's that's where we are that that's that's why they're different amounts. They started out at the same amount Uh, we scaled back the other one to kind of fit within our our funding abilities. We um One targeting the west side would be more arpa eligible the other one on the east side Would not so therefore it would fall under the pge side Excellent. Thanks ellen. I appreciate that. Well, I those that's the end of my questions and I I um, I just have to just mention that I that One of the things that that really does concern me are some of our contractual obligations that we um, that will be coming to roost um in the next Fiscal year and this fiscal year that are not yet in our budget. So I appreciate the The the the group identifying some of the funds that that could be used even though they're one-time funds And I understand that are at least maybe two-year funds Um, we have we have a number of obligations that are not yet accounted for and that does give me no small amount of pause So thank you for for that consideration. Thank you for considering those unfunded Obligations and those contractual obligations that are coming coming home to roost soon. So, um, I I I appreciate all this information and um, I I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Thank you for the clarifications and my To follow up on on um providence health And their contribution to in response. It was I think it was around 400,000 Um, and then we're also trying to get some more money in I think uh, we're we're looking at settering Kaiser But that amount would be about Again around 400,000. So I think I think we're looking Uh, if possible The the amount that could come in from the from the hospital areas would be Around the 800 to $900,000 range So then my 1.1 was erroneous and I I apologize for that But I did I did it was my understanding that it was 1.1 million that they were obligating but but that's you know I'm I wouldn't I'm not going to follow my sword on that information. So I appreciate the clarification. Thanks, Alan councilmember tibbetz Thanks mayor, uh, just a couple of quick questions I I did hear the response from sequoia on the baby bonds and and I do like the baby bonds I like that we have first five to lean on to run programs. So there's probably going to be limited Program costs associated with that. I I'm sorry, racy. I know that john asked you and our mystics was crunching vaccination rate numbers But racy, can you tell me again? Who is going to administer ubi? Human services department would um read that effort and we tie in and um their proposal suggest that they would be um Contracting out to community organizations and it would be return to source. We have discussed that as well Okay, so we don't know what the administration costs would be associated with that We don't um, we haven't uh discussed that part in detail though in their um in the human services department's application to the board of supervisors for their arpa funds. Um, they do have salaries and benefits um embedded into the cost that they're asking for and they're asking That the board of supervisors for nearly nine million dollars at about $275,000 of that are uh allocated are being requested for salaries and benefits and they uh list that as extra help or time limited only And so do you know anything? Oh, sorry I'm sorry I was going to say um, you know, whether we can just write on that because it's allocated We would just be adding to that program is um is what my hope is but that is what we would be discussing because there would The assumption is there's some administrative cost That would certainly make me feel better about it. I have some reservations about ubi given the one time funding nature of it You know, I feel a little bit reluctant to dive in fully without knowing there's an ongoing funding source for a program that's intended to be sustaining um And do we know anything about if we do jump in with the county? Is it too soon to ask about what their programmatic criteria is going to be? Income individuals, etc. Who would be supported by the program? Sure, so um, what they're stating is that um It would go to very low income families and transitional age youth with risk factors uh, and um, you know, what we have discussed is that the program would leverage the funding systems and supports um, such as Sonoma works programs, the uh, foster care extended foster care, uh, and community-based organizations that are already sort of embedded with with the Constituents that we would be looking to serve and so there is that piece of it. Um, if that answers your question It does um, well before our final, you know, doing final approval of ubi program Well, we have the chance to basically decide whether we want to jump in and the county's program or not and I bring that up because Um, I like the idea of helping extremely low-income families. God knows they need to support Uh, even if it is one-time money that you know from my line of work We see that that helps extremely low-income families a lot However, I understand the county's logic about supporting transitional age youth, you know, that is one area where homelessness has expanded Um, so we're kind of chasing the data on now and however, I would want to know more about, um, you know Fully understanding the needs of transitional age youth because our organization that I work for Has just started doing some supportive transitional age youth and through Uh, I'm forgetting the acronym from the state, but they are eligible for between 2,600 and 3,500 a month in state funds For 18 to 25, I believe or 24. And so what that tells me is actually that Uh For them one-time funding is probably not going to make a big difference What we're seeing is that their need is actually housing and the ability to apply that money to extremely low-income housing supports So that would be something I would want to like discuss and know further But you're saying we would have the chance to do that Yeah, so, um, the way the county is um saying that they're going to set up the program is it would be three years with two years of funding at this point um And it would be the first six months. I would be to set up the program. Um, this, you know the the startup Pieces of it and then the last six months would be to um publish the uh process and outcomes evaluation and what we are seeing on some of these things It is a layering effect. Um, so in the models that we're looking at in other areas And of course I don't have all the details off the top of my head But in the models we're looking at other areas. Um, it is uh Layering this for two years giving some breathing room addressing some of the other foundational things Which we are trying to address through other programs both with arpa and outside of arpa So this would at least have um the benefit of the other existing programs Okay, thank you. Um, my I guess my other question is is on the panel, you know, I was I was disappointed to see that um down payment assistance didn't make it into the mix because again when I think when we talk about Helping families young families like truly build wealth in this community in a community now where we saw Property values go up. I think 18 percent last year in santa rosa Um down payments now, you know on a median income home. I think in the county is now 850 000 for a home here Uh, you know, you can find homes in the 500 to 600 000 dollar range But you're looking at a down payment of 120 000 and that's on top of how did you save to get there? um, and then also, you know, we I think if I recall correctly from the last meeting there was a lot of council support for it I heard a few people say we'd like to see it one person mentioned that Um, you know, we I like it because it's sustainable. It's ongoing It's money that we recover and then readminister. So, you know in perpetuity. We're helping people You know put roots down in this community Um, and is it because I guess could you talk about why it didn't score so high and then was that just because was there I'm wondering if there was a misinterpretation of the council talking about sustainable I saw on the criteria in the staff report that Sustainable was environmental kind of focused on environmental sustainability Was economic given consideration there program economics Okay Yeah, Claire, are you going to take this that that was not something that came through condom development? Yep, I'm happy to so We looked at this through the housing and community services department Um, and as you would call, you know, three million was sort of the minimum threshold to make a program even worthwhile to Put effort in The output would be that we'd be able to support 30 to 50 recipients. Um, if there were grants, it would be a one time Um opportunity If it's a loan program as you were Suggesting there in your last remarks That would require a program management just like our other loan programs. We We uh, don't have the staff to support that we actually don't have an existing down payment assistance program On that we could leverage so we would need to address the staffing issue for long term to manage those loans And I I don't have the scoring sheet up to I can't speak to exactly how it fell out in ranking. But sustainability was Less environmental, I would say is is also fiscal fiscal sustainability And we were looking heavily at one time monies that could be expended in this time period Can I ask when we got rid of the housing authorities down payment assistance program because in 2016 I spoke with then director David Gwine and he stated for counsel that We did have a program with infrastructure in place for silent second lending at low interest rates So i'm just curious when we got rid of that program I don't have what he did say What he did say was it was dormant that it was unfunded, but he said we do have it Uh Yeah, so I I don't have a specific answer for you Megan bassinger may be able to be pulled up on on standby here to get a specific answer. She's the interim director for housing and community services Councilmember tidbits, we may need to circle back with you on that one and and so claire and maybe Megan has joined us if he was like Thank you Good afternoon. I'm Megan bassinger interim director of housing and community services And while we don't have a specific down payment assistance program that's available to individual home buyers We do assist with the down payments associated with specific developments So for instance, the lantana homes project Which was just completed in the last few months by bourbon housing Received funding so that we could provide down payments for those households When those units sell we do roll the funds into loans for the new home buyers But it's not an open solicitation to anyone who's looking to purchase a home in the community So do we give that to those individual home buyers like at lantana for example in the form of silent seconds? Correct So it's a loan to the home buyer, but generally they stay with the property and would roll onto subsequent buyers All right. Okay. Well that I appreciate that Megan that kind of syncs up with what david told me personally And I remember he told the council about it too It was during the measure and conversation and we're making decisions then about whether we should fund That program on an individual home buyer basis and then you know The thinking was at the time that that silent second mortgage when the person sold it the home They would either go It would basically get the loan we get called once the conventional mortgage was over Or when they sold it at the point of sale it would repay the city with a crude interest And it'd be an interest only loan essentially So the city would actually make money you'd have some money to offset administrative expenses associated with it And I remember from that day when dav gave that presentation to council It had always been something that I'd really want to see happen because you know, I tell the story that I was lucky. I had a parent who provided me with a down payment somebody who works for me His parents just gave him a down payment and I think about what a privilege, you know What about those kids that don't have that in this community? Um, I'll bring that up a little bit later I'd love it if we could find funding for that program that is sufficient to make a program worthwhile But also um to you know, make sure that if there are expenses associated with it that they get covered And I have some ideas about where funding will come from but I'll pull I'll kind of give that in my comments later My uh, last question is is allen. I'm sorry to put you on the spot. But did you find how much is in the south? Southwest Santa Rosa parks development fee fund So it's all hands on deck trying to find that amount for you. I don't know that I'm gonna have it by by this meeting I absolutely follow up with the full council As soon as I get it Apologize no worries, you know, whenever you have it if it's today, that's terrific You know during this meeting if it's you know, a follow-up email to me That's fine where I'm going with it is I don't want to engage in district politics I certainly do not want to stop the progress on that park that councilmember alvarez has made But to me if there is money in that account that is the defined use of that account and that money For the rosalyn creek park should come from that account. That's that was the argument I was going to make Um, but again councilmember alvarez, you have my support for that park Um, I just want to make sure that you know, we're using the money that these developers are paying into for the appropriate use My I think that's my last question for now Yes, it is. Thank you staff And I think mr. Net wanted to respond on something. Yeah councilmember tibets. I did ask deputy director santos in the park Park planning division to pull that information up the southwest Zone does have 2.4 million dollars associated with it on just for an example rosalyn creek community park if we were to build out that Entire master plan would be probably over 15 million dollars And so each of the zones are underfunded as you see with many of the programs that we've talked about today And I do have information on the other three zones if you're interested Most of which are uh, for example in northwest we have 5.1 million majority of that is already programmed for projects coming forward in the Southeast we have 1.6 million, um, which will likely be Going toward the Kwanasprings community park And in the northeast we have 2.6 million, which will likely be going toward fremont park None of those dollar amounts fully Fully complete any of the park master plans that were defined described So as you're saying at the the 2.4 million in the park's development fee fund The 2.4 that is there is well shy of the 15 million you need to complete the rosalyn creek park That park was 15 million. I don't recall it being that high. Are you That is the whole master plan region No, I was saying that particular park and the infrastructure needs for that park the way the master plan was defined And that is just one of the parks most of the parks In the southwest area are not fully complete And need additional financing to bring them to fruition So the 1.5 that we would be appropriating today from the pg and e funds, um Where's the the rest of the uh, and i'm not trying to be adversarial here, but genuine question Where's the rest of the 11 million dollars coming from? Well, that's part of why most of our community parks remain Incomplete because we have not been able to acquire all of the funds to be able to do the work Southwest community park is looking to have a large finley style recreation facility in pool that's in the southwest area community plan and the general plan We also are underfunded to complete work up at youth community park As a master