Commission on Persons with Disabilities - Regular Meeting

Of the Commission on Persons with Disabilities. It is November 12, and we'll start with roll call. Chair Mullins?

Here. Commissioner Lipp? Here.

Commissioner Lyons? Here. Commissioner Knedler? Here. Commissioner Schmitz? And Commissioner Bondsmith?

Here.

Commissioner Beeler? Okay. Thank you. We're going to go immediately into non agenda public comment. Our member of the public here tonight is former commissioner Lisa Hall, if you'd like to share with us.

Good evening, everyone. It has truly been an honor and a privilege to serve on this commission over the years. About fifteen years ago, was I in an accident that left me disabled. My life has changed forever. I learned firsthand the many obstacles one faces, whether physical, mental, financial, or emotional when navigating the world we live in.

Through this commission, I learned that we can be a powerful advocate for persons with disabilities in our community. During my time here, we addressed many important issues. We worked on implementing the UDO to bring more accessibility to housing for people with disabilities. Alameda has truly been a leader in this ongoing effort. ADA compliance helps people live independently and with dignity.

We supported Vision Zero and the Alameda Transportation Plan to enhance the safety and livability of our city. We also served as liaisons to other boards and commissions within Alameda, helping to ensure disability perspectives were always represented. We brought more awareness to the mental health crisis affecting people with disabilities, an issue that affects all ages. We took a stand for special education students when they were abruptly moved from their classrooms without notice. Whether physical or mental, disability is something that can touch anyone.

Nearly half of all seniors, forty six percent, will become disabled in their lifetime, and about forty percent of people with disabilities will experience homelessness. Housing, health care, and food insecurity are just some of the challenges we've worked to address. I've had the privilege of marching with the disability contingent to raise awareness for voting rights, and I joined the REV UP team with the AAPD to continue fighting the stigma surrounding disability. I also attended many Pacific ADA conferences where we gained valuable knowledge on topics like employment rights under the ADA, fair housing, and accessibility, legal aid as well as emergency preparedness. We're so fortunate to have the Pacific ADA Center right here in Oakland.

I wanna thank mayor Trish Spencer, who appointed me for my first term, and mayor Marilyn Ashcraft for my second. I also wanna thank Sarah Henry, who guided us so well since 2019, and now Lillian Jewell. Most of all, I wanna thank my fellow commission members, past and present, who have shown such empathy, kindness, and dedication. I learned so much from wonderful people like Beth Kenny, Jenny Linton, Leslie Morrison, and Arnold Brillinger. It has been a true privilege to serve alongside you all. Thank you, and may god bless this commission.

Thank you. Oh, and former commissioner Hall, we have a lovely certificate that I believe Lillian helped prepare. So if you don't mind Yeah, no problem. No, I'm happy to. So thank you.

Okay. Thank you former commissioner Lisa Hall. We'd also like to take a moment to just welcome new commissioner Michelle Knedler to the commission. Thank you for being here.

Thank you for having me.

And then I don't see any other public comment, so we'll go to the consent calendar, which is a vote all at once to approve minutes from 07/09/2025 and 09/10/2025, as well as the 2026 meeting dates for this commission. Are there any comments or questions about anything on the consent calendar? Any wish to discuss? Okay. Okay. So then we'll need a motion to approve.

I'll do a motion to approve.

I'll second.

Okay. Sorry. Alright. So we'll go ahead and just do quick vote. And just go down the line if you don't mind. To approve the consent calendar, both sets of minutes and the commission twenty twenty six meeting dates.

Aye. Okay. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Now, we'll start our regular agenda items with a presentation from Captain Dallas Andrews, the emergency manager for the city of Alameda. And this is the current in progress, not quite draft of the new emergency operations plan so that we'll hear about the progress made in that department.

Good evening. I'm a millennial, I'm gonna use my phone. Hope that's okay. So my name is Dallas Andrews. I'm a fire captain with the city of Alameda. Just a little bit about me. I've worked here for just over ten years. Been in the EOC just over two years. I spent a majority of my time at Station one right there on Park Street working on Engine one and Medic one. So very familiar with the Park Street corridor but have spent some time West End at station two.

So like I said, I've been in the EOC about two years and one thing that we've been working on for, call it the last year or so, is a revision to the city's emergency operations plan. So we're going go into that today. So next slide, please. So what is the emergency operations plan or the EOP? I'll call it EOP because that rolls off the tongue better.

So it's a guiding document for city staff and their response to emergencies that affect the city. These aren't emergencies that happen every day, right? These aren't the medical aids that the fire department goes on every day. These aren't the traffic accidents that the police go on every day. This isn't the tree down that public works goes on every day or the blown transformer that amp goes on every day.

These are large scale citywide emergencies that affect what I would say is like the Greater Alameda rather than the smaller Alameda, if that makes sense. It's two basic parts. So you have the basic plan which is kind of the meat and potatoes of the plan. However, it is a very generic plan. It's not really incident specific per se.

That's where the annexes and appendices come come in. Those annexes and appendices kind of outline the incident specific response stuff tying in that basic plan that is very broad and generic for lack of better terms, the annexes kind of narrow that down. So the basic plan is going to talk about our response to everything from A to Z basically. The annexes, there's going to be an earthquake annex, there's going to be a tsunami annex, there's going to be, what are some of the other ones, transportation annex, things of that nature. And the key with this document is it's a guiding document to the city and our response and it empowers staff to make decisions based on their professional experience and judgment.

That's kind of a key statement in here. I think about tsunamis and we're looking at that. I'm sure everybody is familiar with it. In the last year, we've had two different tsunami activations, kind of two different types. We have one. The first one, came from an earthquake out of Crescent City up on the basically the California Oregon border. And we had no notice. We find out at the exact same time you find out about these. Don't have like a special smoke signal or anything. We find out at the same time.

And so that was right now. That impact for us depending on the wave is forty five to ninety minutes that it's going to affect us versus the most recent one a couple months ago was a earthquake off the very eastern tip of Russia, the very western tip of the Aleutian Islands in that area. And we were looking if there had been a wave, we were looking at about five hours. So why do I tell that story? When I talk about it empowers staff to make decisions based on their professional experience and judgment, our response is very different if it's a forty five minute time of impact versus a five hour time of impact.

So it's very hard for us to narrow down in a single document all the different possibilities. And something as simple as the tide factors in because if the Russian earthquake would have hit at low tide, we would have had no idea anything even happened because the normal swing of the tide is able to compensate for the wave that hit us. That hits us at a king tide like we had last week, it's a lot worse. So there's a lot of factors at play in and having the guiding document but still giving our staff the ability to make decisions based on professional judgment and experience is key. So we're in the 2025 revision.

Industry standard for this document is its life is about five to ten years. The current EOP that we're operating under was March 2019. We're actually in version two of that due to a couple of very minor revisions that were basically grammatical revisions for lack of better terms. And then the city's hired Atlas Planning based out of Southern California for the revision. They've done a lot of comparable cities to us in Southern California and they've done a couple comparable cities in Northern California.

And then they have a subcontractor who's based out of Walnut Creek who is helping with kind of the Bay Area centric type stuff of our plan. All right. So the key areas of focus for our revision. So I talked about the annexes and the appendices. We didn't have those in their last plan.

So we just have the basic plan that doesn't really give us much incident specific guidance for us to operate under, so we're working under our professional skills and judgment. So we're revising some of the basic plan, very minor changes to that, but the big chunk of it is the appendices and the annexes for the incident specific type stuff and then the ADA compliance, which in the ADA transition plan, we got hit hard on for lack of better terms. We got pretty beat up. So we're addressing all those issues. And then we're addressing our organizational structure and the organizational chart of our emergency response within the city and moving some stuff around so it flows and works better.

Next slide please. So for the, just the ADA compliance aspect of it, and I can talk about the other side of it, but I figured you guys didn't wanna hear about that. But for the ADA compliance stuff, so some of the things that we're looking at is planning considerations for the functional needs population. So notifications to them of information, notifications of emergencies, mobility considerations during a time of relocation, and then logistical support, whether that be medicine, medical support, shelter access, service animals, things of that nature. So I'll just work down those three.

So notifications, making sure that people are getting the notifications whether that be due to a language barrier or access to communication devices. However we need to address it, we're going to address it. Next, mobility considerations during a time of relocation. So figuring out what it takes to move people. Is that as simple as an AC transit bus?

Is that as simple as a school bus? Is that an ambulance? Things of that nature. And then just the logistical support of people. Like for us to open up a shelter, just taking the disability out of it, just for us to open up a shelter, that's a massive logistical impact to the city.

We have to figure out how we're going to house people, how we're going to feed people, how we're going to provide water for people, where they're going go to the bathrooms, all that kind of stuff. And then we add another layer onto it of disabilities that we have to not address but we have to factor in and service animals and where's the green grass for the dog to go to the bathroom on, things of that nature. So that's the first one. And then communication considerations for access and functional need population. So kind of tying into the notification, but I purposely put it separate because in my mind notification is a one way street, communication is a two way street.

So not only are we notifying, but we also want kind of that receipt of the notification, making sure that people actually received it, they understand it, they comprehend it and that we're able to move forward. And then obviously the last one, I think it goes without saying, but obviously this is nondiscrimination based. We don't care race, religion, color, creed, none of that. We're here to do a service to the citizens in the community. That's what we're going to do. Next slide.

