to be kind of put into a commercial composting operation for that to actually break down There's there's arguments if we talk to you know, does it actually break down properly or does it kind of still maintain its its form That that's still to be discussed But what you see there is it looks almost exactly like A regular plastic cup that you might get in any other sort of Situation and so there's also concern of of if we allow say compostable plastics You know, even if they were accepted at the local facilities There's concern that it could miseducate the public because it looks pretty much exactly the same as any other plastic Um cup there and then there's just some other additional examples there that you can see Layed out there for you in the slide on the next slide, please So dine-in food where this these would be some regulations that we're looking at for folks that are Dining in on premises, um, which we obviously understand that currently isn't happening due to the the pandemic restrictions um But food vendors within the city of Santa Rosa would shall sell or provide food and beverages for consumption on the premises using Reusable which means that it's durable. It's washable. They can use, you know, numerous times up to a couple hundred different times or more Um and and food wear and food wear accessories. So essentially if you're dining in The the requirement would be is that you have to provide folks with a reusable option. You cannot provide a single use Um disposable option if you're going to be offering dine-in service um Any other compliant accessories we're talking napkins, you know straws Which should be available in ponder quest anyways stirs, tray liners We would be expecting those to be to be compliant and to be compostable options Which uh, many of those in the marketplace already are and and it would be too difficult to source those um another another thing that could is a you know, you might think is a small Policy shift, but it could make a big impact Is offering condiments in bulk dispensers rather than the prepackage single use condiment packs And I think that kind of speaks for itself. Uh next slide So take out food wear. This is really kind of the crux of of this its ordinance here is trying to to limit the amount of Materials that you know, not only businesses have to buy but that folks are actually taking home with them The hope is you can kind of do this culture change where we're looking to do reusable first. That's the top of the zero waste hierarchy Um people can you know really just get the container that they need to get Come home use their own fork. They're so aware of their own napkins that type of stuff So what we would be looking here is to provide take out food and usable food wear Compliant food wear, which I I did detail earlier on or items composed or items composed entirely of aluminum the reason for this aluminum kind of subset is um aluminum actually has a high percentage of recyclability and it also is a material that There are what still some pretty good markets for those so the resale value of of that is Is good enough to where you know, it's easy to get it's easy to get those products moved off and into a you know To basically essentially be recycled Secondly, it was when we're thinking about, you know burritos or wraps and that type of thing It didn't really make sense for us to have to have those items be Placed into a you know, compostable or or recyclable Food wear when it's you know already contained within aluminum foil So this would prohibit food food providers from providing food wear and food wear accessories that are not compliant So polystyrene foam plastic food wear food wear accessories and food wear containing PFAS One of the one of the other important things too is the culture change and and really kind of Getting getting the message out and communicating with our food vendors that these food wear accessories should only be provided upon request For to-go orders and if you are having dine-in service You know having those available at self-serve stations or or even potentially upon request as well Where they have to ask somebody from behind the counter to get that And then providing takeout bags that are comprised or composed of paper only plastic bags Would not be compliant for this model ordinance next slide So continuation of some kind of takeout food regulations or measures As mentioned as we kind of know with the the covid 19 situation Everybody's a lot of times should be staying at home or is staying at home They have seen an increase in people ordering, you know to go food to be delivered to their house And so as I mentioned before it's important that we try to Do an upstream Implementation to where we capture whether or not folks actually need those materials from the front end So it's not just automatically provided So we would be asking for the customers to affirmatively request That they need these these additional food wear accessories as when they make their order Um, we would also be encouraged but not required to charge customers receiving any of these food wear accessories 25 cents Um, it is assumed that the money collected will go towards the purchase of ordinance compliant alternatives um as well as as be some sort of a Trying to change the culture by folks if they understand that there's a cost to to to receive these accessories They might be more inclined as to to decline them and just use what they have at home Which is really what we're hoping for is that they use re-usables um Not quite there yet, especially in the the covid environment, but um one of the areas that I do look to Expand and potentially come back to council um as an addition down the road uh is to Require but not provide a credit to customers bringing in their own sanitary reusable food containers So essentially you bring in your own cup where they you know, you get it filled by the restaurant. You walk out. There's there's no sort of You know plastic that need to be used no extra materials that were that were made for you And this will incentivize folks to bring their own food wear containers This is also something that we're very excited about and looking forward to bringing in the future In today's environment, it's probably a little too early and a little too difficult to to really institute something That would be really comprehensive in this in this fashion Next slide. So there are some focused Prohibited retail sales And these are really just going to be prohibited polystyrene products Food wear that is composed and whole are in part of polystyrene foam as I mentioned would be prohibited And then really some of the other items that would be big contributors to this would be Coolers ice chests or similar containers that you see there in the picture as well as packaging peanuts or other packaging materials We would be expecting businesses in within Santa Rosa to no longer be Utilizing these products and to provide You know, either a reusable product in the in the form of a cooler or there are some Fiber based options that are that are currently available for for packaging materials Next slide so as part of the zero waste plan and you know As city of Santa Rosa wanting to to be the leader in the north bay For zero waste efforts. We obviously want to lead by example And so we want to make sure that if we're going to be asking businesses to do this perform these duties We want to do the same thing in our own operations And so the following regulations that I've essentially gone over already would would apply to city purchases and facilities um Yeah, I'd even like to push it a little bit further within, you know, this city city of Santa Rosa organization offices potlucks birthday parties, etc That all city facilities shall use reusable food wear There should be no single use disposables used by city staff and compliant food wear accessories would be used by city staff as well City managed concessions and sponsored events and permanent events would be We'd be requesting that the use reusable food wear or compliant food wear and food wear accessories Obviously anything that's not reusable or compliant is prohibited and we would be looking to Obviously institute whatever decisions were made or whatever policy actions were taken into You know future contracts and agreements that the city has Next slide So this is one of the other elements that I found really interesting from some of the From I think it was the Berkeley ordinance that the they would they've instituted And to be honest with you it's something that's actually a requirement of sp1383, which is a an organics law that will be Coming into effect as of January 1st of next year, which would be really really significant for the city of Santa Rosa Which I will be reach likely returning to council relatively soon to discuss that a little more detail But what we'd be asking is that restaurants that are having a dine-in option for folks who You know for folks always containers would essentially need to provide the three separate containers that you have at your at your house In your residential community So we'd be asking for you know a solid waste container a recycling container an organics container And those should be consistent with recology's collection program With a gray or black container for for the garbage solid waste blue for recycling green for organics To the extent possible given space constraints we would expect all of these to to be together in kind of a tripod and we would be expecting that there would be graphic-rich signage above each Um waste stream so that when folks go to throw their their items away that they that they know what they Where each item should be going into which waste stream Next slide So there are some exemptions Obviously food that's prepared outside of the city Or packaged outside of the city we we don't necessarily have as much direct control over So we would we would be exempting those items But we would be asking and urging those folks to to follow the provisions of the ordinance the best that they can Um, I did already mention earlier that the non-reusable food were composed entirely of aluminum. It would be exempt Um, specifically really for you know, aluminum foil used for burritos and wraps Um, and then as I did mention if the food wearer food wear accessories Made of the compliant natural fiber are not commercially available as determined by the city We would not enforce on those um on those requirements until those items may be made commercially available Um products containing PFAS and polystyrene would would um always be prohibited Next slide um So there are some polystyrene foam products that we just wanted to make sure that we got it out there Even though it's it's uh kind of understood what that would be used for insulating our flotation purposes Or if they're encased in a more durable material and they're reusable those would be exempt So for examples would include surfboards boats light preservers Um construction materials, etc Um, and then also just for the immediate preservation of the public space health and safety do an emergency disaster Um, what have you that the city manager or his or her designee makes and food providers From the provisions of this ordinance based off of uh any sort of public health or safety emergency aspect next slide so we would uh institute a waiver process and So we want to make sure that if there are folks in the community food vendors providers events that if they can Show to the city that implementing um and following the ordinance would create a Undue financial hardship or practical difficulty not available to generally to most folks in those similar circumstances That they should have a an avenue to to potentially uh, you know get a waiver for that Um, so they would they would submit essentially a waiver report where they would detail You know why this would put them in that situation and we would um We would act on that no later than 120 days after receipt of that um that waiver application And if if if a waiver would was to be granted after investigation the waiver would be granted for a term of one year And under extraordinary circumstances An additional waiver of a year would be granted for a total of of two years We're really special circumstance for that The waivers would not be granted passive two-year time frame And it would be expected that the food provider or food vendor would would have to get in line with the ordinance at that point The city manager his or her designee would have a full discretion to verify the waiver and in the decision to grant Or deny the waiver would be put in writing and uh, it's determination considered final Next slide So enforcement is obviously a big component of this ordinance We would be requiring compliance as of as of the effective dates And the effective date that we have um, or at least that i've put forward Initially for discussion is going to be january 1st of 2022. So about a year out from now Um, the enforcement would be administered through our through our Santa