Board of Education - Regular Meeting

Albany City Council meeting for March 2nd, 2026. Council member Lopez, would you please read the land acknowledgement? Thank you. The city of Albany recognizes that we occupy the land originally protected by the Confederated villages of Lean. We acknowledge the genocide that took place on these lands and must make strides to repay the moral debt that is owed to this indigenous people, specifically the Aloney tribe. We thank them for their contributions which have transformed our community and will continue to bring forth growth and unity. The city of Albany commit to sustaining ongoing relationship with the tribe and together build a better future for all that now make this their home.

Thank you. Before we before we begin this evening, I want to inform everyone that due to a staff member's health emergency item 8-1, the flock camera item is being pulled from tonight's agenda. We appreciate your interest and your engagement in on this topic and it will be rescheduled for a future meeting date which is yet to be determined. Thank you for understanding. May we have a roll call, please? Council member Jordan here. Council member Lopez here. Council member Mickey here. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero here. And Mayor McQuay here.

Thank you. We had no closed session. Ceremonial items 4-1 American Red Cross Month. Council member Mickey will read the proclamation. And we have Bana Taylor joining us via Zoom and she's coming on right about now. City of Albany proclamation in recognition of American Red Cross Month, March 2026. Whereas March is American Red Cross Month where we honor our neighbors who make its humanitarian mission possible in the city of Albany. Every day their acts of kindness change lives, bring relief, comfort, and hope when help can't wait. This compassionate spirit runs deep in our community just as it has for 145 years through the American Red Cross. And whereas volunteers, blood and platelet donors, and supporters light the way during emergency, whether it's delivering shelter, food, and comfort after disasters, providing a safe, life-saving blood supply for patients facing conditions like cancer treatments, child birth complications, and traumatic injuries, assisting military members, veterans, and their families with 247 global support. or empowering individuals with skills like first aid and CPR that saved lives. And whereas with 2,223 volunteers in Alama County, the American Red Cross assisted or responded to 141 disasters, assisting 286 families. And whereas through Sound the Alarm program, the American Red Cross installed 1,14 smoke alarms, making 300 homes safer. And where's Alama County residents donated 3,14 units of life-saving blood, hosted

1,165 blood drives, and trained 18,914 citizens in first aid, CPR, AED, and aquatics, provided 20, sorry, 323 case services to military members and their families, and provided humanitarian aid internationally. And whereas these collective efforts are a powerful reminder that the strength of our community lies in our shared commitment to one another. As we mark Red Cross Month, let's celebrate our local heroes and resolve to continue lifting each other up. So no one faces an emergencies alone. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the Albany City Council hereby recognizes March 2026 as Red Cross Month and encourages all community members to reach out and support its humanitarian mission. Signed, uh, Mayor Peggy Mcuade.

Thank you. And Miss Taylor, would you would you like to make say a few words?

Sure. U, my name is Briana Taylor. I'm a volunteer and a board member with the American Red Cross and it is a great honor to accept a special proclamation recognizing March as Red Cross Month. Now each March we celebrate the people that make our mission possible and that is our volunteers, our blood donors, our community partners and our supporters. These everyday heroes deliver comfort, care, and hope to individuals and families in some of the toughest days of their lives. On behalf of the American Red Cross, we want to thank you for this proclamation and for your continued support of the American Red Cross. We're also grateful for the partnership of your city staff and and local agencies as we work together to build safer, more resilient communities. Again, thank you for this honor and supporting our mission to prevent and alleviate human suffering in the face of emergencies. We really appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you for your kind words. Anyone on council wish to say anything? any member of the public. Okay, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Thank you. And that brings us to 4-2, Tibetan National Uprising Day. Council member Jordan will read the proclamation to be accepted by Tashi Kunjo. If you'd like to join him at the podium, that's fine.

Whereas on March 10th, 2026, Tibetans throughout the world will gather to commemorate the 67th anniversary Okay. Okay. Very good. Thank you. Um uh throughout the world we're gathered to commemorate the 67th anniversary of the Tibetan National Uprising against the brutal occupation of their country and to pay tribute to the more than 1 million Tibetans who lost their lives in their struggle for the freedom of Tibet. And whereas credible reports issued by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, the Congressional Executive Commission on China, the US Department of State, and United Nations human rights experts document, continuing repression in Tibet, including restrictions on religious freedom, suppression of cultural and linguistic expression, and instances of arbitrary detention and abuse. Whereas the United States Congress has enacted the Promoting a Resolution to the Tibet China Dispute Act, the Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act, and the Tibet Policy and Support Act, affirming support for human rights, religious freedom, dialogue, and the principle that the succession of the Daly Lama is a religious matter. And whereas his holiness the 14th Daly Lama, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and the Congressional Gold Medal, has consistently promoted non-violence, compassion, interfaith harmony, and the preservation of Tibetan culture. And whereas the principal commit commitments of his holiness the Daly Lama include promoting warm-heartedness, compassion, forgiveness, tolerance, commit contentment and self-discipline, fostering religious harmony and mutual understanding among the world's major

faith traditions, preserving Tibet's rich cultural heritage, and advancing the study of ancient Indian knowledge concerning the understanding and training of the mind. And whereas the city of Albany is home to a vibrant Tibetan American community and stands in solidarity with the Tibetan people and their peaceful and non-violent pursuit of human rights and cultural preservation. Now therefore, be it proclaimed proclaimed that the Albany City Council hereby recognizes March 10th, 2026 as Tibetan National Uprising Day in the city of Albany. Signed, Mayor Peggy Mcuade. Uh, good evening, Mayor Peggy and the honorable council members and the city of Albany. So, my name is Tasha Kunjo and I'm the president of the Tibetan Association of Northern California. We're based in Richmond and uh it's been over almost 34 years of our community's existence here in the Bay Area and at this point of time we have about 220 275 Tibetan kids every Sunday. We have a community uh school there at our community center with about 25 uh teachers uh teaching Tibetan language and culture. And our program actually is open not only just for the Tibetans it's open to everyone you know like uh so we have a kind of a a vibrant cohesive kind of a community here at the Bay Area and the key responsibilities of all the Tibetans in exile actually is to you know like preserve our culture and then also you know like fight for

our country. uh that as many of you know that since 1959 Tibet was illegally occupied by the communist uh China and the Dalai Lama he was 23 then he had to flee Tibet and uh escaped to India and since uh 1959 even to this day he's he's today uh 90 and for the last 67 years he's been living as a refugee in India while uh traveling all over the world earlier, you know, like he's now pretty old. He's 90, as I said, trying to promote uh you know, like uh uh human rights uh uh warm-heartedness and religious harmony and all this stuff. So for that, he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. So uh let me be very brief, you know, like I just have a kind of a prepared statement for the city of uh uh Albany. Uh so on behalf of the Tibetan community uh I extend a heartfelt gratitude uh to the mayor and the council members and the city of Albany for this meaningful uh proclamation. uh your kind of a recognition of this important day uh is not only uh a kind of a gesture of solidarity but uh a strong uh uh affirmation of justice uh of human rights and of the uh enduring spirit of the Tibetan people. I mean uh the important day that is the 10th March which is the Tibetan National Uprising Day. uh as we mark that we try to remember the Tibetans you know like who kind of fought for our country who lost

their lives as uh the resolution earlier said that we lost about 1.2 2 million Tibetans uh since the Chinese occupation and then uh over 6,000 monasteries have been raised to the ground and as I speak we have more than 1 million Tibetan children who are currently in residential school in China. uh they are forcibly uh kind of towards Chinese and uh trying to the the basic uh aim of the Chinese the communist regime is to eradicate the Tibetan culture. So kids as young as four years of age are forcibly taken from their parents and put in residential schools. And at this point of time, as I said earlier, we have over 1 million Tibetan kids who are separated from their parents in residential schools in China where they are only taught Chinese and their culture. So and then you know like since uh 2009 to 2023 we had over 157 people who burnt themselves to death basically with two objectives you know like two asks which is one is for human rights in Tibet and the other one is for the return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet and at this point of time you know like uh this resolution is a big actually uh boost moral booster not only for us here in America but for Tibetans all over the world and you know we have over 7 million Tibetans in Tibet at this point of time where the basic human rights are deprived they are really undergoing a lot of hardship at this point of time and then they look to Dalai Lama and to the Tibetans in exile and to our friends like you for their support so that his holiness can one day return to Tibet you

know like it's been 67 years for him being separated from his people and they've been waiting every day every single day you know like for his return back to Tibet and at this point of time they cannot even have a photo of the Dalai Lama at home you know once you talk about Tibetan freedom you are be behind bars to have the photo of the portrait of the Dalai Lama you are behind bars so this is the uh current situation Tibet so I really am very grateful to the city uh uh uh council members for this support and for this proclamation. This is a boral booster to say that we are not alone that the city is with us and then thank you so much for standing on the right side of the history. Thank you for supporting you know like human rights uh in Tibet and thank you so much for this uh proclamation mayor. Thank you so much. Yeah. And with this uh this is uh a traditional kind of a Tibetan scarf. The white scarf uh uh indicates uh goodwill, purity and auspiciousness. So this is our tradition. We offer this to uh our council members. And uh then also we have an uh a latest book by his holiness. Uh unfortunately I don't have all the books autographed. I just have one book autographed. The others are the same. But uh this is the latest book by his holiness that came out last year and it was a bestseller. uh and I would recommend our uh audience here also to get that book to get you the uh the latest information on Tibet and what the current status is right now. It's called the voice for the voiceless. It's available uh uh you know on Amazon and all this stuff. So I really highly recommend my audience here to read that book. Yeah.

Sh. Sorry. This is this is heare. And these are board members just

Thank you so much. Thank you.

And that brings us to 4-3, Women's History Month, International Women's Day. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero will read the proclamation.

Do we have anybody here? We have we have lots here, but just go ahead and read it. We'll we'll pass it off to staff later.

Gotcha. um in recognition of Women's History Month and International Women's Day, March 2026. Whereas March was designated as Women's History Month in 1987 by Congress Congressional Resolution. And whereas American women of every race, class, and ethnic background have made significant contributions to the growth and strength of our nation in countless recorded and unrecorded ways. And whereas women have played and continue to play critical roles in every aspect of American life, including the economy, culture, and society, contributing to the workforce, both inside and outside of the home. And whereas American women were essential in the founding of many charitable philanthropic I can't talk tonight, sorry about that. and cultural institutions and have long been the primary volunteer labor force in our nation. And whereas throughout history, women have been in at the forefront of the fight for equal rights as abolitionists, suffragists, civil right leaders, labor activists, and peace and anti-war advocates. And whereas American women serve our country courageously in the military and law enforcement. And whereas American women serve as role models and leaders in the field of sports athletics, including Ocean View Elementary School graduate and Olympic gold medalist Alyssa Louu. And whereas women have opened the doors of opportunity for future generations to become leaders in all fields, including professional, political, and community service. And whereas women continue to lead efforts advocating for reproductive rights, racial and human rights, justice, and LGBTQ I plus equality. And whereas the city of

Albany recognizes all trans transgender women in our community and throughout the world and acknowledge they face systemic barriers to freedom and equality. We pledge to work towards eliminating violence and discrimination based on gender identity. And whereas women in Albany played a prominent role in our history protesting Berkeley's garbage dumping which led to the incorporation of the city of Ocean View in 1908. And whereas women have held countless professional, volunteer, and elected leadership roles in both the city of Albany and the Albany Unified School District, providing immeasurable hours of service. And whereas women own and hold management roles in many independent businesses in Albany, increasing the vitality and commerce in our community while bringing unique perspectives, fostering innovation, and creating jobs. And whereas seven of the 14 cities in Alama County, including Albany, currently have women mayors. And whereas we take this opportunity to recognize and honor the women who currently serve in leadership roles in our city government as department heads, including city manager Nicole Almare, assistant city manager Isabelle Leuk, city clerk Anne Sue, finance director Raina Schwarz, community development director Dena Tini, human resource director Penny Ha, and city attorney Mala Subra. could mess it up anyway. Subramanion. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the Albany City Council hereby recognizes March 2026 as Women's History Month and Sunday, March 8th, 2026 as International Women's Day in the city of Albany.