That's it. Okay.

So then if you want to stay up, we'll do clarifying questions from the commission. So typically these are, just questions to clarify any points or, facts stated in the presentation and then we can move to other questions should there be more.

I have like a procedural question.

I

heard this is draft form, like just to expect like will we have another conversation at some point in time?

Yes. The

the plan be exhaustive right now. Yeah. We can

No. For sure. So the

plan is

once once we actually get that draft back, which is sometime '26

Mhmm.

There's a city staff list of people that are gonna get it to review and then it's gonna go to this commission. I think only this commission but I could be wrong. And then at the end of the day, once city staff signs off on it, once this commission signs off on it, then it'll go to city council for actual ratification.

Helpful. Thanks. Clarifying questions?

Yeah, in your presentation you talked about we got hit hard about the ADA. What does that mean exactly? Was there a public or a statewide commission that hit us hard?

No, just the findings of the ADA transition plan.

Okay.

That was emergency management was one of their topics, I guess you could say. And in our current EOP, I'll be honest, our ADA compliance section is a paragraph. And it's basically saying that we will follow ADA. I think at the time that was written on the premise of a vague blanket statement that covers a to z. Well, that kind of came back to bite us and

Got it.

The investigator or the assessment didn't like that. So we're going a lot more in-depth. I think the draft that I got of the ADA was or like not even draft. It was just notes was I think almost three pages long. So we're going from one paragraph to a couple pages.

Excellent. Then one more process if that's So I'm assuming, Loving, you're part of the process as our okay, excellent. Are there any volunteers from the community or outside organizations on the

At this time, no. But once it go once we actually have the draft, then it will be open for like review and public comment once it gets to the city council. And then I would assume here as well with this being an agendized meeting, it will be in the agenda. So it will be open to review. But as of right now, no.

Okay. Thank you.

One of the things that I was thinking about is how does this EOP what's the scope of the EOP? Is it covered just departments and the city owned buildings? Is it something that's gonna inform how schools are gonna respond to emergencies, libraries? How does that work?

So the EOP covers the city's response to emergencies. So how the city and city staff will respond to those emergencies. We do work hand in hand with AUSD. When we had the first tsunami activation this year. We had one of their assistant superintendents in the EOC with us.

So they're not city staff, but they're right there with us, helping us make decisions that affect them but aren't their decisions, but our decisions affect them. So yes, the library is involved because it's a city facility. The library director has a position in the EOP, in the EOC. So yeah, it's basically the city's response to an emergency.

And does that include Alameda Hospital as well or is that separate? Are they

That's separate because they're their own organization. But we work with them as Alameda Health Systems. Okay,

any other questions or comments from the commissioners?

Go ahead, if you want. Oh. We're doing substantive now,

Okay. Think I remember the discussion when we were talking about the ADA transition plan when emergency operations and the procedure came up. This was a while ago. So I'm really happy to hear that that information has made it back to your team and it's being more comprehensively incorporated in the new plan. I think that's wonderful. I'm assuming that the three pages notes were somewhat informed by our discussion. I don't know where that came from. But do you know if it incorporates things like electrical charging? I'm just thinking of things that didn't come up in our original discussion that have since kind of come to mind.

Electrical charging for what?

For like power wheelchairs or people who have devices?

It doesn't specifically say that, but it talks about mobility devices and things of that nature.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay. Great. Thank you.

I have a couple of questions. I know you gave the example of the tsunami where we only had forty five minutes notice. And I think you said you don't have a bat phone or a back channel. But I'm curious if if you have a sense now about I understand we have a consultant or some kind of agency that we we are working with, that this isn't, you know, the fire department tasked with writing this from scratch and going it alone. I'm just interested in benchmarking in similar cities.

I'm happy to hear there's kind of a Bay Area read on it. Alameda is an island. It's obviously we all think it's very special and very unique, but I wonder if there's, like, a collective wisdom that we're capturing as well. And so correct me if I'm wrong, but my impression is the process of updating the EOP has some of that benchmarking and kind of collaboration. But I'm wondering in like the time of an emergency in any of those annexes or appendices do you contemplate do you coordinate with other municipalities or Both other departments. Yeah. Okay.

So again, tying back to the tsunami

Mhmm.

One. We I get a phone call, I get an email, I get a text

Mhmm.

Immediately from the National Warning Center. And then shortly thereafter, I get another email with literally a Microsoft Teams link and a time. And it's it's usually the bottom or top of the hour is a meeting. So, basically the national or Cal OES has a meeting at either the top or bottom of the hour and everybody is on there and they're basically just running through the last hour. Obviously, the first one is an updated situation, and then every meeting thereafter is an update of the last hour and what they're seeing.

Usually, at that point in time, county OES, which is based out of Dublin at Santa Rita, they're scheduling a meeting opposite that. So if the statewide call is at the bottom of the hour, our county calls at the top of the hour. And then the 11 cities within the county get on that call, kind of come up with a formulated game plan and how we go. What we have found works best is the message initially comes out at the county level, and then that same message gets pushed by each jurisdiction because then it ensures that we have one uniform message across the whole county, so it doesn't matter. Because a lot of this messaging is simply based on your cell tower, What cell tower your phone is connected to.

Mhmm. So you're out at dinner at Dragon Rouge when this happens. Well, your phone may be connected to a cell tower in Oakland at that exact moment in time because you're right there on the estuary. You may not be hitting the closest Alameda cell tower. So because of that, that what's called IPOS or WIA message is going to you're going to get the message from Oakland.

So you may see it and be like, this doesn't apply to me. Why am I getting this? So that's why we ensure it comes down from the county level first and then each jurisdiction pushes the same message so that we ensure that that message is uniform across the coastline of the bay, I guess you could say, using that as one example. But yes, there's very much coordination amongst the jurisdictions. The last one, I had my personal phone on one phone call, my work phone on another phone call, and I was on FaceTime with the fire chief on my iPad because I just straight up ran out of ways to call, so we FaceTimed.

So My goodness. And this may be premature, so we can push this to when we have a more substantive draft to review or talk about. But I remember in our earlier conversations about emergency management, or maybe I don't know what we were talking about, like egress off the island just in general. And in my experience, there's been a healthy debate about push and pull about does the fire department wanna know if an individual household has special needs? Like, this is my personal experience.

Like, my daughter is in a wheelchair, we had a lot of special needs. And one of the things I heard from certain people was, it's good to kinda introduce yourself to your local fire department, let them know you're there, like, whether or not there's a database or, you know, not that you rely on that, but it's kind of, like, maybe a better cliche as belt and suspenders. Like try to do it both ways. But I'm just wondering, do you have a sense for this EOP if there's gonna be kind of a map of like people who need extra help or like kind of a population count even, not that we're tracking people's disability. But I'm just wondering, like, how does that information feed in? And, if it's premature to talk about that, we can No.

Not at all. Okay. So in terms of that, we already have that right now.

Yeah.

We have a access and functional needs database on the city website

Mhmm.

That is reoccurring annually. So you have to, you actually have to re, not reapply, but fill out the form every year just to make sure that that information is up to date and accurate. I'd be happy to share that with Lillian to share with you guys. And it's actually in our emergency management software. So we have software called VOC, Virtual EOC. That's the platform we use right now. And it's actually already embedded in that program. And it's a, I don't know, I'd say five minute form that you fill out on there. And it gives us information. There's a disclaimer that says with this guarantees you know extra special services, right?

Yeah.

But it gives information on you, so to say. Name, date of birth, weight, that's actually a very big thing for us. That means can I send just two people in an ambulance or do I have to send an ambulance and an engine company for five people? What kind of medical conditions do you have? What kind of mobility devices do you need?

Where would you like to go? Obviously, can't guarantee that you're going to go there, but where would you like to go, things of that nature. Right now, because it's embedded in our software, it's only in English. We have a couple of different options. There's city staff that you can call.

There's phone numbers listed on it. You call one of those phone numbers, leave a voicemail, and then for whatever language you need, we will get you in touch with a interpreter and they will help you fill out the form. I think we have six or seven languages, I believe, off the top of my head. So we already have a lot of that right now and we're actually getting ready to roll out the 2026 survey. Once you have filled out that form, we're able to extract your address and email, and we're gonna send you an email with a link to the next year's survey. If we don't get a response or we don't see your name in the twenty sixth survey, we're gonna send you a mailer. So

I think that'd be really helpful for some of this planning, just understanding what the population Yeah. Might require.

And we don't use it. Like I said, it's Mhmm. Just like with our emergency response, our daily emergency response versus the EOP stuff, we don't use it day to day. There's only I think there's only five of us on city staff that actually have access to that database, and we can track and see when somebody looks at any of it. So it's very secure. You can only access it from our emergency management software, which you have to be a city employee to even have access to. So I'll send the form to Lillian. She can distribute it to you all so you at least have seen it.

Well, and I would think, and I'm a population of one, so I take it with a grain of salt. But I didn't even know there was a form. Like, I mean, we, like, went down to the fire station, like, in person. But And So I think even raising awareness, you know, just get the word And out

don't get me wrong. The crews love having people come through. Yeah. Don't don't take that away. Yeah. Don't stop doing that.