Rosa code enforcement department In reaching out to the code enforcement division They they did that uh tpw staff myself know that you know for us to for them to enforce this ordinance There would be the high likelihood of a need for additional staffing to do that And so in checking with um with code enforcement, you're able to find that you know full time Code enforcement official enforcement position would be if sufficient to cover the increased workload of enforcing this ordinance And it would be more of a proactive enforcement You know a program versus a reactive enforcement mechanism where we would essentially just be responding to to citizen complaints You know if folks weren't following, um, you know the the ordinance itself there next slide So the the The intention of the ordinance is by no means to be More of a stick approach. We really are trying to encourage customers And we want to work with them to make sure that they they understand what what would be considered compliant foodware And so we the initial the initial, uh, you know, um enforcement would include a written notice of non-compliance and a reasonable opportunity correct Um food vendors would have 60 days from the written notice state to to become compliant And then entities that are non-compliance after the 60 day period would be subject to a citation penalty schedule Which I'll detail on the next slide, please So, um a fine not exceeding a hundred dollars for the first violation Uh 200 for a second violation of the same code provision within a year 500 for a fine exceeding any additional code violation in excess of two of the same code provision within one year If continued willful violations occur at this point and there's any business that just refuses to to comply for whatever reason The city would reserve the right to Consider suspending their vendors use their vendors use permit Next slide So as I did mention the the proposed effective dates of the ordinance would be january 1st 2022 We wanted to make sure to set that out enough time in in the future to Um allow entities to to kind of chew on on the ordinance understand it Adapt to the changes that might need to be made within their their operation And also it gives city staff enough time to to to adequately You know reach out and communicate the impacts to to the impacted business community Obviously, we are in the middle of a pandemic currently so considering the length In the unknown length and the impact of covet 19 Um, it is it is also suggested by staff You know depending on on counsel's purview is also working with the city attorney's office to potentially align the effective date Um to to the pandemic and to the um the health order c 19, which which is obviously around Um uh covet 19 so essentially, you know, we would we would come up with some language that would essentially say if you know coven 19 if the health order is still um impacting the community And there are there still these restrictions. We're not really back to normal that there would be um a situation to where we could tie that to when that order when that was no longer effective And the proposal would be for for that to be 90 days after that But this is this is all kind of just uh being being thrown out there as an option I know that covet 19 was was a was a concern of the Climate action subcommittee and how that might work out if this is the right time frame for something like this Uh, but obviously we don't want to you know hurt our business community even as much as they've been with with this pandemic And so tying it to um to a health order or something that effect I think would be a creative solution to that to that concern Next slide. All right. So obviously it's pretty important. What's what's going to be the business impact? Um it is somewhat difficult to really compare apples to apples or understand, you know Currently what businesses are purchasing what's going to be the dollar to dollar impact on their business From research that i've been able to find and this this initial bullet is actually going to probably be a little bit higher That did come from one specific article that said that the increase to switch to compostable products is about eight percent I have done just some general kind of you know off the wall research Of my own trying to compare apples to apples. Sometimes it's apples to oranges But I would probably put that in the range of about 10 to 10 to 40 percent. So This is just switching to compostable products. This doesn't include, you know, the overall operational cost This would just be the cost to switch to compostable products Initially would would be anywhere from by about 10 to 40 percent more than You know say single use plastic products that some businesses could maybe be currently using the ready Um, the hope is that the increasing costs could be associated with decreases in inventory costs as I mentioned by making it really Um A culture change where the food wear accessories are not just being provided automatically really nearly just here's your to-go item You're getting all this extra stuff in your bag. Whether you like it or not Um, that would save inventory costs as well as the hope is, um, you know If if folks were to really move to a reusable model It would be a little bit more costly up front But there would be You know numerous savings that could be made over the life of a business if they were to to allow and kind of Highly to or implement a reusable model that would have the most significant environmental impacts as well as cost savings um We have instituted an option for food vendors where they would be able to potentially charge that 25 cent fee to try to recoup some of those increased costs Um in in today's environments, um, sustainability is is important You know climate protection is is is on everybody's minds for the most part And so even in today's environment eco-friendly options can often attract new customers and help retain brand loyalty As well as another feature for businesses next slide all right, so Doing some outreach into the community That we have we have done some initial some initial outreach. I would say that there's there's definitely probably some more outreach That could be done But just to kind of detail what has been done so far from staff is in late october There was an information email describing the ordinance and the potential policy options that was sent to the chamber of commerce The sander is a downtown district man. Is that a chamber of commerce? um in early november Scheduled a zoom meeting with about eight to ten members of the sander of the downtown district of the proposal And just to kind of let you know if some of the comments that were made by some of the business community members that were there is um, california is currently essentially promoting single use items And just single use disposable items currently for health and safety purposes covid-19 There were some concerns about the potential increase in costs, especially in the current pandemic conditions and When we talked about the reusable option There was some folks in there that were a little uneasy of the fact of allowing customers to bring in their own Reusables for to go of food and beverages. There was some consternation on that next slide November 12th It did we meet with a handful of businesses and business owners in in rosin village office basketball Road there. It was actually organized by staff member rafael revero in planning and economic developments Some of the comments that we received from that meeting were that food trucks don't have the facilities to provide Onside diners with reusable foodware They would just want to make sure that there was enough time for businesses and To adapt to the regulations obviously would be important to conduct this outreach in spanish And there were a few folks that mentioned that the press democrat is a is a good medium for information sharing Next slide right November 19th also had a zoom meeting in today's environment with about 12 to 15 members of the latino business owners group This meeting was organized by marco suarez with the sonoma county economic development board Similar concerns with this group as well concern over the cost increases to switch to compostable There were some just kind of clarifying questions that were regarding the three bin system requirements And then there's some clarifying questions that I was able to answer during the call regarding the how the standard was a model might differ from What the zero waste sonoma model has put forth? Next slide so when we're looking at Excuse me fiscal impact directly the the fiscal impact would be To add a one one fte to the code enforcement division would cost about $126,000 annually um, there would obviously there would also probably be some additional fiscal impacts in the form of um, you know outreach materials marketing Radio spots, etc. Whatever we needed to do for as far as the outreach campaign and making sure that all the business owners Receive the information on the ordinance and then also understood that And so we would there would be some materials for outreach materials that would be needed to the purchase and so Due to the likely staffing impacts and another element that would be necessary to bring bring the ordinance forward Staff would be planning to come forward with budget recommendations in the upcoming in the upcoming budget cycle Next slide So overall what you know, you might be asking yourself. What's what's really the point of this? Why why do this? Um, you know, why don't we just continue with with whatever going right now? So the policy is the design to promote reusable and compostable food service where We encourage both the reuse of materials and the reduction of pollutants into the atmosphere The hope is that we would be you know diverting some of these products from the landfill As well as hopefully creating some of that culture change with with composting Really really important for for for Santa Rosa and all across the state Is for us to really focus on Having folks take those compostable materials that food waste and put it in the green bin and that just throw it into your trash at home It does take a little extra effort, but that's that's really essentially a lot of the main focus of sp1383 Which no longer is an ideal and an aspirational goal. We do have this California state regulation that is it's very prescriptive and is essentially going to be Uh, if Santa Rosa doesn't follow protocol properly and this applies to all other cities of California There is the potential for calorie cycle to to find those jurisdictions. So it's it's something that you know No longer is the right thing to do. It's it's it's going to be um, you know required Looking to reduce the amount of litter discharged to our streets and waterways It does um help us achieve those goals set forth in the zero waste master plan, which we passed earlier this year As well as it adheres to the the requirements sp1383 as I mentioned and it helps support our statewide trash amendment and municipal separate storm sewer system ms4 permits Next slide So this is really where the staff as I really want to kind of open it up to to hear from city council I've already heard from the climate action subcommittee. Um, but obviously we wanted to kind of bring you a a proposal a An ordinance that you could actually look at and chew on and pick apart and provide suggestions So I just am looking for your overall thoughts and comments your input um, I do know that The climate subcommittee had asked staff to move forward with this compostable model I would just reiterate that um, this compostable model would go above and beyond the zero waste snowman model and obviously there are significant concerns that You know, we would be asking folks to go compostable But the current marketplace and where we where we take these materials don't currently accept those materials as compost so effectively With those materials would be being screened out and sent back to the landfill So there there there would be some potential questions there as to the the impact of that and whether or not, you know Maybe this is the right time to move forward with that. So I'd be interested in your comments on that Um, how you feel about covet 19 the timing of it. Um, b. Are you okay with tying the implementation date to? Um, you know the pandemic and working with the city attorney's office to develop that language Just overall the implementation timeline what you guys might what your thoughts are on that You know the level of outreach that you would be looking for for city staff to perform And then the level of desired enforcement, obviously I mentioned that with for proactive enforcement We'd be looking for an additional staff member to the code enforcement team You know, would you would you like us to be proactive out there? Or would you like us to be kind of a reactive enforcement mechanism where we're responding to? you know Folks in the community letting us know that certain businesses may