Thank you. I did the best I could. Sorry. And that brings us to the city manager's report.

Thank you, mayor. I have a brief report. Understanding your agenda is fairly hefty tonight. Uh please note that the summer activity guide is now available in city facilities and also online. This guides our community through the opportunities through the summer uh for recreation both camps, clubs, and special events. So, please take an opportunity to look at that with a lot new programming involved. Also, outdoor pickle ball open play is a new opportunity for our community. This will take place at Ocean View Park on Tuesdays from 4 to 6:00 p.m. uh starting tomorrow, in fact. And this is an opportunity to just get out and have some fun at pickle ball without too much competition. So, please enjoy that opportunity. Kids and family expo was this Saturday uh for those that were able to attend. It was a great event. We had over 300 kids and families join for this event and it was a buy one get one halfp price offer for our uh club programming over the summer for children and appreciation to all of our recreation and community services staff are working on a Saturday to make this event so accessible to our community. Also a reminder that we have the city satisfaction survey ongoing. This is really to get a pulse and feedback from our community on what's working, what isn't working, and how we can do better. So, please take an opportunity to look at that and give your feedback. albca.gov city survey 2026. We're tracking our progress over the years. We did the same thing last year and look to expand on that feedback. And please save the date for Albany Safety Expo, which will feature both of our public safety departments, which I am very excited to share uh both police

and fire as well as recreation and community services who work uh in concert together really. And this will be on May 2nd from 10 to noon at the community center. a chance to get to know your public safety officers and also understand a little bit more about disaster preparedness and how we work together in the event of a disaster or emergency. Also, finally, Albany Reads is March 1st through May 31st. This is a Albany library program and the book will be The Poet and the Silk Girl, a memoir of love, imprisonment, and protest by Albany resident and author. So, there is also a banner up at the library and community center regarding that opportunity as well. And that completes my report. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Are there any council questions, comments? Go ahead. Yeah, quick comment on the uh kids and family expo. Um chief of staff had me uh take him out there. Just want to say it was greatly greatly run. Really appreciate it. And I also learned that if there's ever a fire, I should never depend on the three-year-old to help put it out. Um his timing was horrible.

Good to know. Are there any online comments? Okay, that brings us to good of the city public comment. This is a time for persons desiring to address the city council on an item that is not on the agenda. Please note, city policy limit limits each speaker to up to three minutes. Mayor may reduce the time depending upon the number of speakers. The Brown Act limits the council's ability to take and or discuss items that are not on the agenda. Therefore, such items may be referred to staff for comment or to a future agenda. Comments related to items appearing on the agenda are taken up at the time the city council deliberates each action item. Mayor will announce when that period is open on each agenda item.

Mayor, apologies. Um just in case we had anyone who joined u late uh you remind people that item that was removed. Right. Thank you. Um, we have due to us a staff member's health emergency, we have pulled item 8-1 from the agenda tonight and we'll reschedule for a future date. Okay. So, now good of the city, do we have some speakers?

Yes, I'll call three at a time. Um, even Alpert, Celeste, Marks, Don Always good to go first. Good evening. I'm Dr. Steven Alpert. Council members know I'm here to ask the city to justify why it follows only the minimum state mandate notifying those within 300 ft of proposed new construction by post college meal but 10 days before first planning and zoning hearing. Moreover, Albany does not require posting signs at the project site detailing the proposed structures. As documented, other California cities have increased public notice to 500 and or,000 ft or with alerts mailed 15 days before first hearing. Here it comes, my favorite. Alerting only those within 300 ft allows the planning and zoning commission to propose and the council then pushed through new projects, no matter how inappropriate, with minimal awareness and input from the community. Such was the case for the uninspired oversized five-story mixed commercial residential modern box proposed for 1600 Solano which if built will drastically alter the small-scale treeline character of Solano Avenue. Only 73 properties were alerted before the first planning and zoning commission study session held in January 2022. Why do my wife and I assert that 1600 Solano is inappropriate? While there may be some debate on whether the building itself is inappropriate and many Albany residents support this contingent as it violates every aspect of Alby's planning and joining mission statement shown here. But tonight we'll focus on the process for which 1600 Solano was approved which most definitely was inappropriate. How so? State law 330 allow 330 allows for up to five city council meet five city meetings to consider a project and the first

planning zoning study session doesn't count video of the second PNZ commission meeting on April 27th 2022 reveals 22 citizens expressing legitimate aesthetic and safety concerns regarding the project and only four in favor including the applicant and the architect. Video reviews about the initial study session and the subsequent April meeting revealed that far more discussion was on bicycle safety than the building's exterior. During the April 27 public comment, three attorneys, including former mayor Chisty, questioned the city's application of densely bonus on the ground for the ground for the ground floor medical offices and whether Solano Avenue qualified as a transit corridor. Nonetheless, the PNZ commission forwarded the project to the city council. During the single June 1st council meeting devoted to 600 Solano, 43 individuals expressed legitimate concerns about the project. And then Vice Mayor Tedman noted, quote, "The intensive feelings expressed in many forwarded emails." Mayor Mcuade, then a council member, voiced opposition, calling the project disappointing nerd continued work to make it quote more appropriate for its location. Despite overwhelming opposition and multiple calls for continuance, then Mayor Jordan called for immediate approval of the project as submitted. Note that council members Mickey Lopez and Hansen Romero were not serving in 2022.

Thank you for your call. Celeste will continue.

Good evening. I am Dr. Celeste Marks. as documented. Despite overwhelming opposition, questions regarding the legality of the city's application of density bonus and calls for continuence. Both the planning and zoning commission and the council pushed through this highly controversial project during single sessions. The video of the June 1st council meeting documents numerous individuals concerned about increased traffic density and congestion at the dangerous Tacoma Orway Salano intersection and the risk of injuries due to the lack of drop off area for children attending the applicant's ground floor orthodontist practice. Incredibly, the former community deme development director Bond offered that in his opinion there would be no effect on traffic congestion, but there's no factual reason for this because no traffic study was ever conducted. The meeting valley videos clearly show the planning and zoning commission, community development staff, and the council outright ignored or downplayed the community's legitimate concerns about 1600 Solano. Council Councilman Jordan, then serving as mayor, wrote that he felt compelled to vote in February of the project because he feared a lawsuit from the applicant. Perhaps a lawsuit might have happened, but we will never know because the council uh approved the project in a single meeting. Alman residents appear to have registered their displeasure at a city officials who disregard their concerns. There is no legal reason preventing Albany from expanding public notification for new construction and the council has run out of reasons why it refuses to address the issue. If the council genuinely believes that alerting

only those within 300 feet of all new construction just 10 days before a first hearing is appropriate, then defend this practice. submit 300 foot notification as a meeting agenda item to allow for extended indepth public discussion. Lastly, while the density bonus may allow for five-story structures on Solanado Avenue, we and many others remain opposed to the ilconry design of 1600 Solanto, which is utterly inappropriate for the salt and appalled by the manner in which this project was railroaded through. Thank you for this opportunity to address the council.

Thank you for your comments. We do not Don, hold on just one second. I'm sorry. We do not applaud or boo or make any reaction during public comment. We want everyone to feel welcome and able to speak their their mind. Thank you. Go ahead, Don.

Hi, I'm Don Cowamoto. I'm an Albany resident and I would just like to reiterate what Steve had said. All would ask for is that the council look at putting this on the agenda item to have it as a discussion to possibly look at expanding the 300 foot notification. You know, maybe looking at this the size of the project, you know, every square foot you add another 100 ft of notification or some metric. The bigger the project, the the larger the expanded notification should be versus keeping it at a set level. That's all. Thanks. Thank you for your comments.

Nasser, Peter Campbell, and Brian Martin.

Good evening. Have funds been found to help property owners for the softstory retrofit program. Would you consider delaying implementation until they are the financial burden, especially for someone who bought property recently and is looking to refinance a loan that's coming due at a 3 to 4% increase in interest rate, which would be overwhelming. Add to that triple insurance, triple waste management bills, 30 to 40% increase in PG&E and water. It's simply too great a financial burden to absorb when the cost for retrofit will not be recovered in either higher rents or property value. Please help property owners with this predicament and undue hardship. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for your comments. I am I'm Peter Campbell, Albany resident. I just wanted to comment on the city manager's comments about the um Albany Reeds program. I attended a program yesterday at this community center. An outstanding presentation by Dr. Ena and the struggles of her family uh during the Second World War uh when she and her family were relocated to a what they called a relocation camp but was really a concentration camp. Uh the the presentation was outstanding and I encourage everybody to attend the future and upcoming programs. There's going to be a program tomorrow. um documentaries are being shown and everything and it's just an outstanding program that everybody should uh attend. It's really an eyeopening um situation that occurred then and we're on the verge of having the same thing happen now. So I just wanted to comment on that.

Thank you. Hi, my name is Brian Martin, Albany resident. I wanted to um follow up with something from the last meeting from good of the city where uh it was uh noted that I noted that a number of city meetings have been cancelled and the response was particularly planning and zoning and the housing advisory. I don't know all the the backstory behind the housing advisory. It sounds like there's a lot going on there and why it's not meeting, but um I do urge the city to um schedule those as as soon as possible and and get that together. Um it was mentioned at the last uh good of the city from the city manager that well sometimes there aren't many things for planning and zoning to approve of building plans and things like that and some things are more over the counter. That is that is true. But there's also things before the planning and zoning committee that um have to do with zoning and things like that that are part of the housing element which uh they could be chewing on sooner than later. Um between addressing R1 zoning and zoning on Albany Hill through Measure K. Um those are all things that uh those commissions could be meeting. Um, and as someone that lives near the bowling alley project that was approved with 207 um, homes, uh, I was glad to see the city did approve the project at 1600 Solano uh, to make sure that the, um, equity component of the housing element is met where not all of the dense housing is put in one neighborhood. And so, uh, I do want to see, um, more of that addressed with those committees and commissions and, um, encourage the city to look at the, um, what they can be doing to help with the housing element.

Thank you. Thank you for your comments.