We can be both. Right? It doesn't have to either. Yep. And then these are just a couple comments. You can respond if you want, but just planting a seed. I love this. Like, just the idea that we're trying to proactively kind of, you know, not necessarily to an individual, but kind of assess, you know, not conceptually what does this need look like, but, like, on a human level. Right? Like, on an individual level.

So a couple of things is, like, one is not all and it sounds like your your intake is gathering some details, but, you know, somebody marking a box of do you have a disability or not. Right? Like, it can be a whole gamut of what that would be. And, like, you've already said, like, you're gauging, like, weight, you know, requirements, things like that. So and I would think, like, gathering that kind of detailed information might help create, a tiering system and, like, people with, you know, limited mobility, but they use a cane or a walker.

Right? Like, we can do the AC transit bus and, like but then you have other people who are gonna need an ambulance. So I just love, like, getting that information up front. It seems like we might end up in a better place. And then the other thing I was thinking is, like and I don't know if, again, this would be on your scope, but just planning the ideas. Like, I wonder if there's a way to have, like, a community network of helpers, you know, like, people who know in our neighborhood. Like, there are people who need a little like, in a time of emergency, you know, like, do you have, like, little, you know, neighborhood champions or, you know, people who can help for those lighter Uh-huh. Needs.

Yeah. So, I mean, there there's a couple different options

Mhmm.

In regard to the the second one or oh, that's first one. Mhmm. Yeah. No. And that's that's why, like, the address is on there. Okay. So we can we can kinda and through the software, we literally can hit a button and it's gonna plot everything on a map

for us. Yeah.

Oh, the, you know, the natural gas leak that we're evacuating half of town for, it's on this side. Well, I can remove this whole half of the map because they're not affected. So now I can just look at just this half, right? And then I can start looking at, okay, well, these people, we're able to take this group and we're able to put them, yeah, on an AC transit bus and get them to install high school that we're opening up as a shelter. Or, okay, now this one we actually have to take to a cardiac receiving facility because they have LVAD, which is an external heart basically.

So we need to take them to a hospital that can actually handle that kind of stuff. You know, and then it's like, do they go to UCSF or do they go to CPMC or okay, well, now we gotta factor that in. So, yeah. We're definitely it's not just a name, address, phone number

Yeah.

And do you have a disability? Yes. No. Like, that would honestly be more of a hindrance to us because it's like, I got this list of people now that I gotta go talk to again rather than only having to talk to once. Once. Great. The second one yeah. So I I always encourage people, get out, know your neighbors. Right? Don't hide behind the two things that I have in my pocket.

The other side of it is we have a CERT program, Community Emergency Response Team. Fire department runs it. It's over 200 people within the community right now. And the whole premise behind it is make sure your home is safe, make sure your family is safe, then check your street, then check your neighborhood, and then we can start looking at the citywide stuff. So I encourage people to do that as well.

Thank you. Really appreciate it.

Hi. Thanks for the presentation. I just wanted to kind of add on to the question about this form that I'm not aware of either. And I'm I'm not sure if I understood correctly. Did you say that if one was on the form, they would know it and they'd be able to access this information about themselves?

No. Okay. Once you basically, once you submit your entry at whatever point in the year, it's now locked away in the software. And then about this time, I think we're getting ready to send it out either next week or the week after, we create the new we copy and paste and just change everything to the next year. So we're changing everything to 2026, exact same form, exact same data and we resend it out to everybody.

And this requires people to submit again. The reason behind that, people move away. Unfortunately, people pass away. So it helps ensure that our database is actually up to date and current and ensures people still want to be part of that. At the end of the year, the old data gets erased and is gone. And then we look at the 2026 data.

Okay. So you said gets sent out. So presumably, these are to people who have already been on your radar. So you're gonna send it to their email or their Yeah.

So we

address?

Ask for an email. We send it to their emails. We give it some time. If we notice, hey, these 10 people didn't respond, we then send them a mailer with the website and I think we do a QR code. And then a link to the form and then hope that they do it.

Right. Okay. So I guess what I'm driving at is since I'm not aware if I'm on your database or not, and I can't say if I ever filled out this form, and I don't remember doing it, and what if I'm a not me, but anyone a newly disabled person? How are you contacting the people you don't even know about?

Unfortunately, we aren't.

That's my question.

Yeah. Yep. It's on the city's website. That requires them to go to the city's website and find it. And I totally get what you're saying.

Because I'm pretty sure I never went on the city's website even in imagining that there was something like that that was available for me. So I think that's something that needs to be addressed because otherwise you're we're missing a lot of potential problematic situations that you don't want in an emergency situation to just come out. Yeah. I'm also aware of cert and and planning on going through the training.

Perfect.

Because I know that is helpful in terms of, you know, small communities and we do do the what is it called? The night out? What what is that?

National night out.

National night out in our our little area over in the Fernside. We've done that every year. But, yeah, more concerned that, you know, there's a lot of people out there including me because like I said, I'm pretty sure I never filled out this form and I don't if I wasn't sitting here today, I still wouldn't know about it. So I don't know if that's our job or I'm not saying it's your job, but it's somebody's somebody's gotta figure that out. We will work on it. Yeah. Thank you.

Lillian, can we include that in the accessibility newsletter?

Yes. Already made a note.

I have one more quick question if I that's was recently part of the my hospital's great shakeout drill. Is there a plan once the EOP is fully in place to do drills in Alameda or is that something that happens here?

Unfortunately, no. It doesn't happen, at least at a citywide level. We do do staff trainings annually. We have the CERT trainings, but beyond that, no.

Okay. Thank you. Any other? Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah. Yeah, I've got a question for you and then a general comment about so far we're at the process. First of all, what can we do as a commission to help support this great program? What kind of support do you guys need from us?

That's a loaded question. I know. I'm gonna defer that one to my boss. I'm gonna defer that one to the fire chief.

Okay.

Who is the fire chief?

His name is Nick Luby.

Thanks. Yeah.

Awesome. Maybe when you come back, you could help us

Yeah.

Maybe pass along what your chief says.

No. I mean, I would say at minimum, like, the commissioner spoke to getting the survey out there. Yeah. A short of you calling 911 in the event of an earthquake, I have no idea who's at your house. Unless you call to get me there, I don't know who's there.

To where if I have information that, hey, I know John Doe lives at 123 Main Street and he is wheelchair bound and he cannot get out of his house without assistance. If I don't know that information, it's not that I won't do anything about it. I just I can't. I can't do anything about it. So I would say I'll retract my previous statement of kicking it to the fire chief. But I'm still going to kick it

to him.

But just get the survey out there. Know, let people know that it's a thing. And I'll send you I won't send you the 25 link. I'll send you the 26 link just so you get the fresh one. But, yeah, I'll be honest, we haven't had much interest or submissions from it. But it is something that we do and we have for sure.

Great. That's very helpful. And my other comment is I was very happy to see you identified service animals in the report. And of course, service animals are a legal definition of actually trained animal as we all know. Think it's just important too that we have a whole plan for animals and pets in general. My experience with people with disabilities and all of us is that our pets are not just their family, right?

Oh yeah.

And a lot of people will not leave in the time of emergency unless they know their animals will come with them. And that we look at creating temporary shelters that we can co locate animals and pets whether they're service animals or not, with with their people. And I think that's really important.

Yes. And that's one of the, I would say, not big changes, but big changes, I guess, lack of better term, in the last probably decade of emergency management is actually recognizing I think we've always recognized service animals, but it's they were just part of the person, I guess, lack of better terms. Yeah. We didn't have any services directly for the animals that I think in the last decade or so of emergency management, there's been a dramatic shift of the thought process there of, hey, no, these are actually part of this person's daily life and we have to treat them just like the person whether they have two legs or four, you know, Because it's very, not debilitating, that's not the right word, but degrading for somebody who has a seeing eye dog, for example. Having to wander around aimlessly trying to find somewhere for their dog to relieve themselves versus with a couple extra steps we can tell them, no, we're going to take you somewhere for your dog to relieve themselves.

And that just makes that person who's already having probably a pretty bad day, maybe that's just that ever so slight glimmer of positivity that keeps them going for another day, right, rather than being down in the dumps for the day. So I think that's been a big transition in emergency management that I've seen of a change of that process.

Great. That's good to hear. I guess I'm wearing my hat as the former director of the shelter when with that comment.

I don't But think you know where I'm coming

thank you. That's great. I

just thought of one more thing. I'm just wondering, because I haven't gone through the CERT training, but if that would be an opportunity for those surveys to be talked about and in fact given to people so that when we go back to our communities, we could have them since we know our neighbors and could disperse them. So I don't know if that's part of it. And my other thing that I just thought of was like, as we were talking and you were talking, it like, okay, well, disability, but I'm also going through my block and I'm thinking, what about, I won't say any, what about someone who lives on the corner who just turned 103 years old? So she's not disabled because she gets out with her son who is somewhat disabled, and they walk around the block every day.

But, you know, maybe the survey also could go to just the aging population of people that might not be able to react quickly in an emergency situation. So I'm just thinking if that's something if I'm on the right track with thinking like that.

Yeah, definitely. I hope to make it.

She's amazing.