not be following the rules And then the next steps would be to obviously Kind of discuss this here here all of your your feedback your input And um, this this is currently a working ordinance a working document So it isn't set in stone the changes can definitely be made and um, my intention would be to to hear from you hear from the public here today and to to uh, you know Take those considerations take those potential suggestions or changes and then come back to you at a future date With a more refined ordinance for you to review at a future date, so At that point, I thank you for your time, and I'm here for any questions or comments that you might have All right. Thank you so much, joey So council if you have a question go ahead and hit the raise hand feature in the bottom right corner of Of zoom for the public What we will do is questions from council members first Then we will come to public comment, and then i'll bring it back to the council for their final thoughts and direction to staff With that i'm gonna See a councilwoman fleming that you have some questions for staff Indeed, thank you for your presentation. Mr. Hanowitz and all of the work that went into this I have a couple of questions. One is um So is around recology and that they currently are unable to process the Certain types of uh fully compostable material is that's what you're saying Well, it's actually not recology. The recology is really just going to be the hauler of the material to those to those sites It's the actual composting site. So like cold creek compost up in ukaya the the site in richmond and nap a recycling facility now But it's the your organization's the actual composting Yeah, and so what What would it take for those? types of businesses to be able to accept fully compostable materials or is there any market driven interest in You know, is there anybody who's sniffing around that just for seeing if there's an onslaught of municipalities and local governments doing this That they would open up the shop that took fully compostable materials It's a good question. Um, I'll be honest with you. I was talking with uh, recology zero waste manager yesterday about this exact thing And I think ultimately I think that there could be something in the future that I would look to work with the the composting Industry to understand why these materials really aren't accepted Um, I from what I understand right now one of the main elements is that the commercial composters claim that these materials they don't break down Um in the regular cycle and so effectively it's it's you know, it's not broken down all the way when they're ready to you know put that compost into Production and resale so they they screen out those materials I think one of the most important things is to Is that they they lose their organic designation? And obviously that's that there's they have a clear business need or Reason to try to maintain that designation because they can sell their compost, you know upwards up to 75 80 percent more than they could if they didn't Right. And so that tags on to my second question, which is And they would lose their Organics designation because of the coating materials that you outlined That come along with many of those composables. I kind of got lost. There's there's a lot of detail in there about that stuff Yeah, so the national organics program for for you to be certified organic You're essentially are not allowed to have any synthetic materials in that feedstock And currently the national organics program still considers PLA and especially PFAS Um as one of those synthetic materials so anything that has synthetic material and would no longer be able to be resold as um Okay, so your recommendation is that we use you be very specific about the type of material that you're recommending Become the the facto standard You know at this point I was really bringing forward a model ordinance where you know the best ordinance I thought would potentially bring us to that fully compostable option, you know If you're asking me for my my recommendation my recommendation would probably be at this point to To maybe wait back and see where the industry can maybe go in the future to go fully compostable because I have a hard time having the restaurants change to compostable products Pay the pay the increases and costs that might be associated with that When we know that those materials all in all likelihood aren't going to be ending up in that that green compost stream And that there's some question you're saying around the health effects of the coding on those things um, I I haven't got another question that is um around Any outreach that might have been done with the county health officer around You know people bringing their own reusable products And if you know, I understand we're in a pandemic, but I also understand that it doesn't seem that people are getting this and you know that people aren't catching cobit in general from touching surfaces I mean not that it's not possible, but um, did you reach out and see what the county health officers level of Comfort with people bringing their own products is in general because this got started before the pandemic and then also um, sorry the pandemic So I have had initial discussions with some representatives from the county department of health on this this this was when I was bringing it up to and it was really kind of in the very beginning of of cobit and so Their initial feedback to me was no way right now. There's just no way you can bring this forward, especially in this environment They were interested in speaking with me once, you know, the pandemic situation, you know died down so to say And looking at exploring potential options for this and working with the business community to allow that There is a state law ab 619 that has effectively You know said that, you know, it is okay and businesses would need to accept clean and sanitary To go containers from from, you know, the community and you know use that for to go Packaging or to go foodware, excuse me But there is a lot of industry pushback for the they are they're concerned About about safety and so I think there there still needs to be some Some considerable discussions and some outreach that need to be done for for us to really make that a reality But my intention is to definitely bring that forward and and to include that, you know Moving forward on potential additions and amendments to the ordinance And council member Fleming if I could just chime in, you know, joey's done quite a bit of research on this There are there are not a lot of cities that are already implemented some On ordinance like this that includes a bring your own To go container I think the challenge we're dealing with is the timing and I think that's what joey's trying to To demonstrate is the timing of this discussion when it when we're in such a place of Fully fully disposable Makes some of this just this really a challenging but but there are other communities as joey outlined in the beginning that that have implemented programs That are currently suspended of bringing your own To go containers And the other one and I don't know if the public see the The climate subcommittee considered this or if you consider this but having a standardized pre-use program where you know people Would make a deposit similarly to how one does when you go and buy something from the grocery store if throughout Santa Rosa vendors had standardized aluminum to go where and you Made a deposit and you could take it anywhere. I mean Throughout the city and you know clean it and then I don't know who this Excuse me Oh, I think that was a mistake. So I um There are there are that is kind of as that at the crux of what is being done currently You do see that in some larger cities like san francisco specifically around office environments Which may not be going on right now that that are doing this reuse where you do have that kind of reuse pilot Where are you bringing your you know the containers and in the next week you switch them out for your new food There also are some discussions and I do know that zero waste Sonoma was exploring some potential grant opportunities for a reuse pilot And so those those are definitely things that you know We're at the cutting edge of the zero waste kind of movement and stuff that we are keeping an eye out for but that currently Aren't in place here in Sonoma county, but I can assure you that you know We're definitely doing our best to try to bring that bring that to the community And I was also curious though if you had had a chance to reach out. I've been to certain restaurants In other jurisdictions where they just don't do Um To go You know disposable to go stuff there like you can buy a mason jar Um, or some you know other inexpensive thing. Um, and you can bring it back or you know So it you know instead of like you know all of this consternation over how it's going to get processed Just stopping doing it and doing what people do Um You know it with bags and you know when when people change their Um expectations behaviors follow and it just kind of becomes the norm. I mean it was that explored at all just flat out banning it Uh at this point the flat out ban wasn't wasn't considered. Um, just because I guess the thought would be I'm not really sure what it would leave businesses to be able to deutilize going forward Um, ultimately, I think where you're what you're getting to is really where we want to move I mean our my implementation is not to really go compostable would be to go reusable It's in my opinion where it would say it has the most significant environmental impact as well as I think it'd save Businesses the most money and there actually are some case studies from alameda. They have a rethink disposables Um program where they they've essentially been able to do that and show that it has been able to save those restaurants money And so I think that is something that um You know is is going to be one of those upstream solutions and that that's something that I definitely want to look into in the future Okay, thank you. I appreciate you answering all my questions of course Hey, thank you councilmember councilmember Sawyer Thank you, mayor, and thank you joey for a really comprehensive staff report and Presentation It's it's a very challenging endeavor and you've articulated well the various challenges, and I'm sure there will be more Um as time goes on My question has to do because a year from now is going to happen really quickly So it has to do with the citations and on page eight of your staff report. You mentioned how you would be notifying the business of a failure to To respond to the to the order and I'm a little bit concerned about how I mean there's There's always someone there's always a business that you'll give them a notice They say I didn't get it And this could get expensive if they if they were not to get the order. Were you intended on doing a? A Return receipt on on on some kind of violation or how would how would you know that the right person Is getting the message that they're not compliant Uh, so I think that's a great question councilmember Sawyer, and I think that that's something that you know I could definitely think think a little bit deeper on and get back to you in the future a little bit more clearly but I think the initial intention would be to To send that to send that letter And then my hope with the proactive enforcement mechanism would for there to be an actual face-to-face conversation Because in my opinion a lot of these things is it's culture change and I don't really think a letter is gonna Change that and so I I'm really a big proponent of actually having that face-to-face conversation and assistance To where that person shows up and says this is what you're using. Okay. This this is how you this is how what you should be using We understand all you may be confused You know, it's a lot easier to to to help out the the citizen and the customer if you have that Face-to-face contact so that would be my initial approach would be to to having it be you know How did the letter being sent out? But then also having there be a follow-up An in-person follow-up by one of the the code enforcement members or potentially myself or somebody on my team Yeah, that makes a lot of sense I think that there would be a lot of pluses as just as moving forward in that way, especially with something like a food truck Because an address I'm not unless it's a business license address and that's going to go to somebody But I think you're that the face-to-face approach not only guarantees that the right person gets the information But an opportunity to educate. I think that's a great way to go. That's the only question I had for clarification. Thank you All right Great councilmember tippants Thank you mayor. Joey, this is going to probably seem like a silly question And I'm pretty sure I know the answer But I just want to ask it to be sure when you talk about an eight percent cost increase You're talking about the line item