planned park So just in general our community parks are fairly underfunded In order to bring them to full fruition And it's our intent to be able to build Specific products so that those parks become functional For the community and uh, don't lay follow Okay, I appreciate that jason. I want to bring something up for the council to think about The one of the other proposals I made when this came out a few months ago was To look at doing a essentially california tiger salamander mitigation banking And I I have subsequently found that the true cost of that program is $300,000 The county of sonoma recently got a federal grant to begin a comprehensive habitat plan for the california tiger salamander and Director tennis wick over there would like to partner with us To include santa rosa plane as part of that mitigation plan We have a lot of land available at the laguna treatment plant that Is land that we own that we can do mitigation banking against and so with what that means is that All of those parcels in southeast and southwest santa rosa that are ripe for development It's you know, all the fallow brownfield areas that you know is infill housing has infill housing potential But it and is on our major transit corridors, but is not Really, you know bankable for a developer because For them to have to pay mitigation credits They're paying 150 to 200 thousand dollars an acre on top of the develop acquisition and development costs to build there Well, if we considered including joining the county on their plan and appropriating $300,000 out of arpa funds to do that We would potentially it'd be a long term probably two to three years down the road But we would open up southeast southwest santa rosa for our housing needs significantly Which then could further get those park development fees increased to support The southeast and southwest parks needs that eddie and natalie and john have so i want to i'll bring it up later To see if there's interest amongst the council, but to me that seems like a $300,000 investment that we should make I spare Okay, um, so I wanted to oh Megan can can Megan come back And she appears. I love it. Okay, uh lantana homes So how many homes are in that? That is a 48 unit development of single family homes and uh How long did it take to build that community? That community was initiated by the housing authority in 2007 It encountered every hurdle that a project could due to the recession lack of funding at the state Um, and we just finished it this past summer That's quite a long time Yes so Okay, so that was my question for that because we're only asking questions and then uh homeless assistance uh What are some of those dollars? earmarked for exactly The 9.8 million dollars Right, so it is I don't have the actual budget allocation in front of me, but it is um It's it's our work. I believe it's our work with catholic charity. So it's it's it's how we fund Our various outreach programs and and others That that are there. I I I saw claire pop up. She might have A little bit more of the line item parts to that but I was just going off of what we typically spent Well, I don't have line items, but I but I can say Um Is that it is status quo with our homeless services program budget. So we have sam jones hall and we partner with providers to um support the The physical facility, but also the operations associated with it Outreach efforts our family support center uh, and and I'm probably missing some items as well, but our the entirety of our homeless services budget is supported by that That line that uh 9.8 million dollars and that's just status quo and again, we saw this as an opportunity It's quite eligible. Um because of the population that serves for arpa So it's an opportunity to apply for arpa to fund something that otherwise would just be from our general fund and provides the city some flexibility Okay, and out of curiosity how how large is our homeless service budget? in totality Um, that's the entirety of our homeless services budget 9 9.8 million Yes for the entire year That's my understanding No, that's Our general fund uh budget for homeless services, right? So There's various funding sources that go into it. That specifically is just the general fund part and that 9.8 is over uh Two and a half three year period so The general fund contributes about four million dollars a year to homeless services fund for homeless services What we're talking about is just that portion Okay, um and claire really quickly. Can you Or someone uh, can someone tell me what the the master lease program was Anyone familiar with that? I'm uh, not sure Your question the master lease program a master lease program Where people were put into apartments or houses or Um, are you referring to some of our coveted response? Um efforts where we Took care of folks that had were coveted positive or needed to be isolated. We worked with the county and ourselves with with And that's not part of this general operations budget, but we did make responsive efforts to to in coveted response And they were placed in in houses So for well, um master lease houses. I I'm sorry. I'm not our apartments or something We had a lease master lease agreement with the sandman in But nagan's just jumped on every she has more a better answer If I could try and interject, um oftentimes nonprofit organizations will master lease Either residences or apartments and use those to house individuals they're serving Um catholic charities had and they may still have a program that was funded through the continuum of care Where they would hold the lease to units and they would use those to house individuals that they were serving Okay, but that was not our program No, it was it was operated through the continuum of care But the community does benefit from programs like that Okay Okay That concludes my questions. Thank you Great any other questions I think this is a question for you jason for the fiber backbone If you were to describe it to the community and say for 8.6 million dollars, you're going to get this What exactly are they going to get for an 8.6 million dollar investment? Thank you, mayor. Uh, that was part of the conversation we were going to have with the county is Coordinated effort. They did go out with an rfp. They received no responses to the rfp To help develop what would be a municipal fiber municipal broadband network What we've looked at is the concept of installing mid Mid-mile fiber installations, which is predominantly on the arterials It would set up for fiber to home or fiber to sell sites In our particular case, we would be able to Connect public infrastructure, whether it's public buildings and facilities traffic signals On the west side of town predominantly like said on those arterials and collectors in an effort to Set the stage for what would be a broader more To the home connection through the county's municipal broadband system At this point as alan mentioned, we just don't have a complete definition on it But that's where the cost came from was looking at what the installation would be per mile Of fiber along our major arterials and collectors And how does the Recent state and federal legislation around fiber play into this conversation My understanding is that there's some pretty substantial buckets of money that we can pull from Absolutely, there's certainly intent on having a large commitment Both at the state and federal levels when it comes to the installation of broadband Um, what we saw during the course of those last 18 months are some fairly significant gaps in our ability to be able to provide services to community members who are in most need of having access to Broadband and the push to try to help install those facilities as it is gaining ground Um, that's part of why arpa incorporated that into the language That stated broadband would be an important and critical asset to incorporate Um In our particular case given the type of criteria that we scored all of the projects against it scored fairly well in particular In the in the qualified zones in the southwest and the and the west Uh, and that gave us the opportunity to include this as one of the line items But that was the nature as it was really a mid-mile Program not a to the house program. So even with this 8.6 million, it'll get us a step closer But it still is not going to be infrastructure that is going to be readily available for the public That's correct at this point in time. There are other models. Um, if we were to go out on it alone We could contract directly with the service provider and Assist in the construction to the house Um, it was our intent as I mentioned to try to coordinate with the county We don't know what type of service model that they're going to try to implement But it makes sense for us to try to coordinate as closely as possible And so it was we were hoping we were hoping they would have a provider selected at this point or a contra consultant selected So that we would have a much better answer for you at this point in time When you say to the home Do you mean single family homes? Multi-family homes or doesn't matter no distinction. I think the ideal concept is any end user Okay, any other questions council? Yeah, council member Fleming Does this fiber backbone take into consideration the potential for under grounding other utilities as we go along Which would seem to me to be well in line, especially with our fire prevention Efforts on the east side, but all throughout the the city would we go along and put things in the ground as we If we were to lay the fiber Yeah, unfortunately the dollar Per lineal foot cost that we used did not incorporate a A full under grounding of utilities along those major corridors Those are extremely expensive to go through those exercises And it would dramatically exceed the cost that we have available to us And so no that wasn't included in the proposal for this particular This particular project All right, let's go ahead and go to public comment on this item I'll start with the hands-on zoom and then I'll come back to the folks who are here in the chamber We're going to start with michelle Am I live? Yes, you are Great. I appreciate that mayor. Uh, thank you council members. Um for making the opportunity to talk about these important investments and For your detailed questions and attention in this long conversation. Um, I am here today to advocate for The roseland boys and girls club and a city investment in that capital project. Um, I really appreciate, um council member tidbits and Council member sorrier some of your comments around the opportunity to really do something transformational with these funds Obviously we can do some business as usual items, but I think You're right The public is looking for us to make very significant investments to transform our community And just a few key points on our project. I've obviously sent you all materials and been in touch And really want to appreciate Mayor rogers and council member alvarez for the long conversations about this project over the last several weeks One the investment that we're asking for from you is not operational. It is a generational investment in young people and in child care Which is clearly one of your priorities. We're so grateful that you're giving that key attention And this isn't going to provide Young people one summer or two summers of programming. This is going to provide Programs for families for an entire childhood Families will be able to go back to work for 10 12 15 years because they know they will have Free high quality child care available to them in their neighborhood Secondly This project scores highly in all of the areas Outlined in a scorecard for these funds It will influence health and well-being. It will improve neighborhood access It absolutely is an upstream investment To give kids the opportunity to learn and grow to allow parents to get back into the workforce And it very clearly expands child care On top of all of that it is in a qualified census track. So as we look at your report card It hits all the buckets that are really important There are 2,800 young people in roseland Right now only 900 of them have an opportunity to participate in before school after school and summer camp programs And they need us So I ask that you have many worthy Projects on your list, but I ask that you look back and advocate today for staff to Look into this project and see how it fits into the use of your one-time funds And I really appreciate your leadership on this and your consideration. Thank you Thank you, michelle. We'll go to ananda Good afternoon, mayor rogers and council members ananda suite with the santa rosa metro chamber First I want to acknowledge and appreciate your time and a strategic approach to investments in our community on our economic recovery Many of the issues that we talk about frequently business support housing supply fire risk and early child care and education are Significant opportunities in this one-time fund discussion and are all key to a healthy economy and thriving community Looking at business support and economic recovery. It's crucial to support smaller employers And downtown investment specifically is an opportunity to support thriving employers Good jobs environmental sustainability and increased tax revenue specific financial support of an active downtown Is additionally a way to create a place where people want to live work and enjoy And a meaningful way to create a sense of belonging to build community and a place where our children and grandchildren want to stay Housing and opportunities to increase our housing supply are critical to our long-term success And your commitment to invest in the room renewal enterprise districts housing fund meets a critical need And the benefits are magnified by the ability to leverage funds Thank you for acknowledging the need to significantly expand housing supply for our residents and your work to recognize the impact that council policy decisions Have on discouraging or encouraging needed housing development Fire preparedness and mitigation as ongoing efforts are critical The fires we've experienced highlight the need to use our natural resources sustainably and to implement practices that minimize the impact of wildfires In addition to prioritizing recovery from fire damage Significant focus should go to fire prevention measures to protect our community against the continual threat of wildfires And last but certainly not least. Thank you so much for your recognition of early child care and education as critical to Santa Rosa workforce today And as a crucial investment in Santa Rosa's future Beyond being an immediate workforce issue these investments are absolutely broad economic development opportunities and bring a high return on investment You see you see that return from savings and special education remediation Better health outcomes reduce need for social services lower criminal justice costs and increase self-sufficiency and productivity of families for generations to come I can't adequately convey within a few minutes of public comment how meaningful your leadership in this area has been Your focus here sends a clear and important message that child care will be supported by the city of Santa Rosa From changes in the permitting process for child care development to significant and direct investment in sustaining growing the sector To meaningful investment innovative solutions to expand access to quality child care We are so grateful for your leadership in this issue Thank you again for your time and focus on these priority areas That maximize opportunities to create vibrant stable healthy economy and are key to a thriving community for all Thank you so much inanda. That's the last hand that I see. Oh, we've got david Hi, my name is david bowman. I want to applaud the council as well as The mayor on their efforts