Uh, good evening, city council mayor. This is Nick Peterson. and I'm a member of the Alony Climate Action Coalition and I want to following on the previous speaker's um comments, the climate action committee meeting from last or I guess last month was cancelled and the reason I was told was that there were no sub substantial items to be discussed. I'd like to remind the city that at the end of 2024, he passed a climate emergency um declaration that says addressing Albany's contributions to climate change are a number one priority. So, it's a little uh contradictory to say the number one priority. There's nothing substantial discussed. There's many things that could be discussed and brought up and put forward so the city can be advised. The climate action committee is the primary advisor of the city council on climate action. So just stating that well uh we didn't have anything to talk about. Uh that that's really disappointing and I I urge the council members to talk to their representatives on the committee and find out why they're not meeting more regularly and why a meeting would have been cancelled because not enough was there to discuss. Um again I I I find this shocking. The other thing I wanted to say was thank you for the coffee with the cops last Wednesday. I was able to attend and was glad to meet with Greg Galliano, our new police chief, and talked to him a bit about the interest in uh climate action, our climate action and adaptation plan, and how every department in the city is to look at ways to reduce emissions and encouraged him to and queried him about

whether he was supportive of looking into ways to diminish the emissions coming from police vehicles. talked a lot about new technologies and whether they're applicable. I think that's fine. But if we can have almost $300,000 for tasers and license plate cameras, I don't see we we can't spend, you know, $3,000 extra dollars to make sure we have an electric parking enforcement vehicle rather than a gas powered one. So again, I'm a little concerned um that certain leaders in the city aren't correctly attuned to the urgency of climate action and the need for the city to be a leader as in do things in demonstration of to the to other cities and to our residents that we're serious about addressing the key cause of climate change, which is carbon emissions. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comments. Hello. Um, my name is Jean Woo. I've spoken to the Alb City Council before. I'm an Albany resident and also a member of the ACAC. And I am and still have been very concerned that we have not made any progress on a um a resilience hub in Albany. The city of Albany has u many different neighborhoods and there actually could be more than one resilience hub but um definitely this being the month of the American Red Cross. The American Red Cross has actually said that of the two possible sites in Albany that could be resilience hubs, the number one site is the Albany Community Center. The Albany Community Center, as we saw last Saturday, is a vibrant place. Many people come there frequently. There are a lot of activities. people are comfortable

coming there and would be an excellent site to have um the installed power including solar and a um adequate battery to maintain at least three days of power to be able to recharge things to have a heating and cooling center to haveformational sites and maybe mental health uh counseling as well as uh providing food and clean water um for Alb residents as we are well aware we are within one mile of one of the largest faults in the United States. So, um, just kind of pointing out that we need this to be on the city council agenda and on the CAC agenda. And also, it would actually be a very big step forward if we could find or you could find a way to fund an actual s a sustainability director so that within uh internal meetings and planning at the state of Albany, sustainability continues to be top of mind. Um, thank you very much for all of your hard work and we really appreciate the activities that are available in Albany. We'd like to see a resilience hub as well. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. My name is Briana and I am a student at Albany High School as well as a peer educator with a tupi tobacco use prevention education program also known as TUPI. As a peer educator, I work directly with other students to talk honestly about the harms of tobacco and nicotine use and to help prevent addiction before it starts. But with no guaranteed funding from our TUPE program next year, it's becoming harder for us to continue doing this important work. Programs like Tupi don't just educate students, they protect our health, our futures, and our community as a whole. That's why it's more it's more important than ever to stop tobacco sales in our community. While we will continue to do our part by educating youth about the dangers of tobacco, education alone isn't enough when these products are still so easily accessible. We ask we ask that you do everything you can do to prevent the tobacco industry from continuing to profit off the health of young people and families in Albany. Your decision has a real impact on students like me and on the next generation growing up in the city. Supporting prevention efforts and limiting tobacco sales is an investment in a long-term community health, not just for today, but for years to come. Thank you for taking the time to listen and for considering the health and wellbeing of our community. We look forward to hearing about the progress the city has made on this issue. Thank you for your comments. Elaine

Lane, are you there? You have any comments, please email to city council atal albonyca.gov. Thank you. Thank you very much. Um staff, do you have any responses?

No, mayor. That brings us to consent calendar. Consent calendar items are considered to be routined by the city council and will be enacted by by one motion. By approval of the consent calendar, the staff recommendations will be adopted unless otherwise modified by the city council. There will be no separate discussion on these items unless a council member or a member of the audience requests removal of the items from the consent calendar. Any council member wish to pull an item? Seeing none, is there any member of the public wishing to pull an item? Anyone online? Nope. I will move approval of the consent calendar. Second.

Thank you. May we have a roll call, please?

Council member Mickey. Yes. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero. Yes. Mayor McQuay. Yes. Council member Jordan. Yes. Council member Lopez. Yep. And the motion carries.

Thank you. That brings us to um item eight, presentation. As we've said earlier that this item has been pulled from the agenda due to a staff health emergency and will be rescheduled for a future meeting date. That brings us to item 10-1, revenue measures, street tree and street light funding. May we have a staff report, please? Good evening, city council um and members of the public. I'm D'vorah Zotterer, program manager in public works, returning to you with an update on our efforts to fund improvements in our street tree and street lighting programs. With me also um on uh remotely are our finance director, Raina Schwarz, and here our public works director and city engineer, Mark Hurley. Continuing as well as our consultant, who I'll introduce in a moment. Uh, continuing on from our conversation with the council in November, staff has been working with the city's financial consultant, NBS, to develop a special tax measure for the upcoming November election. I'd like to introduce Amanda Welker with NBS who will walk us through the background of the proposed funding measure as well as the various scenarios for revenue targets. Uh, one note is that tonight's discussion is focused on establishing revenue targets that we can incorporate into rates and going as well as going over the proposed tax methodology, which is largely modeled after the sidewalk

tax passed by Albany voters in 2024. Staff will incorporate the council's direction from tonight and return likely in June for the next steps of the ballot measure process. Take it away, Amanda. Thank you.

Thank you so much for the introduction and good evening, mayor and council members and city staff and public. Um, as D'vorah said, my name is Amanda Welker. I'm representing NBS as a city special tax consultant, and we've been working on the parcel tax modeling, which D'Vorah just alluded to. Um, so we'd like to share some highlevel details with you this evening. Um and we'd ultimately like to seek council's direction on moving the um parcel tax forward. Thank you. So we'd like to start out by talking about our streetlighting revenue need. Um currently the street lighting evaluation that was completed in February 2024. um brought some recommend recommended actions to increase safety, reassure pedestrians have sufficient visibility, encourage walking and biking, protect human environmental health, and enhance Albany's character. So that need um translates uh financially into a 1.3 million um CIP project that will be used for relamping the city's existing street lights and also um retrofitting doing other um recommended replacements that were part of that evaluation. and the annual cost will be approximately $185,000 which will serve to repay that loan um in debt service. The additional need is for street tree uh maintenance um and currently that need is estimated at 600,000. Um the street tree management plan was created in early 2025 and it includes additional needs um of grid pruning and regular inspections, a GIS inventory management system, increased systematic planting and young tree maintenance as well as some other service enhancements.

Um this um these maintenance activities also align with the city's 2035 general plan and the climate action and adaptation plan. So, what we are proposing to achieve these revenue targets is a citywide parcel tax. Um, just if you're unfamiliar with what a parcel tax is, um, it's a measure that will be brought to voters at the November election and would need to be approved by twothirds majority vote. So, just over 66.67%. um the um parcels throughout the city would be subject to the special tax except for those that don't receive a property tax bill. Typically those are public parcels that are exempt from um property taxation. Um the provision is um similar to our sidewalk tax, the provision for lowincome discounts um and for very low income exceptions. So based on HUD guidelines that are updated annually, we will um collect applications um similarly like I said to the sidewalk tax. Um and then also we do have um based on our methodology which I'll go into on the next slide but we do have a cap of lot acreage which would be the basis of the meth methodology and that would be capped at 500,000 square feet or 11 12 acre parcels would be the highest amount that we would charge um per per parcel. So through our modeling, we've come up with three different um cases or scenarios here based on our revenue target. So um scenario one um we've identified kind of calling it our base case. This would get us to about $45,000 in revenue um per year and that will fund street lighting the street lighting CIP's annual loan repayment um of

approximately 185,000 plus the street tree optimal service in the difference between the current and optimal service levels. So those additional service levels that we would be adding um just the difference between what we're currently doing and that higher amount. Um scenario one would provide sufficient funding to address the short-term increase in service levels and would be a conservative option um should there be concerns regarding voter support of that tax measure. Um the standalone or um scenario two um would cover street lighting loan repayment and then the full street tree budget up to that um optimal service level. um that standalone scenario and also scenario three. Um they would provide for a standalone revenue source for the street tree maintenance program and the reallocation of parks and open space resources to potential growth in other programs and would have more resilience to increasing costs of service. Um and then scenario three, we've just added a little bit extra there for ongoing reserves um for ongoing needs that we may have um specific to um the street lighting. And now what we've done in terms of the modeling um we've based um our methodology very similarly to that sidewalk parcel tax where we've taken the lot um square footage of each each parcel and we've determined how many square feet we have citywide and then we took out some things like that cap of the 500,000 square feet. Um so any parcels that were in excess of that we stopped at 500,000 square feet. Um, we also remove the parcels that are exempt and then we calculated to see how much we would need per square foot to get to our revenue targets. So the low range would be about almost 2 cents per square foot and then the higher range would be

almost four cents per square foot. Um, we have some average annual costs um, listed here for residential and this is based on scenario two. So, this is our kind of our sweet spot if we can get everything taken care of that we're looking for. Um, single family parcels would be in the ballpark of $150 per parcel. Again, this is completely dependent on that average lot square footage. Um, so larger parcels would have a little bit more, smaller parcels would be less. Um, condo parcels on average were $40 and then multifamily parcels were $185. again just based on lot square footage averages and then the annual cost per parcel based on that average lot square footage. Um this one was a little bit tricky because we do have some very large commercial parcels and they kind of skewed the average so we just went ahead and to make it a little bit more simple. 80% of our commercial parcels would be less than $200 a year and then just a very small number would be higher than that again depending on how large the parcel is. So our next steps are listed here for you. Basically um again this evening we just like confirmation that we are on the right track with that methodology and um that you might be comfortable with scenario one, two or three. We're hoping um to get all the revenue that we need to complete these programs annually. Um, and then we would move on to finalizing our rate modeling, getting that final exact dollar amount um, per or I should say cents per square foot. Um, and then we would prepare a memo just outlining that. We would bring that back to council with a resolution that we would then get approved to take to the county and put that measure forth on the um, ballot in November. If that ballot um is successful and passes um

then we would be able to place that special tax on the tax bill in the following year which would be um 2027 in June 2027. And that's the end of our presentation. So we'd be happy to take any questions that you might have. Are there questions from council? Member Jordan.

Thank you for the presentation and the analysis. um staff and consultant. I may be mistaken, but I I don't think I don't recall seeing in the the staff report a recommendation um that what is staff's preference that regard. So uh we I I believe this came up we discussed this at one of the previous meetings the their recommendation and the recommendation from our city's attorneys city attorney's offices for putting in place indefinite programming having a uh funding source in perpetuity would be the best move. So on the the um lighting side since it includes a capital renewal project that if I'm understanding correctly the intent is to finance the project to occur in a shorter time and pay back that financing over 10 years. What is the vision for spending this revenue after 10 years?

Thank you. That's a great question. Uh so yes indeed the 10-year time horizon would be paying back the initial um renewal project. Uh we will have lighting this. We have further recommendations for projects that are in the evaluation that we would like to um move towards implementing. And with our current active transportation plan in uh in review and de development, there will uh be lighting elements and recommendations that come out of that as well to translate into capital improvement projects. Um and of course as you know time moves on we will have other scopes of renew capital renewal to do throughout the city that are similar to the capital improvement project that's recommended um currently. So the idea is that it would be a uh funding source for that would um support this ongoing core service um uh in perpetuity.

Um theoretically would it Would it be possible to um is there are locations where new street lights were recommended by the street lighting evaluation study? Um would it be possible to move some of those forward so they're not in year 11 and extend the financing or I'm just concerned if it's only reling existing lighting. Um I don't know what the state of lighting is. I know there has been some reamping that has been done for those that have burned out. And so I'm just thinking as a voter like okay am I just getting maintenance out of this? What what am I getting? You know I want I'm I hear a lot of concern about dark areas of the city and so

this wouldn't be making progress on that if I'm understanding for 11 years.

