at cannot be recycled, they'll pass it on to the consumer. Of course. Right, so we're not solving the problem. The only thing we're getting is maybe some more tax money to look at the problem. What I'd like to see is, yeah, something that requires where the public has a choice right there and they can put it in the right container. So I think that's a big part. And it does say here, increase public education. The public by and large is, that's a big part of it, but the public by and large is really behind all of this and they will cooperate if they're given the opportunity. The other thing I guess when I mentioned the plastic problem is not today's problem. It goes back many years. We have to be proactive rather than reactive. And it seems like now all of a sudden we're reacting to all kinds of issues when it comes to plastic. When we've had 50 years to look at this. And so now I guess it's more than late. We need to do something.  But Supervisor Caput, I just want to remind all the supervisors that we have a bunch of items. We have people waiting to talk to those items. So if we can keep our questions really brief, that would be great. I'll answer very briefly. It works much like the lint filter in your dryer. You just shake it out into the trash and replace it, it's very simple. Would it go to hazardous waste? No, it would go to the landfill. All right. And then notice it is made out of plastic. That's correct. So, whatever. This is one example, there are other brands. How much of this crisis that we're reacting to rather than being proactive is because of China rejecting a lot of shiploads of garbage where we before didn't think of twice sending it a ship and having China worry about it. That has certainly made it more difficult to recycle plastic, although the county is doing well at that we still recycle most of the plastic we collect. It has not had an impact on the growing proliferation of plastic and that's the issue that most of these measures are designed to address. Okay. And now plastic tarps on strawberry fields. Do they use them more than once? They do not. They do not. We're talking about a big deal here. We're talking about big stuff. Okay. It's not recyclable. Actually it is. It's another issue we could talk about at great length. Santa Cruz County actually pioneered the recycling of agricultural plastic and based on our success, the state help fund and agricultural plastic recycling business in Salinas on core recycling. They do recycle agricultural plastic, although there's not as much capacity as is needed. Okay. All right. That's a step forward. And then milk, the one gallon containers, they all come in. Where does that go? That goes, that is recyclable. In the county that is recyclable, in the city currently not. It varies from place to place. Okay. And then, yeah, I guess the other thing I've gotten at the last question. Thank you. We've got into a society where we gotta be consistent. When we're talking about landfill, we're talking about reusing things and everything like that. Artificial turf, that ends up in landfill after it's shelf life is used up. Talking about a football field and everything like that. So I guess what I'm getting at here is at the same time we gotta worry about, we're worried about plastic, but we have to worry about all kinds of things that are in our life that we use once and then it gets thrown away. There will always be more work to do. There's no doubt. Thank you. Okay. I'll try to be brief. I don't know if I can because I'm just inspired by the intensity and the sincere statements that were made here. I just wanna let everybody know that my office as well as every supervisor up here has received your cards and letters and emails and et cetera. So we did receive those. We know how you feel and how intense you are about this and how you want it to move along. I especially wanna thank a distinguished speaker, Dr. Navotny, and each and every one of you that spoke was distinguished. But thank you very much, sir, for coming up here. You're well highly regarded and appreciate your efforts. And thank the Public Works Department for following through on our direction that we made in February about and our non-profit partners. I think we really... It's a big problem that we know and we must reduce the plastics for our own health and the health of everything that's in the Bay and all around us. There's going to be an enormous amount of education that we're going to have to really put out there within our community and throughout about the dangers of plastics. And getting support from any of these initiatives is gonna take a large scale education program that an outreach that is going to be a consistent effort. And we have done it here before and we're gonna do it again in Santa Cruz County. In order to be successful, we'll need to have a real customized outreach program, I believe, an implementation strategy of how we're going to make this become a reality of what we want here in Santa Cruz County and what we have done in Santa Cruz County that was listed in the most recent one by Supervisor Friend's proposal about either the plastic bottles or containers in hotels and motels. That started something that others are following through with. And that's happened before with our plastic bags and so forth. So in order to be successful, I think that we're going to have to make most importantly an environmental and public health statement about the necessity of doing this, as well as economic for the case that we're going to be proposing. And I wanna make sure that whatever we come up with and what we're going to do that we let the manufacturers of these, not products, but the plastics that are being manufactured, let them know that we're doing this in the glass as well. Let them know that we're doing this and why. And I think that we're going to need, I think we'll be more effective if we take a regional approach at this. And I don't wanna sidestep the issue, but I think if we are broader in this, and I think we can, we saw it with Monterey Bay Community Power, first tri-county effort ever in the state to ever put something like this together and we did it. And the statement that was made, people wanna do it. We know, there's people that are, the leaders right here in this room and there's many more of you, but the people in this county want to follow if we just tell them how to get there. Now this is, it's somewhat complex and it's far reaching, but I think that we need to do, if we can, I think if we can approach it in a regional consensus building, I think we have a format of how to get there and how to do that. I think we're going to be more effective. And I'll be, you know, for Santa Cruz County, there's been a lot of hard work that's been done in this area before and there's a lot more to do. And the bottom line is we can do it and we can lead the charge. But I do think we're gonna have to have a bigger scale of how to address this and let the manufacturers, it's not the consumer's fault so much as it is the manufacturers of the product and how they change it. So I'm with you, we're all with you. Thank you very much. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the testimony and the continued advocacy. You know, the issue of plastic pollution is real. This board has worked on it before and we will continue to be a leader on this issue. You know, the, as I look at the number of different pieces that are here, I just had a couple of questions about it. One was, excuse me, is the question about the food waste piece and the question of 25 cents. We see that our colleagues in Watsonville recently did this at 10 cents. Is there any research that sort of looks at 10 cents, 25 cents, whatever that is? Yes, there is. Berkeley was the first jurisdiction in California to adopt this measure and they did not pick the 25 cent number randomly. They actually hired social science faculty from the University of California, Berkeley to do an extensive study to determine what would be the impact of various levels of charge and what they found was that the minimum charge that would have a significant impact in people remembering to bring their own reusable containers was 25 cents. So that's why Berkeley went with that number. City of Watsonville was concerned about potential impact on portions of their community and opted for a lower charge but the research is pretty solid. Yeah, and when we did the plastic bag band, we started off at 10 cents but moved it up to 25 cents after a year or something like that. Correct, that was in the original ordinance that after a year it would go up to 25 cents so that's an option as well. Great, the other question I had was on this issue of microfibers. You know, I think this is a very serious issue as well. You know, it's interesting, my youngest daughter maybe eight or nine years ago did a science fair project on microfiber pollution and we did this whole thing where we designed our own filter and we washed lots of clothes to see what we would collect and we had a lot of spills into our garage where the washing machine is and she put together a science fair project which won here at the county science fair and she went to the state science fair and when she went there and she presented her project the judge had said, this isn't a real issue. And she was crestfallen as you can imagine but she also didn't believe it either. And when I told her today that we were coming and we were going to be talking about microfiber pollution she said, you're finally catching up dad. We should be running for office soon. Gonna finish architecture school first. And you know, on the issue of contact lenses this is actually a relatively newer issue. I know that because of issues with my eyes I have to wear daily contacts and I'm very sensitive about what I do with that waste and during the course of the conversation about what happens with contact lenses I never really thought about it really besides that you know I went online found that the Bousham loan has a one to one program where people can send it back and they only identified two optometrists that are participating in the program but when I contacted my optometrists they said yes, we could bring it in and it was interesting to hear from you that this is something that's already going on. I think it's important. You know, one of the things that we've seen just this week on the front page of the Santa Cruz Sentinel was a story about the San Francisco airport and one of the things that told me is we have to lead in order to start that national conversation that story was picked up across the country and it's starting a national conversation about plastics and what could happens at the airport and because everybody's familiar to going to the airport and it's part of a larger conversation that's going on around plastics. This board in our county has been working on on waste reduction at its source for a while and I think that we need to continue to lead in that piece and we need to show what we could do here. So there's on a couple of these I just want to go through this list for one second on the plastic bottles. I think that we have to start showing ourselves that we can, I think the first step is bottles like these and we shouldn't be selling single use plastic bottles at county facilities and we need to do public education and have resources for people to start doing differently. I know I was part of that handing out of cloth bags. We passed them out at Live Oak Super.  