to think about how to use these one time funds in a strategic manner the The reality is that these types of events are singular and I think Require a lot of due diligence to think through not only the short-term benefits, but the long-term implications And where those funds can be invested in something lasting something that will be paying back The community members who have supported the idea and seen it through for years to come Should rise to the top. I want to echo previous comments about the need for a location in roseland To support the youth of santa rosa the the need is so great um And the need is not only on behalf of that those youth that Are looking for a place to find solace counseling Continuing education, but also to their families who are juggling multiple jobs just to make ends meet Or a desperate need of affordable child care And you are struggling under the weight of increasing cost of living in santa rosa and sonoma country and sonoma county in general So I do implore the council to give further consideration about how Some of the ARPA funds could actually be invested in a true tangible visible and long-term solution That is really a a community hub a place where the youth Of our community can actually learn grow and the families of our community Can seek some help and just making ends meet. It's uh, it's critically important to the future of our community and as previous Speakers have mentioned just the investment our youth the payback of healthy well-adjusted Community members is incalculable. So with that, I respect the council and mayor's time and My employer just give this further consideration and thank you for your great work Thank you so much david I'll come back to the council chambers. We'll start with phil followed by keith I've maxed out the podium My name is phil kerr. I'm the ceo of city ventures And I wanted to love the opportunity to come speak to you in person. Finally. It's nice to be back in the council chambers We have over 700 homes under development in santa rosa We're the largest housing Builder in santa rosa. We're the largest solar all electric housing builder in the state And we're we've been committed to santa rosa for a long time And we've really enjoyed the experience of working with your staff and developing in santa rosa Our commitment is to developing in infill locations developing in ways that can use development to conserve open spaces and Doing that in a way that addresses climate change as well. So every home we build is solar all electric as well It's been a great opportunity. It's been an opportunity that's been made possible by city staff Santa rosa is a really interesting place to build because there's every time you build here There's about nine agencies that you deal with It's one of the most difficult places to develop housing In the probably 80 cities i've ever worked in While simultaneously having one of the most competent staffs i've ever worked with I've had the pleasure of working with specific staff members Jesse Oswald gave osborne claire hartman Andrew tibbetts scott moon in particular in the fire department. You have an amazing set of leaders in your staff and The the opportunity i think that exists Is to put funds towards some of the contract staffing things to make So your leaders and your staff can focus on some of these bigger priorities There's uh, so much to do in terms of permit checking etc I strongly encourage the council to make sure to fund additional planning and additional Contract resources to streamline the processes processes can be really daunting in santa rosa They don't need to be with additional contract staffing um, I'd also like to give a quick nod to councilmember tibbetts and the tiger salamander Concept dimension we focus on infill development. There's a tremendous opportunity for infill development in this city If you can address the tiger salamander process and problem in terms of how to build in those infill locations in a streamlined way that protects open space mitigates but does it in a streamlined way It took us nine years to develop two projects in the southwest Um, and that was going about as fast as you could And so there's opportunities to streamline that work together with developers to do that Be happy to help in any discussions on that. So thanks for your time Thank you phil Keith mayor city council members staff My name is keith christopherson christopherson builders And the purpose my purpose being here today is to uh Is to talk about housing Having gone through the the various exhibits today and I was it was startling to see what your what your unfund unfunded objectives are And it's daunting seriously but Housing is is a designated crisis Not only here in santa rosa, but around the state and for that matter around the country and I was Honestly, I was disappointed to see that I was thankful that That there was roughly two hundred and fifty thousand dollars allocated for a planner and But these guys need more help Like mr. Kerr said you've got a great staff here We've worked in a lot of different places And including santa rosa for the last 40 years And this staff is over the top amazing top to bottom head to toe But they need help they need some support Housing is is is so critical. I was looking at the baby bonds And I don't know how many what the bursts over deaths are in santa rosa I should but I don't on an annual basis But just take those just take those 700 100 babies And in in 20 years those people are going to be looking for housing So you've got you've got 14 what 14 000 Housing units that you're going to be looking for in 20 years so When you start to think about that it's it's a big big number So i'm hoping that my hope would be that That somewhere amongst these spending priorities that you have That you could find a little bit more to send over to Jesse gape and claire And help them get the job done so we can provide housing to our community. Thank you very much Thank you Are there any other comments in the chambers? Mr. DeWitt. Hello, my name is duane de witt I'm from roseland action Which is an environmental justice and social equity group founded 28 years ago in the qualified census tract of the roseland creek neighborhood next to roseland and shepherd It's really important that we look at the possibilities of how to improve these areas Thanks that you're putting money forward for the library and parks Please seek more money for storm water improvement Flooding occurred on mcminne avenue this weekend. It's happened often in the past From what I heard today You could actually use arpa funds For water sewer and I believe storm water improvement And those funds could help with your ideas for The bicycle and pedestrian circulation Which is why the city convinced the county To first buy six acres on the south side of roseland creek a full 10 years ago Nothing's been done since Now though with this funding Things could go forward also Arpa funds could be used for the broadband You probably don't know but over 20 years ago It was discussed during the redevelopment of sabbastopol road to have redundant cabling fiber optic and cable that was copper To enhance the possibility for broadband in the future Now that sonic is operating in the southwest area of santa rosa Would be an excellent time to put this funding forward Especially along sabbastopol road Where the housing could be built In the mixed used infill that's been talked about with the term transit oriented development And this could help with that last mile to the homes The thing about much of this that's been talked about today Is it's all been talked about before and the can has been kicked down the road But now there's some money here and you could make some positive investments And we could have a better community all the way around The idea that somehow the west side would be getting more than others Well, that's because it's deserved This is the area that is the qualified census tracks of the most disadvantaged underserved and overburdened areas of the city The city chose to make rosalinda county island 25 years ago and further ruined rosalind's possibilities for the future Now because this money has come forward through arpa And pg and e with tragedy We could turn it around over there at least along rosalind creek in that disadvantaged neighborhood of rosalind creek Thank you kindly Thank you, mr. Dewitt The last public comment that i see so i'll bring it back to council members Mr. Assistant city manager could you frame for council members what type of feedback you're looking for in this discussion? Yes, thank you, mayor We are interested in understanding if the program that we've outlined based on the scoring Is consistent with council's Expectations and if there are areas that you would like to see us make adjustments if you would please describe that for us And how you would like to Have us bring it back to you moving forward All right, we'll start with zoom. We'll start with councilmember tidbits Thanks, mayor Thank you, jason i'm gonna i'm gonna politely say that my expectations were were not exactly met with this plan And i I think to explain my initial reaction a little bit here and i do want to first thank everybody who put work into this Right, it's always important to acknowledge the work that goes into these reports that come to council But my I think some of my frustration with how this rolled out was this this really when I think about what COVID was meant to be from the biden administration. It was really a few things It was how do you help people through times of COVID? Um, how do you help your communities get ahead? And it was also meant to be funding for communities that were negatively impacted by COVID And I think the Implication there was a financial one Um, and when I look at our budget, you know, the city of santa rosa was in a most fortunate position. We started our 2019 2020 budget was I mean, I had it. Oh, it was 436.7 million in 21 and 22. It was 474.9 We actually saw our budget grow by 38 million dollars Um, and and I actually attribute that large part to one thing I think that has to do with a lot of folks from The peninsula who were able to do remote work We're able to move here. I mean, we saw a dramatic appreciation of property values and skyrocketing costs of living During this time, which was I think unique in many respects So when I saw a lot of these general fun things that we were We appropriated money for on our budget this year come forward With the thinking that we'll use arpa money to pay for what the council already approved in a budget I I just felt like we were not giving our citizens the opportunity that arpa really presented Um, I understand the foresight associated with it. We were looking at How can we we always have that looming budget deficit? How do we get ahead of it? We have contract negotiations going on and you know, those contracts are going to come do is john rightfully put Um, but I was just hoping to see I think a little bit more out of the plan so You know, I want to propose I guess a couple of changes for my colleagues to consider And I I think uh, I guess I'll begin with number one and that is that california tiger salamander mitigation plan that presents huge housing opportunities for southeast and southwest santa rosa huge revenue opportunities for the general fund and huge park fees For southeast and southwest santa rosa to help close that gap And with the county of sonoma already on on the path With us with the opportunity to glom on I think we'd be really remiss to not fund that especially and again I I recently learned that the number I originally quoted of 2 million is actually more like 300 000 So what I want to propose to the council is taking half of the 600 000 from a specific area plan Putting that towards a california tiger salamander mitigation bank and habitat plan Um, to me that seems like a good compromise. That seems like we are helping the general fund down the road But we're also acknowledging that that specific plan was going to happen one way or the other without this general fund The next thing I'd like to propose is tibets before you move on if I could ask you a clarification question on that Are your is your expectation with that statement one of actually acquiring mitigation credits or What we what I I think the county may be doing is exploring the possibility of Being the administrator of permits for different species that are on the listed list and so Is that your expectation is that we're talking to the county and it may not be actually acquiring rights It may just simply be an administrative aspect No, I'm I want to be clear. I'm more interested in acquiring rights About two years ago councilmember schwedhelm then mayor schwedhelm and I had the opportunity to join a round table on this issue With the army corps of engineers and a group of stakeholders locally a lot of county folks were present and uh specifically the interest was in a lot of the laguna treatment plant lands that we have lands that we That you know, we don't have to go out and buy but we could essentially get that land permitted as banking lands Which then can become a revenue center for the city or at the very least help with some of our housing and development needs So I would like to focus it probably more at that level if that's not the direction The county is going with it, but I think it's important as we're talking about Okay, what are we going to set aside for the next six months to a year as we figure out more of these programs? I think $300,000 is important to set aside To kind of figure that out. Let's see where the county is going. Okay. They're not going in the exact direction We wanted to go and there aren't any synergies between us and the county and where can we go on our own reasonably? Thank you for the clarification. I will um, the reason I was asking is because uh, we have recently acquired mitigation credits Um, they far exceed the cost of what you're mentioning as far as what you're hearing from the county um, I also understand in talking to director Burke that We have significant limitations on what we could identify as Habitat qualifying on our properties and I would need to Promote her to respond to that directly. I just want to make sure I'm clear I'm happy to do more research and to get back with you with more detail about what that could look like And we'd also want to communicate with director wick over at prmd to make sure that we understand what program they're Evaluating so I just want to clarification and I appreciate you offering that up Okay, thanks jason. Um, the second the second item that I want to bring up is Uh homelessness, you know, I think that 9.1 million dollars supplanting money from the general fund using arco money Um is a heck of a lot Again, I recognize the we don't know what things look like two years from now necessarily argument But I want to be clear to the public that um, what I'm about to recommend is not to take away funding from homelessness We have already set aside in our budget Money for homelessness the tune of about 4.1 million a year. I think that was the number Um, what I want to ask us to do is instead of supplanting the money with arpa for two years I would like us to supplant it for only one year So we're still achieving I guess a net gain on the general fund of over four million dollars and consider applying One year of that homelessness funding to The down payment assistance program. So roughly four million four point one million dollars If we looked at doing a 60 thousand dollar down payment We could help probably about 66 families Um acquire a home build equity in this community at a time when prices are just getting unattainable for people My age and younger And then the last thing that I want to bring up and this might be a little bit more of a hot button issue with the county But I