Sure. So what we've done is modeled this off the reamping. Um yes there are recommendations for additional um you know lighting throughout the city in different areas. We don't have really good costs of what that would be. So, it's hard to build that in, but I my sense is um well, we have we have built some of this into um capital projects. So, this this works in conjunction with our capital funding. An example on the Marin project, we've added um lighting at a number of intersections. So, I think this isn't a zero- sum game. I think it works in conjunction with other other capital financing or pro funding that we have. Um there might be opportunities as well depending on where the numbers come in to um use this funding as well.

So we're keeping it flexible. Thank you. Um and was there consideration of separating out the reamping project as a as a bond measure instead of a financing it through a pay as you go indefinite measure. Um I we really focused on the the the fin the let me understand your question. Okay. Sure. So what I'm typically on a on a project that's a this is kind of a capital renewal project. Um if that's going to be financed my history which is you know I'm not an expert. Those are typically done through a bond measure

rather than through a parcel tax measure. Now obviously a bond measure comes from ad valorum. Yeah. The property taxes but nonetheless it's a bond measure. So we didn't look at bonds specifically. One of the thoughts too is you know thinking about how we did the last reling where we got a loan for I think it was 10 10 years or plus or minus and now we're at the point where we're just paying that off and we need to reamp. So some of the thoughts are that there are going to be capital renewal needs maybe not in the first five years but as things go. Um, so, um, we were thinking more of a long-term, um, reinvestment into our lighting system. So, we keep it up at a certain, uh, level of service.

If I can add to that, one, um, benefit of our, uh, third scenario is to add a small but um, but potential amount of revenue that would we would be able to build into a reserve. So that in the future for these types of projects, we may not have to lean on financing or may not have to lean on as much financing to be able to uh give us more of a um um a little bit more resilience in being able to address needs more imminently without having to go through the financing process.

Thank you. Um thank you. And uh by the way, this is Mark Hurley, our public forks director. He jumped right in. Thank you, Mark. Um, I think I just heard you say that that we're just paying off the financing for the revamping in 20 2008. I think it was in 2008 or might not was the PG& it was I believe 2011 because I believe it was a 15-year term. Nicole might know better than I would. Okay. Okay. Yeah. I think she was environmental sustainability right at the time. Yeah.

Yes. Um but yes, we're we're at the the period I mean this this sort of time um horizon is sort of typical for and especially as technology develops we see um different lifespans for this sort of thing. So it makes sense to have uh funding in place to support this um the cyclical larger than normal maintenance um but in line with our other many of our other capital programs which invest annually into uh into capital renewal and rehabilitation. Yeah, thank you. I didn't realize the financing on that was 15 years and

it's just getting paid off. Um seems like forever ago. Um on the the street trees, just to confirm my recollection, the the intention is if this goes forward then to change the city's ordinance so that street tree maintenance is now fully back with the city. Yeah, that was discussed in detail in the last meeting where you know this would go this funding measure would go hand inand with an update to the ordinance where it would be uh the city would take on that responsibility more fully. I can add that we're um embarking on that process and the next time we come back we are hoping to have a draft ordinance um to be the full package with the completed tax methodology and memo. Great. Thank you.

Working on that with the city attorney's office. Thanks, city attorney. Those are my questions. Thank you, mayor. Anything, Jennifer? Any council questions over here?

I have I have a couple of questions. Um, when you were talking about the application for low income and and whatever, we I talked about this a little bit the other day with somebody is can we even now start thinking about having one application for all tax measures that we can so people aren't filling out different applications for basically the same thing? You don't need to answer that right now, but let's just kind of consider that. Um, and are is it a is it one pot of money that is going to go for both trees and lighting or is there a real division where trees get x amount of dollars and lights get x amount of dollars or is it a little bit funible? So the intent behind um the building of the revenue targets is to establish a um uh a general picture of what our annual need is and then we would establish the use of those funds through the budget process in our bannual budget for maintenance and in our capital budget for for projects.

Okay,

it's not a hard line, it's a budget line. We want to make sure that as costs change we are able to adapt but we again we'd be formalizing that as we see what conditions are. Thank you. There any online questions there? Oh I should have done in in-house first. I'm sorry. Let me start again. I'm new at this. Um are there are there any public comments? Franchesco, come on up. Hi. Um, could you pull up the slide that has to do with who pays and who doesn't or how you come up with the who the single family homes have a who where the taxes are? There's a slide in there that designates. Can you bring it up first? Okay.

Yeah, she's go ahead and ask your question first. Okay. So, well, I want to know I mean it was just a quick slide. One important question is who doesn't have to pay? You just said, "Well, there's some that are exempt." And then I want to know who the big payers are. For instance, it would be really helpful if instead of saying 500,000 acre square feet, you said, "Well, Safeway is a lot that would pay X amount. Target would pay X amount."

And most specifically, I'd really like to know whether and spec that the I guess the university village doesn't pay anything. and if the where the residences are. But I would like to know very specifically if the se Belmont uh living the senior living center there is going to be paying anything and if the sprouts complex is going to be paying anything because are they exempt? I can answer a couple of your questions, but without looking at all the individual parcel data, I can't give you all of the information. But I can tell you generally that public parcels, so those owned by a public agency, are typically exempt from taxes. They don't receive a property tax bill. Sometimes they can still be subject to special assessments, but this is not one of those. So, they would be exempt from parcel taxes. Um, I can tell you some of the top payers based on the square footage. Again, this it's all the same rate for everybody. It just depends on how big the parcel is.

Some of the top ones, I don't know if this will this name will ring a bell to you, but owner would be GG LH LLC with four properties. Um, Golden Gate Hill Development Company, Target. Um, yes. So, so some private companies that have the larger probably commercial lots are the ones that are going to be the top. that that rate be? Um, so we have the the highest rate based on that 500,000 square feet is going to be uh again this is based on our scenario too, roughly $17,000 per year.

Okay. And so and so I was on the financial advisory committee before it was disbanded and we were trying to make an effort to find out what is the university paying from Belmont Village and um the sprouts soap that whole complex it's a commercial

maybe I can help respond to this uh stamp with our newer parcel taxes standard proc procedure by council policy is that we do the um possessor interest. So those parcels would be applicable and responsible for payment as well that is in our newer parcel taxes. So they would be included. Okay. And Franchesco, I'm going to jump in here for just a minute. The clock isn't running. Can you start the clock? Well, he already had Oh, he's already done. Okay. And also I want to remind people it's not a discussion time. Okay. And just one other question. I live on 800 block of Key Route and or I'd like to understand how it works.

The lighting there is ridiculous. I mean, they have street lights in which there's this little dot that doesn't do anything. And then half block down there's something that shines. And I inquired about this a couple of years ago and I thought they they I was told it was going to be replaced. So, what standards do you use for lighting so that we could expect a change as homeowners and we'll be able to see? Franchesco, that's good. And let's wait till we're all done and you can answer all the questions together. Next speaker, please.

Hi, Don Koto, Albany resident. Um, I would just like to address the council members. I'm sorry, kind of new to this topic. Uh but personally um on a street where we have very poor street lighting I would say street lighting is a safety issue and safety first is my feeling about this. So if there is any money a bond measure or ballot measure to go out. I think more people would support street lights because I hear a lot of complaints about it being dark on the street than I do about oh we need more street trees. So um just for what it's worth. Thank you. Thank you.

I just was wondering if there could be a little clarification in what you mean by relamping. Is that just maintaining what we have or are because it's inadequate at this point. So if you just maintain it's not going to do a whole lot. Um is there a plan for making them better, brighter, bigger, more that's all. Thank you. Are there any other comments in the room? Are there any online comments? Okay.

Hello. Um I hope that you can hear me. This is Jean again. The street that I Yeah, we asked actually when I moved in over 30 years ago, we asked for more lighting and we were told we could have it if we paid for it. So, we on the street have been paying for this lighting for over 30 years. And at this point, it's only one bulb per lamp. It's like so dim it might as well be like non-existent. Is any of this lighting going to affect that lighting? Because if it only affects things like Target and Safeway, then I don't have any I see no reason why I should be paying a bond measure for this. Um, we've been asking for lighting for years and all we get is one bulb per light and that's so dim you can miss it. I'm walking down the street. Just um uh just in case you want to see come and walk down my street.

Thank you for your comment. Okay. Thank you. We'll bring it back to council. Um are there responses to the questions? I'll tap in Mark to answer the reling question if he doesn't mind.

Sure thing. So I think all the three questions were around what standards are we using and uh a number of years what 2024 we completed the street uh lighting evaluation which actually set guidelines. So um in the past we had one standard that was deployed across the whole city. Now we have um at least four different fixtures that we um use when we reamp. So when we say relamping that's every light in the city would get switched out to the new standards. So that does two things. Um the the standards were developed so that um u they provide the coverage and visibility not adding more lights but maximizing what we can do with the existing light structure. So there should be a a pretty large improvement in lighting just by that replacement and then that would be the base case that we would then fill in afterwards with new lighting. So it it would be a complete redo of the city and we recognize that in a lot of cases lights are failing. Um they they slowly lose diodes and so they become less and less effective over time. And so that's the big urgent need for this uh measure right now. Thank you.

Okay. Comments from council. Council member Mickey, are you ready?

Yes. And I'm once again looking at council member Jordan because he jumped my question or not my question, my discussion point. Um, you know, I I really thank staff for providing this information and and uh really breaking the numbers down. It's really helpful. It's really great to understand what's the minimum we would need to get this work started and done. what's kind of a more um robust funding scenario that would allow us flexibility. I appreciate that staff is looking at this as something that over time we can look at flexibility about how we roll it out so that it's it's really thinking about the public realm all together at once. Um but I do have a major concern and and it's most it is um while I appreciate the explanation that new lights will be brought forward as parts of CIP projects. uh that's really hard to explain to the public when I think what I have generally heard from the public is actually a desire for more street light fixtures and also when are we going to fix the light bulbs we have and so I think there's been a a a large request for this additional light and so um what I'm hoping is that we can think a little bit of a way is how do we take something like maybe scenario three for the lighting that says, "Hey, like we're going to build a little bit of reserve fund and it's not necessarily only for maintenance, but it's also to help us offset some of the CIP costs because my fear in the long term is that we will have projects that come in front of us where the road costs and the sewer costs are so high, there is no money to put in those new lights when something happens. to cover that extra cost. And so being able to pitch this as something where we're building a reserve to help offset some of the costs in the CIP projects um

I think would be beneficial to us um uh to be able to really explain to this to the citizens that we're not only are we maintaining what we have but we're actually doing more um and that you're not at the whim of kind of the budgets of CIP which uh kind of depends on where our budget ends up over the next few years on how much we're going to be able to invest and those things. So, um I would encourage us to or or perhaps maybe staff to think a little bit about what in the robust scenario is that enough to truly start to build a nest egg for potentially new lights or is there a higher number that we need to be thinking about? I love everything else you brought forward to us. I just council member Lopez, any thoughts? sort of jumping on um actually let me give you

Sure. I I can uh support what council member Mickey is saying. Um I I think some clear increases in lighting need to be included um in order for this to be meet the the requests of the people and be viable in that regard. Uh, one idea is to put lower lower wattage, lower power lighting on the poles that don't have it along the priority sidewalks that's on the sidewalk side rather than street side. So, so things like that. Um, and in that regard, I would support more revenue for street lighting. Um and on the street trees I'm currently I'm curious what other council members have think on this but of a mind to split scenarios one and two. Um so some of the funding is still coming from measure mary trees as it is currently as I understand it. Um but some of that is also displaced by this new measure so that the measure is more balanced between notional revenue that's spent on street lighting and notional revenue that is spent on street trees. Um, some questions that came up from comments. Uh, a commenter that if this measure is for the purpose of improving lighting on large commercial properties, then doesn't really do what they need. Um, could staff speak to whether this measure would improve lighting on large commercial properties if that's its purpose.