for the inventory not the overall business Correct one item for the inventory costs not the overall business. Yeah Okay, and also to be clear Um, you were talking about uh, we don't currently have the industry for the fully compostable And you are recommending um, that that we go with kind of a A baby step in approach for lack of a better term and do you know when the industry will be online? Is there a guarantee that it will be? Uh, you know, there's no guarantees. Um, you know, I kind of as mentioned by councilmember flemmy It would be working with the compost kind of industry to understand the detriments of having these materials Um, it would also be that you know, these compostable materials with these, you know, compostable polymer Compostable plastics or kind of fiber-based plastics out of cornstarch. It's really kind of brand new. It's cutting edge Um, I was working with one of the local companies here in Sonoma county that does make these products and There is the potential for r&d research and development down the road where They might be able to design a product that is fully compostable And is acceptable by the uh by the compost industry So there's there's kind of you know, you would need to get all those those three segments together the policy makers Which would be the city the city council the the compost uh industry and then also the the business community That's that's making these products. Um, and so I do have uh, I'm I think that in the future there definitely could be something that would be feasible and usable for all It's just right now. It seems like we're not quite there, but um, you know It seems like there there are companies that are currently looking into that to try to Find a product that would be suitable for for everybody And if I could chime in I just want to add onto what joey said and to some of this is a market issue, right? You know as the market builds not only will compost facilities be more likely to expand their offering of what they're willing to take But we're going to see more and more aggressive behavior from the manufacturing companies. They're they're creating These compostable products and so so I think the more agencies begin to work this direction to More fully compostable the more not only products are available But also the more outlets to be able to take those products for composting in the future Okay now, but in the interim I understand the kind of creating the demand aspect in the benefit of going compost now but Is it safe to say that the environmental benefit of doing that now is that if one of these objects Were to fall off the cart and enter the ecosystem It's going to to compose and biodegrade more quickly with less ramifications to the ecosystem You know that is a great question and you know, you could probably talk to 10 different people with 10 different answers their council member tidbits, but effectively with a lot of these compostable products Especially the kind of compostable plastics and there is the argument with the the compostable fiber-based lining Is that they won't break down unless they are actually in a man kind of Seen commercial compost process. So the argument is if you put it out to the natural environment It's going to degrade like any other biodegradable product. And so it's um effectively It really would be compostable in the situation of being in a commercial commercial composting process where it's being overseen with the right conditions I see okay So it is safe to say that we're the benefit is more solely focused on Demand creation for the industry to follow You know the demand creation as well as you know, one of the other benefits is obviously would be reducing Plastics getting plastics out of the environment and getting plastics out of out of the the waste stream Obviously the argument that it sounds like you're making and kind of what I'm I'm understanding as well is You know, there may be some unintended consequences with moving that direction at least in the current environment It may be it may be a little bit premature But I still think that there, you know, there are pros and cons to Either way you look at it, but at this point there might be more Um concerns surrounding it only because You know, you're hoping that it goes into the compost stream It's getting screened out and it needs to be hauled back again by ecology to the landfill. And so You know, it potentially may create additional Work or or issues for the other industries after it gets, you know, out of the can Well, that that's what I was dig. I was searching for is I guess What's the benefit other than demand creation and to me reducing single-use plastics out of the environment is a really important goal You know, I I do think and I'll make my comments later after I listen to the public But I do really like your proposal to phase this in after cobit 19 Um, it just makes a lot of sense from a public health and safety standpoint Economics bottom line standpoint for businesses right now. And you know, this is this could be during cobit We don't want to be engaged in the death by a thousand cuts exercise that we hear about so commonly Um, but uh, this is awesome. Joey. I think it's a it's good stuff right All right council members what help Thank you Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Joey for that presentation again I learn more every time I hear different perspectives of it And one of the things that I think we heard at the subcommittee which had an impact on me was the capacity Of our current landfill Uh, and specifically when it will be at capacity if we don't do something do you remember what those timelines and figures were? Yeah, we're looking at about 26 years left of uh of available capacity And that's if we don't do anything such as what we're discussing today, correct Yeah, that's if that's if we continue on the same trend that we are in Sonoma county over the past You know five ten years, correct Great. Thank you. And then are there any other Sonoma county jurisdictions contemplating this or having anything That we're discussing in place Yes, zero waste Sonoma has been reaching out to all the jurisdictions there there have been a few of the jurisdictions that have passed the zero waste Sonoma model Which um, basically allows for it to be compostable or recyclable. Um, which essentially would you know And it encourages the to-go foodware to be upon request and encourages the abusables Excuse me. Um, there are some of the jurisdictions have been sabastopol. They adopted it Um, Healdsburg, I believe and I believe Windsor adopted it But they've currently suspended that due to uh, it's suspended enforcement because of of the pandemic situation So nobody's actively enforcing any anything like this currently Great. And so it would be helpful for me Uh, making the assumption this item comes back if we could see Here's the similarities and here are the differences because I do feel for both businesses and consumers To understand, okay, now I'm in this city and how's it the same and how's it different because I think consistency Throughout our region would really be a good idea and then a lot of the outreach he did and a lot of the information about, uh, Restaurants dining and taking out, um, was covered But this would also apply to grocery stores, correct for like plastic bottles plastic water bottles They would no longer if we passed the similar ordinance for grocery stores or warehouse outlets They would no longer be able to offer those products. Is that accurate? Uh, not entirely so with this one the focus would be on the actual food wear element of it So you would have to be receiving food to go Um, it wouldn't be it wouldn't be covering the broad spectrum of plastics in in santa rosa Which would be a whole separate ordinance and in a whole another lift, but This would only be applying to foods prepared or packaged with the intention of being eaten off the premises um And so, you know Bringing that up there. Well, there was one that did come to mind where it potentially could be where it would apply is like say like in, um, Oliver's or Whole Foods where you get those kind of to pre-made to go foods to go In within the ordinance itself the way that I brought it forward to you would be able to apply to to those to those Folks as well, but it wouldn't apply to like a Pepsi bottle or a Coke bottle now So I guess when we're talking about it is the one of the goals is to not let this enter into you know single use enter into our environment You know, I think all of us if we've attended any of our grocery stores or large warehouse outlets You see cases upon cases of plastic water bottles leaving the facilities Would we have you entertained potentially including those type of single uses? Um, it's I mean it's been entertained. I mean whether or not We could move forward. I think that would be a much significant larger lift Um, and the change would maybe be have to be made at the state level. Essentially, we would be You know, we would effectively be banning all single use plastic altogether Which would be a really really big ordinance and a really big push and and you know, it would probably cause some consternation in the business community Um, ultimately, I think that's that's the goal of where zero waste would like to go in But what we found in other jurisdictions and kind of with other similar cities that are that are kind of doing some of these these things is the The foodware component has really been kind of the the highest level that they've taken on on reducing some of these products That no other jurisdiction has gone to that level that you that you mentioned I guess I'd be interested in further exploring this based on what mr. Tibbets was saying about the business perspective And though at mr. Nutt was explaining to that if we're just eliminating to restaurants the supply and demand from the manufacturer aspect of it I you know, I don't have the data But I'm guessing some of the large warehouse places where I you know The aforementioned case upon case of bottled water goes out probably has a bigger impact And if we're able to get that industry to voluntary comply Due to the impact on landfill and some of the other studies that you said well They pulled out of san francisco bay, you know, I know you can't trace it back to you know the source But I would venture to guess a large part of it is from those grocery stores and large warehouse outlets So if we really want to make a difference, I think that might be you know, maybe not the first step But something the direction that we're going so Thank you. Those are all the questions I had Thank you council member and uh, actually just on that note for the the rest of the council That is a discussion that we'll continue to have at the climate action committee Tom and and joey and I we've had some pretty good conversations about the futures of plastics Including what to do with those single use plastics and and I think to your point one of the things That that we really need to be considering in this ordinance Is the idea that micro plastics don't break down and compost. They just they continue to exist and end up elsewhere And one of my favorite statistics to use in this conversation is to talk about 70 percent of breast milk that was tested Had micro plastics in it. So it is a public health issue as well that we need to be getting to Joey, I wanted to ask you a little bit about an educational campaign around this In particular if we have this three bin Approach for our restaurants And you mentioned specifically that the graphics that will be on top of the bin to try to teach the community What goes where who provides those those bins the graphics and the educational component Is that built into our contract with the brocology currently? The the infrastructure as far as the bins Would not be inside the restaurant The ecology is required for the contract to provide the bin that would be you know The ultimate collection bin outside of the restaurant. So your two the four yard bin They are required to provide that to to all of the businesses that are required for sp 1383 which I've been working on ecology with The expectation would be that the businesses would be expected as a business cost To to buy the in restaurant bins and then the signage would be relatively easy We have the pdf graphics already that are made by ecology and so we can make that available where they could essentially You know have a you know those graphics already pre-made and print it out And then you know laminated and they can provide those relatively pretty easily for the businesses Okay, and do you have an idea what the the cost for those bins would be for the restaurant? It would I would just be venturing a guess, but you know, I'm thinking 50 60 dollars for a bin And depending on how large the restaurant is and you know, they're really only going to be adding an additional compost bin They should already hopefully have garbage and recycling or if not garbage two bins Um, and so you're probably looking