think it merits discussing and probably not here per se It's probably a topic that belongs on it as its own agenda item in the very near future But uh as of september 7th, um vaccination rates in the county was 75 Uh, the total was I looked up the numbers Um, if you'd bear with me for a second here Um, it was about 320 000 people had been doubly vaccinated as of september 7th I went on to the county's website just now and as of october 25th We now have 341,441 people were vaccinated and remember these are all only people over the age of 12 So when you look at the population statistics, we're now at 79 vaccinated When you then look a little bit farther, there's another 30 000 people who have received one vaccine So why i'm bringing this up is when we're looking at spending or appropriating setting inside 1.2 million for staff testing Uh, we should probably have that conversation about is that too much? And and the reason being is you'll recall when when sundar dr mace was before this council, you know, I said Honestly, you know doctor. What is the um herd immunity? I mean, I had heard the cdc use the number 70 percent and she said well, actually it's more like 80 percent And I said okay. Well, we should set it at 80 percent for the city and she said no you have to go by county-wide We're in this together Well, well folks i'm here to tell you based on what that doctor said We're kind of here or we're going to be there in the next two to three weeks And if I also recall back it was about 60 000 a week to test our staff Maybe staff has a more exact number So i'm I wanted to propose that we look at um only funding this three weeks out maybe a month With the understanding that we will have hit that 80 figure and we probably don't need to spend 1.2 million And in fact 200 000 or 240 000 might be sufficient to get us to where is reasonable Which would leave us then with about 900 000 left over um from that Uh, I guess line item if you will and then I was going to recommend that we invest that in the boys and girls club facility over in roseland so You know, I don't want to get into the vax anti vax conversation, but um, you know, I'd rather us fund that A couple weeks at a time as opposed to saying staff here's 1.2 million And then we forget about it and then come budget season You know We hear about it in the form of turn back and we've missed the opportunity to invest in something that the community is looking for In needs today. So those are the three things that I wanted to throw out there For folks consideration Thank you councilmember councilmember soyer Thank you mayor. Um, well for let me address first of all, um councilmember tibbetz suggestions I am curious to know, um, where we Whether we could drill in on some of the cts mitigation discussion Not sure where that's going to go But I but the cts has been dogging our city and our county for for I don't know close to 20 years now So, uh, where we where we could Um get some movement in that discussion. I would be interested in Um in finding out I'm not sure what that conversation might look like but it but I am intrigued by the by the direction because it is a major impediment to Development inside our urban growth boundary Um, secondly, I would like to sharpen our pencils on the on the the covid testing. Um I think it should things change so quickly. Um Since this recommendation came across, I'm sure things have changed already. So, um, if there if there is uh staff Capacity to look at how we might Lesson that amount from 1.2 million to something else. Um, I would be interested in in in in pursuing that I'm not interested at this point in obligating where those funds might go But I am interested in in look in sharpening our pencils on the covid 19 testing I will say that I am the the programs not in the spending plans Really concern me. I mean there are some major major Concern I have major concerns about those things that we are not going to be funding and they are Um, I I can hardly Look at that list and feel comfortable that we're not putting funds into those Um into those buckets Um, the one that that sticks out to me, and I'm sure this will come as no surprise to anyone on the council is the Burbank carriage home The carriage house and home Um, I hope that our consultants are correct in how long they think that roof is going to last Um, any kind of any any kind of leaking in that environment could drastically Compromise the A an irreplaceable collection um of historic documents, etc And um, I'm not sure what since there's no amount there. I'm not even sure What the cost might be but I have been hearing for quite some time Um, this unknown about the material Now, whether it's a an issue of of covid and they can't seem to get the material or they don't know what the material should be Or they don't know how much it will cost um I that we are kicking a Potentially very costly can down the road And we would lose our status as a national historic landmark and perhaps even the our state designation as well. So, um, among Um, almost everything on that list of the things that we're not spending money on That one rose to my attention in part because there is no cost Um, and maybe it's difficult to assess the cost Um, but I'll I will leave it at that Thank you, and I appreciate the work of staff. This is not easy to do It's no easier for the council to make comments about this list as it was to produce the list in the first place So I appreciate the work. I thank you for it. And, um, uh, I look forward to Expending those funds That we need to spend within the within the deadlines. I'm sure we'll have no problem spending that money. Thank you JC, you look like you wanted to say something Uh, thank you, mayor. I council member Sawyer I just wanted to assure you that we are actively working through a project right now with a consultant to design an accurately Uh, a historically accurate product that will be used to re-roof that structure. That's what's ongoing right now Um, the concept of what it will take to actually Finish the re-roofing to do the physical construction is one we won't have a an idea on until we understand what the material So that we are historically accurate Looks like and we expect to find more information this year as that contract finishes Thank you, Jason. I understand the challenge Council member alvarez Thank you, mayor, uh from myself Actually, I want to start off by saying that support, uh, councilman tibbet's inquiry into the tiger salamander issue that has really as Councilman Sawyer said entered us for over 20 years So I definitely do want to hear more From staff on how we can assure that that southwest san rosa continues to have a vibrant future So i'm absolutely supportive of that in in secondly I I saw a a large Difference between what we're dedicating to our homeless issue compared to what we're dedicated dedicated to our our children Of san rosa and i'm happy to hear that that councilman tibbet's Was creative in saying that if we funded the first year only opposed to the second year or at least taking a look at the At the first year it freed up some funds Uh and in line with thinking that how we can actually promote home ownership for those in the community it kind of reminded me of childcare and how important that is instrumental to our vibrant Economy and and how we can actually help our labor force Continue to work without having to stay home with the children and and what we can do there to support them and again, this goes in line with what is childcare what is with uh The investments into development of of housing in our area So I see how how how One is definitely playing into the hands of of another and I have to tell you deciding what to do with other people's money the taxpayers money is It's probably the hardest thing that that any of us have ever had to do It's it's easy to throw out millions in one direction or another direction. But wow, this is probably the hardest thing that I have to do on on sitting here on city council And and this is this is due to an opportunity that's been presented by both arpa and the pgne funds So this is definitely a one-time Occurrence and and I definitely want us to pay attention to the to the equity part Which I'm very thankful that staff has done so and and I'm thinking How can we Make the investment Transcend generations not just the two to three years that we're looking at and and with that being said I do have a question for staff and what is the contribution from our regional partners when it when it comes to homeless the homeless issue in addressing homelessness Claire are you available to come on and respond?  Um, I believe kelly checking it all has been elevated to a panelist Thank you kelly. I'm here Sorry, give me a second. Yeah, Kelly. I was wondering what the what the investment from our regional partners is to our homeless issue You know It's a great question. I I have you know our city budget for homeless services in front of me this evening I don't have What our continuum of care is contributing toward this issue or the county of sonoma or the other cities In sonoma county in front of me. I can certainly look into that I know that the county and the continuum of care are investing heavily in this issue as well With their resources as well as all the resources that are coming in from The state to assist with this effort. So i'm happy to get back to the full council with that information I don't have it ready ready this evening. I appreciate nonetheless kelly and the thoughts behind the question is If if we are helping people elevate themselves from homelessness If we are assuring that community members are first-time home owners That we need to provide an inventory that provides a stock needed as well as uh, Correcting what is a supply and demand ratio? So with that being said, I definitely would like to see us invest heavily Into those programs that do help the community Far beyond the two to three years and for me It's definitely assuring that our labor force to show up to work And I think an undersweet as well as michelle spoke on this fact of how important it is to support our labor force So for me, it would be in accordance with jack said about looking at homeless investment for the one year and being able to fund future or or or programs that go beyond it Again, I think where we part ways a little bit brother is just um The the down payment for 66 families where i'm hoping we could see the the the labor force kind of Be strengthened more by by the child care ensuring that they can ensure to work But I think we're all very much in line of trying to see how we can actually look at this money more from from the community Investment more than an operational standpoint. At least that's where I believe we're mostly coming from which I do appreciate Thank you Thank you councilmember councilmember fleming I think that councilmember alvarez said it right It is not easy to spend other people's money and it is not easy to spend a lot of money I think what makes it particularly difficult is that it is not enough money To do everything that we want to do I think if we had enough money to fill all of our dreams and wishes for our future our present and our future This would be a very easy conversation I think the challenge is that um We would like to do a number of things and we'd like to do a number of things well, but that we're Not going to be able to do that and I do think that staff did a fairly comprehensive and proficient job of providing us with a list of things in a way that we did ask for it in terms of Um rating things on on equity Equitability and sustainability and environmental sustainability and all of the different things that we asked for and and I frankly think that there was Probably no one way That this was going to be done that was going to please all seven of us And so I do really appreciate the staff for having done that there are a couple of things that I um have heard Here that from other council members that that have caused me to want to comment one is um around the the california tiger salamander if $300,000 could solve A chunk of our cts problem. I think that that would be money well well spent. I can't say I understand exactly How we could spend $300,000 and have it solve our problem, but if it does do that Obviously, we need to do that because that would be Uh a watershed moment for us, but I have I have great doubts, but I'm very open-minded um, the other thing is that I do recall supporting the idea of Funding our existing down payment assistance program Uh, and I do recall us having support Um, at least myself and council member tippets and perhaps it was just the two of us, but I do recall Uh, at least another person supporting it So if it was fewer than four then then I get that but I am disappointed That we didn't hear more about that today because I do believe that's a long term intergenerational Solution to poverty Um, although I do wonder about you know, even with a down payment who can afford a low look You know, what kinds of low-income folks are going to be able to afford the housing that's In the market these days, but not nevertheless. I do think it is worth exploring and I think also that council member tippets brings up a great point about testing That if we are approaching 80 percent and we're going to be able to get our elementary kids vaccinated in the next week. I'm hearing that You know What you know, how frequently do we need to be testing into the to the tune of 1.2 million dollars? I'd love to see that that money redirected to our our park and recreation department and and beefing up their services in our southwest quadrant where they Have been the heroes of the pandemic alongside with our police and fire services and our water department The people have been coming to work day in and day out Like love to do things that can make life better for the working families Of the city of santa rosa and that that'll have to suffice for my comments. Thank you Vice mayor Thank you, mayor. Um, first I'd just like to thank the staff for all their hard work and dedication in and getting this done All right, so now I'm about to go with my comments so, uh starting with homeless assistance 9.8 million, um No, let's not start with that. Let's start with jack. Let's start with the tiger tiger salamander thing I would love for $300,000 to get rid of the tiger salamander that would free up so much Space to develop in my district. That would be great if we could make that happen jason Like $300,000 $350,000 Somewhere in that ballpark. That would be awesome. I think we would all be happy if we could make that happen With that being said I think that the gentleman that spoke Had a point and I don't know if claire is still on I don't know if with our council goals of us wanting to develop If planning has enough support um In the amount of development that we do want In the city of santa rosa Um, we say that we want, you know, affordable housing We have to build it that we need Housing will we need to build it because we don't have it I don't know if our planning department is Is keeping up. Are they backlogged or they delayed Kind of what's going on so, um That is where I would need to lean To staff to know like how far are we Behind how is that affecting Our developers is that Making it so they don't want to come here And develop and is this something that we can do to support them to support us to get What we are saying is one of our priorities and one of our goals met So that would be important to me I am a product of the boys and girls club So i'm always going to have the boys and girls club back I spent my summers at the boys and girls club I think that For my mother was a single mother And so she was able to drop me off there before she went to work in the summers And pick me up and I was safe and i'm alive and here I am today So I