So, this measure is solely focused on public rideway. So, no private property or no private developments um would be included in it. just street lights. Okay. Thank you. Um and um there was a a comment uh well I think it might have been the mayor's comment that um applications for tax relief there's is that yourself? I'm sorry I'm not remembering for or multiple applications to receive tax relief and that they should be unified. If we could make it one yeah my understanding is it is it is one currently at least for Albany tax relief. I mean, I know there's a separate one for city for school district is likely the complication there. Yeah.

Let's be sure we get this one the same. This one the same. We don't start a new application process.

Yeah. Yeah. Um Yeah, because that's the way it's been with the past measures. They've all just been added to that standard form. So, um uh yeah, I mean I appreciate that they're they're combined. You know, I think there was some intimation of maybe street lighting should be separate from street trees, but I I appreciate that they're combined because I I'm worried about flexibility um as needs come and go on one side or the other. And uh so I originally thought that maybe this should be rolled into a reauthorization of the street paving um measure, but but staff's preference for good reason was to have it as a separate measure. Um yeah, I think that's what I have. Thank you very much. Um, go ahead. Yeah. Um, first of all, thank you for all of that, um, in-depth information. Um, just one of one of the things that I think that we have to be careful of is is wording as you know brought up as well. um and give some real um kind of some make sure that we have some background, some transparency as far as how it's been, why we're here, and the problem that we're trying to solve. So, it's it's very clear to voters. Um because obviously just here in this room, we hear a lot of questions and stuff like that. So just having that background knowledge um for our voters I think really helps you know them understand more um and just another piece on the street tree. This is also for removal of some that have and replacement for those that are causing sidewalk issues, roof issues, everything else. And hopefully we're going to make sure that the street tree and the street light don't get too close

to each other so that they're kind of not Yeah. So that that's all.

Um yeah, I realized I had a a question or two. Um on the the condominium calculation, the average condominium calculation, could you go through how that was calculated given the condominiums don't sit on their own parcel each? Yes, that's that's definitely a tricky one. Um, council member. Um, so the secured role is something that um NBS receives from the county and it is a parcel listing of every parcel in the city and it has certain data points and one of those data points for all parcels is the lot square footage and specific to condominiums it is duplicated. So um it's very difficult. It takes the um basically the footprint of that underlying lot and if we have condos going this way and this way, it's repeating that, you know, 15,000 square feet over and over for every single one.

Wow. So, what we have to do is we have to go in there and determine which of those condos belongs to that lot and divide by the number of condos that are in that building um by that total lot square footage. So, we have a it's a very usually a very small usually, you know, less than 2,000 square feet, sometimes smaller um per condo because we have divided it by the total lot square footage for each one.

Great. Thanks for doing that work. Um yeah, sounds fairly confusing. Um and and um maybe some information on the 500,000 square foot lot upper upper size for maximum assessment. um that came about because basically all the parcels in Albany are that size or smaller except for I think two that are Golden Gate Fields. And so in order to limit our exposure to future reduction of of tax revenue, the decision of the council and past metrics was to cap it because of the possibility that Golden Gate Fields is going to be bought by a nonprofit entity and or the state in which case that tax would go away. That's the rationale on that. Thank you, mayor.

Um, I guess my only my only comment is I think what I hear and I think what we all hear all the time is we need more lighting. And so I'm wondering if like with option three where there's a bit of a um, you know, what's the word I want to say? Surplus to use over time. if we could frontload that a little bit and start either replacing some of the bulbs we have or or whatever and sort of so it starts out a little I want to say brighter so that you know we start out changing lights right away rather than over a long period of time. Is that what you're thinking or is that doable or

So the two pieces of this the first piece is that yes with the capital renewal project the intent is to uh finance the project upfront so that we can construct the project. I mean it takes time to go through the financing process and bid the project but the intention is to be able to with that that project is currently unfunded in the CIP. Um, and the intention is to be able to do that project sooner rather than later and to be able to see results quickly. Um, the other part of that would be um, no, actually I think that covers it. I think one I think we're good with one part. Thank you.

That's fine. Okay. Um, so you need direction from us as to which option to pick. Is that is that correct? Um, well, I'll start. I would just say I would like to pick number three. It's not a lot more than number two, but I think the need is really great. And I think especially if if we're sort of frontloading it and people are seeing a real difference right away. Um that's a that's good. And I think that number three gives us a better chance at that. Am I you're nodding? So I'm in the ballpark sort of. I think uh number scenario two and scenario three both would accomplish that goal of allowing us to finance the project. But from some of the other comments um being and your yours as well being able to build that um reserve to address depending on staff capacity and other resource questions and you know delivery conflicts with other um priorities that have been expressed in the CIP. um we building that reserve would enable us potentially to um add to elements to improvement projects more quickly.

Okay. So, um, I guess I would start by saying if we weren't looking to increase the number of lights, I am honestly leaning I would lean towards scenario one only because it is um in a world of increasing cost of everything. It is the minimum that we need to get this these programs running and going. I am intrigued by the idea of a scenario two or three where instead of saying we are where where we continue to use measure M to fund some of the street trees but that would allow a redistribution of the way those funds are to more of a not necessarily 50/50 split but just something that would truly allow us to save up enough money to start putting in new lights, new light fixtures. Um and so uh I I am whether it's scenario two or scenario three in terms of the actual dollar amount um I think more for me is the split right between where we're starting at least as we talk to public is the intent is right now we want to collect this money to replace lights install new lights and up uh start the program on tree maintenance um over time as street lights all get installed called that if that measure is still there, the funding can shift to be instead of installing new street lights offset measure M. So measure M doesn't need to be used for the trees anymore. But my preference, I guess what I'm saying is I really like scenario two. We don't necessarily today need to decide exactly the way that split is, but in that sense, that's why I'm more supportive of measure two, sorry, scenario two or scenario three. Um I'm more inclined to go with scenario two

just because something around scenario two because it is a little bit less and um knowing that I think in the long term we'll be able to be reallocating those but we can tell the public this money will also be used to install new lights

and I'm fine with two thoughts. I would say my my personal preference is that we advocate for scenario three. Um uh partly not just because of the fact that it helped resolve uh very critical con concerns that we are hearing from the community but also uh allows us to have the flexibility to reimagine what uh safety in our community looks like through very direct and tangible uh city uh le programming. And so, you know, not trying to tow the line on uh other items at this time, but I do think this does help also resolve some of the con concerns our community has around safety. Um and I well I can speak from many personal experiences of you know the challenges of trying to navigate through some of our streets in the evening and you know just understanding like yes from a personal community stand community member standpoint very frustrated but then also hearing my partner like why don't you do anything about this um and here we are trying to do something about it but you know we have these conversations I I know it's tangental, but I'm bringing it up because we have these conversations. Um, and how, you know, this the act of just simply improving something such as, you know, street lights, uh, has tremendous community benefit for how we feel and how we navigate. And, um, but also how we value the spaces that we're in. Um, and this isn't just about, you know, street lights, but also trees and, you know, our canopy coverage and what we're doing to fight the climate crisis. We have a responsibility. We need to own up to that. Um, and so I'll

I'll leave it at that. I know I can be I can get more long-winded than uh than folks probably please uh or would want to hear right now, but as it stands right now, I'm pretty heavy-handed for scenario three right now. Council member Jordan.

Yeah, I'm currently landing at um I don't know 700,000 to 750,000 total, which is close to a little under scenario two. with um 400 to 450,000 nomally for street trees which would displace in the in the air term which would displace some of the current measure M spending on street trees and leave $300,000 street lights in order to both pay the financing for the reamping as well as provide a meaningful amount of capital for adding more street lights in the near term. Was that two or three or uh it's it's none of them. It's uh

that's what I was waiting. Yeah. So just you could just put down 300,000 for street lights and 400 to 450,000 for street trees. So it's closest to two in total amount, but it's a bit of a different balance between the two as um Council Member Mickey was was suggesting or intimating.

Vice Mayor Hansen Romero, your your choice. um kind of in the middle of two or three. Um part of me wonders too just once we get through a lot of this major portion of things having that um continually coming in. When are we going to like take a look at that again? Is this can going to continue to be necessary? Is it is there any way uh I know we were talking about in perpetuity but um is there a way to raise the telescope on or periscope on this again and look at it in a few years like is this money actually still same amount being needed? I know lighting you know is constantly being updated and improved all the time. I mean, and you know, just when we went and did a bunch of the first generation lights on Solano, what 22, three years ago, now those are even starting to look dim and and yet then there's also our bulbs that have been there since what, the 50s. So, um, and I know that those take a great deal of cost and, um, have other maintenance costs involved in in changing out those, uh, tulip bulbs and stuff as well. So, um, so yeah, I'm just I'm kind of looking at this from from that aspect of things, like once we get past this major chunk, how much how much is this, you know, reserves are we going to need? So,

yeah. And I I appreciate that comment uh Council Member Hansen Romero because I think you know when I um when I was uh when I first got elected, one of the conversations I had with Nicole was I loved our sidewalk tax. I loved how we could show the public that we were improving the public realm and we were being responsible with our funds. And I will tell you that my biggest hope is that the conversation we were having today would include would be street trees, street lights, and traffic coming. We didn't get to the traffic coming part, but one of the reasons why I wanted those three to be combined was that long-term flexibility that, you know, if we had a tax measure that passed, we would have a funding source for these things over many years. Um because I think as a special tax, which this is, um having it be able to be multiple buckets allows the staff flexibility without it being a general plan item because a general fund is because if it's a general fund, then any council can decide to do whatever they want with that money. Um and I I feel that that having this be really allocated to the public realm is important. I I personally have some concerns about just having two items under this one item. But I think this is also the kind of thing where given that this is going to the voters, it would mean that council at a future date could choose to amend this this tax measure and either reduce the number or ask the voters if we can include other things like traffic coming uh into a measure like this or perhaps at some point actually combine the sidewalk, street trees, street lights and just say this is really about the public realm. This is about the things that you interact with every day when you walk to your car, when you walk to Solano, when you walk with your kids. Um that um it's

something where it's really just talking about how does the city manage the public realm. But that's at this point a future conversation. Can add to that as well. We actively monitor each of our special taxes in terms of your two-year budget and would address that year-over-year. Uh, and as you know, with street trees, they're certainly long-term. So, that's planting, pruning, removal, replacement, and whatnot. So, the funding would certainly sustain over the need for the service year-over-year. Well, and I think the same could be said for um street lights that they technology changes like burnout. I mean, I think there is an ongoing ongoing need. It sounds like since we're giving direction, we're not really taking a vote here. Would you all agree that scenario two is where we're sort of falling even though you're kind

I want a different split. Yeah. Yeah. total amount. Yeah,

I'm comfortable with 750 for the totals being somewhere between 750 and um 8 21700, right? It is mostly the split because I would love to have more discussion with council member Jordan about that split because I I would keep pushing for more to go into the lighting and but I think that really needs to be perhaps better informed with staff helping us understand what does it mean for you to get an extra $100,000 for lighting versus $200,000 for lighting in terms of actual ability to install lights. Um, I can't tell you the cost of a street light, let alone running wire and installation. So, I'm not sure right now for me where the break is, but I think the dollar amount being somewhere between 750 and and 821. Um, on reference, I think of well, I appreciate the average lot size in Albany being represented. Um, I think of the typical lot size is 5,000. Um it's scenario two is 50 cents a day help us improve our street lights and street trees and it's 51 cents a day for scenario three. So I'm just again thinking of 5,000 foot lot. Um so again that's why I'm generally comfortable with this 750 to 821 is we're talking about 49 cents to 51 cents a day. Did this give you enough?