at a couple hundred bucks To to be able to do this for a one time for a one time cost Okay, was there any discussion? And I really appreciate by the way You're bringing forward the fte's that it would require for us to actually implement And the cost for the fte I think is really an important component for us to understand was there any discussion of If you do it institute a 25 cent surcharge on these takeouts that you have One cent i'm making this up obviously one cent out of that 25 comes back to the city to help fund The the enforcement of the ordinance. Was there any discussion along those lines? Personally there there wasn't no the I hadn't seen that any of the other jurisdictions, but You know per council's direction if if you would like me to look into that I'm happy to do so But we haven't had any research or any discussions about that currently no Okay, I think that'd be a good conversation for the council to have After we hear public comments as well And then just one more question for you and it's a data question You mentioned in the beginning that our goal is to get to less than one pound of waste per person per day What is santa rosa currently at? We're at about 2.8 Right Yeah, so we're looking to get about a 10 reduction each year, which is a It's a big goal, but we're hoping that you know, we could we kind of start turning the tide a little bit with the community Okay, great. Um, thank you so much. That's the the last question that I have Very good thorough presentation So we will go on to public comment now For folks who would like to speak go ahead and hit the raise hand feature Dina In our clerk will will have a three minute timer for folks You will be able to speak when she allows you to to join in And then we will bring it back to to the council after public comment for discussion First on the list that I see is slown Followed by lizzette. So slown if you want to take it away make sure that you can unmute And hear us and you'll have three minutes Can you all hear me? Yep. Okay, great Um, good afternoon mayor rogers and city council members. My name is slown pogol and I am with zero waste sonoma A couple comments today. Um first zero waste sonoma fully supports santa rosa And going above and beyond the provisions of the model polystyrene and disposable foodware ordinance, which was created by our agency Secondly, I'd like to highlight that pla line fiber compostable products are not accepted through our collection programs and screened out as landfill material Which uh, joey did mention and it was brought up in the questions um Next From a litter abatement perspective compostable foodware is no less likely to become litter than plastic At this point while compostable fiber Products may degrade more quickly than plastic in the environment These items will still persist for months or years outside of the commercial compost facility And finally, um, although we want to reduce the overall use of single use plastics We recognize that recology is accepting and recycling hard plastic food service wear and packaging at this time Which is why these products are compliant under the original model ordinance Um, so again, we think it's great that the staff is proposing an ordinance that goes Far above and beyond what we created and we would love to see some of these changes adopted Thank you for the opportunity to speak today and that concludes my comments Great. Thank you so much slown Lizette followed by Catherine Yes, hello All right, we can hear you Lizette go ahead. I wasn't sure if you could hear me. Thank you My name is lissette van vliet and i'm the senior policy coordinator of the organization breast cancer prevention partners Which is a national organization that focuses on preventing breast cancer before it starts From our exposure to toxic chemicals which have been scientifically proven as linked to the disease um I would like to say that we are very strongly in support of this ordinance as it pertains to the p f as chemicals the single use plastics and the styrofoam band Because all three of these items or chemical categories Are linked with cancer and breast cancer specifically PFAS Several of these have been scientifically associated with increased risk for breast cancer these chemicals never break down They will never be Compostible in the way that we understand the word They can be found in the placenta in maternal cord blood and as was already mentioned in breast milk There's lots more specific details on the scientific findings on our website under the glossary of exposures um So these p fas get into the food Um studies have shown that they leech or migrate into the food They then go into our bodies and then they then go into our babies Um, and it's not just breast cancer. There's also concerns about affecting semen quality affecting Time to pregnancy early menopause onset as well as some of the other concerns that were highlighted in the presentation Moving on to styrene It's a known carcinogen Um, and it was listed already in 2011 by the national report on carcinogens um to do with the um lympho hematopoetic system that's um production of lymphocytes Cells of blood lymph nodes bone marrow spleen and thymus and then just finally single use plastics use a lot of chemicals That are known to be disruptive of the hormones in our bodies and that has been linked to breast cancer as well as lots of other chronic and fatal diseases So we strongly support this ordinance and wish you all speed in your deliberations and look forward to hearing your conclusions. Thank you very much Thank you, Lizette. Thank you for the comments. Catherine followed by chris Can you hear me? Yep. Go ahead. Great. This is Catherine Dodd. I'm a member of the alliance of nurses for healthy environments And I'm want to first say that joey's work was amazing and thorough Um, he probably knows more about waste than most of us And I also want to thank the climate action committee for including um a more aggressive uh model ordinance than sonomas which uh was which does Talk about I spoke to the staff and they said they they do want to eliminate Um PFAS, uh, but they didn't specifically mention it So I really hope that santa rosa as the county seat will lead that effort Sonoma county will be reviewing this in j in january of 2021 Um, PFAS as was mentioned is a forever chemical We don't want it in our landfill where it will ultimately leach into our water We don't want it in our food wear where it'll leach into our body The cdc has pointed out that it decreases immunity And it decreases the effectiveness of vaccines, which brings me to the pandemic We are eating out of to-go containers far more than we ever did So to wait until the pandemic slows down kind of tying it to Opening restaurants defeats the purpose. We need to decrease our exposure to PFAS now For for all the reasons that have been cited We also need to decrease our solid waste and and banning styrene and PFAS coated Containers will do that This is not something we should be waiting on the these chemicals are where it We're being increasingly exposed to them. I want to draw your attention to the consumer's union Testimony which points out that many of our retailers like pandera and chipotle Already comply with this The center for the environmental health is willing to help the other localities Berkeley, San Francisco are willing to help this should not take us two years to implement It should take us six months and I'll leave it at that. Thank you very much Thank you so much Catherine chris followed by Logan Chris if you can go ahead and unmute yourself There you go.  All right. Thanks. Uh, my name is chris o'neill and managing partner russian river vineyards We're here in forestville And we do serve food um With our uh, you know in our operation and well, we were anyway and hope to again at some time in the Not too distant future. Uh, we serve five or six hundred people a week and although we don't do takeout We use compostable serve where for all our outside dining and Really thankful that the uh council climate action committee is is looking to strengthen this proposed Ordinance because you know getting the PFAS out of the food wear and and and styrene as well It has been difficult, you know getting healthier options to the PFAS and and um But I think that as as joey pointed out that as we create an additional demand for that Those options will become more prevalent and probably less costly. Um, I have worked with Recology and they did provide us with a Comp compost dumpster And everything that we use for service from silverware to uh, you know food containers and what we serve them in in paper bags all goes into The compost and there was actually no additional cost to that compost dumpster for us and so not only do we Reduce what's going into the landfill, but we're actually saving some money because we're Doing, you know less We're having to pay to get rid of so, you know during the pandemic as we're trying to support local restaurants and Purchasing more takeout products. We really need to get rid of the harmful Chemicals in these and you know that that do end up in our landfills and and ultimately our groundwater And I want to just thank you for helping to eliminate some of those chemicals out of making our community Healthier place to live. Thanks very much All right. Thank you sir for your comments Folks, we have a celebrity in the house. Uh, mayor harvey from sonoma. Go ahead. You'll have three minutes I'm going to be pretty strict about it with you Thank you chris and I would like to congratulate you Mayor rogers on your selection to be mayor of santa rosa appreciate working with you on a cta and regional climate protection authority and uh, given thanks to Mayor schwedholm for his time as mayor it was great working with you on the uh The mayor's call so I appreciate about the work Also, I really want to thank joey henowitz. I'm calling kind of in my capacity as a waste zero specialist for recology snowman marin Joey's been a fantastic Person to work with and just really a leader on this and I think the presentation He's put together for you today is really emblematic of that work. And so, you know Joey's joey's really helping you guys lead the way and you guys are leading the county And so I appreciate that just a couple comments that I would make yeah Recology is the implementer. We have uh recycling compost and garbage bins that we place outside for kind of general service We also do education in the restaurants. My role is to go into restaurants and businesses Teach them how to properly recycle compost and and throw things away and reduce their Reduce what they're putting into the garbage and so as something that we take really seriously and we work hard on We also provide some amount of indoor bins But there's sometimes they're charged. Sometimes they're not Just kind of depending on circumstances and it's about 30 dollars for kind of slim gym style ones I'm sure there's there's a range of prices. So just to kind provide some clarity there As far as compostable plastics, I would encourage the council to look and we recently went through the national zero waste Conferences and there's some interesting examples in places like Portland, Oregon and throughout the bay area like go box Where they're doing reusable? There's a program who do reusable Plastic ware and to go boxes and so it's really kind of incredible to have that System running if you could get that started in Santa Rosa or we could talk about doing it in the county Providing kind of a place where our business could come through Wash to go to containers and keep them completely out of landfill which may solve some of these problems about organics Would encourage also looking at organic options in terms of straight paper And wood fiber options. These are kind of compostable food ware options that do break down Significantly better than the bpi plastic But as an implementer of some of these programs, I would say that the bagging the Bpi certified compostable plastic bags are really critical to get restaurants to compost at all There's always concerns about rats and other sort of vermin that can come as a result of having a foodware And that's significantly mitigated or a food waste in a bin outside That's always significantly mitigated by using compostable bags So it's a it's a really critical piece That's there. So again, you know, I Recall that we look forward to continue or continuing our partnership with the city of santa rosa I appreciate you guys taking the lead on this in the county It's all part of our kind of climate goals and our collective goals. And so You know, just appreciate you guys you guys have the manpower. You're leading the way and the rest of us can continue Thank you All right. Thank you so much, mr. Mayor And uh, hopefully your council continues to follow us as well on this one Mara, you're up next Mara go ahead and unmute yourself And dna, can we unmute mara? Let's see if she's there Well, mara, we're having a little bit of trouble with you. I'm going to