think that the boys and girls club is a great investment um So I advocate for the boys and girls club Um now we'll go to homeless Assistance I would not be opposed to One diversifying the providers that we have providing services Uh to our homeless community um And in saying that I would not be opposed to I don't know about cutting it in half, but looking at taking some of the 9.8 million dollars because I feel like We do give a lot to homeless services and putting some of that to the down payment assistance program and that is something that I have Said that I really support and I've been very passionate about I think home ownership opens up A lot of doors but with that I um I'm a firm believer in you can give a man Fish and he'll eat for one day, but you can teach him how to fish and he'll eat for a lifetime So with that definitely having a very strong educational component to that um and really teaching people the importance of like Credit and like all of that but making it all encompass not just like here you go here is money But here is a program go through the program and then We help you with the with the down payment kind of a thing Like this is our investment in you and and here you go and in your family um, and I think that we can help so many families because To have 48 units That were built and it took from 2007 to 2021 that's a really long time And it's so restrictive to me, but if you can have People within the community and you're teaching them really how to go out in the community and buy homes anywhere Um, I think that is so powerful And that just really teaches them how to fish and not just giving them a fish And i'm not saying there's anything wrong with the development not saying that at all I'm just saying to me you can you can reach A lot a lot of people a lot more people um And I think that's all folks. Thank you councilmember alvarez Yes, thank you, mayor. I'll I'll be I'll be quick here Uh, an email came in right before Counseling began and I really wanted to thank congressman and mike thompson for support for the boys girl and girls club here in roseland And specifically the child care program. So I thank you sir for for having sent the letter and for your support Councilmember tidbits Yeah, two two quick comments first if it wasn't clear before when I was Talking about my support the down payment assistance program and what those programs look like Historically they're done as loans. So when I mentioned that, you know, if you loaned out 60 000 and a down payment Uh, you would recover that and the average american will hold on to a home and then for 10 years and then sell it So that are initial 66 for any members of council members of the public thinking we're gonna We would grant 60 thousand dollars to somebody that's not at all It would be it would be a loan that would get recovered and then reissued and and reach, you know, far more than 66 people Over over time it would be hundreds if not thousands as long as the program was continued All right, thank you councilmember and just as a point of clarification for council ARPA funds need to be spent Uh, so if we're talking about a down payment assistance program that would need to be funded out of the pgne fund As I understand it from talking to staff because we have a set date that we have to spend ARPA And set criteria on what we can spend ARPA on PGne is the one that is completely flexible So if we're going to find three million dollars for a down payment assistance fund It's likely going to have to come from pgne funds Which means removing some of what is currently being proposed within that that bucket So I just want to make sure that folks are Aware of that as we go through our our conversation for me It I'm looking at this from a pretty simplistic standpoint for me the pgne settlement funds Were the unmet need for our community from fire And yes, there's some bleed out away from fire issues because we had other opportunities such as the rosaline library And such as the renewal enterprise district that we likely would have wanted to have funded But then didn't have the funds because we were responding and recovering from the fire And that's one of the slides that we glossed over that I thought was really important was what we've actually spent on fema projects between the general fund and water And what we've spent on resiliency funds or resiliency and recovery projects from the pgne funds That's about 80 million dollars that the council has spent over the last four years that we weren't able to use on other types of resources With that said, there's a couple of things that are in the Left by the wayside in in projects that were not funded That I think that we really need to figure out how to fund with the pgne funds One is vegetation management What I heard is with 1.2 million dollars as a shortfall We can make that work by sacrificing an additional year of vegetation management But these are matching funds that actually money begets money in our community And I wouldn't be comfortable leaving an additional year on the side of the road for vegetation management That's what we've committed to in the cwpp And we know that that's a five-year plan. We need to fund the vegetation management for that plan We also have the hot eoc which was a commitment that we've made as a best practice to our community That's 1.4 million. Yes congressman thompson and our Our senators have worked really in congressman huffman have worked really hard And it looks like we've secured a million dollars for it We need to make sure that we actually get that funding across the finish line to fund the hot eoc To me those two are more important than some of the other things that we have funded in the pgne funds Such as the the specific plan Even the rosalind creek portions Yes, we need to get there eventually But if you're asking me about funding some of what we have in there versus funding vegetation management and the hot eoc I'm telling you that there's no competition for me. I want the vegetation management and the hot eoc We also have board stipends in there Which the council has never actually discussed more than passing comments from the dais And what I heard from staff and we talked about this a little bit in long-term finance is that Perhaps another use or a better use for some of those funds Since we have no program criteria and 75 000 means we're going to be picking and choosing which Board members or committees are most important and get us stipend I don't want us in that game and I don't want to setting Setting funds aside until we have that conversation But I did hear a need for child care at our boards and in commission meetings I'd be fully happy with changing the stipends to Added child care for those meetings as a a criteria criteria instead When we go to arpa arpa i view as a once in a generational opportunity To be able to actually address poverty and the impacts not just of the COVID-19 crisis But those who have been impacted the most by that crisis And really do things to help lift people out of poverty and make changes within your community So there are many things that are in there that I really like But i'm having a hard time i'll be honest getting behind the fiber backbone That seems to be like a public works project that was sort of shoehorned in and it's a it's a fourth of what we'd be spending our arpa funds on with no direct Immediate impact to the community it'd be part of a longer project I think we need to do things With that fund that are more beneficial right now to the community Rather than taking the long game, especially when we have so much funding coming from the state and from the federal government For broadband projects It seems to me like that's going to be funding that we can compete well with And that particularly when you look at the criteria for that funding going after what What currently qualifies for arpa means that what we're leaving behind is the parts of the city that are not going to qualify as well Or have a harder time qualifying for that federal funding I do think we need to fund the parklet program And invest in our businesses and help those that have struggled particularly in downtown And I do think we need to set aside some funding particularly for programming for downtown To get people back in person and get people back in in community spaces As we move forward My final question really Is for the council to evaluate too When we walk out of here when we finalize our spending plan when we talk about what we've done with arpa Do you look at it and say this is going to change the community? And I I don't want to lose sight of Needing to relieve some of the pressure on our general fund in the future I'm fully supportive of homeless services, but but there are a number of things in there There's a number of funds that are still in there 2.6 million in the second year for example I'm just I'm hoping that will look a little bit more aspirational and more community changing as we finish our spending plan on that fund I saw a couple of hands went up. We'll start with councilmember tibbetz Thanks, mayor. I do have a clarifying question. I suppose it is and it's as I guess as much of a comment as it is a question You know, you were mentioning some of the requirements of arpa And I think it was kind of in response to the down payment assistance about how it needs to be spent instead of loaned out and recovered You know, I what I'm about to say, I guess kind of dovetails is what you're saying chris about again, you know, I was kind of absolving the general fund of a lot of the financial burden using arpa And that's that's I think what I'm struggling with and I think I heard you kind of say that too I don't want to put words in your mouth, but uh You know the the homelessness thing that's that's somewhere where I guess You know, maybe can this is my question for stat Jason or alan would Would basically funding Homelessness using arpa as a backfill then free up 9.2 million in the general fund For some of these other programs that wouldn't otherwise fit the bill Because they're loans or something to that effect I'm trying I'm trying to get to yes on the down payment assistance program For the council Council member all start and alan may fill in afterward when we began this process back the prior to budget season We were evaluating our long-term budget strategy. We were seeing fairly significant budget deficits coming forward And there was a general Recommendation by council that we look at ways that we can we can work and utilize the federal funds to offset the general fund need So that we can save those general funds to cover our budget shortfalls That's part of what staff utilized going through this And that's why I think you see the significant Recommendation for homeless services. It is one of the few programs that fits into the federal Um description and allows us to reserve general funds for addressing that that general fund budget issue if it by shifting funds away from Homeless services with arpa that doesn't actually reduce the program Offerings it just simply means that the general fund will continue to support Those programs within the homeless services team And so I wanted to make I think that I'm hoping that answers your question about why we have attempted to get to this place Why we looked at offsetting general fund Um, but uh, you look like you like I haven't quite gotten there yet Yeah, I apologize like it's probably me, but that was about as clear as mud. Um, I mean specifically what i'm asking is if our first question Is that as a down payment assistance program in the form of silent second loans an ineligible use for arpa I I think I think it would be but I don't know that for sure So I've already reached out to our consultant. They're on the east coast So I'll get the answer back in the morning but but yeah Okay, thanks, Alan I appreciate you being honest about not knowing for sure and I appreciate you proactively reaching out to the consultants My second question would be for you Jason or Alan. Whoever might be best equipped to answer this If it is ineligible And the council says let's fund homelessness for 4.1 million a year meaning we have Basically it's made 4.1 available in our 21 22 fiscal budget Can the council then subsequently say we're going to take that 4.1 and put it towards down payment assistance Because it's not technically arpa funds council has the authority to direct staff to invest general fund money how council sees fit So that's a yes That is a yes Okay, thank you. Jason my my last comment is going to be this and that is you know, I I've been on the council through five budget cycles now and every year We've been told that we've got a deficit And that you know a year from now two year from now is going to be really bad I could probably go into my office and pull out the the binder from My first year on council and it's said three years from now We're going to be 10 million in the whole and we don't know where the money's going to come from And I and I recognize the dance that we do Staff has to be conservative because you guys are the ones who keep this city running day in a day out But I also want to say that you know And when we're using these funds for a transformational experience for the city We need to keep in mind that you know In the last at least in the last five years We have yet to see the big budget deficit to come We always seem to find it from department turn back or we seem to find it from settlements from our city attorney's offices and cases They've been victorious on Funding from the state or feds So I just I just add that with a little grain of salt and a lot of respect for staff because this work is hard So I want to be clear. I'm supportive of the down payment assistance If it is eligible for ARPA my understanding was because it's a revolving fund or that's how it's being proposed That that doesn't expend the funds and so wouldn't be I'd love to hear from alan tomorrow morning that it is in fact Eligible or that there's a way for us to get there and if not i'm supportive of trying to find a way with the pgne funds as well Uh, I'll push back a little bit on my on my colleague. We cut 14 million dollars from the budget this year Uh with more cuts coming next year, which is why i'm okay with opening up some flexibility in the general fund By moving some of our services over to the extent that they can I also want to remind council, uh, and then i'll i'll get off the soapbox and turn it over to councilmember soyer We also have just reached agreement with most of our bargaining units Or in the process of reaching agreement with most of our bargaining units And one of the things that is an eligible expense that's in there that we need to make sure we're accounting for Is the the covet premium pay for essential workers that has been agreed to in many of the contracts That's not funded in our existing budget. Uh, that is not accounted for going forward So I just want to make sure that there's that reality check for us as we have these discussions about what our budget Looks like for the next three years in particular Uh with that i'll turn it over to councilmember soyer Thank you mayor and thank you for mentioning Though that the um that unfunded expense that you just mentioned um It does give me concern um I'm curious about process um And how we move forward now there have been a number of recommendations and a number of questions That have that will are yet to be answered that I know staff is going to be researching and looking for um more definitive answers I i'm still curious to know how the uh the baby bonds how that 1 million would be invested and So there are a number of comfort of questions that have come up this evening We've never dealt with these kind of funds before we've never had a list of we've never had this these amounts um That were