Yeah. So to your first point, it is definitely something we've talked about. Part of the rollout of this was a plan to have the cert team actually at the library, whatever that is, that way. One night a month for like an in person fill out day or fill out session. They had a laptop with them and they could go on and fill out form right then and there in person.

They could answer questions, things of that nature. Did it for four or five months and I don't think we So had a single person show it was kind of like, are we really actually accomplishing anything here? So that's definitely something that we've talked about. And the library supports it. They have a room for us that we can use.

Think Mhmm.

I wanna say it was like the last Wednesday of the month, I think, for an hour, hour and a half or so.

Yeah. Maybe, like, reaching out to Kiwanis or Elks or the, talent, you know, the other, some of the other community groups that exist that kind of, you know, interact with with the community and and have members who may be disabled. Mhmm. I met this certain person, forgot her name, but at at one of the fairs that were

Carmen, Sandy,

I'll tell you later because I know her, but I can't think of her name. I'll just describe her by her Australian accent. Strange. Yeah. I don't know why I can't think of her name right now, but I know her. But that's nothing new, losing names. But yeah, no, anyway, Kiwanis or some other places where it can be brought up, and just to get the information out there, because here we are, disability commission, and quite frankly, I didn't even know it existed. So I feel kind of, wow, I should have known about this. You know, can't know until you know.

It's okay. It's all good. Yeah.

One I know. Yes.

Sorry.

One last thing. I forgot all night. Actually, I do I actually do remember sending my son is hard of hearing. I remember signing him up on through the city's website. I did not realize that I had to re sign him up every year. So he's You'll

you'll get the link here shortly.

Yeah. And I think it'd be worthwhile reaching out to the Alameda Unified School District because it would be something that could be included in their special education newsletter.

Gotcha.

Because a lot of those kids would meet would would the families would want to let people know that those kids might need extra assistance.

Yeah. Totally. Thank you. Definitely.

Thank you so much.

Hey. Not a problem.

Very stimulating conversation. Good. Got our wheels turning in. No. I appreciate

I appreciate it because I was afraid I was gonna just be up here Charlie Brown in it for ten minutes. Oh, no.

She came to the right place. Awesome. Thank you so much.

Appreciate it.

Okay. Thank you, captain Dallas Andrews, for that presentation. We will now go to our next presentation on this regular agenda item. This is an info item presented by Oscar Davalos, the chief building official for the city of Alameda. These will be accessibility and the building codes.

Good evening commissioners. Thanks for having me tonight. I wanted to come before I adopted the codes. Yeah well the council adopted the codes in October. And I wanted to come before and present this information but it's never too late.

This is real good information. First, I want to express that I'm probably one of the first persons that understand your job, your functions as a commissioner. And I really appreciate the work that you do because one of the primary reasons why we have Building Codes is because people like you that serve the community and advocate for change and provide feedback to the government so they can put systems in place and codes that we can enforce. Know, often when I review documents, you know, like for new permits, projects or even special events, I always think about being the voice of the people that don't have the voice. You know, sometimes we get a lot of push backs.

Sometimes it's from our own people that says, do I have to do this? I have to spend another $1,800 on this? I'm like, doesn't matter. If you want my approval, you're gonna have to provide it because you talk about being inclusive, but you're not showing it. So, you know, it's my function to make sure that you provide that accommodation. So, I just wanted to say that I'm very appreciative of the time that you spend to do this. You know, John, to answer questions that you may have, how can you contribute? You're already doing it. All right. So I'd like to start by just giving you a little bit of overview on the building division.

Know like I said we're part of the enforcement branch of the city. What we do is basically ensure barriers free for people with disabilities and we do that in several aspects of the organization. One is actually through the building codes which is the laws that we enforce. And also being open minded. Sometimes, you know, providing an accommodation it's just finding an alternative way of providing that accommodation.

So, if you just look at things from the black and white perspective, you never get anything done. So sometimes you have to kind of make sure you bend the rules a little bit to be able to provide the accommodation that is needed. If you feel about like, let's say it's a promoter, they wanna propose an event and perhaps they don't have the ability to provide an area dedicated for people with disabilities because that area is not quite accessible. So then there's alternatives, know. Sometimes it's okay, dedicate a sitting over here in this area and then you can have people over there that have the accommodation.

Or just host the event maybe outside or an area where you can do it. So sometimes it's about being open minded and being flexible to be able to provide that accommodation. The rules are black and white, but the interpretation is based on our, you know, own interpretation. So just to give you a little overview of the building division. Building division is part of the Planning, Building and Transportation Department.

In the responsibilities that I oversee as the chief building official is the plan check, the permit center, the inspections and court enforcement. In every single one of these aspects we enforce accessibility every single day And in more than one way. You know, the plan check process, you submit plans for plan check. When you go to after this meeting, you stop by a restaurant, you'll have the ability to get in, to use the facilities and then just have seating that is accessible. Anybody here that has an accessibility disability has that ability because of the work that other people do.

The people that work in the permit center, you know, they're the ones that take all permit applications and route it to the reviewers. Just to give you an idea, in house we have certified accessibility specialists but also we contract with consulting firms that do our plan check-in. So we have about 50 people that have accessibility certifications. So the people that are doing this, they're architects, engineers, design professionals that are now doing plan check for like our city. And then in the inspection, so you know the information that we bring is in paper.

So somebody has to inspect it and make sure that it gets done. The button that you have there at the top and bottom that opens the door automatically, somebody needed to make sure that it was done and that it's fully working. So what happens if it's not working? That's why we have the other branch called court enforcement. Sometimes people call us, hey Oscar, you know, went to this place and I wasn't able to access it.

Or I went to this event and they didn't have any parking for people with disabilities. So one of the things that we do, you know, when somebody is proposing a special event, we look at accessibility right from the parking lot. All the way to the final piece of the presentation, whatever that is. If they have a stage, you know, a stage needs to be accessible for people with disabilities or they need to provide a letter. The promoter needs to provide us a letter saying that, hey, we don't have anybody that needs accommodation.

At the end of the day, that's also being open minded. They may have a ban that is for private, you know, use only and those people, they don't have a need. So for us is to make sure that if the need is there, that they provide the accommodation. So how did this happen? You know, first of all, you know, the building division is a big advocate to making sure that we remove barriers for people with disabilities.

We do that through the codes. The codes are adopted every three years. And so I'll give you a little bit of an overview later on on how that happens. But for now just so you know, the codes were recently adopted a lot of these books, you know, they all have something to say with accessibility. If you look at the plumbing code, for example, there's details about where the grab bars need to be installed, where the plumbing fixtures, how high that the sinks needs to be, all that including signage.

So if you look at the electrical code, those receptacles that you see on the wall and the switches and all that, they all have dimensions. And so it's our job to enforce that. So what I'm saying is that because of these laws we have the ability to provide a voice for people that were not heard in the past. So talking about the past, it's a good segue. You know, a lot of our people that went to the military, know, they went and served our country to defend our freedoms and to be a voice.

They found themselves coming back home with injuries that now prohibit them from going to places. Places like church. Places like a restaurant. Places of public accommodation. So, thankfully for us, they started speaking out and they started, you know, letting their voice heard.

And little by little the initiative started changing. You know changing, evolving little by little from the American National Standards Institute where they put the guidelines for accessibility to go into the evolving of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Before then we had the Section five zero four which is the Rehabilitation Act that was very essential because that was basically the pioneer for like accessibility enforcement. At that point is when we started looking at things from not just becoming optional but becoming a law. And so for us, you know, because we have those laws, we have the ability to make sure that things that are developed, things that are remodeled, things that are like put in place, including you know accommodations for public ways are in place for that.

One the things that we do like I said to be open minded is making sure that we also align with the way things are. For example, I mentioned about the certified accessibility specialist. So all the inspectors that we have here, they're certified building inspectors. So those people they need to know what they're looking at when they go address this. So we look at things because as much as the code has evolved over the years, we also need to evolve with it to be open minded and also prepare ourselves.

But it wasn't until like around 02/2010 when we started seeing more actual guidelines, you know. Guidelines with illustrations like the one you see there for, for to provide actual access for people with disabilities. You know, some, at the beginning they started building ramps to provide access for people with disabilities. But people have this misconception that accessibility was only intended for people that could not be mobile. They forgot about the people that couldn't hear, that couldn't see.

And there's disabilities of many kinds. So, the codes nowadays, they're really intelligent to address these issues. For example, if I'm gonna open the door and the door too strong, what if I have a situation where I'm not able to open it? That button over there, it just needs to have five pounds of force for anybody to do it. They don't have to use their hands.

They can use their hip. They can use any other part of the body. They can use their wheelchair to open it. So, that's one of the reasons why, you know, like a person like me that is very passionate about enforcing is very happy to have these codes. Now, just to give you a little bit overview, you know, this is how we started doing from the federal law to the local law.

Like I said, it took a voice like yourself to be able to start opening up and then getting things done. So at one point, things would evolve into what we have today which is the building codes. This is the set of the books like I mentioned. So what happens is that the International Code Council or the International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials, they produce a code called the model code. And the state of California, is one of the pioneers in the entire United States for being so advocate about accessibility, they have, we have our own codes.