go on to anita really fast and we'll try to come back to you afterwards Anita, can you hear us? Yeah, I can hear you. Can you hear me? Yep, you got three minutes. Go ahead. Okay, great Um, so again, my name is Anita migliore. I also work with Logan here at recology We're part of a team. Um, that does the zero waste outreach and education So, um, I just wanted to say we're really excited about this ordinance and we appreciate the the council and and the mayor's time To be looking at this and considering it and and we appreciate your your support of this as well. We're very excited Recology as a whole and myself personally have over 20 years of experience in implementing these programs We've done this model in san francisco over that time period and we're really excited to be bringing that Here to sonoma county and just kind of getting that awareness To the general public about, you know, there is a better way to be doing this there's a better way to Be respectful of our environment and just little changes can do that except we offer The the program here in uh, santa rosa at no no additional charge So it's included with the service and so hopefully we we try to educate that with the people And make sure they understand. Hey, this is beneficial for your bottom line and the environment as well as meeting state and county goals So I just want to say we're we're ready for action. We're ready to partner with the um With the city's department to make sure we're educating everyone and supplying the tools to do it and make it easy And basically just make it happen. So I just wanted to say we're we're excited and ready to go Thank you. All right. Well, thank you so much. Anita and thank you for for being here with us today Um, so mara, it looks like you have lowered your hand If you're still interested in speaking, I'll give you another second to to put it back up if we can try again Okay, I'm not seeing any hands raised Uh, madame city clerk. Were there any public comments via phone or email? Thank you, mayor rogers. There were no voice message public comments received and Uh, we did receive several Email public comments which were uploaded into the registrar file and the agenda was republished this morning and made available to the public Excellent. Thank you so much. Uh, and I did see one additional hand pop up that I'll take Before we come back to the council. Uh, and that's barbara. Go ahead, barbara Barbara go ahead and unmute Okay, can you hear me? I apologize Yeah, go ahead. Now. My name is Barbara Sattler I'm a registered nurse and a professor emeritus at the university of san francisco and I I live in somnilma county and I'm just going to limit my comments to the PFAS issues And I know that others have talked with you about The health effects associated with it and I just want to tell you that Every semester one or two of my students and this is for the past Several years have always done a literature review on PFAS Choosing that and the literature just keeps expanding in terms of the health effects And right now 95 of those of us who are on this zoom conference As well as 95 of our relatives including children are likely accumulating PFAS in our bodies And we know this because every year the unit u.s. Government through the cbc Tests a representative group of americans For the presence of toxic chemicals that should never be in the human body and PFAS And similarly constructed chemicals are found in 95 of the samples of blood and or urine And so to me these results are an indication of failed chemical policies A sign that our state and federal governments are failing to protect us from very harmful chemicals But you have this amazing opportunity to put forth a policy that will begin to protect us from at least the food wear related PFAS exposures And I want to just share another public health success story and failure story in the 1920s When we began to know that lead was really An unforgiving poison particularly for children They banned the use of lead in europe in the 1920s in paint It took the u.s. Till 1978 to do that And just think about how often you repaint a house, right? So how many layers Of lead based paint um and associated lead based paint dust have we made our children Around the country exposed to so we are at a moment now that is similar to the 1920s moment And you can be making a decision about this known poison and reducing it and removing it from our environment So it really encouraged you to adopt an ordinance that protects not just Individual and public health, but the environment all at the same time. So thank you so much. I really appreciate the opportunity to say this Yeah, absolutely.  Uh for council members so that we're clear on what type of feedback you'd like to hear at the end of this study session sure Once it's queued up. I will uh I will do that okay, so Some of the feedback that i'm looking for from you today mayor and city council members is Just your overall thoughts and your overall input on the direction of the ordinance how you feel about it Are you comfortable with it? Would you like us to go further? Do you want us to rain it back? You know what I think one of the big really the biggest star that I would probably have Near this thing would be the second bullet is Obviously we want to be as aggressive as possible. We wanted to try to be as fully compostable as possible But I just want to make sure that we understand if if we do go this direction We can give her to those single-use plastics but in in the current environment and currently with the industry If we do go fully compostable with just the understanding that those those materials in all likelihood Are going to be getting screened out and taken back to the landfill because they won't be accepted at the compost facility, so I just would be interested in your thoughts on that obviously Regarding the COVID-19 implications and the timeline. Are you comfortable with the implementation date of january 1st? Would you like to implement sooner? Would you like to tie it to potentially that health order so that? We don't you know, we don't impact those businesses Even further than they've been impacted during this during this time That implementation timeline. I kind of just spoke about as well There has been some some limited outreach that has been done and my hope is to do some additional outreach but I would be interested on your Your desire for the level of outreach to the business community I would also kind of especially considering that there probably isn't going to be many in-person meetings That would be available. So these would be through digital means And then also your level of desired enforcement. Do you want us to be proactive or reactive in the enforcement? And then really just any other comments or feedback that you have is great It might my next plan would be to incorporate your feedback incorporate your policy direction And to come back with you with a little bit more of a refined ordinance after I hear from you For your future consideration Excellent So with that, I'm going to first see if councilmember Schwedhelm who is On the climate action subcommittee if he has any thoughts or if you'd like to try to answer some of those questions for you Sure. Thank you, mr. Mayor Once again Joey, I'm uh, I really appreciate all the information you've been providing. This is the direction I think we do need to go My biggest concern is the implementation timeline and is that outreach with those business owners Are going to be directly impacted by this. I'm not in that industry. So I'd want that continued Dialogue and I'm very hesitant to say, you know, six months after the public health order expires We need to continually stay in dialogue with them because I'm guessing as quickly as this last shelter in place order You know, I think we had 24 hour notice if I'm running a business in trying to understand what impacts will that have on my business As we're evolving through here. I don't want to add additional stress To these businesses that are in a very challenging situation So again that constant dialogue and actually letting them brainstorm together because one of the things in my meetings with business owners Um, they said just give us. Okay. Where you want to go and let our Entrepreneurial spirit come up with some solutions and that really resonated with me. I think it would also resonate With this challenge. So let's lean on those entrepreneurs to come up with a timeline I would hope that they recognize where we need to go and I would just ask that they help us get there And I think those are my comments Great. Thank you councilmember. Councilmember alvarez Thank you, mayor. Uh, I do believe the time is now I believe there's no better time than now, especially now during the pandemic. This does allow us, uh A period of time where we're a business owner, especially in my district with the top of trucks down to basketball road Do have an opportunity to implement the strategy with that said I would like more information about possible vendors To make them available to the top of trucks And I would also like to know the breakdown of your your assessment of the line item being up to 40 percent more expensive to to implement the the renewable sources In regards to outreach one of your your Questions, I definitely would recommend the social media as well as the facebook Local radio stations. Those are extremely Effective in the spanish community and I would like to see more of those being used and I make myself available to you In order to make that part of it happen There was a important subject that was brought up or or issue brought up with from councilman fleming in regards to The the recology center. We just heard a speaker say that they are more than happy to help us implement this this program Um, I would like to know what what what they have actually available for us at this point in time But at the same time, I would like to know what the cost associated is for the hauling of the the The material that we cannot process here in in sonoma county And I would also like to to maybe do more more Collaboration more conversation where we can help The local businesses have the potential to to take on This this matter and so where they don't take the loss with the 75 80 percent of their Their their their products that they do have for sale or they can make available to the to the market In regards to the enforcement education should always be first. I would hate to see that we would be Uh in the reactive part of really Enforcing the defiance or the penalties to the community, especially as one they're dealing with the covid issues at this current time And I believe I believe that is it for now But again, I do make myself available to any of the efforts that you that you uh have in mind Especially with the with the community in the first district as again the talk of trucks from my perspective They will be the most heavily affected by by this ordinance But again, uh, something very important that you just state it's a cultural change and when we see over 2,500 items in the russian river or 1,000 cubic Yards of wastes in our creeks It's hard for any of us to say that this is not the time to to make that cultural change. So thank you for that All right. Thank you, sir councilwoman fleming Thank you, mayor. Um, so, you know where I one thing that really resonated with me is what councilmember schwedhelm said about You know empowering the business community to solve this problem And so to that end I say let's be bold And not say, you know Just do this. Let's say That we want to stop using reusable Um items and I know that it probably sounds crazy, but I was watching um Boardwalk empire a couple years ago and watching the guy take his food around. I mean, it's it's really a new thing that we use reusable items and it's You know a big thing that the plastics industry pushed and they're going to be aggressive about this But they've really confined this conversation and defined for us So that what we're doing here is we're really in a reactive position Um and living in fear because we've been taught that we we have to have these items that the best we can do is trying not to poison, you know our Our people at night, you know, it's the percentage of women You know who are lactating is as high as you say it is I think that First of all, I mean, I don't want to conflate the PFAS issue. I am completely there That just has to go That's completely unacceptable But I I think that the ask really from the business community. I see all kinds of branding opportunities in terms of having reusable and to take out things but um, you know as far as like Building a secondary cottage industry around Um dealing with the problematic aspects of compostable Uh serve where just it just seems kind of nutty to me. I think we ought to you know Go back to basics and use glass and aluminum and you know be the adults that we are and these things, you know 60 of Businesses which means 50 more businesses in our county are owned by men than women