handed over to us to make to make important decisions on on funding So this is a unique uh a unique environment in which we are operating So i'm curious about process at this point. Um, Mr. Nutt how how We what what's what are the next steps are are we will staff come back to us with The answers to these questions and then we'll kind of hash it out again and and decide where we want to move some money I I I agree with the mayor's concern about about the broadband broadband Amount it's it's a lot of money and i'm quite frankly kind of wondering How the how that became priority? um Given the list of things that we um that we're not that we're not funding But so process wise what are the what are the next steps? How are we going to what what is staff going to do next for us to help? um finalize this list so that we can start spending this money per the per the The requirements Yeah, thank you very much council member. Uh, you know when we met last time there was a fairly significant brainstorming session Where we collected feedback from each of the council members on items that you'd like to see us evaluate How they fit into these programs? We then further talked with staff about programs that needed to be added to the list And then we took information and feedback from council as far as what the scoring criteria should look like And we did our best to try to outline those so what you see allen bringing back to you today was our first go around Trying to use the the scoring criteria the projects that were identified the dollar amounts to see what? Falls off what what rises to the top and I would say 75 of the projects that we put on the list are items that you Agree with and I think that that will will consider those as we move forward As like we did when we met the last time on the fire recovery projects We'll consider those as Recommended by council the 25 that we're discussing right now. We will take a further and deeper look at We'll look at how we can make those adjustments either to bring in those projects that you felt Fell off the list fell out of the scoring and should have not have And so we'll try to bring those back in we'll readjust those other projects In an effort to try to fund what council has asked us to look at at this point And we will collect some additional information and return to you in another study session I realize that this is a little onerous, but council member as you mentioned We've we've not played with this type of one-time fund before and we want to make sure that we're investing appropriately As each of you has have mentioned tonight For the betterment of the community and so That's why we'll take the additional time to review those items that you just discussed and come back with a revised Proposal for those items and additional information and clarity on some of the programs Thank you. I appreciate that advice mayor Really quick talking about the the broadband thing when we were all at home There were a lot of children that had to do schooling schooling from home And depending on their their location it was it was almost impossible for them to get On to do their schooling from home and it was really slow and they really couldn't keep up With class without it glitching and not Not working and so I think that that is where the I mean broadband really came in and it's not It's not equitable across the board as far as it's like. Oh, you go home and do but everyone doesn't have the ability to just go home and Keep up and do live streaming and have the ability to do schooling and stuff From home and so that's when we were really able to see that it is definitely not Equitable but the schools were saying go home and do this and Everyone should be able to do it and you know, it just it didn't happen that way And so I think for me when you talk about broadband that's Why it it's still a thing and I'm not I know we have kind of passed that mark But I'm not saying it's not going to come back or we're not going to have a situation and also we're moving into a An age where our children and people are using technology more And so it really is showing the difference between the have and the have nots when you're able To go home and the libraries close at a certain time So in starbucks closes at a certain time So what happens when you're not able to go home and have the internet and the ability to use those Services because I know I pay like a hundred and something dollars and I don't have cable I just have the internet and that could be a lot of money for some families. So Yeah And I agree with everything you said For me the issue is that we've got about 70 billion dollars. That's with a b From from state and fed. So I'm wondering if there's a more immediate impact we can make here, but Is there any additional direction that you need mr. Assistant city manager? I know thank you mayor and council. I think we have direction that we need at this point Okay, council is going to take a half hour dinner break. We'll come back at 6 30 And we'll start with our study error at excuse me our public hearings items 15.1 and 15.2 All right, let's go ahead and bring us back madam city clerk. Can you please call the roll? Thank you mayor councilmember tidbits Here Councilmember soyer Councilmember fleming here councilmember alvarez President Rice mayor rogers president mayor rogers That the record showed that all councilmembers are present with the exception of councilmember schwedhelm Great, uh, so we're going to play a little bit of hopscotch on our agenda because uh, we're running a little bit behind Our public hearings typically try to be as close to five o'clock as possible. Uh, so that means we're going to go to item 15.1 Thank you, mayor and councilmembers item 15.1 is a public hearing Introduction of an ordinance of the council of the city santa rosa amending title nine of the santa rosa city code by amending chapter 9-12 Refuse and sanitation and chapter 9-14 construction and demolition debris by adding provisions and requirements of senate bill 1383 short-lived climate pollutants organic waste reductions Joey henowitz zero waste coordinator is going to be presenting Thank you assistant city manager. My name is Joey henowitz zero waste coordinator for the transportation public works department And i'm here to present to you tonight some city code amendments To codify senate bill 1383 we can move to the next slide, please So a little bit of background as to why sb 1383 came into effect We're all pretty well aware of the climate crisis that we're now experiencing Specifically here in santa rosa. We've had some some gifts significant fire events That have affected our community hotter summers with record-breaking temperatures extreme droughts and rising sea levels that erode our coastlines Scientists tell us that greenhouse gases that are released from human activities You know like like land landfilling food and yard waste can cause climate change And specifically sb 1383 focuses around organic waste and diverting that organic waste from the landfill Where in the landfill organic waste emits up to 20 percent of the state's methane emissions Which is our climate super pollutant 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide So it's important that we try to get those materials out of the landfill and into our compost facilities next slide Um, I just kind of mentioned organic, uh, organics like boot scraps yard trimmings paper cardboard, etc They do make up a significant amount of what california is currently dumping to our landfill So we're really trying to get folks to put their organic material into the green bin and out of the gray bin Here in snowman county and in santa rosa. We're showing it about roughly about a 40 to 45 percent Organic material that is going into our landfill. So we have a lot of room to improve in that area And reducing these short-lived climate pollutants like organic waste is going to have a one of the fastest impacts on the climate crisis Um, and this is why sp 1383 was signed into law in 2016 To respond to this climate crisis california is now implementing the statewide organic waste recycling and surplus food recovery legislation and regulation next slide So as I mentioned in 2016, um, the governor at the time governor brown set methane emissions targets Which codified sp 1383 and a statewide effort to reduce the emissions of these state of these short-lived climate pollutants Namely methane which is emitted from um, organic from the landfills when the organics go into landfills um, and the overarching policy elements of sp 1383 Is to an act statewide targets designed to reduce organic waste disposal by 75 percent by 2025 And to rescue for people to eat at least 20 percent of currently disposed surplus food by 2025 So some very aggressive targets But as we all know that these aggressive targets are needed in um to try to fight this climate crisis next slide, please So the reason why i'm here before you tonight is obviously this is a state law and state regulation But the city of santa rosa and all some jurisdictions across california must adopt an enforceable mechanism requiring compliance with the various sp 1383 requirements No later than january 1st of 2022. So that's what i'll be bringing for you tonight in the city code amendments And these city code amendments are basically to codify the provisions and the requirements that are set before us with the state law As the 1383 next slide So the regulations should become effective um, uh, january 1st of the upcoming year 2022 As as it is what we would call an unfunded mandate sp 1383 does authorize local jurisdictions to charge fees to recover the costs incurring and complying with these regulations um, and sp 1383 outlines specific implementation tasks Required of local governments to try to achieve the goals of sp 1383 and i'll go over those here on the next slide um, so the city of santa rosa the overarching Kind of elements of sp 1383 you'll see there before you to provide organic material collection to all residents and businesses It's just basically mandatory service to have all three bins Establish a food recovery program to recover edible food from the landfill conduct outreach and education to all affected parties and generators Um, and you'll see other folks there the haulers facilities at edible food recovery organizations. Um, next slide um continuing with the requirements that uh, the city is in charge of in order to comply with sp 1383 is um, you need to estimate organic material processing and food recovery capacity to the city And we would need to potentially create a plan to fund expansion if the edible food recovery capacity in our jurisdiction is not sufficient We do need to procure a certain amount of recyclable or recovered organic waste products such as compost mulch and or renewable gas The thought here here is that they want to create the markets for these materials and that was the reason for that from from calorie cycle Um, we also would be needing to monitor compliance and conduct enforcement of covered entities So we would be making sure that Everybody has the three-bin system and we would also be doing contamination checks as well To make sure that people are properly disposing of the correct products of each of the three bin waste streams Along with that we would need to maintain accurate and timely records of sp 1383 compliance Which um, calorie cycle will be having us submit an annual basis in the form of an implementation record Next slide So just to kind of get a little bit into the some of the specifics of the overarching Kind of policy points there that I just went into As far as edible food recovery requirements are concerned We are required to develop a list of food recovery services and organizations within santa rosa And to implement an edible food recovery program, which is going to educate The edible food generators on the requirements of sp 1383 Potentially needs to increase the access of food recovery services and organizations if the capacity is not currently sufficient We're currently underway of trying to establish this and You know set the capacity in santa rosa that that work is still being done at the moment We would need to monitor that the edible food generators are complying with the requirements of sp 1383 And as I mentioned before if we don't have that current capacity We would need to make sure to expand that the city the city would be on the dole to expand that capacity If there's no current capacity that exists in the jurisdiction next slide So calorie cycle on sp 1383 does break the edible food recovery requirements into two tiers There's a tier one commercial generator and a tier two commercial generator You can see there where each kind of um, you know facility or location would fall into Um, and then we can go on to the next slide with some more specifics on that So with the tier one, they must donate their access Food and apply with the associated record keeping requirements as of the onset of sp 1383 as of january 1st 2022 The folks that are located in the tier two section They must do the um the same as of january 1st of 2024 So they get a little bit of a two-year Reprieve on on those reporting requirements and the actions that are going to be needed But both tier one and tier two must maintain a contract with A food recovery service that provides pickup service or accepts donated food Or that it may self-fall that material and they are required to keep records on each organization that they service So there are going to be some record keeping requirements of not only the food recovery Generators but also the food recovery services that are picking up the food and transporting that food to be Used for for folks to to eat next slide Another section that is pretty significant in sp 1383 is it does require the procurement of recovered organic waste products This might this may include compost renewable natural gas electricity from biomass conversion and or mulch In some of the renewable gas and biomass conversion sections This material actually has to be diverted from a california landfill and it has to be Organic material that was created in california as far as those generations are concerned And based on initial calculations and I could tell you that jurisdictions across california are all pretty worried about this component Because it's a significant amount of organic waste that needs to be procured But initial calculations that have been done by a city of centers of staff would Um for compost we would be approximately 8200 tons annually that we need to be procured at approximately a cost of about 400 000 dollars If you if you change that to um yardage We're looking at about 56 yards per day that we need to be procured and then dealt with on an annual basis on a daily basis Um Just briefly i'll touch base on we are looking into a rebate program here in sonoma county So city of santa rosa and the other jurisdictions that are part of zero waste sonoma who is our jpa For for some of our solid waste matters are looking into exploring a compost rebate program to lessen the financial And the compost availability burden or essentially There's a certain amount of compost that's available in our area and most of that compost is used by the agricultural community We don't want to compete with them and one of the elements of sp1383 is we are able to sign direct service provider agreements with Hopefully some of these um agricultural businesses where we would give them a certain rebate and that rebate has yet to be determined Where essentially they would get a certain percentage Off of the compost that they procure as long as they sign an agreement with us that says we are procuring this on behalf of Zero waste sonoma or the city of santa rosa to hopefully lessen our burden We are still exploring that and working that through with cow recycle