On the issue of food waste, I think like my colleague says, we need to think about this regionally or at least county wide but I think we should look toward an ordinance but we should also direct you to work with the other jurisdictions so we can have a common charge. We shouldn't, it shouldn't be 10 cents here and 15 cents there and 25 cents there. We should do that collectively. I've talked to colleagues at the city of Santa Cruz and there is interest on that council about a similar type measure. So there's an opportunity for us to look at this county wide. Tobacco waste is a big challenge because I don't, the doctor's presentation, he is exactly right. This board has supported state legislation from our assembly member Mark Stone to rid the filters on cigarettes. We also know that when we did the flavored tobacco ban that that required a lot of outreach to retailers so they could think about that and we got pushback from retailers who said they was gonna kill their business and everything else. We still did it anyway. And so we, as we look at tobacco waste, I think we do need to do some more outreach with retailers to help them prepare for what our future would look like without that and say that we are considering an ordinance but do that outreach first and bring them in on the conversation. On plastic microfibers, I think it's really important that we move towards this. I think that the county should take a leadership role in the purchase of filters like this and do some public education to help people understand that this is a pretty easy thing to use and to come back later after that public education campaign with an ordinance that we could take a look at. I think that that's critical. And on contact lenses, we should actually find out how ubiquitous this might already be and get a decision about whether we need to make it a ordinance or not or whether it's, there are plenty of opportunities and part of it is just educating people about the dangers of it. So I'd be prepared to make a motion that would prohibit the sale of water and plastic bottles, single use plastic bottle less than a gallon at county facilities to direct the county staff to draft an ordinance around single use disposable cups in the unincorporated area, but with additional direction that you work with our other jurisdictions to find a common charge to initiate a public education campaign that includes the distribution of some filters and come back later with an ordinance after that public education campaign around microfiber pollution and to report back to us around the contact lenses about whether there are enough places where that's being done or whether we require an ordinance to make that happen. And the public education I assume. Oh yeah, and the public education is critical as part of that. I mean, one last thing I would add, I think we also need the CAO to come back at budget times for planning for the installation of additional hydration stations in county facilities. I think that that's critical. That's a motion. I'll second the motion and I do have some questions still not of my colleague, but in regards, one of the things that I found, actually when I first came into office, it was not too long after the plastic bag ban had been implemented. And most people believe that the fee that you pay goes to some sort of purpose, but it doesn't. It just goes back to the business. I mean, the entire idea is that it's a disincentive and under Prop 218 you'd be required to go to the voters to ask that that be dedicated to a purpose. And I think it should be dedicated to a purpose specifically for environmental purposes or environmental cleanups within what the public works department does. And we subcontract with some of the nonprofit providers that spoke here today. I don't think we should make, in essence, the same mistake in regards to the food wear. And I think that we should, if we're going to implement this, also go to the voters and then say, shall we dedicate that 10 or 25 cent fee toward environmental cleanup costs in the unincorporated or incorporated areas? If we're going to do this with other jurisdictions, it would make sense to me that we would include the plastic bags, although I know they're more de minimis now at grocery stores than they were originally. But you should include all things that we charge a fee for. It strikes me that as opposed to just providing a 25 cent disincentive, we should have a 25 cent fee that actually goes to some sort of environmental cleanup for the waste that it's actually being created. So if the maker of the motion would be open to when that comes back, that we learn about how that would be implemented because I recognize that this would create, at least on some small businesses, a burden of collection of a fee or a tax that they hadn't done before, which is different from what we've done. I don't know what the extent of that burden is. I recognize that this is an outreach effort. But I think that it just doesn't make sense to me to charge a fee, I'll recognize it reduces consumption. It doesn't go back to mitigating the issue that we're all sitting here talking about. That fee should go back to the cleanups and to these programs that we're funding that do exactly that. So if the maker of the motion. Yeah, well, I'm interested in hearing about what that would look like. I'm not sure it's what it would actually provide in terms of resources. And I do believe that it's the fee that changes people's behavior, right? I mean, I think that's the key point. But I'm open to hearing about other ways and some suggestions about whether that could actually make a difference. So this doesn't change the process of the fee. This directs where the fee will go. So for example, if the voters decide that they don't want the fee to go to environmental programs, the fee still gets collected because the board has taken its action or the local jurisdiction has taken its action. I don't know why the voters wouldn't want the fee to go toward environmental cleanup, but I think that it sounds reasonable, especially because I'm confident most people think that's where the fee's already going. They just don't recognize that it just goes back to the business that's charging it. Then you would have the dual advantage of reducing consumption and actually funding something that has an environmental and local benefit, which is what I just think that that seems like an easy thing to do. We didn't have a comeback date yet. We haven't asked, but I think we should provide some direction as to when these will come back. There are various elements. The letter actually suggested September 24th, but that's a discussion. Yeah, I would ask that not to be September 24th because I think we have the coastal development piece, the syringe services. I mean, it's gonna be a busy day on September 24th. So almost any other day besides September 24th. Tim, part of this is conversations with other jurisdictions and everything. And so does it make sense to come back in October or November? October would give us the time to do that consultation. Okay. So at a meeting before the end of October, work with the chair on what's appropriate date. Sure. And I assume more information is gonna come back on the microfiber filter side. I was under the impression that you presented it as a pretty easy thing to do. I've talked to a couple of people that have attempted to install it and have been unsuccessful on it. So I don't know, it'll be interesting. I think it's something that needs to be done. It's something that needs to be done at the point of manufacture, meaning that we need to encourage manufacturers to actually make something that has this built in. That's a statewide issue, not a local issue. But what I also don't want is to create an island in Santa Cruz County where we're actually incenting people to purchase things in the incorporated area or outside of the county as a result of getting around ordinances within here, which speaks to the importance of what Supervisor McPherson and Supervisor Leopold said about harmonizing with other jurisdictions because you could very easily make an argument that if it's difficult for you or you don't wanna, or if you wanna avoid the ordinance and we've done this on everything from sewer laterals to other policies at point of sale, that we probably want this to be countywide because it doesn't strike me that under its current construct, it's easy for a lot of people to be able to do it, especially if you have an outdated system. But we would like it so that if you purchase something anywhere within the county, incorporated or unincorporated, something is done. And so when you come back, I'd be interested in also learning about the viability actually of an absent state legislation and what could be done just in the unincorporated area that doesn't provide that distance to it. Thank you for your work. The only thing I have to add, so I'm fully supportive of the motion and I'm glad that we're moving forward and it's critical when you read the reports about the Bay or about our human health, it's sickening the level of plastic pollution and it's way it's infiltrating all aspects of our lives. The only thing I would make, it's critical that we at very least come up with a countywide strategy. I was, we passed the flavor tobacco ban following the city of Santa Cruz. It was absolutely the right thing to do. I'm glad we did it. I was sitting in a coffee shop last week and I heard two young women sitting behind me saying, one said, oh, I just drive up to Scotts Valley now to get it and the other one said, well, why you do that? I just haven't delivered it online. And I thought, you know, like we made a statement, we're moving forward, but we're also now creating a larger carbon footprint as people maneuver around these, move around our rules. And so to the extent that we can make sure that we're uniform and especially, I mean, some of our smaller cities, 40 people like you all showed up today show up in some of these smaller cities. I think that you could really move an agenda forward in a way we haven't been able to. And we can very least start with Santa Cruz County and then let's spread to our Jason County so that we can make it really comprehensive and change people's lives. The direction is gonna include more than just attacks. And what we're directing is, are we going towards the source, which is the manufacturers? We did this before with Styrofoam, right? Styrofoam, if they keep, if we kept buying that and we just put attacks on it, we'd still have it. But these companies are capable, we landed a minute on the moon 50 years ago. They're capable of coming up with something rather than these cups like the county provides. There is no doubt that the alternatives to this throwaway culture and this plastic packaging exist. We have a job here to enact ordinances and push policies that push these manufacturers to do just that. When we banned the plastic bags, all of a sudden there was a plastic bag coalition as if it was an endangered species. And you know, when they talked about jobs and everything, at the end of the day, we have to push to get these manufacturers. The single use plastic cup isn't gonna go away completely with our action, but we need to start getting people to think about the tools that they need to have a lighter footprint on the earth to take plastic out of our waste stream. And these actions today help us make that happen. So they'll come up with an alternative that is recyclable if we put the pressure on the manufacturer. Yeah, I believe so. So we have a motion and we have a second and we're grateful for everyone who came out today. So all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. Thank you all very much. Okay, we're gonna move on to item number nine, which is to continue a public hearing to consider a resolution amending the general plan, local coastal plan, and accepting the secret determination of a notice of exemption and ordinance amending the Santa Cruz County Code chapter 13.10 to create a permanent room, housing, combining zone district, and to schedule a final adoption of the ordinance for August 27th, 2019, as outlined in a memorandum of the planning director. And I'll give people a moment to clear out of the room. Or mind Daisy and Pie that we've heard this item a couple of times so we can keep it short. Got it. All right, so why don't we get started with the staff presentation? Okay. All right, well, thank you, Chair Coonerty, supervisors. As you mentioned, the purpose of today's continued public hearing is to consider general plan and county code amendments to create the PRH Combining Zone District. As a reminder, the purpose of this zone district is to recognize