so, um, you know 60 percent of that means that The amount of when we talk about who is this impacting and The developing children are more susceptible to these types of toxins And you know, I really appreciate being differential to our business community as they create a ton of jobs But also they get the benefit of making a lot, you know, in many cases their incomes off of having boysons The earth and and our women and children and in people color and disproportionate numbers So I think that we need to be bold We need to ask them to step up stop using this these types of products and to make these changes right away I don't think that the pandemic if anything it adds urgency to why we should do it because more people are using Takeout services rather than dying in And so I think we need to do it sooner rather than later I recognize that my position might seem extreme But I think if you go forward a hundred years if we haven't completely torched the planet at that point in time It will seem kind of like a no-brainer that we stopped doing this at a certain point not to mention the landfill and problems with Composable and he fast So to to your questions, mr. Heinewitz, um You know, I think I said I don't think that the Coronavirus should have an impact on implementation. I think implementation should be Six months to 12 months the level of outreach. I really like what councilmember albright suggested around that face-to-face contact I think that that allows for business owners to ask questions and feel supported by us and then You know, I think that that hopefully will reduce the need for enforcement But hopefully we'll have a proactive enforcement so that we just don't have more regulations with That that aren't enforced And then You know, I do think that that what we will probably really need are robust education program to go with with this But I think that our residents our kids And people who are bearing the brunt of the reproductive services Which are making the majority of the economic group in our City and county deserve to be cared for in this way and You know, people shouldn't be bearing the the brunt and the expenses All for the sake of the profit. Thank you Thank you councilwoman councilmember tidbits Thank you mayor, let me pull up my list here My overall thoughts and input joey, I mean, yeah, like the speaker said, I was really impressed with just how much you know this stuff And thanks for bringing a, you know, a complete Neophyte like me into some level of understanding My overall thoughts though, I think that this is absolutely a good thing. I want to see us Get to the the fully compostable model, you know, what sold it for me was The plastics getting it out of our creeks and water and ocean, you know, I like to tell the story about When I was crossing to Hawaii, it was just like every minute you saw some kind of floating plastic and it was just such a shame So I'm on board for that COVID-19 implications and implementation implementation timeline for me are Different than the previous council members who spoke. I do think that this needs to be implemented after COVID-19 is over and You know, I think just by for two reasons one when the public health officer tells you please wait I think we have a kind of a responsibility to listen. We are about masks and other important things The second issue for me is, you know, I think that it's becomes easy to forget How difficult it is for businesses these days and they're just trying to make payroll. They're just trying to make rent Keep their space open I was talking to our grant writer at St. Vincent of Paul today and she got a call from her One of her restaurant a friend of hers who owns a restaurant and the person said we're so close to going under Please continue to order takeout from us. And I don't think that story is unique. So I don't think we should be You know piling issues on at this time Um, uh, so we went through implementation timeline. Joey, I really liked your suggestion when COVID is over You know, bring this in and let's go full compost Um, level of outreach. I really appreciate you tapping into marcos rafael. Um, you know, that's keep doing that Like eddie said use the council members as much as as you need Probably doing good, um Outreach to the restaurant tours through the business community is probably important I'd reach out to peter rumble at the santa rosa metro chamber I believe there's even a restaurant association around I I've only heard from them Um in small moments in time But even though you're probably going to create opposition to this by reaching out to them I think it's important that you do. Um, so we can really Uh, get more data like tom was saying, you know making sure that these assumptions in here are correct I'm sure that they are but also just to be able to say that we reached out and you know, your input was was received Um level of desired enforcement. I do not want to pay for proactive enforcement I think that we have a citizenry here That is really diligent and really passionate about this issue and I have no doubt that They'll be proactive in reaching out to uh, code enforcement And and as far as next steps are concerned, I look forward to seeing this come back to council With more input and ultimately, you know, I'm barring more public input. I look forward to supporting it. So thank you Council member Sawyer Thank you, mayor. I'm gonna move from the bottom up. Um Level of desired enforcement. I'm not interested in doing the proactive. I think that that uh council member Tibbets is is correct The the community is watching. They will be good at identifying Those individuals that need a um face-to-face communication Um, and some probably some more education um Which leads me to uh level of outreach. You can never have too much outreach um and the uh the um All of the avenues that you can take advantage of um, and I know that Some of that outreach is already happening with with um zero waste Sonoma They have a very good program and some great employees working on outreach as well. So that that will be Uh as as important as it is you also have a lot of avenues to to to go down In in the outreach area Implementation timeline. I am concerned and I'll tie that to the covet. Um, I agree with with council member Tibbets again I am concerned about putting more pressure on our restaurants as much as I would love to get rid of the plastics And get rid of everything that's bad in our in our waste stream I would be concerned With the timing right now of as important as it is because there is so much to take out It's a little it's it's really a conundrum, but I would be uh, I would be concerned with putting more pressure on our restaurants um At the same time they could be educated as to to like starting the process sooner And since they are going through so much so many takeout containers, I assume they are um Maybe they could uh, you know, we could be in communication with with with the restaurants letting them know that this is coming I'm sure that that's already in in part of the plan is to you know, keep them fully um informed as to the as to the what the future holds because this is going this is not a in if um, but I went and uh, so they they needed the sooner they started kind of in planning on on how to to address these issues And changing who their vendors are and how they buy these products The the sooner they start thinking about it. Um, the better off they will be um In the the fully the proposed fully compostable model one of the things i'm concerned about is Is the wasted effort of putting these things in the in the compost that are now that are just going to be screened out And then put in the landfill How would I be curious about is what the processors and our composters those people that are in the business? um What what are the what if any are the costs involved in spinning their wheels? um Putting these things in the compost bin and then having them take them out and put and then trucking them back to um to central um If they're spending a lot of money doing that I think for for the time being maybe that money could be spent in a different way And I'm just so i'm I have no idea whether you could even you know What kind of research you might be able to Whether they even know how much money there's they're spending spinning their wheels on on uh on these Really not compostable products um It's also a little disingenuous to the community for them to think that they're doing of the right thing When all that's going to happen it's going to get screened out and stuff and dumped in the landfill So I think that they're that There's one of the things that has always concerned me about recycling is that is the the expectation of the Community that these particular things are you look at that little triangle and because it has a particular number on it that they're good to go and uh, it's just not the case and you know people spend so much time and energy trying to do the right thing And this is one of those times where I really want them to know that if they they think that this item that they're putting in the compost Is really going to get composted that it's really going to get composted and and and I so I'm concerned that that we are asking them to Do something that is that is really not as effective as they think it is And so I kind of bow to your recommendation as far as how to move forward with the with the fully composed compostable model um I just you know, I I would be curious to know how much money is being wasted by putting these things in the stream um But I I can't answer that I can't answer that that question fully Perhaps at this point because I I am not sure What the industry is doing about it and how soon we will actually have some of these materials That can actually be composted Not necessarily organic But even the secondary The kind of comp compost that that other where people are not necessarily looking for fully organic Um That they could actually that these materials could actually go into that second grade of um of compost so Um, I'll I'll leave it there. I really appreciate your being our our garbage star You are you know, you do know more than the average bear on uh with compost and garbage in general And I appreciate this wealth of knowledge that you've been able to gain because it has enabled you to give us Presentations like this. So thank you very much Thank you councilmember madam vice mayor Uh first joey, thank you so much for the presentation and for the work that your team has done for the presentation It was very thorough. Um, my overall thoughts is I think that we probably need to act sooner than later. I do realize that We are in, um, COVID right now, but Now, I mean, we can't go backwards and we're not sure how long COVID is going to be here. So We need to find ways, um To do multiple things and that is to be aware that we are in a pandemic But also be aware that we are feeling our environment. We need to stop that Um fully compostable model. I'm not too sure on that one. Um, I kind of echo what Councilmember Soler said about, you know, the public believing that one thing is happening and it's not happening And it's also creating additional, um, Works for other people. Um, implementation. I think we should like I said implement Uh, sooner than later Which leads me to enforcement Um, when I say implementation, I think that we should definitely Speak to restaurant Owners and get the education out there, but I do not think that we need to have proactive enforcement at this time Um in our fines. I think uh, just really with the educational Aspect is what I'm looking for not saying down the road that we do not start with, um enforcement in in fines, um, so I'm not sure what the what the next steps Um would be but those are my thoughts. Thank you Thank you, madam vice mayor, uh and in joey. I really appreciate your work on this As you know, I'm very passionate about this issue and in particular the reductions of plastics And my viewpoint really starts from a belief that, uh, the cost of utilizing many of these, um Plastics and food wares doesn't actually reflect the environmental cost or the total cost that we have as a community By allowing them and what has actually typically happened in california and across this nation is that Our recyclables are sent to other countries to be dealt with Uh, and that marketplace is completely dried up with the national sword policy Uh going across across the world, uh, where china has typically taken our recyclables And and that's how we dealt with them. We no longer have that capacity. The standards are way too high and they're not accepting it So we need to either reduce our use or we need to significantly invest in the infrastructure that it takes For us to be fully self-sustaining uh here in california. Um, I I am again also torn on the question about the fully compostable Uh, and and i'm going to present the other side of it as well, which is the hardest part of what we're talking about is developing new behaviors And is there a