Sounds like we're between two and three and we'll come back with some additional analysis and uh some draft language. So, will you need to come back now an extra time or can will this just be the like you had proposed originally one time to come back with the ballot language and pretty much everything? Yeah, we'll be packaging a handful of those for you in the near future. So, this would be likely the first. Great. Thank you so much. Thank you for your presentation.

Um, if I may, I had a I had an um response to the the vice mayor. I I had mine maybe a 10-year tax as well, which sort of goes to what we've done with sidewalks, which is kind of drives a re periodic reanalysis. Um, and that would seem to fit the street lighting part, but it's kind of this this union between the two where because the city would be changing its ordinance to take full responsibility for the street trees, then it needs to be indefinite, which, you know, that's been my goal for sidewalks. Um, it's turning into a 40-year plan. Hopefully, I'll live that long. um that the city wants to uh make sure the sidewalks are in good condition before it takes back liability. Um which is understandable, but I'm grateful that the city's willing to take the street tree liability now as a part of this measure. I think that's a great a great point.

Thank you. And that brings us to 10-2 local tenant protection measures. May we have a staff report, please? Sorry, mayor. I was just wondering um if anyone needs a break. We take a Let's take a hard 10-minute break. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Looking at my watch.

Uh, yes. Hello. I am Leslie Menddees. I'm the planning manager. Good evening, Mayor McUade, council members, and members of the public. Um, as I mentioned, I am the planning manager, and tonight we are presenting staff recommendation to city council following an evaluation of potential tenant protection measures as required by program 5D of our adopted housing element. The city retained Chris Hess who I'd like to introduce who is the principal of HS consulting to assist in implementation of this program. Chris is a housing and community development consultant with more than 20 years of experience in affordable housing, homelessness response and resident services. He works with cities and counties and nonprofit housing providers across Bay Area on tenant protection, supportive housing strategy and regulatory compliance. Um, before I do turn it over to Chris, I do want to take this time to really thank we've had a series of housing advisory commission meetings throughout calendar year 2025 and I we had a large participation and I really would like to thank all the members of the public who took the time to participate and especially to our housing advisory commissioners um who have volunteered their time and energy and with respect and a plum discussed debated and provided input on what this is a very critical though often divisive topic. So, I'd really like to extend my thanks and I know there's two of them here um in the council chambers tonight. And with that, Chris, thank you.

Good evening, Mayor McUade, city council members, members of the public. Thank you, Leslie, for the introduction. Uh I'll be here to talk about three areas of tenant protections that have been a focus of housing advisory commission meetings over the last year which is uh anti-discrimination and harassment, just cause for eviction and rent stabilization. Could I have the next slide please? And so the uh the the the timeline of this work is up here. Uh the council formed the hack or the housing advisory commission in March 2024 to study this and other housing issues. We did eight meetings with public comment and uh debate among the commissioners last year. Uh and in September 2025, the hack made a number of recommendations which we'll be showing you. You've seen them already in the the session uh that we had in December. So then the city council did have a session on December 1st to give the public further opportunity to comment and that brings us to today when we're looking for your guidance on where to go next with this. Next please. Um so yes I I mentioned these are the three buckets that we'll be talking about today. Go ahead. So when we talk about tenant protections in Albany or any California community, this is of course in a broader context of a state that offers many protections to all of the tenants here. Uh there is a long record of anti-discrimination and harassment legislation among the strongest in the country in the state of California including these areas that are shown here on the slide. uh Fair Employment and Housing Act, Unrue Civil Rights Act, which regulates business activities, and then other uh long-standing harassment and retaliatory eviction laws which specify what types

of content con sorry, what types of conduct are not allowed by landlords toward tenants. Next. So, uh, most importantly, we're currently in the Tenant Protection Act of 2019, AB1482, which was later amended by SB567. This provided a state level rent stabilization and just cause for eviction set of protections. It doesn't apply to all units. It applies to those that are older than 15 years and tenencies once they've gone beyond a full year of teny or 12 months. There is a limit which is the lesser of the CPI or 10% for how much rent can be increased in a year. It does provide for just cause for evictions everywhere and it uh is uh intended to expire or set to expire on January 1st 2030 unless it's renewed or modified. Also very importantly to this discussion is the Costa Hawkins Act which exempts local uh I'm sorry exempts units that were built in 1995 or before from local rent stabilization not the state rent stabilization. Uh it also requires that whenever units become vacant the landlord may set the unit tomarket rate. Finally the Ellis Act allows that property owners can go out of business. they can terminate tenencies in order to remove units for from the market uh for a variety of different reasons described there. So the options that are available to local programs and that we discussed in hack generally run into these uh three buckets of of work. Uh and there's a lot more detail on this in attachment one of the staff report. So, we can strengthen

discrimination and harassment protection stronger than what the state offers by adding protected categories. Some communities have additional civil rights offices that that will uh counsel tenants or or do investigations. And if the city of Albany wishes to do that, it would apply to nearly all rental units in the city. Uh strengthening just cause is an option. Uh the city may regulate timets. It could expand the units that are protected under just cause uh establish uh relocation payment requirements. This has a reasonably broad application up to almost 3,000 of the city's rental units. And finally, this the council could choose to add local rent stabilization, which is to cap rent increases at something lower than the level that the state offers. Um, but always remembering that this the council can only cap rents for units that are allowed under Costa Hawkins, meaning they were constructed before February of 1995. We estimate 1,900 units in the city would be subject to a local rent stabilization program. We received a lot of public input both here at the council and at the housing advisory commission. Property owners and property owner associations were very well represented in this. And uh some of the the feedback that we received from them is that yes, rents are going up. Uh so are the operating costs. We've heard some very uh dramatic stories about insurance, maintenance, and energy costs going up. Um the property owners say that the state law is providing enough protection. We don't need a local program as well. And in fact, that there may be some risk of landlords exiting

the rental market entirely if they feel that local regulation becomes too much uh that they can't make a good return on their investment. uh tenant advocates, which were represented in uh much fewer numbers overall in our meetings, uh did say that uh rents are growing faster than incomes. Uh residents here in Albany are at risk of displacement. Um that yes, they're state protections, but those may be difficult to access and that a local set of protections would have some advantages there. and that the limited legal representation that may exist for tenants does put them at a disadvantage when it comes to uh evictions and court processes. Um the hack voted in September to recommend a number of different measures on harassment, discrimination, just cause for eviction and then I'll show on the next slide rent stabilization that the council should consider including in a framework for a local tenant protection ordinance. I say it's a framework because we did not talk about specific rent levels that we should set here or um the exact expectations of the scope of the program. We didn't weigh uh an amount of staff or a costbenefit analysis on this. These were voted on generally as ideas that the majority of the hack would like to see explored and for city council to consider. Uh generally that vote went 4 to one on almost all of the issues. Next one please. Um I'm not reading off all of the measures that were recommended because that would take a lot of time and uh you have seen it before. It's also in the packet. Next please. Um we have looked also at what uh data is available that might indicate what rental conditions are in the city of Albany. uh very one one piece of data

that's available to us is eviction filings. So we looked at eviction filings. This chart does show for the last three years in various jurisdictions of Alama County. Some of which have tenant protection ordinances and some don't. Um now this this means that evictions were filed. It doesn't indicate what was the outcome of that, who prevailed, whether the eviction was withdrawn. It also doesn't show households that left without an eviction ever being filed, perhaps because they didn't want something on their record and so they left voluntarily. However, that's not data that is available. This is data that's available and obviously you would rather be Albany in this situation because we have a much lower rate of eviction uh adjusted for our renter population than other communities. And that does uh by the way really reflect the what the community has been telling us in public feedback. Uh we looked at uh data that's available on what is happening with rents in Albany. Uh I direct your attention first to the orange line. These are the observed median rents that we found in Albany. Uh starting in 2020 uh through 2025. We do see that there's about a 30% increase in rents over that time which is very significant. That data came from the census and from Zillow. It combines a lot of things including all different sizes of units, units that turned over as well as tenants that remained in their unit and experienced a rent increase. Once again, this is the type of data that we have and it is the best picture that we that we can get. Um, I do believe that this does reinforce a lot of what we heard from tenants and those that advocate for tenants in the city, which is the comparison between the orange line here and the blue line. The blue line is a simulation. If you

took that same rent of $1,927 in 2020 and increased it with the consumer price index, which is a measure of inflation, you would end up with a much lower rent. meaning that rents in Albany are increasing faster than inflation and probably faster than incomes. Also noteworthy though is the purple line which is if you applied that rent amount uh to the state's maximum which is generally running between 7 and 10% per year of allowed rent increase. We do find that Albany rents are not increasing at that type of a rate. uh that there is some market pressure uh bringing rents a away from what you know potentially the maximum could be uh and further that uh that we do see that the orange line is flattening a bit between 2023 and 2025 at least it's approaching the CPI uh a little bit more after really dramatic increases in the first couple of years during the pandemic and next please uh finally we've heard as I mentioned that operating costs for landlords are rising quite a bit faster than CPI. Uh we did look at that here. Uh the Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes the CPI. It also publishes various components of the CPI including insurance, energy, and maintenance costs. And we found that those are rising a great deal faster than CPI. They're also rising a great deal faster than the actual observed rent increases in the city of Albany. and bring up the concern that should the city try to uh to push uh rents down through a rent stabilization regime that that could result in owners having a difficult time getting a good return on their investment. Next please. Uh so ultimately coming to the staff recommendation

um we've concluded after the public feedback after the data that we've received and after debating at the hack the staff has concluded that the conditions are not such in the city that uh we should be investing the staff time in building a rent stabilization program. um that would in with the experience of most other communities require at least two full-time staff and a couple of years to get off the ground in addition to a lot of other types of costs. What we are recommending that we do is further education and outreach which could include some workshops for renters and property owners probably in separate workshops done by outside organizations. um a centralized housing resource website because many city websites do have a landing page for all things that are related to housing whether they have a tenant protection ordinance or not. We don't have that in Albany and we could uh and also to use the opportunity of the business license process to do more education particularly of the property owners about what their responsibilities under the state laws are. Uh we would like to publicize the rent review program further. Uh it has it it's run by Echo Housing. It is an opportunity for renters and property owners to discuss rent increases in excess of 5%. Um and it has a lot of capacity for more utilization right now. Uh we do believe that a lot of folks don't know about it. And then finally, uh, ongoing monitoring, uh, some of this, uh, data and information as well as what the public is telling us are things that we would really recommend the city council continuing to look at so that we have an opportunity to revisit this should those conditions change in a way that would be a little bit more indicative of the need for a local program. So, uh, with that, I'll be opening up, uh, for questions. Uh although there was a question that

came in the public comment. If this council wants me to to address that or to uh address your questions first, either way is fine. We'll start with council questions. Okay. Council on this side. I'll uh occupy my traditional position here. Um could you explain how the Zillow data uh which I presume was used for 2025 estimates given that American community survey um data existed for prior

Yes, that's that's right. Thank you. Uh uh Council Member Jordan. Um the Zillow data was used for 2024 and 2025 in the lack of any data from the census on those years. Uh it's obviously not optimal because it doesn't necessarily reflect actual tenencies. It reflects advertising for tenencies. Um but it is uh a publicly available data set that doesn't require a big market study. Um and uh does to some extent track with the other types of rent increases we'd seen in prior years? Um, was there a comparison for years that overlap to relative to the statement you just made? So, for 2023, 2022 to to see