the conversion of former visitor accommodation and care facilities to permanent housing that is affordable by design. So you last met to review this proposed combining zone district on April 23rd, directed staff to make some substantial changes, which meant that the amendments needed to be sent back to the Planning Commission for further review. The Planning Commission held two hearings in May and June and have come up with resolution 2019-07, recommending approval of the proposed amendments with some additional changes. In my presentation today, I'll focus on just those changes since you last met and reviewed the items in April. So first, regarding the general plan and local coastal program, modifications were made as a result of planning staff coordination with the local coastal commission staff in order to enable the creation of the PRH district, while also meeting and not weakening the LCP policies. Regarding the county code, again, as a result of coastal staff coordination, the VA visitor accommodation and CT tourist commercial zones have now been excluded from eligibility for the PRH district within the coastal zone. The ordinance was also modified so that new definitions are now listed in one place, and it clarifies that the PRH applies only to type A visitor accommodations, which are hotels, motels, and lodging houses. The wording of the ordinance was also adjusted to remove terms that are not defined in the code. The purpose of the district was streamlined to clearly state the intention of the district and clarify what is intended inside and outside the coastal zone. Regarding short-term rental use, at your last hearing, your board directed staff to clarify that short-term rentals are allowed if the use is already existing, the property has paid transient occupancy tax and a maximum of 30% of units on a PRH zone parcel may be short-term rentals. The planning commission further clarified the term current and payment of TOT to mean paid for the past three years, and recommended that new short-term rentals could be added to the PRH property if it's allowed as a use in the underlying zone district and you still don't exceed that 30% maximum units. Other changes to the county, the proposed ordinance, the inspection requirements have been clarified to give a one-year window for the five-year reviews, so five-year review could begin six months ahead of the five-year due date up until six months after that five-year due date to give some flexibility. An application requirement was added that property owners must indicate on their application whether they have or intend to have any deed-restricted affordable PRH units. This is something that aides coastal staff in their findings for coastal development permits. The planning commission also modified the proposed process for revocation to provide additional time to property owners to respond to notices and prepare for public hearings. Okay, and then finally, the planning commission also considered the findings of denial and revocation that were added by your board. Public comment was received expressing concern that these findings of denial or revocation were too vague or broad. In response, the planning commission revised certain findings indicated here to tighten up and clarify their meaning while retaining their intent. So in particular, the words untrue statements were revised to false statements intentionally submitted. Regarding inspection requirements, language was added to clarify that this review includes reinspection using the PRH inspection checklist, as well as review of the PRH permit use and development requirements. Staff also changed the word active to verified regarding code violations since property owners have due process rights and active cases are ongoing cases where a violation may not have yet been proven to occur. Regarding the criminal activity on the properties, the commission directed staff to work with the sheriff's office to modify the language for the finding related to criminal activity and staff produced the findings shown on this slide, a record of repeat visits to the property related to criminal activity that is attributable to the property owner management tenants or visitors. The planning commission's resolution has addressed public comments that were received regarding clarity in the ordinance related to definitions, findings of denial or revocation, the process for revocation and other topics, as well as coastal commission staff concerns. All public comments received since your last board's, your last board hearing on this topic on April 23rd are included in your packet as attachment H and a coastal commission letter of support of the amendments as currently written is included separately as attachment I. You may note that we've also received public comments about the suitability of the Bayview Hotel property for rezoning into the PRH district. As you know, an application for the Bayview Hotel is not being considered today. Since the planning commission continued consideration of individual applications to a date uncertain following adoption of the general plan, LCP and county code amendments. So just wanted to clarify that. So staff recommends that the board reopen the public hearing, consider the planning commission's recommendation and the proposed amendments to the general plan LCP and county code, adopt the resolution along with the CEQA notice of exemption and approve the ordinance and concept. Please note, there are some proposed changes to the ordinance language related to clarification and typos. You have received a couple of correction pages on the dais. So I would include those in our recommendation for your approval. And then we recommend that you direct the clerk of the board to schedule the ordinance for a second reading and final adoption at your next regular meeting on August 27th. Great, thank you very much. Is there any public comment on this item? Please come forward. Thank you, Becky Steinbrenner, resident of Aptos. Thank you for the good report and for your excellent work, Ms. Allen, in this project. It's been a long, long project. I'm here to support this project because I think if you go back to the original intent, it is to try to support affordable housing in this county and I think it does it very well. Unfortunately, because of the Bayview Hotel property being one in the mix, I think it has been singled out and a lot of the additions and things added to this action were to become punitive for that property. And I think that's very unfortunate, Supervisor Friend. I want to also point out, I'm glad that the language was clarified in terms of code violations, active, things like that. And I want to let you know that the owner of the Bayview Hotel did submit a Public Records Act request to the Sheriff's Department because she's been accused of having so many sheriff visits to her property. The report showed that anytime a CHP or a sheriff pulls somebody over in the area and because the parking lot is open, the hotel is not being used at this moment. So people are pulled over in there because it's an open space out of the way of traffic. The Bayview Hotel comes up as the issue, the identifier for that action. There are many, many like that in there. So it is not really well represented some of the information that you may have, Supervisor Friend, about the Bayview Hotel, which I suspect largely comes from the developments around the Aptas Village Project Developers. I recognize there are issues there, but I think we need to support this project and all of these people have patiently waited to hear you. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes public comment. I'll bring it back to the board for deliberation action. Supervisor Friend. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Ms. Allen, actually, for not just working with the Planning Commission, the board, before all your community outreach that you've done, you've been very responsive to every community inquiry that's come in. And I appreciate that. I do have a couple of questions regarding some of the Planning Commission changes. As you know, Supervisor Leopold and I hadn't supported the short-term use. I still have those concerns haven't changed for me. I think that the board has been in the business of restricting short-term rentals as the ability to ensure that we have a long-term housing, but I recognize that three members of the board disagree, that's the right. But one of the things I thought was clear, the board originally had voted on direction in April to not allow them. And then the board reconsidered, but one of the reasons was, was because there were legacy properties such as in Supervisor McPherson's district that have been doing this and therefore paying TOT. What I don't understand is why we would now allow a property to expose factor or retroactively pay TOT to come into compliance. I mean, either you've been paying it and you've been a good actor or you haven't. One of the things, the lecture aside from the community member, one of the things that I've been working on is ensuring that people that are actually good actors could actually partake in a program that could potentially benefit them. I don't understand why the board or the planning commission, maybe you could provide clarity would allow for somebody who is derelict on transit occupancy taxes to be allowed to be considered for such this program. Yeah, the allowance for retroactive payment of TOT would go back only three years. And the purpose of that is to make sure that the ordinance is internally consistent also with the findings of denial or revocation. And it allows for some flexibility. Yeah, I would say that was just about trying to create the same window that for example, we created for the vacation rentals to make the window large enough to make sure we preserve anything that is out there existing as housing. And it is of course up to your board whether you allow that extra broadening of the window or not. That's correct. We can't go further than three years. That's why you're proposing. I'm also saying you could choose not to allow the back look and opportunity. I mean, what the board could do is say that you have to be current on TOT. Again, walking back from April, the board took an action that we didn't want. The board revised that on a three, two vote saying that we would allow them because there are people who have been using, have been doing this and have been actively doing this and advertising this. Therefore that would speak to me that they've been in compliance. They've been a short term rental that have been paying TOT. If you broaden it to say that you can now retroactively pay it then you're allowing in essence somebody who says, well, okay, I did it but I was doing it underground and I was flaunting the county system and but it's okay because I can just pay it off. So I'm confused as to why that would be a board priority. I wouldn't support that as a board priority. I don't support the short term use at all but I would hope that the board majority on this would see to it that you would have to be somebody who is current on TOT. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to be a reason for evocation. The second question I had is just on the language and might be a better question for council but on 1310428D1, the modification on language for purposeful false statements versus I mean I guess what would be deemed an honest mistake. I don't really, it seems like that puts a burden that I don't know how we would prove. I mean, so somebody could falsify something claim that they didn't intend to and then I don't know how this burden, why the county would put this burden on ourselves to have to prove that. We have a certification in a lot of the forms that we provide, including just basic permits. So you certify that everything you said is true. We don't really have the, I mean, I recognize that if you have a, you transpose a number that's one thing but I don't understand why the county would place this burden or whether this creates an undue burden, maybe council can answer. How would the process go? I mean, so we would have to, it would go before a hearing officer, the burden of proof would be on the county to show that this is an actual false statement. I'm confused on the process there. Yeah, the way that it's being proposed right now, it would go before a hearing officer and that would get worked out in the mix, but it would be on the county to show that it was a false statement as opposed to, as opposed to what some have referred to as an honest mistake. And it's totally up to your board as to whether or not you would want that to happen. It's basically, this I believe was changed as a concession to community input that believed that it was a vague and ambiguous statement, but we could have arguments back and forth as to why it's not and why it would be keeping in conjunction with every other ordinance that we have to keep it the same way it always is. Okay, I mean, I would like to see that consistency in that regard. I don't understand why when we're permitting something, we would put an undue burden on the county then to showcase that somebody is deserving of said permit if they committed a false statement or whatever pretenses. It's already flexibility within the planning department during an application process to have communication with an applicant and verify certain things that happens all the time. Things are modified all the time throughout an application process, but to have that level of specificity that I think puts an undue burden on the county, I don't think actually serves our purposes nor is consistent with other elements of the code. So I'd also like to see that change, but I'd be interested in hearing others input on these two issues. Thank you. So, President McPherson. Yeah, and I understand the concern, a legitimate one. And I was, it was my community, my district, Consentments Valley in particular, that had the concerns. And I just want to thank the planning department. First of all, the commission and the housing advisory commission for their work on this. And our goal in this whole thing is to create a pathway for these properties to provide some form of affordable housing. And I think we're going to do that and get more of that because of what we have before us. This is really especially important in Santa Rosa Valley and my district where large scale development of affordable housing is really not feasible because of restrictions, particularly with subject tanks and so forth and one acre minimums and so. But I think this also allows some properties to remain economically viable in this respect by having the flexibility to serve visitors and permanent residents. As long as they qualify under the code that we're, I think we're about to approve. And I do, I think that doing this, the properties that have done it legally and paid the POT and I think it was probably not more than a dozen properties or something we were talking about at the time. But I don't know if we have that specified, but that being the case, I would like to just continue on with it and I can appreciate what I know. I can understand the opposition to this, but I think it's a legitimate request for those who have been determined to have followed the rules of the game, so to speak. So I'll hear from more of my colleagues, but I'd like to make the motion that we would, that we'd move to this recommended action as proposed, but I'll hear more from my colleagues as well. I'll second. Okay, motion a second. Any other? Well, I think the intention of this ordinance is a very good one. And the idea of having our code look at what these properties actually are, it makes a lot of sense. The short-term rental piece is just confusing to me because it seems in a lot of ways to run counter to the goals. And that's why I didn't vote for it last time. I appreciate the remarks made by my colleague about the question of false statements. It's one thing to take public input, but it's another thing that people should be held accountable for the statements that they make. And I think the county does have a reasonable history where if someone makes an honest mistake, it's an honest mistake. But if someone tries to not be honest, that there should be consequences. And it shouldn't be our burden. Should be their burden. So I'd appreciate if we, I'm not sure I can support this with this short-term rental piece at all, but I think it would be wise to change the language about who's responsible for okaying the false statements instead of giving the burden on us, it should be back on the applicant. Okay, so we got a motion and we have a second. I'm supportive of the motion. I think, frankly, I think this process has taken far too long for the number of properties we're talking about and to have our talented planning department spending an ordinance amount of times on essentially moving forward with what already exists. And I think I trust you to, that you understand the economics of all these various properties and what will work and what won't work. And I'm just interested in moving away from, getting this done, seeing how it works and moving on to more substantive planning issues in our county. So that's why I'm supportive of it, but I appreciate the work. It's not that, I think the work's been great and really important. I just think that cost benefit of any more time is not worth it. So we have a motion and we have a second. Would the maker be willing to split the motion? I think that there's unanimity on the creation of the program. I think there's not unanimity on the short-term rental on that language change. If the maker isn't, then I'll vote against the program overall because I'm not given a secondary option. I can propose a substitute motion, but what I've heard the maker say is not that far off from what I'm saying, which is that I have no issue with the good actors on the TOT, but what we're allowing is for people who haven't paid it to now come into compliance by realizing that they're being given this gift and they can come into compliance. I have a concern with that. And so there was two elements that we were looking to change, but I'll... Can we go back to the recommended actions? I mean, I'm happy to split the motion, but I don't, within this, the motion was to approve the recommended action so I don't pulling, there's no one bullet point to pull out. I think we should just sort of move forward with a vote. What we're asking for in terms of splitting the motion is we wanna support the idea of the permanent room housing designation and the goals of that. We don't support the short-term rental piece and to break that off into a separate part of the motion is a way of acknowledging that we generally support the program, but we have concerns about that. And I'm okay with that conceptually. I don't know how to do it practically. Well, I think my colleague has a different motion and maybe if you listen to that, maybe there's a way of meeting the needs of you can't figure out how to do it, maybe someone else asks. I would just need to find within the code section where the short-term rental number is, it's 13.10.42... 427K? 427K. So it would be then I'll introduce the substitute motion which is for the recommended actions without 13.10.427K and a modification of 13.10.428D1 which is the modification that was made by the Planning Commission on false statements to adhere to the original proposed language to the Planning Commission by planning staff. So the burden is therefore on. This isn't, the problem is that's not splitting the motion. This is a substitute motion. If it's just a splitting... I introduce the substitute motion. Okay. And that's what I'm doing, which is for the recommended actions with these two elements being modified, which is the elimination of 13.10.427K which is the short-term rental component and the 13 and modifying the language in 13.10.428D1 back to the original language that was proposed to the Planning Commission by planning staff, which puts the burden on the applicant, not on county. I would second. Okay, so now we have a substitute motion on the floor. Yes? Supervisor, we can't adopt the recommended action as stated because it has to come back for first read. The changes that you're making wouldn't allow the board to adopt it. And that's what the recommended action is. I just want to be clear about what the motion is. And why would that be if the Planning Commission considered this already? And I'm just changing something that they've already considered. It wouldn't have to go back to Planning Commission. It just has to be renoticed and be put on a future agenda under the Brown Act for the planning commission. I think that's a good point. Okay, so we're going to adopt the agenda under the Brown Act because we're adopting an ordinance. So in order to adopt the ordinance, it has to be noticed, placed on an agenda. This is the version that was placed before your board. So we're going to have to come back. We can't adopt it on first read with those changes. Today, today. Okay, so the substitute motion then would say what? To come back with those changes? Yeah, exactly. The substitute motion would be to come back with those changes at the August 27th meeting. And we could do the first reading on August 27th? Absolutely. It's similar to what's being proposed here. Yes, the matter would just come back on August 27th with the changes that you want to make.  So August 27th, and instead of the second reading would be the first reading and in September 11th or 10th, whatever that meeting is, will be there. Assuming it passes on August 27th, the second reading would be on September the next meeting. I recognize this as an exercise in futility because there aren't three votes for this. But it's a statement of where we are, which is that we're supportive of the program and concept to understand that the maker of the original motion won't accept the changes. So that'll be my motion to come back on the 27th with these changes. I know we have a second, I know we don't have three votes for it. I will move through on the regular process and I think two of us will vote against what's being proposed. So, do you want it? Substitute motion, yeah, I'm honest. You want to vote? That's my substitute motion. All right, so we have a vote on the substitute motion, which is to bring it back on the 27th for a first reading without the short-term rental. Okay, so we're voting on the substitute motion rather than the first motion. Correct. And if it passes, then your motion would be null. Okay, so all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? No. Okay, so now we're back to the original motion, which is to approve the recommended actions. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. No. No. Okay, so passes three to two. Thank you all for it. Wait, this is an ordinance. Does it have to pass four to one or three to two is okay? Three to two. Okay. Okay, thank you very much for your work. Item number 10 is to public hearing to consider the proposed condemnation of real property located at 111 Ralston Ridge and adopt a resolution of necessity to institute imminent domain proceedings to obtain possession of the required real property interests as recommended by the deputy CAO and director of public works. And do we wanna have our county council put this in context or? Yeah, this is a concerns of matter that's currently in litigation that I think your board is aware of. We're negotiating with the property owner. This is as close to what you would consider to be a friendly eminent domain proceeding as possible. And we kind of need to do this in order to preserve our ability to pursue the eminent domain action at trial in the event it goes through. But we're looking at a resolution of the matter we're negotiating with the property owner. After that, I'll turn it over to Mr. Machado to supplement. Right, okay. Good afternoon, Chair Coonerty, Board of Supervisors, Matt Machado, Director of Public Works. County council stated it quite well right there, but I'll add that the homeowners are not in opposition of this resolution necessity or this public hearing process that we are working together for a mutual resolution. I will also add that this requires a four fifths vote to conduct the public hearing and to adopt the resolution necessity. I will stop there and answer any questions you may have. No questions. I just do appreciate the work that our county council public works department has done on this. I think it's a great move forward and I would move the recommended action. Hold on. First, I'm going to ask if there's public comment. Thank you, Becky Steinbrunner, I'm a resident of the mountains. So when I see eminent domain coming through from the county to take away someone's home, it caught my attention. I understand that it is not being contested by the owners. They're still living there. I drove by and looked at it. And quite frankly, I think that before you approve this, you need to see photos. Supervisor McPherson, have you been to the site? So I think before we take someone's home, there are actually two homes there and eliminate a property tax base of over $6,000 a year. For a repair that I just, I didn't see the danger. There's still people living in their homes. They're not red tagged. So the damage to the homes is not so significant that people, they are not habitable. There are places like that slide all over the county. There are concrete barriers at the base of the slope for traffic and even the bicycle shoulder is there on Bear Creek Road. I do not see the value of the county taking someone's home to provide a slip out repair that happens all over the county. This is not making sense to me. And I didn't want to disturb the occupant. I'm happy to hear they're not contesting it, but I would like to have them come and be more involved and issue a statement to you to verify that. I would like your board to see photos of this area because it's a long way out. And again, we're talking about taking people's homes at a time when there is a very little housing in the county, especially in the San Lorenzo Valley for affordable housing. So I think this needs to be put on hold until you have time to really look at it more carefully. Thank you. Thank you. That closes public comment. I'll bring it back to the board for deliberation. I am not a fan of eminent domain by any reason, but this has been well reviewed or overseen by all parties. I think it's the right thing to do for public safety in the future. And I'll make the motion for the recommended action. Okay, and I'll second that. I'll just comment. I'm not a big fan of eminent domain either, but in this case, there are a lot of circumstances and also the condition and everything of the property that have to be looked at. And we have looked at it. This is a little different than just going in and saying, hey, we want to get out. Yeah. For the benefit of the public, this is not done in the dark of night. There have been lawyers involved. There have been the property owner has been involved. There have been many conversations. We don't take this lightly. And as our attorney said, this is a friendly action in the hopes towards working to resolve the issues. I'll prepare. Where is exhibit A with the findings? All right, we're not going to have you yell out, please during our, no, no, you already, you've already spoken for your two minutes. Thank you. So we have a motion and we have a second. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. Moving on to item number 11, as the board of directors of the Davenport Sanitation District of public hearing to consider the 2019-2020 Davenport County Sanitation District sewer and water service charge reports and adopting a resolution confirming the 2019-2020 sewer and water service charge reports as outlined in a memorandum of the district engineer, Mr. Adler. Good afternoon chair and supervisors. On June 11th, 2019, your board approved the 2019-2020 service charges for the water and sewer for the Davenport County Sanitation District and set today is the day for the public hearing to hear the reports or about the reports. The sewer service charges are increasing overall by 4.2%. The water service charges are increasing overall by 4.4%. In order to complete the water and sewer service charge proceedings, it's necessary for your board to open the public hearing, take testimony, hear any objections or protests, and then at the conclusion of the public hearing adopt the resolution confirming the sewer and water service charge reports and I'm available if you have any questions. Thank you very much. So I will now open the hearing. Is there anyone who'd like to speak to us today? Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing and bring it back to the board for deliberation and action. I'll move the record back. Second. Got a motion by friend, a second by Leopold. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. Thank you, Mr. Adler. Moving on to item number 12, we'll consider an ordinance repealing chapter 7.32 and sections within 7, 4.20 and 7.28 of the Santa Cruz County Code and amending chapters 4.20, 7.16, 7.28, 7.30, 7.31, 7.39, 7.79, 7.110, 8.02, 8.03, 8.12, 8.16, 8.18, 8.21, 8.22, 8.23, 8.26, and 8.28 of the Santa Cruz County Code to change typographical errors, address organizational issues, align the code with changes of state law, delete unnecessary material, make additional miscellaneous changes and schedule the ordinance for final adoption on August 27th, 2019 as outlined in the memorandum of the County Council. Chair, if you don't do it in one breath, you have to do it again. That's right. I know. Memorized. Yes, memorized it. So good morning, Board. Back with our eighth installment of changes to the County Code. This one deals with health and safety, public welfare chapters. We're continuing to make progress on this project. We anticipate that we're gonna continue to bring you additional ordinances over the next few months as we start to get closer towards finishing it off. I'm happy to answer any questions that you have. Surveysel, Leopold. Thank you, Chair. This is a very interesting project to be taking on. And in this section, I learned about mosaic index Cs and that we have prohibitions have been nudity on our beaches and everything else. There is one section that I'm prepared to support these changes, but I'm gonna ask that we add on an additional direction around section 8.12, which is the drug paraphernalia piece. When I read this, I didn't realize it was in our code. I didn't realize the words roach, clip, or bong were in our code at all. It's a relic of a different era. And now that we have legalized cannabis and there are stores that are selling these pieces of equipment, we may not need this section. I talked with Sheriff Hart yesterday and he tells me that they never use this code section if they're gonna go after people with paraphernalia. There is a state health code section. And I think if we're cleaning up our code, it might make sense to get rid of this. Recognizing that not all of the rest of you have had conversation with Sheriff Hart, I'd like to recommend that when we adopt this that we direct staff to meet with the sheriff's office and come back with a recommendation about whether we actually remove this section of the code because I don't see very much use for it. Is that a motion? First, we'll ask, is there any public comment? Seeing none, I'll bring it back to the board for action. I would move the recommended actions in direct county council to meet with the sheriff's office and come back with recommendations about whether we need to keep section 8.12. We'll do. Well, we got a motion, a motion by Leopold and a second by Friend. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. Moving on to item number 13, which is considered final appointment of Chris Miller of the Workforce Investment Board as a representative of the local business for a term to expire June 30th, 2022. I'll first ask if there's any public comment. Seeing none, I'll bring it back to the board. Move motion by McPherson, second by Friend. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. We're now moving into closed session. Will there be any reportable actions? No. Okay. Thank you.


So, welcome to the Dr. Gundry podcast. Well, could certain foods, even ones that are thought of as healthy, be sabotaging your health? Well, what do you think the answer to that's going to be if they contain lectins? The answer is, of course. You probably know that lectins are toxic plant proteins that can unfortunately lead to digestive problems, weight gain, joint pain, brain fog, and almost any other health issue. So, you want to avoid these edible enemies at all costs. And I'll be the first to tell you, eliminating lectins from your diet takes willpower, consistency, and most importantly, commitment. And once you see the difference, though, between your physical, mental, and emotional well-being, most people actually agree that it's worth it. So, we've got a great guest for you today. Her name is Claudia Coricci, but if you look for her name, it's going to be spelled Coricci with an I on the end of it, right? Right. Okay. But you don't pronounce the I. She's living proof of that. Claudia started to see her health decline in her late 30s after relocating the United States from Dubai, where she had lived for about eight years. She actually gained weight, and I want her to tell this story because it's a fascinating story. And no matter what she did, she couldn't lose it. But all that changed when Claudia adapted the plant paradox diet. Now, Claudia, who's studying to be a health coach, she shares recipes and advice and other resources on her Instagram account, which is a must-click. And it's a healthy lifestyle website at all. It's called Creative in My Kitchen, and you probably know it, and if you don't, you should. The art of cooking lectin-free food. So she's my guest today, and Claudia, it's so nice to see you in person. As you know, a big fan of yours almost from day one when you started writing. So tell me about your kind of journey. Get us to Dubai to Dallas, Texas, where you live now, and what happened? Okay, so first thing I'd like to say, thank you for having me. I'm so beyond excited to meet you. So yeah, when we moved from Dubai to Dallas, it was already another big change for me. And I started to gain weight, slowly but surely. Now, let me interject. You had just been newly married recently. Yes, kind of.  To burgers and some other, not that healthy food, but still I wasn't an unhealthy eater. So I was always taking care of what I eat and choosing the best choices. But I have to say my diet, especially in Dubai, was very high in lectins. Homas, fattush, tomatoes, cucumbers, every single day. And I continued to eat that when I came to Dallas, thinking that's healthy food. Having a salad every day, having a whole wheat bread toast with some peanut butter and some banana. That's a healthy breakfast. Then I changed to oats because I thought, okay, oats, maybe it's better. Goji berries. I tried everything and it would just go up. I was doing yoga every day. And you were telling me that you never got on the scale? I was scared because I saw my sizes going bigger. I didn't want to see the number. But you weren't sitting on the couch watching yoga videos and eating cookies. You were actively exercising and eating a healthy diet. Yes. And the weight just kept going. Just very slowly, but it was going up. And then I like this part of the story.  