Codes are different from the nation. These are called the California Building Codes for a reason. Know, they grab them out of codes and then they put all the amendments that are specific to the California needs and they become the California Building Codes. So one of the primary reasons why I emphasize on that is because like in this state we have the vision of state architects which enforce all accessibility and all the standards for public facilities like schools. And the HCAI which is an organization that regulates all the hospitals and all the amenities that they need to have to provide not only access but a safe place.

Captain Dallas was explaining what happens in case of emergency. The reason why we have these other institutions to make sure that the place are safe is because in the event of a disaster we need to have a place where we can find ourselves safer. So, that's why we have that. And so, but emphasizing on the modern codes, now we have codes that address, you know, like EV charging stations. Know, you, okay, we want to encourage like green technology, but what about providing a place?

What if my van happens to be you know electric and I wanna participate in that? Would I have a place to park? You absolutely would because the building codes make provisions for that. So I think it's important to do that but not only just looking at things from the black and white perspective. You know, if you look at all the signs that I included on this presentation, Just think about this meeting tonight.

In the past, we didn't have the ability to provide a meeting that had visual. And so now we have a meeting that has visual. But if you wanted to have, for example, somebody that is not being able to see this presentation, they can hear it because I'm explaining it. If someone's not able to hear it, they can see it. If they don't have that ability, you know, we have other ways of doing it.

If you look at a movie the way the movies used to be back in the day, you only have one way. Now, you can graph and I often tell my son that and my family, I say, I want you to see things from different eyes so you can understand what I do for a living. So, you know, we're like turn the volume off and then put the description of it and then you can see that. So, I'm a geek when it comes to that. When I see things like that evolving so fast, I'm a fan.

I'm a fan of the work that you guys do. So here's a little bit of the key milestones and the significance. You know, like I said, they started in 1961 with American National Standards 8117.1 which was the first accessibility standard and then moving on to architectural barriers act. And then all the way to the modern codes which actually provide a specific laws that anywhere that you go and I guarantee you if you start looking at old photographs you'll see like ramps made out of wood that didn't comply. When the inspector goes to a job they're dropping the level there.

They're making sure that that complies or they don't pass inspection. Sometimes they have to demolish entire projects just to make it compliant. But somebody has to do it. So we do that on your behalf. And when I say you, everybody. So, the conclusion says providing accessibility is not optional. Building codes have evolved to be more inclusive and we like that. Technology advances also helping in removing barriers for people with disabilities. Like I explained, there's so many things nowadays that aren't available. I was talking to one of my officers today.

I said, you know, one of my neighbors bought this van from Toyota and this thing is a piece of art for someone like me. I see how it works. They grab a button, push it, thing opens up, person can go in there, his wife right next to it. So now these people can actually go someplace together. And they can do that themselves. They don't have to call Dial A Ride or another institution to do that. They buy a vehicle like we would buy a different kind of vehicle. This is already equipped with the state of the art technology that provides that. That's fascinating to me. So, when I talk to Lillian about this, I like to go talk to the commission.

You know, I want to thank them for the work that they do and perhaps answer any questions that they may have. Which leads me to the next segue.

Thank

you, Oscar, our Speaker Davalos. Okay. Any questions, clarifying questions from the commission?

Commissioner Thank

you, sir. You mentioned that the city council adopted the revised building code in October. Yes. And is there anything you can clarify about that? Was there any big issues around access that came up to that discussion?

No, thankfully for us, the California building codes already include amendments. There are really specific chapter 11A and 11B. Our entire chapter is dedicated to nothing but accessibility. And so some of them refer to like, oh, for plumbing fixtures refer to the California Plumbing Code. For electrical fixtures report you need to look at the California Electrical Code.

And I tell the council, you know, they have to vote on this but the codes are mandatory. Like if they would say, oh, we're not gonna approve this. Okay, January 1, by default, I have to start enforcing the California building codes. I may not be the one because they might decide to let me go but somebody will be enforcing the codes. But you know, for me it's about like education. So, you go and present the information, explain what it's for, how it works. And at the end of the day, I work for all of you guys, you know. I live in Vallejo. So, you live in the city, I work for you. Know, sometimes people come and say, well Oscar, you're holding my business this and da da da.

I go, no. I'm not really holding your business. You're holding your business. Cause you know, you provide me a set of documents and those set of documents, they need minimum information in it. Now once you provide that, we're happy to approve it. Many of them are not just, I'll give you a good example. Sometimes people think, oh accessibility is I come to the parking lot and then I have access. No, what happens in an emergency? Like we make sure that if you aren't able to use the elevator that you have an area of refuge which is an area that is safe, fire rated and is accommodated so someone can, you can be there when the people come to rescue you. All that is really important.

And to us, know, I always say if you're going to be in this business you need to have a passion for it. If you don't like your business don't be in this business. So, fortunately for me and for my family I love this business because it gives me the ability to make a difference. You know, sometimes when the firefighters go there to serve in an emergency it's possibly too late for us. So, the next best thing that we can do is if there was a fire, a car crash into the building, I will need to make sure that it's restored back to a safe condition, code compliant condition.

So, a lot of people don't know our job. They don't appreciate it. Doesn't hurt my feelings a bit. For me it's about like doing the job and doing it for the reasons that are intended for which is protect the public.

I just wanna say thank you very much. And it's one of those things where I have to admit I was one of those people who didn't pay attention to it at all. Took it totally for granted. And then all of a sudden, you know, a number of years ago, my family, like somebody had an injury and was in a wheelchair, like just very abruptly. And all of a sudden, we were needing those kinds of accommodations.

And I did, I could just tell you from the very beginning of that whole journey it was just I felt like I'm so glad to be in America, know, California especially. And I was just like I felt like I could walk into any establishment and just say like well how are we gonna make this right? You know like first of all like things were generally accessible because of law and because of enforcement and, you know, the work the good work that you do. But it was also, like, even in those odd situations where things weren't quite right, you know, it's just our our whole approach to it really helps empower people with disabilities and family members to be able to go in and just, you know, not confrontationally, but just, you know, like, we belong here. You know, how are we gonna work this out?

So just wanna say thank you and, like, continue the good work. And, like, I know we have benefited from it, and so it's, a very virtuous cycle. And then the other thing I wanna say is the comment about, like, Ben, so you don't break. I really appreciate that. You know, just being realistic, you know, and just sometimes being and I'm a lawyer by trade, so I'm like, trust me, I understand.

Like, using good judgment is what it's all about. And I I'll just add this one little comment about having that phrase work in both directions or in multiple directions. And one of the things we've talked about a number of times on the commission because usually and I misinterpreted the agenda item. I think it was more about like planning commission and building codes for like future developments. And we often end up talking about waivers and exceptions to the code.

And one of the things I think about when I hear Bend it so you don't break is like have those accommodations absolutely. We live in the real world, you know, and I understand not everybody can afford to do everything. And sometimes it's, you know, it's letting the perfect get in the way of the good, but also don't break, you know, that whole system and, like, hold the line and do continue the good work you're doing because, you know, having more and more accessible places and having folks have the understanding why and, like, how important it is is great work. Just encourage you to keep that I

appreciate you saying that, Commissioner. You know, sometimes like I said, people don't really understand unless they experience something like that. But, you know, for us it's like, sometimes people think because I'm so passionate about this that maybe you know I have someone that has that challenge. Go, I think we all do. But that doesn't matter.

This is something that we do for society in general. You know, mean, somebody needs to say that, hey, you need to provide this and this and that, or we're not gonna be able to approve it. And I understand what you're saying about like the waivers and all that stuff. Luckily for us, you know, the codes are minimum, minimum requirements. There is a times like unreasonable hardships that are like, like the code allows for something like this.

For example, if you're doing a tenant improvement and your tenant improvement is so small that you really, like you're going to go out of business if you have to spend $300,000 on accessibility features. So then, yeah, you will be allowed to open your business because you file for an unreasonable hardship. But based on the construction codes, you will have to provide a percentage dedicated solely for accessibility. It could be providing a parking stall. It could be making the entrance accessible.

But we're not gonna let you go without providing the minimum requirements. So sometimes people say, well can you waive that requirement? I go, no one can. It's just, you know, like one of the job, one of the responsibilities that I have in my job is to make sure that I don't waive any provisions of the code. I have so much latitude on what I do, but one thing that I cannot do is waive any of the provisions of the code because the code is there for a reason.

So I'm entrusted to enforce it and I can make interpretations. For example, Lee and I have work on special events where, okay, so we're gonna have all these vendors on this path of travel, but the path of travel is inconsistent so it's not really a path of travel. So what is accommodation they're gonna be able to provide? Concierge service. You're gonna put a station over here and then anybody that doesn't have the ability to go through that path, they're gonna come here and whatever they want, you're gonna go get it for them.

That's concierge service. That's an equivalent accommodation. So for us is to make sure that everybody's treated equal. And or special. You know the thing is I always say that we had an event and good thing I'm not gonna say names or addresses because it'll get me in real trouble. I had an event that I just couldn't hear. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. So I asked for accessibility to the stage. I said, who's gonna participate in this? Is it special event? You're going to have, no, it's just people from the public. Okay, so you need to have a ramp or a wheelchair lift. They say it's too expensive. It's going to break our event. So then don't have the event.