But the hope is is that we might be able to reduce some of those procurement Targets for each jurisdiction in sonoma county next slide So within sp1383 there is also the adoption that we need to maintain with the calgreen standards With the calgreen building standards really where this affects the solid waste kind of component for the city is within our construction and demolition debris franchise our cnd franchise Currently we have a 50% Diversion requirement for our cnd haulers in our cnd franchise We just need to change that to the 65% and that's where you're going to see the city code amendment in the 9-14 So we're going to be proposed those adjustments to align with the calgreen requirement from changing it from 50% to a 65% diversion requirement next slide So the city does have some enforcement requirements that are Necessary and we must adopt an ordinance imposing The requirements for all generators to apply with organic material collection edible food recovery That's contained within the ordinance amendments that you see before you tonight Regulations specified as sufficient number of businesses need to be inspected each year to confirm compliance city of san rosa and zero waste staff have interpreted that to be 10 of businesses on an annual basis and The first two years between 2022 January 1st 2022 and 2024 is what they call the education phase So there won't be any penalties or or formal enforcement that'll occur during those first two years But anyone in violation of the requirements will be given educational materials At that point and then after that January 1st of 2024 The enforcement process will become effective and will involve progressive enforcement action potentially leading to administrative penalties For those that don't act on the requirements of sp1383 if necessary next slide So CalRecycle also has some enforcement that they potentially would administer over the jurisdiction So if they find that any of the jurisdictions aren't fulfilling the requirements of sp1383 They may engage in their own enforcement actions of their own Those actions that you see there listed on the second bullet point there Next slide so As far as the penalties are concerned the jurisdiction Shall impose penalties or violations of the requirements of sp1383 as I mentioned as of january 1st of 2024 for non-compliant entities The first notice would be an educational notice obviously so when I say the first violation They're actually going to be us reaching out to the non-compliant entity before and to try to get them to correct the behavior But if they don't respond and they act on that the first violation would be anywhere from 50 dollars to 100 dollars Second subsequent violation would be 100 to 200 and then third violation You see the cost there as well the 250 to the 500 dollars next slide For non-compliant jurisdictions Cal recycle may also administer administrative penalties as well on jurisdictions that don't comply with the requirements Best sp1383 these are a little bit more significant and why it's really important for us to make sure that we Do this correctly here in santa rosa and I can assure you that we are But the penalty levels are a minor violation You see there about a 500 to $4,000 per violation per day Modern violation is is significantly higher 4,000 to 7500 and then a major violation would be anywhere up to about $10,000 per violation per day So it's important that we make sure that we we implement this and I can assure you that we are next slide So just a little bit of follow-up on the penalties that could be issued by cal recycle I don't anticipate this being an issue here in santa rosa But I just want to make sure that you guys are aware once the penalty range has been determined cal recycle does have A set of various factors that they may Administer potentially including the range on that and you see some of the issues there whether the nature the circumstances and severity Violators ability to play its pay The deterrent effect of the penalty on the violators So there's a couple different avenues that they can look into when they when they are going to be administering those penalties on jurisdictions Next slide So what are the santa rosa impacts? How does it impact our community? How does it can impact our ratepayers? So sb 1383 compliance is obviously going to come with increased costs Those are for education and outreach general administration as I mentioned the organic waste product procurement is going to cost some money The inspections the enforcement and the capital costs to make sure that everybody has, you know, all three bins across the city And establishing and or expanding edible food recovery program. Those are going to be all of the cost drivers with sb 1383 The city is not alone in this effort There are also other partners that we have that are working towards the implementation and have their own Responsibilities so the city of santa rosa zero waste sonoma and ecology will all have a part in sb 1383 Just to kind of touch a little bit of high level on that zero waste sonoma As the jpa for most of the jurisdictions in sonoma county is going to assist with the education and the outreach The organic waste procurements As I mentioned, we're going to be looking to try to do that rebate program and zero waste sonoma is going to be kind of Heading that effort with the support of the jurisdictions Reporting and record keeping organic waste processing diversion planning and they will be handling the initial administration of complaints violation and waivers Next slide So our waste dollar ecology will be assisting with the capital requirements So any new bins that need to be purchased any new cans decals, etc They will be the boots on the ground for this process So they will be doing the route reviews and the contamination monitoring And doing the record keeping and the outreach associated with that But ultimately and this is this is really set in stone in in the regulations is Even if we have these other partners work on behalf of the jurisdiction to to accomplish sb 1383 It's requirements Santa Rosa and the jurisdictions across california are ultimately responsible to ensure that all sp 1383 requirements and conditions are met And then Santa Rosa would be the ultimate enforcement authority for non-compliant entities Resulting in any administrative penalties, which would be going through our code enforcement department If we have any non-compliant generators That I mentioned before as far as the penalty process was concerned Next slide So the complete cost to implement sp 1383 or won't be fully known until probably at least a year a year and a half into implementation where the costs are actualized Zero waste number will be increasing their agency fee to increase some of their staffing and increase some of the Additional costs that they're going to be going through as far as the edible food recovery program Recology will obviously be increasing their rates to account for some of these increases and things that they weren't originally Contained within our current franchise agreement Initial cost projections that we've done so far reveal that that we're looking at approximately a five percent increase to solid waste rates The good news here is that I we're not going to be seeing sp 1383 Increases in rates until 2023 the upcoming 2022 rates that we're going to be seeing in Santa Rosa Are actually what's been submitted to me by recology. We're looking at actually a flat increase through the single family unit and for multifamily and commercial we're looking at About a three to five percent increase So that's actually pretty good news because we've been having significant increases from our single family unit For the past few years. So there was a little bit of an increase in the recyclables market where we're actually going to get a little bit of a Of reprieve there And then as far as the agreements with our partners are concerned We are finalizing and I will be bringing forward to city council relatively soon in the next coming few months Agreements with zero a synom in the form of an MOU to effectuate The responsibilities and what zero a snowman will be performing for on behalf of Santa Rosa And then also what we bring forward a fourth amendment to our solid waste collection services agreement with recology to To update and codify that those those new requirements that we will be asking of recology That are outside of our current franchise agreement and scope and responsibilities Next slide So that is pretty much all I have for you here tonight We're just providing you which the city code amendments that are necessary to to codify ask the 1383 within our city code And i'm available for any questions or comments that you might have All right counselor. Are there any questions for joey? I have one for you joey and it's just sort of a broad question about uh compost facilities Are they generally a money maker or a money loser? And I kind of ask that question because if we're spending 400 000 a year on procurement of compost And i'm sure other cities around us are in a similar vein Is is this the kind of thing where the city could look at our infrastructure? I know that other attempts to have a compost facility have fallen through And is that perhaps an area worth exploring from the council side? Uh, you know, I definitely think that they they are profitable because they they are in business You know as a business to make money. So I do think that they are making money What the margins are how much money that you know, they are they are making I I wouldn't know nothing in a compost facility Um, but the point that you make I think is is a is an excellent point that if we are going to be spending this much money on On compost it definitely could and maybe should be something that we would explore here locally we've Looked into a local compost facility. Um, that was being headed by zero waste Sonoma That was going to be a regional facility that eventually, you know fell through for equity financing reasons But it is something that we are continually looking at to try to bring a local compost facility here to Sonoma county All right, thank you We'll go ahead. Uh, go ahead Mr. Assistant City manager. Do you have something? All right, we'll go ahead and open the public hearing If you're interested in providing comment on this item go ahead hit the raise hand feature on zoom I'm seeing no hands I'll go ahead and check no voicemail public comments Great. We'll close the public hearing Bring it back And I do believe Mr. Mayor there is a um recommendation And that recommendation requests The amendments. Um, it is in the staff report Yep, I was just looking to see which council member has the item. It's council member alvarez Yes, thank you, mayor No, I will be reading the ordinance without the amendments. I believe This is showing as amendments I mean as ordinance, I mean I couldn't hear you there council member. Oh, I'll I'll stand. I'll be reading the ordinance, but I don't see the amendments Uh Councilmember Sawyer, you've got your hand up. Do you have this as well? I I don't but I I'm just gonna I'll be wait I'll wait for the motion and I have a comment. I'm after it's on the table. Okay With the permission, mayor, I'll go ahead and read the ordinance. Yep Very well Ordinance of the council the city of santa rosa emitting title nine of the santa rosa city code By emitting chapter nine dash 12 Refuse and sanitation and chapter nine dash 14 Construction and demolition debris by adding provisions and requirements of senate bill 1383 Short-lived climate pollutants organic waste reductions and way further reading of the text Second second Okay, we have a motion from council member alvarez and a second from council member Sawyer council member Sawyer you had comments I do. I just a very brief one. Um, you know, the the importance of the difficulty of SB 1383 cannot be underestimated and I just wanted to appreciate Mr. Hennel what's in his and the team that he has been working with Constantly for months and months and months to come up with this recommendation. It is an amazing effort That was done in a Incredibly brief period of time given the type of work that was necessary So I want to honor their effort and their work and the product that they have come forward with because this is This is a major change in how we deal with many aspects of our solid waste so Congratulations, joey Everything that you've done and the team that you've worked with you guys have done yola's work. Thank you The vice mayor I would also like to second those comments and thank you and your staff for your inspiration Because me and my babies have also started composting at home So thank you guys very much for your hard work and your dedication With that, let's go ahead and call the vote Thank you, mayor councilmember tibbetz I Councilmember Sawyer I councilmember flimming Yes councilmember alvarez I Vice mayor rogers I Mayor rogers I That motion passes with six eyes with councilmember schwedhelm absent Great. Thank you so much, joey. We'll go on to item 15.2 Thank you, mayor and council members item 15.2 is a public hearing zoning code text amendment codification of zoning code interpretations and other technical questions moneye shakali reporting Thank you. Good evening mayor and Members of the council, so I will start going to my powerpoint. Let me turn my video off Okay So as you mentioned the item before you today is codification of zoning code interpretation and other technical amendments next slide please Okay, sorry The proposed zoning code amendments will incorporate 20 zoning code interpretation issued by the zoning administrator and includes amendments that are technical in nature Such as chapter remaining corrections to downtown station area specific plan implementation sections and other minor changes next slide please Okay A brief history of our current zoning code Our current zoning code was adopted in 2004 and it allows the zoning administrator To issue interpretations when there are questions about the Meaning or applicability of specific parts of the code since 2011 the zoning administrator has issued 30 such interpretations seven of these interpretations have been codified or superseded through prior zoning code text amendments and Three interpretations are temporary measures written in response to COVID-19 public health order And these 10 interpretations are not included in today's codification Also in july of this year This zoning code text amendment was presented to the planning commission Which recommended approval to the council next slide please So here you can see the subject of these 20 interpretations proposed for codification These interpretations covered diverse topics like fence high led price signs and introduction of cottage food operation as a home occupation Next slide please so I am going to give you an example of one of these interpretations in january 2013 The california homemade food act went into effect and created a new category of food facility operation Called cottage food operation Which unlike other food facilities can be operated out of a home kitchen And paired these law cities cannot prohibit cottage food operation As a result of this law an interpretation was issued in january 2013 to provide a definition For this term and to include cottage food operation as a type of home occupation That does not require a planning entitlement Next slide please And here is another example of an interpretation The applicability section exempt city projects from entitlement permits While the design review section requires the city projects be reviewed by the design review board These two sections raise questions about under what circumstances or when a public or city project requires an entitlement permit And compliance with the zoning code Next slide please So zoning code