I I I did look at that actually. I don't have the numbers on a slide for you or anything. Um, I found that it generally tracked although Zillow's data was a little bit behind what the census reported. So if anything, if that trend does continue for 24 and 25, then that orange line with census data would probably be a little bit higher and the rents a little bit higher actually than what we what we got with this analysis. And when you say track behind, does that mean that the the AC American Community Survey ACS acronym um median rent was higher than what you would get from Zillow typically? Exactly. Thank you. Yeah,

that's fascinating because conventional wisdom would have the opposite typically since understanding Zillow is what's like vacant on the market being advertised. Oh, that's fascinating. Thank you. Um there was a question in the in the written input. Um could staff or yourself and thank you very much for all your work on this uh provide an example of of anam uh property a building that's in each property type residence category. Um so a number of categories that were listed on that on the tables and uh somebody just asked could you

yes definitely uh that I did see that question. Uh so we're looking at attachment one of the staff report. There were a few tables on what types of units in Albany are likely to be affected by a local ordinance. Uh UC Village is student housing and it is stateowned. It would not be impacted by a local ordinance for either just cause or rent stabilization. Uh detached single family homes that are rented um obviously if it depends first of all always on construction date. So, if they're 15 years old or more, they might be in the state. Uh, if they're constructed before 1994, as most of our housing is, they would be covered uh by a local uh rent stabilization ordinance. Um, for the state, it depends on the ownership. If the ownership is like a a family or a small owner, then state protections don't apply. If it's an LLC with a corporate owner, they do. uh duplexes and condos uh are um are are a little bit different but have the similar situation with the ownership exemption uh and generally are exempted from Costa Hawkins. If

I could just break in there. So is that as I see in the footnote if I understood duplex if one of the residences in duplex is occupied by the owner then state law doesn't well state law particularly on thank you for that for duplexes specifically that's right if there is an owner living in one side of the duplex then the other side is exempt whereas if there is a duplex that is fully rented to tenants that are not owners then it could be included depending upon all of the other qualifications construction date. Okay. And when when when you say exempt, we're talking specifically about stabilization because there's some differences between the tables. I'm just

That's right. Unfortunately, it's a complicated area of law. Um and there's overlapping requirements clearly. Uh for rent stabilization, um the uh the condos are not eligible for local rent stabilization under Costa Hawkins uniformly. Uniform. Okay. But for just cause they could be included depending on how you design a local ordinance. Okay. Interesting. Yeah, I didn't catch the condos were not um excluded no matter date of construction.

Thanks. Um then I had one more question. Well, I guess I guess if uh I guess if you keep going um with examples from each of these

Definitely. Yeah, I can do that really quickly. Um, Belmont Village and uh, Saha are or generally affordable housing are similar in that they are exempt from from local rent stabilization. They could be included in local just cause. many cities don't mess with it uh because there's a number of different regulatory agencies on aging or on affordable housing that are involved and enforce uh more significant requirements on them. And then finally, the the other rental units is just what remains. It's mostly multifamily units, mostly constructed before 1995 and thus uh uh eligible to be stabiliz to be locally rent stabilized. Uh they would be in those are the 1900 units that a local program would uh control the rent for.

Thank you. Um, which of these categories would a property that has a single detached primary residence plus an ADU, which of these categories would that fall in?

So, uh, the ADU is not mentioned as a specific exemption or inclusion. Um, something like a junior ADU that's attached attached might be a duplex. There actually hasn't really been case law, as far as I know, to really define that. Um, but a detached ADU would be eligible for rent stabilization or for for just cause if it was constructed on rent stabilization. Sorry. It would be if it was constructed before 1995. Most ADUs are actually more recent in the city. So then it depends if they are the 15 years or not whether the state rent stabilization and just cause would apply.

If I could just add one more thing because we did consult with our uh city attorney on this and EDUs are not specifically exempt. So unless they were constructed after 1995, they could be subject to a local ordinance um both for just cause for eviction and rent stabilization whether they're attached or detached or converted. And if they're constructed after 1995, are they still exempt for just cause or no? Then we could include them in just cause ordinance, not rent stabilization. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Sorry. Um, so the interpretation is that an ADU does not make a single family house a duplex. Correct. Okay.

Thank you, mayor, staff, consultant. Those are my questions. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Do you have any questions? Council member Mickey, any questions? Member Lopez,

just a couple. And I know I previously asked city manager, city manager about this and just thinking quick clarification. Um the the data that was presented to us, is that inclusive of UC village? Um okay. And if to the extent possible, if you're able to answer these questions, amazing. if not because I know it's a little convoluted. Um, one, uh, is that data able to be parsed out? Okay, so the data on evictions does technically include UC village. However, it would be only if a UC village unit went all the way through to the county eviction process. The university actually has its own kind of program agreement around those units. they don't resemble typical tenency so much. Uh they have a relationship with a student or or a faculty member um that could make them, you know, cause them to to leave the unit without going through the court process. So in are they included? Technically, yes, because if an eviction went that way, if someone really bunkered down and refused, the university probably would have to go through the courts to get a sheriff lockout order. Uh, for rent stabilization, the US Census does not distinguish and it does include those units in the overall count of units in Albany. So, the answer is is yes in in terms of looking at the average rent according to ACS.

Okay. Um, so then that leads to probably my last follow-up question. Um, and again, this is around UC village because I know again it's a little convoluted over there. Uh, it's a weird situation when your landlord is also your employer. Um, I know from personal experience. Um does the data that was presented on the uh observed rent uh average rent increase in Albany? Is that also accounting for the fact that the UC had skyrocketed folks rent by over 20%

for anyone who moved in after 2024? Okay. Uh so so I I'm I'm not familiar with UC's um rent rent increase, but I do believe that it would be included for ACS for the years 2020 through 2023. For 24 and 25, we had to use Zillow as a gauge of the market. And I don't think that UC probably wouldn't show up advertising. So I I think it would not have included any of that.

Okay. Thank you. Any final questions? So then basically just as a followup to that that's really skewed some of the data there especially since you know so really it's looking like a bigger issue including UC when in actuality it's it's really not

well I I don't know for sure because uh it you know the the census and Zillow don't parse out UC versus other types of units uh Anecdotally, it sounds like there was a very big rent increase. Um, that probably wasn't included in the rental data here though

because it was 2024 if I heard correctly. Member Mickey. You know what? I'll save it for discussion. It It's okay. I'll I'll write it down and save it for discussion. Okay. Um, is that it right now for from staff? Uh, yes it is.

Okay. So, we will begin public comment. And I just before we go, I just want to remind everyone of the rules of decorum. Be respectful of each speaker. Address the council, not the audience. And please, no applause or negative comments or noise. We want everyone to feel comfortable speaking and not to be intimidated by audience comments or reactions. How many here are planning on speaking? Okay, it's 9:20. I'm going to I'm sorry, but I'm going to cut it down to two minutes. Um, so let's begin. Um, the clerk will read three names. If you can line up, we'll just keep rotating through. Try to be as succinct as you can, but we do want to hear from everyone.

Okay. On K. And then second one, Belle. Last name, last initial ANC R. Hi, Don Kamoto, Albany resident and Albany landlord. Um, I really implore you council members to to look at education for tenants, for landlords, especially new landlords. And it's really, this point really was driven home to me a couple weeks ago. I got a call from a friend who's renting an apartment in San Rafale. He called me saying the property, his landlord uh sold the property, the new landlord wants to jack up his rent. And he told me how much. And I said, "That's above the state limit. They can't do that." and I gave him the name of Alexis who works for the Sanfell Housing Department which has an awesome awesome housing rental landlord website. It's a great website. You guys should check it out. Anyways, so I pointed him to the Sanfal housing manager, Alexis. I pointed him to the legal aid. But what this told me was that you can have as many laws as you want from rent control to just cause and it doesn't mean a diddly because if the tenant doesn't know about these laws and if the landlord especially new landlords don't know about these laws the laws aren't going to matter. They're not going to know they have to do these certain things or that they're entitled to these different rights. So, I would really encourage you to put all your money if you're gonna like get the biggest bang for your buck and put all the money into education and really getting the word out to all the tenants

in Albany and all the landlords in Albany about these different programs that can help them learn about the laws. Thank you.

Thank you. Hi. Uh, I'm Belle Adler and I, uh, own one very small ADU, so it's not going to go um, it's not it's not appropriate these regulations in my case, but I did want to thank you for an a remarkable presentation. I had a whole bunch of questions and I don't have them anymore because you've answered them all. And I was really also glad to see that Albany was is doing a righteous job with their tenants. Um, I I strongly believe in tenant protection even as a landlord, but I did do think that there needs to be some balance. That said, I would also urge council member Mickey, I think the last time I was here, you said that you recre you recused yourself because you are a landlord. I think your voice needs to be heard. you're very um reasonable and and knowledgeable and I think that needs to be the balance between the two because it is a business arrangement and um thank you very much. I thought that was really excellent.

Thank you, Mayor. If I I know we usually wait, but I can I just address that one issue just to make sure. Uh so, in the past, I have had to recuse myself because we had not gotten a decision from the state whether or not I could participate. And so as we passed the housing element, I was not allowed to even be in the room. Uh and so since I'm in the room, uh we have we have heard back from the state. Uh thank you to the city attorney for continuing to ask the state for clarification. I am allowed to participate this and I am allowed to to vote. So thank you. After Nancy would be SJT Mic.

Hi, my name is Nancy Roberts. I'm a Albany longtime Albany resident and I own a condo over at Bayside. So, I am exempted from Costa Hawkins, but I'm here as a community member. Um, I've spoken here before about how tenant protection measures would impact mom and pop housing providers. And I've already lodged my concerns about the impact on our community if the new measures are too ownorous and a mom and pop. Uh landlords are forced to sell their properties to the corporate buyers who are waiting in the wings to buy up the majority of rental properties. I will tell you they must have access to the business licenses because I get contacted all the time about selling my property. Um so they are just waiting to buy it all up. Uh my concern tonight is what is driving these measures? Where's the evidence that Albany suffers from excessive conict evictions and rent gouging? I the the evidence that you mentioned seems sketchy. It sounds like Albany is not in line with the rest of some of the uh cities in Alama County. Um and uh we've we've already got protections with the from the state uh that includes rent caps and eviction protections. So why are we enacting solutions to a problem that we don't really know that we have to just to create new problems and uh you know with corporate buyers eating up our property or buying up our property.

Thank you. Thank you for your comments and just a reminder we we're not going to do any clapping or booing or anything. Um, my name is BJ Thors. This thing moves. Um, or Elizabeth. Um, and I used to live in Albany, but now I live in Elserto, but I'm an Albany land lady. Um, and my first thought was, why? Just what she said. Why are you doing this? Is there a problem? How come I haven't heard that there are problems? And I'll tell you in uh Elserto I kept every meeting after meeting tenant advocates were coming in and using Zillow. Don't use Zillow really. It's wrong. If I could get the rent that's in Zillow, I' I'd just go to Hawaii, move to Hawaii and live. Um and so I kept coming in and saying, "We can't get those rents. That's nonsense. You don't know what your rents are. You have an idea and you're probably in the ballpark, I would say." So, Elserto decided to put in a rent registry. I just keptounding them as much as the tenant advocates were. Uh, and the apartment owners association hate rent registries because they think they're the beginning of rent control. But we found out that on the whole our rents were below both the state and HUD's affordability things. They were amazed at it. I was not because I know we have a lot of small-time landlords, which I think you have in Albany. the big corporate buildings were a different story when when there's property managers too because they aren't you know they're not the owners. Um so um we we actually found out and we're monitoring it serves to monitor as well and the landlords pay for it but from my point of view that's I'd rather pay for that than pay for rent control we don't need. When you put in real rent control, I think the states is good what the

state has, but things happen right away. Average rents go up. Um, diversification goes down, gentrification goes up. These things are part of the research. Available, uh, affordable housing goes down. That it Thank you for your comments. Oh, I had so many more things to say. Thank you, everybody.