But you need to have that accommodation. So I'll give you a good option. Either have an accessible stage or don't have a stage at all. How do you plan to accommodate? He goes, well the people with disabilities, they can dance down there and the people without disabilities can dance on the stage. I go, that's called discrimination.

So,

if that's your thinking, I'm gonna deny your special event permit. So, they didn't have a stage. And so, you know, they only have two options. And the options is you provide accommodation or you just don't have the stage. But the events need to be inclusive. And it's part of our job. So, I'm, you know, like I said, I'm really a fan of the work that you guys do. And I really wanted to come tonight and present this item because I want see that you're not by yourself. There's other people in the city that are doing this every day and we share the same vision and the same responsibilities.

Thank you so much. Any

other comment? I really appreciate you coming and taking your time to walk us through all the building codes. It's very educational. I'm happy to see that it's being enforced, and it's clear that you're very passionate about this. My mom was in a wheelchair for about a decade, and we would travel together, and I would remember sometimes checking to an ADA room in a hotel, and the one accommodation would be that it would have a peephole down low on the door and that was it. And that was all

That was it.

That was there for a wheelchair user. That was the only accommodation. And so she, like, couldn't get in the bathroom. So it varies quite widely when it's not enforced, and I'm glad that it's something that Alameda takes very seriously. I did have a question about the enforcement. When people report things through See Click Fix, is that funneled in in some way? You receive Yeah, those we

court enforcement receive those complaints daily and so you know we don't ignore anything. For us somebody could say hey you know the elevator is not working. And like well you know elevators they're really not required for like, they're not really the option to provide accessibility. But at times if you had a building and the building was approved like to have let's say lawyer's office in the bottom but also upstairs. Well, what if I wanna go to the one upstairs?

So then there's an elevator. Then the elevator may be required, you know. So if the elevator is required then if it's not functional then you know, we're gonna make sure that it is. And so sometimes, you know, tenants, you know, they express the dissatisfaction and landlords, they don't listen. They call us and we're the voice of reason because we have penalties that we assign to the voice of reason. Typically that delivers the results. But yes, we do have a full branch of our department that specializes in enforcement.

Thank you.

Thank you for your presentation tonight. And certainly your passion for your work shines through in everything that you said, and I really appreciate that about you. Thank you for the education. Now that I know you exist, you might see more of me. And in terms of just buildings in Alameda, I know there's a lot of old architecture and I don't know if this is how it works, but maybe some places are grandfathered in at being built at a certain year or whatever.

When public places make changes to their facilities and they don't upgrade to ADA compliance. Is that something that you look at or that people can bring to you?

That's a brilliant question. That's a million dollar question. So, the historical code gives some latitude to some buildings of historical significance. However, there are things that are not negotiable. You know, City Hall built in 1895. Here we are. There's an elevator. There's all these buttons. There's many like I'll give you a good example for, you know, it's not considered a structure but they have a use permit to do some events. For example, they use this Hornet.

So some of the amenities are not accessible for people with disabilities because many of the functions are accessible for even for people with disabilities. And there are just some areas where we'll take the historical significance away from like the vessel for example.

Yeah.

But in lieu of that there's other accommodations such as they have an area that is fully accessible where they have all the displays in there. And there's people there that'll provide you a whole overview of the history. Same with buildings. For example, the radio museum here in Alameda, you know, they asked me, hey Oscar, want instead of the guard railing I want to put just one rail in the middle because we removed the old facade and restored back to the historic significance. So, the whole place looks and feels like history.

Except that there's amenities in there to provide accommodations for people with disabilities. Because this is trade off, know. When you are gonna restore, when you, if you have a building and you're not going through any updates, any changes, we really cannot go over there and knock on your door and say, hey, you need to update it. But if you're coming to us to remodel the place, there's a threshold. The Department of State of Architects have a threshold like 206,000.

And so if you're gonna do a project that is 206,000 or more, you need to provide full accessibility. If you do less than that, then you need to do 20 of the construction cost. So to answer your question, Commissioner, yes, they don't get a choice. They still have to comply. And a lot of the places in the city, little by little, you know I'm very happy to see like the city hire Lilly and the city is doing things you know for like ADA transition plan because let's say we build a brand new building or refurbish a building and then we ask, okay, we need you to provide accessibility from the sidewalk all the way over there.

But the sidewalk is not accessible. So you know, I'm happy to see that things are moving in the right direction to make it more inclusive, more barrier free city. And even in our own educational process with our colleagues in other departments as well.

Great. Well, thank you. And, yeah, you're right about the USS Hornet. I have been able to access the ship, and there's a special lift that they'll take you up in your wheelchair, or in my case, my mobility scooter to get on board. And and there's certain parts of the vessel that, of course, you wouldn't be able to access because of just the nature of the vessel, but Yeah.

They do provide assistance with that. So if if there are some specific things that I have thoughts about with places that may have been upgraded and not brought into a better place for I'm talking I'm thinking about a couple of places, but bathrooms, that didn't make it any easier for a person with a wheelchair to access. Is that something that someone would just bring to the department

or Absolutely. To work? So, you know, sometimes, you know, like I, I've been in places where they tell me, how, Oscar, how did this pass?

That's exactly

what I'm And they go, easy. They never got a permit.

Okay.

You know, with us we deal with everything.

Okay.

You know, as I gave you an example, if you, let's say you're doing a remodel. There used to be a restaurant and now I'm gonna rent the space and I'm gonna also do a restaurant but my changes are minor. I'm gonna replace a check stand. I'm gonna do a few improvements. So my total cost of construction was only gonna be $20,000 So I'm not required to bring the place into full accessibility compliance.

Because for me to spend $2,300,000 I won't be able to make it. So the law understands that. And so for that reason they will have to file an unreasonable hardship and then I will review that. All unreasonable hardships are reviewed. And so if there's some logic to it and code compliance, we approve it.

If not, we don't. And there's been times where somebody submits for an unreasonable hardship, go, I'm not gonna be able to approve that. And your project requires to provide full accessibility, so how are you gonna provide the full accessibility? You know, at times it's, it's also about staying firm with your convictions and your job and being responsible about the job that you're entrusted to do. So, if you find a place that perhaps doesn't meet code, send that over to us and we'll look into it. Okay. That's the job that we do.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Well, thank you commissioners.

I just wanted to say it's I think it's fitting that it's my first meeting and you're speaking because I'm a designer and I'm working with building codes all day long, existing building accessibility compliance forms and hardship exceptions. So I really appreciate you sharing all of your knowledge with us, and I appreciate your dedication and enthusiasm about accessibility. I think it takes empathy to really have that kind of attitude that you do towards it and that all of us do as well. So I really appreciate that and I look forward to working with you.

Well, remember at the beginning I say thank you for the work that you're doing. So you know, in many ways, you know, a lot of times when people volunteer for a position to serve, sometimes they have a family member or themselves that have a disability. Sometimes it's the work that they do and it's reflected on it. For us, you know, it's important to be respectful of everybody's commitment and be appreciative. You know, you understand my job more than anybody because you know, you're a partner in safety.

Know, the people that do the design, everything that we review comes from somebody that already put their due, did their due diligence to provide the minimum code compliance. So, you know, I really appreciate your comment. And also congratulations, know, is great. Thank you for taking the time to serve. Pretty amazing.

Thank you.

I just want to say I've had a chance to work very closely with you Oscar in your role and with Alan Tye as well. And I think we are very fortunate to have you leading this department with Alan. You guys do amazing work and I really appreciate your approach that you are problem solvers and you work collaboratively with people but you're also committed to doing the right thing. So I just wanna thank you very much for that.

Thank you. Thank you very much for your comments and for giving me the opportunity. If you feel that there's another topic that you want to learn about the operations that we do, feel free to pass it on to Lily and Lily will reach out to me. I'll be happy to come and present or answer any questions that you may have. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank

you so much for presenting tonight. Oscar, have a good evening. Okay. So, we will close that agenda item and move forward to vote for our chair and vice chair for this commission. And I'm just going to approach you guys to pass out little slips of paper, and then we'll get started.

And

we're writing in one name?

Okay. Thank you.

You've

come up with a great idea. Or I don't know if you always plan to do it this way, this is this will help.

Okay. So we will open it up for nominees for just the chair position, to start, and then we will vote and then nominate for vice chair and then vote. And then chair Molians will count the votes for each and announce who has been selected. Of course, we we do we are missing two commissioners, commissioner Beeler and commissioner Schmitz. So, you can name them or nominate them, but we they won't be able to vote tonight.

So, they're not excluded from being named or nominated, but they are excluded from the vote. But, we do have a quorum with our five. Okay, so we'll open it up for or I guess I'll just summarize quickly. So, you've probably become familiar, the chair of this commission just simply helps to lead the discussion, can lead a motion, can, you know, call things back to order if it gets unruly or anything like that. And then the vice chair would be just in the chair's place, would serve in that same way at a meeting should we need that in an absence. So it's not as formal of a position as perhaps of other councils, but still helps with the decorum and things for the commission.

I'm sorry.

Yeah. Please. I was just gonna ask, can you remind us how long chairs and vice chairs serve in that position? And are there limits to the length of time that they can serve?