value in having even though these these will be filtered out for the time being Is there value in us getting that behavior? Uh, and doing the educational components about it? Uh ahead of time Uh, really worth it for our community I think the answer kind of relies on when these new Materials are going to present themselves on the marketplace if they were to present themselves two years from now We would look like geniuses by being proactive about it and getting the community to start doing this early If it takes 20 years, then we're going to have you know 19 years of looking silly for how do you have that be a requirement? So I don't know how to go about that But what I do know is that for many of these things there is no such thing as compostable when we're talking about plastics Every piece of plastic that has ever been created is still in existence It doesn't compost it it just breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces of plastics And going back to that discussion about it making its way into our waterways and making it into our our bodies and affecting our health So i'm going to leave that one alone for the moment. I think the uh, I think the conversation around The the PFAS is is an important one because PFAS are endocrine disruptors And I think we already know this and I think we need to acknowledge that and how we move forward The PLAs is an interesting conversation to me as well Because you do start to see some businesses that are charging for those those linings particularly on coffee cups Where it really is necessary for their business model But for example starbucks actually gives you a 10 cents credit If you bring in your own reusable mug as opposed to using one of these lined cups And and so I think that's something that we should be paying attention to as well As we move through this conversation is that just because we haven't banned them Doesn't mean that we can't take proactive steps to reduce People's dependence on them And to that end. I want to talk a little bit about the proposed Opportunity not mandatory 25 cent charge I actually think that we should have a mandatory charge on some of these takeout things such as the PLAs That we know that we would prefer to get rid of but we can't Because that will actually help shift behavior so that we have reductions in it and by making it mandatory We put it evenly across all businesses and we don't put one Business pitted against another business It is a community-wide effort at that point and it's not reliant on on people who are to jack's point trying to just make ends meet at that 25 cents If that is the number that we go with Can stay with the business I want it to stay with the business so that they can then make their margins and continue to invest In the types of materials that we're asking them to do. I don't need it to come back to the city It doesn't need to be something that is viewed as a money generator for us I think it really is just to to reflect the actual cost of the materials that people are utilizing In the cost the cost of society For the timeline, I am fine with the january 1st Implementation timeline, but what I would suggest after listening to the comments from council members Is that perhaps we do a check-in? We set the date of september 1st and then do a check-in in september in september to see how we are actually feeling about Covid coming out of it I know you had suggested that we build in a 90 days from the end of the the health officer's order I'd actually prefer for us to do a check-in at that point and give some level of clarity to businesses on when it would actually Be implemented and potentially enforced Our outreach is going to be incredibly important and significant And I think we should be pursuing a robust conversation around that with brocology who are willing partners And then finally for the desired enforcement I'm hearing a mixed message from from the council On whether or not they would prefer proactive enforcement or if they think that the community would be able to Help help self police on this one. I am fine if what we want to do is see how the first six months go I do think that either way the the most enforcement is going to be up front as people are coming into it Which is also the time when we want to be the most permissive and educational by nature So I really don't care on that one at the moment on if we are proactive or if we do it through education What I will want is that after the this has been implemented for six months or a year That we have a chance to check in and see where we're actually at on the adoption throughout our community And then have that conversation about if we have to increase enforcement to increase the uptick And and with that that's my comments on it Did you get what you needed from the discussion joey and what the what are the next steps for the council going to look like? Thank you council members and mayor for for the feedback. I do appreciate that it does give me some direction to to move forward The the next steps I think would be for me to internalize today's meeting check in with with My fearless leader jason nut and discuss the item moving forward But my plan would be to what I what I've really kind of heard consistently from the council on on some of the things It sounds like you guys aren't sure but really what I've heard is You know outreach is important continue to do the outreach involve the business community. So I'd like to potentially Try to set up some more Some outreach meetings with the business community potentially kind of like town hall styles to try to to gather that that information and to have them really be involved Secondly, I think one of the important things would be to Maybe try to get a little better clarity I don't think that there's going to be a An end all be all that you know, there's going to be a certain date where these materials might be Acceptable by the compost facilities, but I think it would be who myself and also be interesting to the council to hear back from Me to do a little bit more direct outreach with the composters to see exactly what Their issues are what would be the challenges to potentially accepting those materials in their feedstock? And then thirdly, I think You know really just coming back to you after I've kind of chewed on some of that and coming back to you with a Little bit more of a refined approach potentially with some I get kind of like a buffet of options so I could give you guys so here's an option a here's option b here's option c And you know, this option is fully compostable. This option may be only adopts the zero a snowman model with some additional considerations So you guys potentially have, you know, not just one Potential pathway, but you have multiple pathways that you can sit or move them forward Within I would say the first Few months of 2021 would be my my intention Great. Thank you so much Joey And with that, uh, we have been at this for about a little over two hours now as a council I'm very cognizant of the fact that we have a long meeting for tonight But I am going to grant a five minute break for council members to To go and do what they need to do for a couple of minutes. So we will come back at 340 We'll just call it 345 and I'm going to ask council members to to stick to that timeline because again We do have a long meeting tonight and we'll be back with item An item 3.2 at that time All right, I will bring us back madam city clerk. Could you please call the roll? Yes, thank you councilmember alvarez present councilmember fleming councilmember fleming councilmember Sawyer here Councilmember schwaitham here councilmember tidbits councilmember tidbits Vice mayor rogers mayor rogers Councilmember Fleming have you joined us? councilmember tidbits. Have you joined us? Okay, let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of councilmember Fleming and councilmember tidbits Thank you so much, and I'm sure the the two council members will find their way back With that we will go on to item 3.2. Mr. City manager Item 3.2 wildfire preparedness mitigation and resiliency project Proposed uses of PG&E settlement funds I'm going to give a brief introduction. We can go to the next slide And then I will turn it over to chief gossner Um, so A couple things this is the The next step in a continuing conversation with the council about how to utilize Uh, potentially utilize PG&E settlement funds. Um, this these conversations obviously started back in august We had a series of meetings. We also did a public input session some public input processes The next The next step beyond this The next step beyond this will be I am so sorry. I had preloaded Items my apologies It's all good councilwoman Fleming was grooving I saw The next step will be a january 12th presentation Uh, but with our fiscal consultants pfm to address potential investment opportunities and the restrictions around investing funds and then We will also have a meeting it In the latter part of january early february With our federal lobbying teams and that's really important because you're going to see some items That potentially we're understanding may have some opportunities to be funded on the federal side in this portfolio of opportunities The just as a reminder for council members those federal opportunities, even if they exist Will likely um require a match by the city In some form or capacity Um, so at the end of this you're also going to get a roll-up of all of the requests to date with Uh potential cost estimates from staff um And the question which will uh, we we would like to have answered by the end of the presentation as we prepare for Bowl setting and budget conversations beginning in february Is is there anything else that council wants to see between now and those conversations in february? Again, we'll have a follow-up meeting on the 12th With our investment portfolio advisors And then we will have a conversation With our federal lobbying team about what what we're hearing are potentially some ways To maximize and leverage federal funding And now I will turn it over to chief gossum Good afternoon everyone One second Good afternoon, mayor and council members welcome new new vice mayor rogers and and mr. Alvarez It's good to see you here. My name is tony gosman. I'm the fire chief for the city of san rosa Today, we are happy to present within this study session Some proposed uses of the pgne settlement funds for wildfire preparedness mitigation and resiliency projects Deputy chief scott westrop will deliver the fire department's presentation and will focus on six items Those six items are rebuilding station five moving and adding stations to meet today's needs Discussion of additional personnel to staff new stations and increase command and control Purchase of additional apparatus implementation of a comprehensive vegetation management program And the implementation of the wildland resiliency and response strategic plan which chief westrop was instrumental in developing Myself chief westrop chief moon and assistant fire Paul loathall will be available at the end of presentation for any questions that you may have And now without further ado, I'd like to turn it over to chief westrop. Thank you Thank you chief. Good afternoon, mayor rogers vice mayor rogers and member of the council scott westrop deputy fire chief with the city of san rosa What we're going to be presenting to you this afternoon is what the fire department has determined will be important moving forward and significantly increasing Our wildfire resiliency and response component components of the organization Well, this is a small part of a big picture. We feel it's vitally important to the mission of protecting the community as we move into the future We've broken this down into sort of two categories The first that i'm going to present to you is the strategies that we can immediately Implement and that will have immediate impacts with one time funding And as we move on through the presentation We'll present some strategies that are longer term in regards to completion But not necessarily longer term in in regards to necessity of the need Next slide, please So this first slide is just sort of a executive summary of the two programs that we presented to The public safety subcommittee on both september 25th And then november 23rd 2020 respectively The first is the comprehensive vegetation management program. We'll go into that more in detail in the next slide And then the center is a fire department wildland resiliency and response strategic plan, which we'll go into more detail Here in the next couple slides as well The important thing to take away from these Is we really feel that the funding of these proposals would immediately improve the prevention mitigation response capabilities For the community the city The department and without and this is without adding additional stations or operations bureau personnel Which we'll get into much further down the road here Next slide, please So the first thing we wanted to present to y