interpretation was issued in june 2017 And uh, it was to clarify the city projects are not required to obtain planning entitlements The proposed zoning code amendment adds a sentence underline on the slide Which states that conceptual design review by the design review board is required for city projects This sentence creates consistency with the design review section. So to add the Code we will have a consistency also can you go to the next slide please Also as a result of this interpretation We are clarifying the redevelopment agency by adding or its successor agency shown here In bold takes because the redevelopment agency was dissolved in 2012 And we are removing the text shown here as a structure to simplify this section next slide please So here are some of the technical correction in this codification The removal of the aggressive economic development measures because the ordinance included a sunset date in august 2015 Also renaming the title of a chapter to better reflect the intent of provisions And changing a footnote in land use tables to correct assembly bill number next slide please And here is another technical correction this slide reflects technical correction to act to to the accessory dwelling unit ordinance to Better reflect consistency with state law some of these corrections include regulation of side corner setbacks Removal of restrictive second story setbacks requirement for a separate exterior door and Permitting of attached ad use for existing multi-family developments Next slide please And this slide shows the majority of technical corrections related to the downtown station area specific plan These amendments are made to improve the internal consistency with the zoning code and implement the specific plan And some of these corrections include clarifying the director level design review process within the review authority table Deleting redundant language in the land use tables for downtown zoning districts and Eliminating the superseded downtown station area combining the street. You can go to next slide please And Hopefully that's like this slide reflects amendments to the resilient city development measures Some of these corrections include removal of the requirement for notification of temporary use permits of accessory structures removal of the setback and Exemption regulation because this language was previously added to another section of the zoning code and addition of automatic tenancy map time extensions that were unintentionally removed as a part of the most recent updates next slide please And The proposed text amendments which are meant to clarify the original Intents of the zoning code are minor in nature and do not substantially change Or alter the purpose of the code therefore this codification is exempt from california environmental quality act next slide please And with that it is recommended by the planning commission And the planning and economic development department that the cancel introduced an ordinance approving amendments to title 20 of the city code to incorporate zoning code interpretations and other corrections that are minor in nature next slide And that was my presentation. I am available to answer questions and thank you Thank you so much for the presentation council. Are there any questions? I'm not seeing any so i'll go ahead and open the public hearing If you're interested in providing comment on it go ahead hit the raise hand feature on zoom We'll go ahead start with you mr. Dwight Hello, dwayne. Dwight from roseland One of the unfortunate things about the resiliency ordinance is that has essentially turned the zoning administrator in to the main planning king if you will Or queen depending on who holds that seat And you've taken away the opportunity for community members to actually have a voice On projects right next to them Perfect example of this was a year and a half ago when the zoning administrator allowed false administration Information to be put into the record in front of witnesses that were at a meeting across the street In the annex building that you have there It was february of And as people asked to have the meeting be recorded the zoning administrator said no As people asked to have a record of the information Previous to what had occurred be available to the public which the brown access is supposed to be allowed The zoning administrator said no Then the zoning administrator and the planner that was handling that project Allowed false information to be entered into the record Which was then utilized later To allow that project to go forward and when it was at the planning commission The chair of the planning commission Admitted that the information was wrong and told the proponent of the project. It's bad That you did this but we're going to let it go forward anyway This is getting to be so Deliberately deceitful That it's bothersome to many people in the community that this is allowed The zoning administrator should be someone who is helping the community Not just being a shill for the developer that comes forward with any project What needs to occur again? I believe is that you need to end the resiliency ordinance It's been four full years since the fire There's no need to have this type of a Vacation of our democratic processes so that people can build houses The majority of the houses burnt down the fire have been rebuilt or in process now So what's essentially happening is housing in other parts of the city are being allowed to go forward Under the rubric of the zoning administrator Taking away the oversight that was there in place for decades Projects are being fast tracked. They're not doing as they should in terms of having Public involvement community engagement and all the things that you profess to believe in and say you support So now is the time for you folks to say wait a minute This zoning administrator action It's not right. It's incorrect and we should go back to the way that was in place before the tubs fire. Thank you Thank you, mr. DeWitt I see no other hands Do we have any voicemail public comments? We receive no voice message public comments on this item, mayor Great. We'll go ahead and close the public hearing We'll bring it back to council I do believe that uh councilmember tibbet. This is your item Thank you, mayor I move in ordinance of the council of the city of san reza amending title 20 of the san rosa city code to incorporate zoning code Interpretations made by the city's zoning administrator and other technical corrections file number st2 1-001 and waive for the reading of the text Second Motion by councilmember tibbet's and a second by councilmember soyer. Are there any additional comments? Okay, let's call the vote councilmember tibbet's I councilmember soyer I councilmember flimming Yes councilmember alvarez I council vice mayor rogers I Mayor rogers I That motion passes with six eyes with councilmember schwedhelm absent Okay Council will go back to the beginning of our regularly scheduled four o'clock meeting Mr. Assistant city attorney, can you give a brief report out on the closed sessions from earlier today? I don't think we need one on the study sessions We had two closed sessions item 2.1, which was a conference with real property negotiator and 2.2 conference with labor negotiators And uh direction was given to staff and council and no final action was taken Great. Thank you so much Mr. Dutt if you'd please do the staff briefings Thank you, mayor and council. We have two staff briefings this evening item 7.1 COVID-19 response update and I will be giving that As of monday 341 163 county residents aged 12 and older are fully vaccinated against Equivalent to 79 of the county's eligible population Another 30 458 residents have been partially vaccinated Sonoma county residents who received any of the three COVID-19 vaccines are not eligible for a booster shot If they meet new criteria outlined by the sonoma county department of health services yesterday Residents are encouraged to visit SoCoEmergency.org To review the latest criteria to determine if they should schedule a booster shot age health status occupation type of vaccine received and when received are some of the components of the criteria The county health officer has offered guidance to the community on how to stay safe while having a good time trick-or-treating and celebrating halloween last year door-to-door trick-or-treating Was discouraged because the county's case rate was high and climbing and no vaccines were available to help combat COVID-19 This year things are different and dr. Mace has offered the following suggestions for a safe and enjoyable holiday Trick-or-treaters should avoid large groups and should wear a mask that covers their mouth and nose Before eating treats people should wash their hands or use sanitizer Indoor gatherings of unvaccinated people including children should be avoided People greeting trick-or-treaters at the doorstep should wear masks while distributing candy instead of inviting children to reach into a community candy bowl Consider handing out individually wrapped treats or placing them on a table Most importantly, if you are sick or concerned that you've been exposed to the coronavirus Stay home and do not distribute treats Mr. Mayor that concludes item 7.1 okay Go ahead go to item 7.2 Item 7.2 is seed collaborative equity plan update and Amy Reeve our human resource director will be introducing the item Thank you and good evening mayor and council members I'm Amy Reeve the director of human resources and i'm pleased to introduce Paul Hudson and his colleagues from seed collaborative this evening They will provide a brief update regarding the diversity equity and inclusion Of work that's going on across the city as well as providing a high-level data On the citywide survey recently Completed so with that i'll turn it over to paul and his team. Thank you Thanks, Amy Good evening Mayor rogers and council members This is an update on our due diligence and our findings and analysis We have a number of slides to go through so we're going to try and go through this pretty quickly If you could go to slide three and i'm going to turn the presentation over to Thomas sang who is Doing who's our market analyst? Before i do that we have with us evan holland who's our senior consultant shana Aloni who's one of our account managers in simone basil basale who is account manager Along with thomas saying who's going to do this section of the presentation. Thank you Okay, thank you paul Good evening everyone. Um, so i'm going to first uh very succinctly go over with you sort of the process that we went through In particular i want to review the due diligence process that we had undergone from february towards the end of august here The first part of this process was a deep dive overview into doing interviews and focus groups because we wanted to Get a sense of understanding insights understanding themes Patterns, we wanted to hear directly and hear voices directly who were stakeholders who are members of the city And so you can see sort of across the city We had interviewed not just council members, but staff members as well as external stakeholders We also did a deep dive into the police department The fire department as well All together there were 113 Participants who participated in these interviews and focus groups And um that led to us to sort of analyze and understand sort of similar patterns And then we then proceeded to the next phase of research, which is the next slide We also then conducted an employee staff survey And you can see that a quick overview here First of all, I guess kudos. I mean, I think we had over 50 percent of all staff Participate in this survey, which was extraordinary And we very much appreciated the efforts on the part of the staff that we worked with And just some quick um highlights here the the center pie chart here is the actual city Breakdown of its demographics by race and ethnicity on the left there is how our survey Um Performed and you can see sort of it largely Home huge closely to sort of the the employee demographics Although there was one section of those who did not specify their ethnicity Close to 15 percent at 14 percent there This is also a group that was largely very educated based upon sort of our collection of the data You can see here that Essentially close to 70 percent of folks Had a college degree and also earned an advanced degree as well Next slide And very quickly you can sort of see who else we got as a part of the survey respondents Over half were folks who were line staff Another 31 percent were folks who were Senior members of the department, but also had managers and supervisorial Our roles on the on the right there gender-wise you can see over a third were female A little bit over half were male and then again another 12 percent who did not specify That now one thing to note about that I think you'll you'll see as a something that might come up later, which is Those who did not specify gender or race or ethnicity These are oftentimes folks that may be A little bit skeptical about sort of the transparency of the process And therefore just choose not to disclose that information We'll see some patterns about that later on next slide Approximately two-thirds of the folks that participated over on the survey were ages between 35 to 54 years of age You see that on the left side and then on the right side You know, we almost had sort of 50 percent of those who had worked in the city for 10 years or more And the other 50 percent right below that and with that I'll go ahead and pass it on to Evan Holland Thanks Thomas and good evening council next slide please So a couple of notes I want to make before we dive into some specifics with regard to the data So just as a friendly reminder, this project is an internally focused project looking at Structure policy practice culture and operations within the city as it relates to diversity equity and inclusion And so just want to remind the council of that the second thing I want to remind folks is that In addition to looking at the city broadly, we were also tasked with Honing in on some specifics around the police and fire department So what you're going to see right now is an overview of data findings and analysis from the city at large And then I'll pass it to Thomas to talk in detail about the city Police department and fire departments next slide please So in terms of our top line citywide Analysis findings and themes. There's three we want to highlight. The first is that Staff perspectives on dei are largely positive, but vary just like many cities Staffs they vary And understanding in in terms of understanding and in terms of satisfaction with departments leaning into dei From a policy and practice standpoint And so what we've seen and what we learned through our analysis is that the city has microcultures like many cities There's different facilities Staff working in different places and in different teams and so microcultures develop and so as a result Diversity equity inclusion is playing out relative to how all of those various cultures within the city Are operating and again, that's organizational cultures We heard specifically So thomas referred to the employees that did not specify either their gender or their race or ethnicity And so for those that did not specify specifically in the survey There was a correlation between those folks and their expression of dissatisfaction with the with the dei progress within the city In addition in our interviews and focus groups, which are confidential We heard from uh, women or female identified staff that there's been reports of exclusion Microaggressions inappropriate jokes and comments along the lines of sexist or of a harassment nature And so something to flag um in terms of internal dynamics we're seeing So contributing to some of these dynamics is so