Because I hear this all the time, but it's great coming from you. Yes. So I go to a routine checkup. I'm healthy. I don't have major health issues. But at the routine checkup, for the first time in some time, I had to wake myself. So before I had the appointment, I saw the number and I had like an anxiety attack. I was like, oh my God, this is the heaviest I've ever been. And we had the checkup. I was considered healthy. And the doctor, who is very kind and nice, he asked, do you have any concerns? And I was actually thinking like, yeah, I'm concerned about my weight because it's going up without me being an unhealthy person. And he said, again, very gracious, very kind. He said, you know, you're healthy. There's no problem. It happens with women once they approach forties. There are a lot of hormonal changes. And you know, it's just, it's something natural. You shouldn't be worried. And I don't know. I didn't know what to think. I just felt a little bit like, OK, so from now on, it's only downhill. But I couldn't accept this answer. I felt I was in a search. And that's when I discovered the plant paradox. So how did you find the plant paradox? So while it was two years ago, it was right before my birthday. My birthday is next week. So I'll be 40 next week. Oh, happy birthday. Thank you. So it was the same time when I think we tend to be more reflective around our birthdays. So I was thinking, so what am I doing wrong? What is this? Searching, searching. And then one day, this seems kind of like, but one day on my Facebook feed, an interview with you in Goop came out. And it just caught my attention because it said, the healthy foods, they might make you sick. It was something along these lines. It's like, OK, I know I'm eating healthy foods. What I consider to be healthy. What if this is relevant to me? So I read the article. I ordered the book immediately. The book was lost. It didn't come. So I received a message from Amazon that the book was lost and I was reimbursed for it. So you gave me that one star on Amazon for them losing the book. No. The only one star was you. Actually, I got reimbursed and then the book came. Oh, good. Oh, so you got a free book. So I got the book and I was like, OK, this is meant to be. I felt like it was something like, you know, it just came to me. Then I read it and if you see my book, it's just like, you know, highlighted all the colors and I read it like several times. So you've lost 25 pounds? Yes. Yeah. So I think a lot of people, particularly when we chat and I get emails or questions on Facebook or Instagram, a lot of people say, you know, this is impossible to do. It's an impossible diet.  You weren't obese. So what was your motivation? How did you do this? There are several things. One of them was that, I mean, weight aside, like if I looked at myself in the mirror, I couldn't recognize myself. Like, I felt like this is not me.  I wasn't obese or not even, like, overweight by some standards. But I felt that way. Because, you know, we all know how we normally, like our normal weight or figure or is. So that was one thing. I couldn't, I didn't like myself.  So not only is the weight that you're heavy, but I guess there was some water retention and all that stuff. I had harbor and I had to take those chums every night. But those we consider them normal today, right? We think, you know, everyone has that. I also have it, so. And tell me, you're telling me about your sinus conditions and how you kind of had to keep escalating your over-the-counter drugs. Tell me about that. So I never had sinus issues until I moved to Dubai. Something happened. I don't know if it was some change. I mean, of course, the air is different. There's a lot of AC there. There's a lot of dust in the air. So maybe that was something, or maybe it was the God that was changing and that gave me. Anyway, I started to have sinus problems. First, they would go away with Advil, just simple Advil. After a while, I had to change to Advil sinus. Then after a while, that wouldn't work anymore. I had to change to Advil sinus allergy. You know, there's like... And then after I moved to Dallas, even the allergy one wouldn't work. Like there were times when I had this pain on my sinuses. I could take anything. It wouldn't work. Now when I think about it, it was probably food. Yeah, yeah.   And I must have been in there every other week. Just, you know, I couldn't. It was just constant headache.  And I got actually a funny story. I got allergy testing and, you know, they put all the needles on your back and they actually said, we'll be right back. I'll never forget it. And so a couple of minutes later, I noticed my mouth swelling and then my tongue swelling. And the next thing I know, I said, this is very interesting. I'm a pre-med. And I swear I'm having anaphylactic shock.  And she said, oh my gosh. And she got an adrenaline shot. And she said, wow, I've never seen a reaction like that.  And that explains everything. So I was actually on allergy shots for a number of years. I have no allergies anymore, interestingly enough, once I kind of started doing all this. So it was food, you know, that I was reacting to, not just ragweed or, you know, pollen. I want to go back to something. Because I think this is really important. And I've actually written about this but it's a long time since I talked about this. So I was, you know, obese. Even though I was running 30 miles a week and going to the gym every day and eating what I thought was healthy. And interestingly, when I was obese and a lot of obese people think this way, we look in the mirror and we do not see that obese person. We actually have a visual picture of ourselves when we were skinny. And I can tell you, I know exactly the picture I had of myself was when I was 17 years old at the beach in Daytona Beach and I was standing on a surfboard and I was thin and trim, you know. And that is my visual image of me.  I saw this slim, good-looking guy. And I talked to so many obese people who that's part of the problem that they actually don't see that right in front of them. They don't see it. But you at least saw it and I think that's very interesting. So I think that's great. If you see it, then that's pretty good motivation to do something about it.  You don't see it. And just, you know, it's okay. But that's what happens. You're not walking around thinking you're obese. Yeah, that's amazing that you saw it. One of the things that I actually recommend people do is get out that old picture of yourself. Almost all of us were thinner than we are at some point. And you may not be the stick figure, you know, that looks like Twiggy or Frank Sinatra, thin, but all of us started at a lower weight. And get out that picture, make a couple of copies, put one on your refrigerator, put one on your bathroom mirror, and then, particularly in your bathroom, just stare at you and stare at that picture and say, you know, I gotta get back to that. And if you've read the longevity paradox, you know that it's never too late to take the step to get back to that. I used to do that a lot. Looking, I like to look at my, not because I like myself or I'm too, but, you know, the old times in Dubai with my friends and I look at my pictures and like, oh my God, like, that's me. Like, look, this is me, this is not me. I think that's how, yeah. Okay, so now you're on the plant paradox and obviously things are happening for the better. So what motivated you to do creative in my kitchen? So I always love to cook. Like, since I was a little girl, like I like to experiment, to take my mom's cookbooks and, you know, surprise my parents with fancy dinners or that kind of stuff.   Yes, we participated. We participated in the cooking process always. We were helping. We were doing something, whatever she told us to do. But I think I was also like, my sister was not, didn't like it that much. I like it more. So I guess it's also, you know, what, so I always love cooking, but especially after moving to Dubai, you know, it's an environment where you go out a lot and you go to restaurants and I started to use the kitchen less and less and when I moved here, I was curious to try all the restaurants and all the American food and so I didn't use the kitchen that much, but I was still doing cooking at home and I was never a person who follows recipes. I would just make up things or get inspired by something and then make my own thing. I would never measure and I will always forget what I had like the week before. I would want to recreate a dish and I'll be like, oh my God, I forgot what I did. So that motivated me to start keeping a journal and what's best for this than Instagram. Keep a visual journal and a few words about like what I ate and when I started the plant paradox, that was the motivation, okay, that will help me to see what I eat and will take it from me. I wasn't planning to have this big, like my name back then, I had to change it. It was something like that I would even forget it. I would remember it. It was just something weird, but yeah. So that's what motivated me to keep track and to be able to look back and see what I ate and that whole Instagram experience is Blossom, you're coming out with a cookbook in the first quarter of 2020. Right. Got any idea of what the title is so people can be looking for it? Well, for now, a working title is The Living Well Without Late In Cookbook. And then some other, like about 125 recipes. Wow, okay. All right, so you've been busy? Yes, very busy. That's great. Who's the tester? Is your husband the tester? Well, it's a lot of the people that are following on Instagram if I post something and they give me feedback. I have a friend in Dallas, Christie, who always makes my recipes and she always gives me feedback and everything she makes from my website, she makes it better. Like, if she brings me something, like one of my recipes, I'm like, oh my god, this is much better. It looks better and it tastes better so that makes me happy. And she's a vegan, yes? That's actually another friend, well, most of them, but my friend, my friend, Christina, Christie, Christina. See, that's her. Christina, and my husband is Christian. Holy cow. I'm attracted to him. So, yeah.  Oh, no. Yes. All right. So things are going well and you've got this cookbook going, but you've recently had some health challenges and tell me all about that. So about four months ago, one day, before that I was feeling like hyper and I was feeling like I'm a superwoman. Like, I can do anything and I'm like doing all the stuff and super busy. And one day I had, after I ate something that I would always eat, it wasn't anything new. I had a reaction. Like, I started, like, my ears got like blocked and then my nose got stuck and my throat started to like close kind of. So I would say I never had allergies, ever, any kind of allergies. So, but I imagine that that's the kind of reaction you have when you have a food allergy or some environmental allergies. But there was nothing new in my environment. It was just a brand new day, the usual stuff and then this happened. Had moved into a new house, had didn't get a new mattress, new carpet, you didn't go on vacation, you didn't have a weekend off. Completely the same thing. And then it was followed because I didn't know when the reaction was so strong, followed by anxiety, followed by a panic attack. And that was the scariest thing I've ever lived, I have to say, from a health perspective. So, yeah, for a while, I didn't know what it is. I went to emergencies. The second time I had this reaction, I felt like I couldn't breathe. So I went to emergencies. I thought it's pollen allergy because it was kind of the season. But they gave me anxiety and depression medicine. And I didn't want to take that. So I started to... Well, let's stop right there because this is so common, particularly, so you're now basically a 40-year-old female and you're having a panic attack and for what apparently is no good reason. And of course, our thinking about a 40-year-old woman with a panic attack is, this is anxiety and you need antidepressants and you need prescription or at a van or whatever. And it's interesting, I met a young man yesterday in my office who is 23 years old and he's had exactly these sorts of attacks but primarily in his abdomen, stomach, and it feels like a knife is stabbing him and he was told that this is anxiety because they give him some at a van and the pain would go away and that proved that this was anxiety. This is the least anxious person I think I've ever met in my life. He's kind of a typical laid-back 23-year-old kind of a surfer dude sort of. And he's sitting there kind of like this and I said, you know, you don't strike me as an anxious individual. He's a man-dude, no. That's not me. And I said, yeah, but they're drugging you up. He said, yeah, I