Not necessarily limits to the length of time they can serve. It's an annual serve. So in my staff communications, actually, I was going to mention that next agenda, I'm gonna ask if we can just clarify that it would be for all of 2026. Cause I think on the agenda I I wrote an end date Yeah. To take us through the fiscal year but will actually be the full calendar year for 2026. So it's one year at a time. Commissioner Elliott, did you have a question?

So a similar question. So says chair Mullins, so she could serve another term. I

guess. What was that? Sorry.

Chair Mullins could serve another term?

Yes.

Alright, as chair, okay.

Yes, she could, thank you. Okay, so we'll open it for nominations for the chair.

Okay, I'm just gonna be honest. Since this is like my second meeting, I don't really know. I still am trying to read through these signs to read everybody's last name. You know, so that's my first deficit there. I can see lip and I can't even see yours.

Let me do it this way. Yeah, and then It's not like online when we have our names in our boxes.

True.

And is there I guess, does anybody not want to be nominated? Isn't I mean, I I don't really know too much. So I feel like I'm just gonna watch. Like, gosh.

I feel like I was the only person here, which I feel like I miss Commissioner Hall even more. The last time we did a vote and it was it was I'll just say this. It was just as awkward. Okay. It just kind of happened. Thank you. Yes. I was like, let's just lean into the awkwardness, I would say. Yeah.

Yeah. Commissioner Lyons, please participate still just for the vote and the quorum.

Well, I'll participate, but I'm I'm definitely not gonna

Sure. Nominate anybody. Also, just a blanket understanding that all commissioners that are serving, they're here because they're qualified and wonderful people and have a lot to say and a passion for the field. And the role is not necessarily related to who's more qualified or who's more popular as in high school.

And I

will It's purely just some it's more of like an organizational structure thing.

And I'll just put it out there. Like, my feelings will not be hurt, and I'm not the most responsive person during the week. Lillian can attest to that. So if there's somebody interested, it's absolutely with all, like, my, like, blessings or, you know, like, it I would not feel at all put upon or rejected. So if there's somebody who's especially interested, that would be even more exciting,

but Not me.

I'm open. Completely open. Mhmm.

So I I was gonna say I I I'm as a newbie as as well, I'm still kind of figuring out the commission, how we work as well. So I would like to nominate Chair Mullins if you want to continue in the role. I think that would provide some continuity certainly for me as a new member if you're willing to serve in that role. So that's where I'm coming from you. And everything I've seen, you've been an excellent Chair so far. So I appreciate that. Thank you.

You beat me to it. I second that nomination. Any

other nominations? Okay. Well then, I suppose we could bypass the written voting. Commissioner Lip, I'm going to go a little even more informal than usual if you don't mind. He's my parliamentary support system. But and we'll just do all in favor of chair Moline's continuing as chair for the commission. Say aye.

Aye. Aye.

And any nays? Aye. Okay, the ayes have it. Okay. Now for vice chair. Any nominations for that one please?

I'm gonna continue if that's okay. You know, I think Kathleen Bondsmith, would love to nominate you as the Vice Chair. Again, you've in the commission and I think longer than more than half of us here tonight. And I really appreciate your perspective you bring to it from a medical perspective and your personal lived life experiences. So that would be my foundation.

I'll second that. I'll that. I'll third it.

Third it? No. I'll third it.

Okay. Well, then we won't need to vote again on all the papers. So all those in favor of commissioner Bondsmith becoming the vice chair for this commission for 2026, say aye.

Aye. Aye.

Okay. Any nays? Okay. Well, congratulations. Chair Mullings, you will continue for 2026, and commissioner Bon Smith now is our vice chair. Thank you. Okay. This moves us into commission communications. And if you don't mind, I'd love to just start it off by teeing up. Commissioner Knaedler, if you'd like to share a little bit about yourself and just introduce yourselves to the commission, please.

Sure. Yeah. My name's Michelle Knaedler. I've been an Alameda resident for eighteen years. I work as a designer for a global architecture and design firm, so I have quite a bit of experience working with building codes and the ADA and with different stakeholders coming to compromises for accessibility among other things. I also led a year long research grant on neurodiversity last year and so I'm very interested in making sure we have accessible access for people with all different kinds of disabilities in this city. Wonderful. Welcome.

Yeah. Thanks.

I'm happy to have you.

Nice to meet you.

Okay. Thank you. Any other commission communications, please? Commissioner Kneller, this is sort of like an open forum so that each commissioner can share something if there's like an event or an agenda item, anything like that that they would like to propose or share about. And I'm not sure.

Lillian does a wonderful job onboarding, so this might be overkill. But I learned early in the commission that there's sensitivities about sending emails or not having communications outside of the proper channels

just to

make sure that For commission business. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So sometimes you just wanna pass on a note about, like, oh, there's this fair happening, you know, related to disability issues, but it may rise to the level of a commission business. So that's why this is a good little section of our agenda to talk about that. Or email, when in doubt, email Lillian. That's what I that's my my rule that I stick to.

I'm sorry. What what can we do now?

Just This is just kind of an open ended non agenda item sharing. So if you have an event or something you'd like to talk about or even an agenda proposal for a future meeting, it's kind of like an open communication section for the commissioners.

Female I have one thing. I think it was I think you shared it in an email, but I just wanted to put in a plug. UCSF has an annual virtual conference. It's kind of focused on health professionals, but also not on disabilities. And it is, I think, more focused on kids this year, but it also covers the adult population.

And I attended it three years ago, and I thought it was amazing. And it was really great because they brought in different people from the disability community to talk to health professionals, and so it was very much like a two way conversation about the health needs of people with disabilities, and I just wanted to share if anybody's interested. I think there is a $100 fee to attend, so it's not free, unfortunately. I don't know if they offer scholarships, but if anybody's interested, you could always email the folks running it. And it was just a pleasant way to spend a day to hear from people. When is that? It's in March. Oh, in March. Okay. Yeah. Okay. March.

Thank you.

When we had, it was great to have Oscar in tonight, and I really learned a lot, and just love his passion. So that's buildings. Who is roads?

It depends what part of roads you're asking about. So there's the planning department. Oscar's within the PBT, so planning, building, and transportation. There's the planning department. They're the ones, the visionaries, who are often engineers or people who can figure out, okay, what do we want to do with these roads?

There's the transportation department, are all other specialized professionals that have studied traffic design and different elements within how people relate to pathways and travel ways and those sorts of things. And then there's public works, which is the department that actually builds it, actually implements those designs, tests and confirms the feasibility of the designs. And then, you know, our engineers and our builders, our inspectors are the ones who will go out and do the work and get it so that it's tangible. Yeah, so there's a lot of people who work on the roads.

Okay. Yeah.

I guess there's a lot of work happening that I'm probably unaware of, but why I'm bringing this up is for two reasons. I did the Alameda ride for the parks, which I've done a couple of times already, and it was great. But I have to say, the roads and the trails that we rode was at times just horrible. And I ride a low recumbent trike, so with on a if you don't if if you've never ridden a trike, you wouldn't realize if you've only ride a two wheeler. The the camber of a road is completely different when you're on a trike.

You really notice it. But the other thing is just the condition of some of the paths we were on. Really difficult. And yesterday, was it yesterday? Maybe, it doesn't matter.

I was out for a ride along Harbor Bay on path, and there were two people that walked by me, an elderly woman using a walker. And didn't stop and talk to her, but then shortly after that, there was another woman who was in a wheelchair. And I just decided to stop because I was, my head was already bounced all over the place, and I thought, I wonder what this might feel like for her. So Helen was her name, and I just asked her, I said, well, how is it for you to be on this path? And she said, you know, pretty not easy.

In fact, she told me that some gravel, loose gravel, at times have come up and she's actually fallen out of her wheelchair. And so I told her that I was on this commission and that I would appreciate it if I didn't have any way to give her my email or whatever. Said, I just want you to know that I feel the same way about these paths. They're not fun to ride on and I can't imagine. When I have gone out for a walk there I have to really be careful.

And I'm not in the you know propelling a wheelchair. So anyway, it just made me think perhaps there's a plan that I'm unaware of. I'm sure there is, and maybe everything just takes a long, long time. But I encouraged her to reach out to either you or to the to the city just to say, you know, I met this person, me, and I guess what was moving was she said, I have been waiting for someone like you to ask for years to ask me that question. And I said, well, it's my hope in the next four years or whatever, two years that I'm on this commission, that I can help get these pathways better, because they're not fun to use right now.

Yeah, thank you. Just to dialogue a little bit with that one, since it's a multi part point, you're absolutely right that there's a lot of work that needs to be done on the multitude of even the types of pathways throughout Alameda. Obviously, have the sidewalks. We've got the bike paths. We've got the roads themselves for all types of, you know, transportation.

And there's a lot of work being done. There's a lot of work that's in the planning stages to be done. A lot of these projects, if you dig through the website, you can find them on either transportation planning website or the public works website web pages, excuse me. And then when it comes to the Harbor Bay Pathway specifically, I would always encourage people that you're connecting with in the community, which I love that you're doing, to also submit those See Click Fix requests because a lot of Harbor Bay Pathway, it's an interesting and this can be translated to several little elements of Alameda where the majority of the path is ours, and it's actually the Park District, and they just went through and patch repaired a lot of things and did some patch smearing and things to try to stabilize the surfacing in order to just not at the point where they can do a full remove and replace. But then the other part of the pathway is East Bay Regional Parks District.