don't like it. He says, that's just crazy. They take his gallbladder out because they tell him it's his gallbladder. That didn't make the pain go away. So he's been actually going around. He's been to Stanford. They told him it was anxiety because there's nothing wrong with you. And lo and behold, he has markers for an autoimmune disease, lupus that nobody ever bothered to look for. And so they, we've been working with him. I met him for the first time, but my PA, Mitsu, saw him a few months ago. His lupus marker is now turned off by following the plant paradox. But we've still got some issues and we're going to get into that. We've got some really cool leaky gut issues. But so tell me, so tell me about histamine. Right. I had no idea what histamine is. I just knew the word from those pills that people take for allergies or seasonal. But I had no idea what they are. But searching my symptoms and trying to understand what's happening with me, I found out I came across some articles like about histamines and then I was trying to look at what I was eating and it's true, like my diet was, I would say heavy and what is considered high histamine in foods. So tell our listeners what those foods typically are. So, avocados, spinach, mushrooms and leftover animal proteins. And dairy. This is not really necessary, the whole thing, but I gave up dairy, yes. But usually what is aged, let's consider high histamine. So a cheese that is aged. And fermented foods. I love sauerkraut. I grew up with sauerkraut. I would put avocado and sauerkraut on top of each other and I would eat that like for breakfast. So I think those were the foods that for me maybe tip the balance to make it like, no, this is an overload. And maybe combine with some seasonal allergies. I have some pollen, I don't know. I still don't know exactly. So, you know, histamines are trendy things to talk about. So we have a set of cells that are in our skin and our nose and our GI tract that are called mast cells, like the mast on a sailing ship. And these mast cells have little granules that have histamine in them. And if you stimulate mast cells, they will release histamine. And histamine actually, among other things, makes things turn red. Those of you who take niacin or who I've asked you to take niacin know that the niacin flush is actually caused by niacin activating mast cells to release histamine. And sometimes some people are so sensitive to niacin that even a little bit of niacin and a multivitamin will make somebody's nose run. And so histamines will release, actually, a lot of nose running. It can make things swell. But histamine anti-histamines tell mast cells not to release histamine. That's actually how they work. So we're, believe it or not, all allergies, basically, you release histamines because you're actually producing lots of mucus with the idea that you're trapping palind and, oh, by the way, lectins. So lectins in themselves will release histamine. And that's why many of us believe that it's not histamine so much as it is lectins that actually start the problem. So you've taken those foods out of your diet now? Right, yes. And are things better? Yes, I control my symptoms. Without those foods, I still have, like, every time I eat, I feel something. No matter, even if it's low histamine, but it's very light. Like, it doesn't give me that kind of. And then it goes away. So it's like, yeah. I feel like it's getting better and better. Well, it's interesting. I profile a woman in the plant paradox who was deathly allergic to nuts, all tree nuts. And as kind of part of the program, she one day, I think, gosh, maybe a year into the program, she and a friend went out for a salad, a Caesar salad at a restaurant in L.A.   And she didn't give it any other thought. And her friend called her the next morning, almost in a panic. She said, thank goodness I hear your voice. Are you okay? And she said, yeah, why? She said, well, I just found out the Caesar dressing there is made with walnuts. And you're deathly allergic to walnuts. And she said, walnuts, huh? And so she actually went out and bought some walnuts.  And she said, well, yeah, there is that kind of feeling.  You know, there was a woman who unfortunately has passed away. And you probably saw her website, The Histamine Girl. If you haven't seen it, it's well worth looking at. And for years, she was really on a campaign to get histamine out of her diet. And she had low histamine cookbooks. And she actually finally wrote a post. She says, you know, actually, this is all from lectins. And that's the troublemaker. But you bring up a very interesting point. And I mentioned these new, exciting tests. And I don't have a relationship with them there. It's called Viber in America. And I don't know who their PR guy is, but these tests are really stupidly named. They're called zoomers.  And what they look for is, number one, they'll look for all the usual suspect lectin foods, including gluten, which is a lectin. And then they'll look for leaky gut. But what's been surprising, I see a lot of patients who really toe the line on the plant paradox. They really don't cheat because it's been worth it for them. But things aren't perfect.  And so we started to get these tests. Unfortunately, insurance doesn't cover them, so there's a cost. So I've been reluctant to use them because I really want people to have health care without incurring too much expense. But I've yet to regret these tests. And what's been fascinating to me, and there won't be a test on this, but there is a very interesting lectin in spinach, potatoes, corn, soybeans, green bell peppers, not red bell peppers. And there's one other one, and I think I said potatoes, that it's the wildest thing. There's little pores in plants that open and close so that plants can breathe. They can actually breathe out water vapor. And if it's really hot in Dallas, Texas, they close these pores so that they can serve water. That's actually what they do. It turns out that you and I have these same little pore control things in the lining of our gut. And we have them in the lining of our brain, the blood-brain barrier. And the plant aquaporin lectin looks virtually identical to the aquaporin that sits in our gut and sits in our brain. And three of my female patients now who swear on a stack of bibles that they're perfect, they react vigorously to the spinach lectin. I had another woman who was gluten-free who reacts vigorously to the corn and potato aquaporin lectins. So I've actually, probably in my next book, I'm going to stop recommending spinach to people. Because it's... And I've seen several people with what looks like pseudo-Parkinsonism or brain fog that they react to these aquaporins and they have a leaky brain. And we can measure it. So, scary stuff. So, and I'm so glad that... I'm not glad that this has happened to you, but I'm so glad that you started looking for, okay, what is this? I'm doing everything right. And one of the reasons I keep seeing patients, not a day goes by that people say, you don't need to see patients. You've done all that. You're famous, blah, blah, blah. Every day, I learn something. And if I hadn't had patients come, boy, I'm a saint. I'm doing everything right, but things aren't right. And I go, boy, we've got to look into this. And now with these new tests, I see people who not only react to KCNA, one melt, but darn it, they react to KCNA2, or they react away. So, you know, their quest bars have got to go. And their goat cheese has got to go, and their sheep cheese has got to go. Or I have some people who react to the white of egg, believe it or not, the egg white is far more antigenic than the egg yolk, but I have some people that will react to both. And the other thing that shocks me, and I'm not saying this is happening to you, I have yet to see an individual who swears that they are gluten-free, who doesn't take test positive for gluten in their bloodstream and the components. Many of them are women or men who are married, and their spouse or significant other doesn't eat that way.  I have another woman who is so allergic, she literally can't leave her house, she came in to visit me completely gloved, and her husband has a whole wheat English muffin every morning, and she makes it for him and puts it on the plate.   So I've been so impressed with these tests, you know, kind of getting through, I do everything right, and why did this happen to me? And I would be willing to bet, if we did the test on you, that we would find you still have leaky gut. That's what my, the doctor, I had to go to a doctor because I was desperate, and we took blood tests and everything, and that's exactly what he suspects. I mean, he's the main issues, they don't really come unless you have a leaky gut. That's correct. Like, so I think now if I look back, I wish, and that's maybe something I would not recommend, but just from my experience, I wish I took those blood tests when I started the plan paradox. So I go hand in hand, and I target specific issues. I had heavy metals in my blood, like very high. I had to do a liver detox because of that. And other imbalances, then normally we don't know unless, you know, we have the numbers and the tests. So I wish I started that a bit earlier. Yeah, it's, again, I think when, particularly when things aren't making sense, I think the new batteries of tests that are becoming available really do find the answer. And I'm going to bring up one more example. I just gave a lecture on this this week. There's a 75-year-old woman who came to me in Santa Barbara who has been told she has celiac. And so she's been eating gluten-free for years. And she still had horrible bowel issues.  So we actually did these set of leaky gut tests. And sure enough, she's got gluten all over the place. She's got leaky gut. And she said, but that's impossible.  I said, do you dine out? And she said, yes. And I said, well, by dining out, you are eating gluten. And I have many restaurateurs and chefs who are my friends. And to a person, they say, you cannot eat gluten-free in a restaurant no matter what anybody tells you. I could give a lecture about that, but you can't. And she was eating corn as her primary gluten-free food. Corn chips, corn muffins, corn everything. And there's a test. There's a protein in corn that looks exactly like gluten. And she had this crossover so that every time she ate corn, her immune system thought she was eating gluten. And so when we started working with her, it actually took us about seven, eight months to get her leaky gut done. Now when we do her tests, everything's green instead of bright red or yellow. And I keep telling particularly women, please visit a doctor who will keep you in mind, who will believe you and not give up until you find a reason for this. Yeah. And getting back to the low histamine girl, the root cause of histamine reactions is the leaky gut. Because your immune system, and the root cause of allergies is the leaky gut. And your immune system just goes crazy and it looks for anything that might otherwise not bother you. So let me ask you, what preparations are you using as anti-histamines to help you out? Any supplements? Ah, yes. I mean, I've been through like a process. First I started with something just emergency, like, you know, helping to get through the like really difficult time at the beginning, which was some anti-anxiety, but just supplements. I did a liver detox protocol for a month. Tell me about that, because I can, yeah, tell me about that before I open my mouth. Okay, so it's, can I mention the brand, what I did? Like, it's Quicksilver Scientific. They have a black box, that's what it's called. I didn't do it by myself, recommended by my doctor. So I did that for a month. Everything tasted terrible. Like, ah, that was really bad experience. I had to do it in the morning and in the evening. And I did feel better after. You know, it was a process and with the time I felt better. I don't know if it was that or if it was something else, but at the same time I was, you know, I gave up dairy. I gave up animal protein, which is very small exceptions. I ate all the greens, you know, dandelion greens and all the stuff that's supposed to help us. I kept it whole foods, vegetables, organic, local, like the best I could do. So that was something, yeah, I took everything out, but I tried not to, because at that point at the beginning I was feeling better when I didn't eat, to be honest. So I kept it for a while, just one meal a day, but I just felt like, okay, I also have to eat. I was losing a lot of weight. So I started with two meals a day and then eat all the colors, all the good veggies. And I started to reintroduce little things, but I didn't do dairy at all. Like it's out of my... And how about eggs? Every now and then I have one whole egg and maybe one yolk, but not every day. It's just to add a little bit more extra. I know egg yolks have to be well-cooked. Egg whites have to be well-cooked. They're quite high histamine, but I did a little bit of beef liver, because again, because apparently it's a good... Well, so as you know, elimination diets are popular and one of the latest crazes is the carnivore diet. And this got, I think, a real push by Jordan Peterson, who claims that he now is intolerant to any food except beef. He cannot eat anything without getting a major reaction to it. Nothing else. And in a way, I've listened to some of his interviews and he feels trapped, because every time he tries to add something, he can't. So I'm... But the carnivore diet is an elimination diet. And all plants have lectins. They all have toxins. They don't want to be eaten. But I think there's better ways to do that than the carnivore diet. We've had a carnivore diet expert on the podcast. Yeah, and everyone got a little bit confused. So what do we do now? Well, I like to give people the benefit of hearing them out. But I think carnivore diet people don't understand. There's a new paper out sounding the alarm. And I write about this in all my books. There's a molecule in beef, lamb, and pork, sugar molecule called Nu5GC. We don't have that. We have Nu5AC lining our blood vessels, lining our gut. And the new article confirms that if you eat Nu5GC food, it will produce an antibody against your own blood vessel lining and against your own gut lining that will eventually do you in with at least heart disease and probably cancer. So as a long-term idea, the carnivore diet, we were not... Unfortunately, it's a genetic mutation. We were not designed to interact with beef, lamb, or pork. So when somebody tells me I'm a carnivore, and that was what I was designed to eat, well, genetically, guess what? You were not designed to eat that stuff. And we're probably going to pay for it. So have you tried Cursatin and Rosemary? No to Rosemary, but Cursatin, yes. I even took it this morning before I came. Yeah, so you not only have to take Cursatin twice a day, about 500 milligrams, but Rosemary, Rosemarine Acid is far more antihistamine than even Cursatin or Curecetin. Either way is correct. So get yourself some high-quality Rosemary extract or look for the words Rosemarine Acid. Incidentally, Perilla Oil, one of my favorite oils, is full of Rosemary Acid. Very hard to find. Oh, it's on Amazon. Really? Yeah. And it's easy to find. Okay. So other than losing weight, how did going lectin-free benefit you? In many ways. Firstly, I didn't have to take an Advil or any other type of medication for the past two years for anything. So no pain, no aches, no harbor, nothing. So I'm very grateful for that. Something I wanted to actually say, I know it's a topic that a lot of, especially women, they don't want to talk too much about it, but their menstrual health, it's two weeks after I started a lectin-free diet, I got the first period of my life without pain. In 30, like, eight years of life, of course. So I think this is amazing.  So this for me sold me like two weeks after I started. Yeah, it's interesting, I even have a gynecologist who sees a lot of women with endometriosis and she's been shocked that if she can convince them to do the plant paradox and go lectin-free that their endometriosis pain goes away. And she said, I think you're on to something and thank you for bringing that up. I think it's all related. So everybody says this is hard to do. Give us some tips. How do you get started doing this? I think first people need to find their motivation because if you don't have that, then you're not able to stick to it. So find your why, write it down on a paper and put it somewhere where you can see it every day, every morning. And once you have that figure out, just make up your mind that this is a commitment, you don't have to think it's a lifelong, but think three months I'm going to stick to it. And then write down what the benefits are and then put them against how you felt before and decide is it worth it or is it not worth it. I think it will be worth it for everyone. And then, of course, you have to cook if you're going on a lectin-free diet. So just try to enjoy cooking, experiment with the new ingredients. Good resources? Like creative in my kitchen, for instance? Sure, I have over 150 recipes on my website for anyone like from vegan to vegetarian to... For beginners? For beginners for the three-day cleanse. And there are also a lot of other lectin-free bloggers that share their ideas, what they eat every day, just follow them. And you will get inspiration. Okay. All right. So audience questions. Normally, as you know, folks, we have audience questions. But today, Claudia is the audience. So let me have it.  Especially if we can have nuts or other... If we eat only produce, is that enough?  And they don't eat beans. They don't eat grains. They don't eat nuts as a source of protein. So they do very well. They have more muscle mass than we could ever imagine. In fact, all the largest animals on earth are vegetarians or vegans. And they do extremely well. Do you have to eat a lot of vegetables? Yes, the answer is a gorilla eats 16 pounds of leaves every day. But they're a whole lot bigger than we are. So it's perfectly capable of getting all your protein needs by eating plants. And if you're really worried, then, for instance, hemp protein is a great source of protein. Or hemp seeds or hemp hearts. That's an easy way to do it. I'm a big fan of mushrooms as a protein source. I like the corn products. They do have a little tiny bit of egg white in them. Now, most corn products are off the list. They're all sorts of mischievous stuff, particularly the vegan corn products. But, for instance, corn grounds are a great replacement that most people do very well with. But no, you do not have to have animal protein for health. Okay. Next question. I wanted to ask your opinion about liver detox. Is that necessary? How does that work? How can I support my liver? And I see a lot, speaking of protein, I see a lot of medical information that we need protein to support the liver detoxification. What do you think? So the liver is designed to detoxify multiple compounds daily. And there are phase one and phase two detoxification enzymes. Some people do have a defect in one or more of these, but in general, things like milk thistle, a compound called D-lemonine, which is in orange peel, and curcetin actually really boosts the phase one and phase two liver detoxing enzyme. So that's number one. Number two, the fallacy of a liver detox is, and this was actually shown, and I write about this, by Ray Wolford, who was a pathologist at UCLA, was a member of the Biosphere II, the failed experiment in the Arizona desert years ago, where the biospherians were locked in geodesic domes, simulating a mission to Mars and they were supposed to grow all their food and generate all their oxygen by themselves. And it was a horrible failure. They had to pump oxygen in and these people lost a third of their body weight in six months. And Ray Wolford was actually the father of calorie restriction. In fact, Walter Longo, Ray Wolford was his mentor, so Walter Longo is his student. Ray Wolford studied heavy metals in the biospherians and as they lost a third of their body weight, their heavy metals went up just huge and it took a year for their heavy metals to go down. Why?  That's why a swordfish or a giant tuna can go swimming across the sea perfectly healthy with toxic levels of mercury in them because it's all in their fat. What most people don't know about a liver detox is the liver has absolutely positively no ability to detoxify heavy metals. None. The liver instead takes the heavy metals and says, gee, I can't do anything with these guys so I'm going to get rid of them and put them in the bile and it'll flow out into the intestines and we'll be rid of it. Only one problem. Our intestines rapidly absorb the heavy metals.  So what you have to do is you have to aid liver excretion of these and there's compounds to do it but you also have to capture those heavy metals and I use high dose chlorella and I use activated charcoal. And knock on wood. I haven't had anybody whose mercury levels and lead levels and cadmium levels we can't get down to normal by just having them add some phase two and phase one liver enzyme and chlorella and activated charcoal. But the idea that your liver is somehow going to detox these things is one of the great myths and it will not happen and that was proven by Ray Wohlford years ago. Right. Okay. And also like a little bit related like the genetic testing I just did mine. I didn't get the results but I just sent my samples but I had a little bit like it took me about two months to decide to do it. What do you think? Well I think it's useful to find out your apoE status see where you carry the four allele which is unfortunately called the Alzheimer's gene and about 30% of us do and there are things to do about that. I have recently last week saw my 99 year old gentleman who carries the apoE4 he runs his company and his daughters, three daughters do not want him to retire and he's 99 and has the Alzheimer's gene and I can assure you he does not have Alzheimer's. So having this gene doesn't mean you're going to get it but there's steps to do to prevent it from being mischievous. Since more than half of people carry one or more of the MTHFR mutations I don't think you need to be tested for that. Just take methylfolate and methyl B12 and you'll be fine. On the internet everyone wants to blame everything that's ever happened to them on these mutations, the MTHFR genes. And I'm sorry it's not going to work. Actually I discovered after my last blood test I have an MTHFR mutation. Yeah most people do. And believe it or not if you have a double mutation it usually means you probably have some degree of ADHD. I have never met a successful person, successful business person, successful entrepreneur who usually doesn't have one or more copies of the MTHFR mutation. I think it's actually good for you. Okay. Alright so that wraps it up. Claudia, where can people find you if they don't already know of you, you famous W? Well they can find me on Instagram at creativeinmykitchen, my website creativeinmykitchen.com I also have a Facebook group. Also search creativeinmykitchen, the plan paradox and then you'll find it. And that's pretty much all at the moment. Pinterest, you know all the social media. Okay and your book will be out first quarter we think? Quarter of 2020. Right. And it'll be on Amazon. It'll be on Amazon and all the bookstores. Barnes and Noble. Yes. Great. And we always need more lectin-limited, lectin-free recipes and thank you so much again for everything you're doing. Thank you for having me and for everything you've done for all of us. Pleasure. Pleasure. Keep up to good work. Very helpful. We're all in this together. So if you want to hear more, please leave comments on if you like the podcast. What you want to hear next because we're always looking for something that you are going to like. And hope we entertain you today and we'll see you next week on the Dr. Gundry podcast. Before you go, I just wanted to remind you that you can find the show on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts because I'm Dr. Gundry and I'm always looking out for you.