So it's actually not Alameda's jurisdiction. And so there's this funny little line in the park where all of a sudden it turns into East Bay Regional Parks. So when a C click fixes request is submitted, then that's often, you know, especially with photos or if they submit it in the moment, there's often a geographical marker that's pinged for that request. And so then we can see, oh, this is actually not our jurisdiction or this is or, you know, so that's another way that those things are really helpful for reporting those things. But, yes, there's a lot that can be improved.

Absolutely. So I appreciate you bringing that up. And and it maybe that would be an interesting agenda item. I can talk to public works director, my boss, Erin Smith, just to see who might be the best person to come before the commission to talk through some of those things that are in the works.

Yeah, and thanks to because I I didn't even realize that half part of that or a piece of it was East Bay Regional Parks, I never knew that. The other thing, I know that mayor is very big on getting people to get out on their bikes, which I agree also. When you take the little path that brings you over the harbor, the whatever that bridge is from Alameda or the Harbor Bay, that bike path that's a bridge, then you go left on Mount Trashmore, do the loop around Mount Trashmore, that is hideous at some point. When you then go over to the Harbor Bay Loop, Harbor Bay Parkway, that is terrible. And people drive like it is a freeway, and there is no bike path in either direction on that spot going along the golf course, which is the 10 mile loop that I was doing that day, that then I didn't want to go back that way, which is why I ended up on that, which I already know is a crappy Harbor Bay Park, that pathway, because that's also very bumpy.

But so then there's that too, just wondering how do we get bike paths designated onto major roads that, know, was part of the Alameda Parks and Ride things.

Thank you.

I agree with you completely. I just finished my most recent marathon and I did training. Yeah, I did it. Awesome. And my training was running around Alameda and including down in Farm. And even as a runner, unevenness caused a lot of near falls for me and it's very treacherous. I thank you for acknowledging that too, however you get through that. And the traffic safety and I would definitely encourage that. I think we need more lighted crosswalks. As I've been running, I've been almost hit by cars probably at least 15 times because People just blow through these crosswalks.

They don't stop, they don't look right or left, and I think having more lighted crosswalks would increase safety, especially for people with disabilities who might need extra time getting through a crosswalk, so.

Oh yeah, I could go on and on, but I won't, I'm, you know, as a bike rider, when you come to an intersection, especially on a low recumbent bike, there's a couple places that they now have these things that bike is approaching, that's great on the Clement bike track bike path there. That's wonderful. But in other places, I can't even reach the button to get the indicator to get a traffic light to let me cross. And I should just take notes everywhere I go and write down the intersection every time.

Put in C click fix too because then it'll get officially recorded.

Oh, okay. Yeah.

Have we ever had someone from East Bay Parks come and talk to the commission? I feel like

we have, but maybe it was a reference to it in a

It was a reference.

Yeah. And not somebody from I don't I feel like there was a joint presentation, but maybe it was just slides from that reference.

That that would be good too because I I was about to get that. I also wanna know I don't know. How you can get one of those logo

on a slide, but that's the limit of my memory. I don't know. But it would be good. I mean, it's such a prominent part of Yeah. Lameda. Mhmm.

It it that I would I would vote for that too because I also wanna know how you can get one of those accessible tarmacs or whatever it is on the beach so that people in with even rolling their things in their in their carts with their kids loaded with stuff. But people with wheelchairs can get beach access. The ramps

I'm wondering though

like come up. Like, jurisdictionally. Mhmm.

Like, we may not be able to ask East Bay Regional Parks much, but, like, if our parks department is the liaison mostly with East Bay Regional Parks. I don't know. I just feel like, you know, it's more likely that we'll get the Alameda Fire Department and the Alameda Building Department to come and talk to us. But, like

I asked our parks department, and I was told that that they are not in charge of Crown Beach Memorial Park. It is East Bay Regional Park's jurisdiction.

Yeah.

And so they'd be

the ones to initiate that kind of request.

I I I remember it coming up. There's an accessibility questionnaire or accessibility survey

Yes.

That that a lot of the community members brought up the issue with Crown Memorial and were asking for some kind of, like, a rolling you know, a retractable ramp or something. It came up, and when we were talking about the survey results, that's exactly what Yeah. They said is that this is East Bay Regional Parks, and I think all of that information was sent on, but I don't know that we ever got any feedback back about it. I do know that if you're a wheelchair user and you wanna access Crown Memorial, you can go if if it's during the hours when Crab Cove is open, they do have a wheelchair like a beach wheelchair that you can check out with, like, the big inflatable tires and stuff. I think you just, like, leave an ID or something, you can check it out for a couple hours.

So that is an option. I've never actually verified that it's physically there, but they're supposed to have that there.

At the what do call it

again? The Crab Cove visitor.

Crab Cove.

Yeah. Crab Cove. Potential there.

It's potentially there. The

wheelchair is Yeah, potentially it's supposed

to be.

They're supposed to have one there. Okay.

Yeah, we worked a lot with the families at the animal shelter. I found the East Bay Regional Park Association to be very responsive. And you know, mean, have a board, they're a community organization. I bet you if we reach out to them, I bet you they'd be more than willing to come and talk. Think they view Alameda as obviously a key partner for many reasons. And I'm happy if you want me to make a phone call to see my contacts over there and just see. Is that okay?

Yes, you could do that, or if you want to do email, then you could just CC me, however you'd want to connect with them. That'd be great, thank you.

Sure. Okay,

any, oh sorry, go ahead.

Sorry. Please. I'm just thinking, it's funny that they would have the beach wheelchair at Crown Crab Cove, because there's no beach access there, really. I mean, where you really need it is at the pavilion where, you know, which where I think they are doing some accessibility changes there, if I'm not mistaken, and that's where most people would access the water to swim.

Yeah, yeah.

So I'll go check it out.

Okay, any other commissioner communications? Okay, I'll just do, excuse me, my staff communications. I'll just kind of do rapid fire here. So, on November 19, which is a Wednesday, 9AM to 10:30AM, I'm going to host the first, website user testing session at Mastic Senior Center in the computer lab. And that will be, I've shared it in the newsletter, and it's also gone out, I believe, in Mastic Communications, and possibly, I think it's posted physically there on-site as well.

It's a free session open to the community. So kind of target audience are people with disabilities or impacted by disabilities, also seniors who use Mastic, so any or anybody who uses assistive tech to interact with online or computer systems. So this will be we'll just go through the city of Alameda website, basically. And I'll do prompts, and we'll time things, and see how navigable, intuitive, etcetera our website departments continue to make improvements in digital access. Coming up on 01/22/2026 is the point in time count, which is an annual localized, although nationwide, count for people who are experiencing unhoused, or unsheltered homelessness.

And so it takes place that morning from 5AM to 11AM, and it they're just requesting volunteers. I have a couple of flyers here if you'd like to grab one on your way out. So the housing and human services department here in the state of Alameda is coordinating volunteers from within our staff as well as community members who basically go out and everyone will be provided with supply kits. There's also homelessness donation drive as well that you can donate to, and you engage with whomever is, you know, whoever you find out and about in the community, and basically they answer some basic questions. You can kind of think of it as like a census for people who are experiencing homelessness, and then it's really helpful with data tracking statistics and things like that.

So point in time count, January 22. If you'd like to volunteer or donate to the drive or share the information with your networks, like I said, the flyers are here. Something that Oscar mentioned that I wanted to highlight is the accessible event checklist. That's something that he and I created together. So it's now become part of the special events permit package for the city of Alameda.

So anybody who is requesting a permit to host a temporary event here in the city, That's not part of the package. It's just a checklist that goes through multiple areas of accessibility, and ADA compliance, and it requires their responses to things like, will you provide, or how are you providing accessible restrooms, the concierge service that he mentioned, and if you answer no to any of these checklist items, please explain your plan, etcetera. So it'll be a great part of that permit enforcement for events. And then in addition to that, Alameda Recreation and Parks Department recently purchased a mobile or portable electric wheelchair lift or mobility aid lift that is to be used at stages for events. So if someone is hosting an event at a city site and they already have their permit, they can rent this wheelchair lift from ARPD.

If but they need to go through, like, a city site, not just anywhere. It's not open to anybody. But it'll just be a great additional amenity that's available for rent to make events more accessible. And I believe that's it. So thank you for all of your comments and possible agenda items. So our next meeting will be 01/14/2026. Nice year. Wow. I know. Happy holidays. And if there's nothing else, we'll go ahead and adjourn. If there's a motion to adjourn.

I have a question. So if I have thoughts and questions that come up between now and the next meeting.

Yes. So please email me, but I do want to touch base with you again to try to schedule get to know you meeting between you and Chair Mullins and I because that's where we'll go over like the Brown Act and some basic organizational things and logistical questions you might have just so you feel more comfortable with how things flow. Okay, alright thank you.

You did great though. Do you make a motion to end the meeting? Yeah,

how do I do that?

You don't have to, I don't mean to put you on the spot. You basically just say I move to

Oh, I'm I move to end the meeting. Anybody wanna second? I second it. Wonderful.

Okay. Meeting adjourned. Thank you, commissioners.

Thank you. Thank you.