I'm Kirk Schumacher. you have seen me before, some of you multiple times. I'd agree with her statement that a two-minute time to uh speak with you folks really doesn't give an opportunity to see what's really going on. But the thing for you folks to think about is that we're in a capitalist society where if you want more of something, you make it easier, you make it cheaper, you make less bureaucracy in the way you make it more profitable. If you want to get rid of something, you put more burdens on it, you make it cost more, you make the return be less. If you want to have less rental housing in Albany, put in rent control. Put in all these other things that have been proposed. I was glad to see that the recommendation is that there's really not a need for that here because there really don't seem to be these sorts of problems here in Albany. Um I I haven't seen any issues of harassment. I don't, you know, hear anything like that. I've had I've provided 500 years of rental unit availability. In my career as a rental housing provider, I've only had two issues. One was a woman who didn't pay her rent. She got an eviction notice and suddenly within five days, she tripped on the stairs and needed a $5,000 payout by my insurance company. The other one was a guy where a a tenant committed suicide off premises. A friend of his thought that meant he could move into the apartment, live there rentree. I said, "That's really not how this is going to work. I don't think there's a problem here that needs a solution. I think that, you know, the all of the metrics for Albany seem to be better than the surrounding uh communities. And if you put something that creates a wedge between the owner and the tenant, it's going to make things worse here. It's not going to make them better.

Thank you for your comments. After Mike would be uh Franchesco P, Peter C, and Michelle L.

Right. Hi, I'm my name is Mike Saji. I'm been an Albany resident for 21 years. um want to talk about short-term rentals and stand from standpoint of um community connections. We own a a house. We have a short rental. Um and majority of our guests are actually locals. They come to see family members, grandparents coming, seeing grandkids. Uh um um people seeing uh the grandparents or or family members coming for holidays, graduations, and other events. Um it's a great city, but a lot of the houses here are small and so families cannot host uh um um other family members that are come in. So this is where short rentals come in. They fill the gap, help help the family members to stay in the neighborhood close to the people that they want to see. We've seen this. It's common every week. We and um um it's a common occurrence here. this financial direct direct financial benefit to the city. 10% of the of the uh of the um money does go directly to the city as a transient occupancy tax. Visitors go and uh use the restaurants, go to restaurants, grocery stores and help sustain our local economy. Um we are not big corporations, mom and pop. We do this so we can help with the high expenses, mortgages, insurance, maintenance cost just like any other operator here. Um, if you're considering tackling eliminating uh short-term rentals, maybe you should look look into policy uh uh um uh tools. For example, right now if you have a house and ADU, you have to live in there. You cannot rent it. Why is that? If person leaves and you allow that relax that both the house and ADU can be um rented out. Thank you very much for your attention.

Thank you for your comments.

Albany is a great small k city and home buyers and renters come here and pay more per square foot because of the great schools and it's a safe place to live. It's safe because we teach and practice respect for ourselves, our neighbors, our neighborhood, our local businesses, and our environment. And our teachers and leaders should follow those same values. The rent control effort is led by a few well-meaning local people, but spearheaded by activists from throughout California whose goal is to create a onesizefits-all repressive rent control everywhere in the state, undeterred by the disastrous, unexpected consequences of their misguided social policies. Key to this rent control strategy is to create a bad guy who must be punished. They use generalized statistics that they extrap extrapolate ridiculously to Albany. Albany is 19,000. Oakland has 440,000. Richmond has 400 I mean 115,000. Ignoring real trends, they create an enemy that must be controlled. They are sewing disharmony and discord while they paint all landlords with the same ugly brush. They want you to be their enforcers and to pit us against them. They're asking you to do their dirty work. Instead, show us how we respect one another and work together. They want you to regulate and punish. instead educate and incentivize mutual respect. Show why Albany is such a great small city.

Thank you for your comments.

Hi, my name is Michelle Lee. I am a small housing provider in Albany. We also have a small property in the adjacent rentstrick city of Berkeley. Um just want to tell our sto story. We started we came to the Bay Area with nothing. Uh we started as renters in San Francisco, Berkeley and then Albany. Through years of hard work, sacrificing lifestyle choices, we saved enough money to invest. Instead of choosing to turn a quick profit by flipping a property, we thought, why not invest in the community we love and we live? So, we became a landlord. Um, we make a point to know every one of our tenant personally. We respond to their repair requests timely. We answer phone calls and texts over the weekend. When we have to raise rents, we follow all the rules and guidelines and take their situation into consideration. We're now putting our Berkeley property on the market for sale next month. If you're interested, you can check it out. Um, if it all goes well, well, it will look like we made money on paper. However, after we take away transfer tax, broker commission, u taking account of all the capital improvements we've made, we're lucky to break even after owning it for nine years and actively managing it. And our broker told us, we're in the rare case that we're actually looking like we're making money. Most people are selling at a loss right now. Um, but don't need to feel bad for us. After all, it's just an investment decision. Maybe not a smart one. Um, but please do feel bad for our tenants. They most likely will have to deal with corporate landlords. Um, go go go through lots of trouble to get their repair needs met. Um, well, if the

numbers didn't work well, that's why we're selling. So if that happens in our Albany property, we'll be offloading that one too. So this measure is displacing small landlords like us. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. After Peter would be Elaine S, Rice N, and Daniel W.

Good evening. Um, I'm in general pleased with the staff report that addresses many of the ideas that rental providers have for years urged to be considered. I believe it is the responsibility of the government to care for those who are unable to care for themselves. This is a legitimate and necessary function of government. I support this concept and I suspect that if you pulled rental providers, most would agree with this. However, there are things that need to be considered and this is important. If regulations require individual rental providers to support the rent burdened, there will be little to no incentive to rent to anyone in a lower income level bracket. This would be contrary to the goal of providing a vibrant and equitable housing system, one that serves the entire community, not just the chosen few. Lower income tenant protections are fine, but don't burden don't burden just the rental providers. These are public issues and should be funded by the public at large not just one small group of business owners. Let's look at Albany Village. The actual number of household units in the village is closer to 1263 not the 974 as stated in the reports because of recently completed units. It is fair to assume that most of those student tenant households are in a lower income category and therefore account for a very large percentage of our rent burden residents. The data as presented does not distinguish this. It is important to remember that the Albany Village residents will not be affected by anything the city enacts. Yet they represent a huge percentage of the renters in Albany. Therefore, are draconian measures justified? Sure, there are and probably always will be a few renters who need assistance and on some level, but I urge you to set up publicly funded programs to take care of these situations. A one-sizefits-all

approach is not justified or wise policy. Thank you for your comments.

Uh hello, I'm Elaine Stelton. Um, some say tenants are over 50% of the population, but when you take Albany Village out of the out of the equation, depending on whose numbers you look at, uh, that number drops dramatically. I'm concerned about any attempt to draw meaningful conclusions based on the survey that Albany did and also by the co-mingling of data. I mentioned I worked for the census and we did go doortodoor in Albany and of course Albany Village was a very big concern of ours and I can go into more detail about that uh given that it was during the pandemic. Um however one thing I noticed is Albany rents are extraordinarily high and the people who live in Albany Village are tenants so of course they're cost burdened. they um are not working full-time. Many of them are families if they're in the village. And so all that data is co-mingled. I called Albany Village today to ask them if they keep track of who is lowincome and they don't. So I'm but we can be pretty sure that a good segment of our population that is claiming to be costbururden um and probably is cost burden is actually living in Albany Village. Um in addition to that as mentioned uh by Mr. has um the village has their own eviction system in place and it's more expedited than our system but that data additionally is co-mingled with our data. So it's very hard to sus out w with regard to Albany Village being such a very large portion of um tenants in Albany. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Hello there. My name is Bryce Nesbbit and I came here tonight to tell a rent control story. I have a bunch of them, but tonight just one. Um, and a disclosure, I'm a my extended family are beneficiaries of rent control. Uh, an extended family member has an apartment in Greenwich Village in New York City and uh, they pay $105 a month and have for decades. their stability allowed them to hold on to that rent and uh where someone who had to move would not have that advantage. My rent control story uh is from locally on Marin Avenue, my parents home, and uh when I was one year old, they had extra space in their house. So, they started renting out uh what eventually became my bedroom to a student during the term. And then every summer it was a guest bedroom and then another student, often the same student. And that going back and forth was fine at the time. Uh but eventually with the uh passage of the rent control ordinance in Berkeley, uh that became impermissible. Uh but they didn't notice. Then eventually a student moved out and instead of a new student, uh an older guy came. Turns out that he'd missed his bus. So, he was going to go to a different house, but he went to my parents and he moved in. But he didn't move out 3 months later. He stayed. He stayed for 25 years. The last five of which he was unable to pay rent. But I'm telling this story to talk about a situation where there was access to a room or a place in a house that's just not possible under rent control. Had you out of rent control, that place would have been a guest bedroom all the time.

Thank you. Thank you for your comment. After Daniel is uh Robert C and Aaron.

Good evening, honorable city council members. My name is Daniel Winkler. Some of you may know me. I was on the housing commission with Aaron and I'm here to speak to you tonight on this subject matter regards to this rent ordinances. Um I think the presentation that Mr. has put together and Ms. Mendes did was actually very fair. I was surprised to see it come out that way considering how the voting went during our meetings at the Alb Housing Commission. My first point of feedback during all the HAC meetings we had, we did not have any tenants coming to the meetings with protests, signs saying anything about the rent rates in Albany. It was eerily quiet from members of the rental community. We did have a rental resident call in, I believe, once or twice. But the people that showed up were the people that provided the housing. From this observation, I started to ask myself, where is the crisis? Where are the folks that are complaining about the rent or how their landlord may treat them? from fellow commissioner Margie Marx. I heard that she does a laundry day in Albany and that the folks that come there all talk about how bad the owners are, that they provide the housing and it's in poor condition and they're afraid to complain or they'll get evicted or they'll get harassed. So, one day I went to the laundry day that Margie hosted. Now, I think what Margie is doing there is great and it's a great community service. I talked to six folks doing their laundry through Margie's program and not one person complained about their housing provider or their housing. Quite the contrary. In fact, several stated that their housing provider did a great job taking care of the property. So again, where is the crisis? From a rent control perspective, I understand the need for managing the increases and the state has provided such a regulatory environment and framework for rent control or rent increases. But what is lacking even at the state level is means testing. There is no reason that rent control should allow rich people to squat in rent controlled housing. If rent control is designed to protect low and very low income, that is understandable, but is

not there to protect the more fortunate in our society, the folks earning 200,000 a year or more. All city Daniel, thank you for your comments. Your time is up. Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Robert Chastiy. I'm a lawyer and I'm here on behalf of Bernie and Lois who own 1350 Solano, one of the largest complexes in Albany, 27 units, not a single one of which is being rented for more than $2,000. All of them are rented below market. There hasn't been a single eviction filed in the decades I've been involved with them as clients. What I can say that they have done is they've taken in quite a few members of the Tibetan community, some of whom were refugees. And I don't know if you all know who professor is, but he is the gentleman who basically lived on Solano Avenue making wire sculptures and uh making taking aluminum cans and turning them into flowers. Well, the Jodans have taken him in. They've given him an apartment and he's thriving. He hasn't been on the street. Sits at a bus bench now, but he's doing well. And that's because that's the kind of people the chosen are. What I can say to you is they've asked me to come and say to you that please don't make their job any harder. Don't force them to raise rents to protect themselves. I think the staff recommendation seems reasonable. I think that their approach seems very reasonable and balanced. So, I ask you to consider that there are real people that don't want to sell out to larger corporations that are going to have their apartments run by property managers who will jack the rents through the roof. These guys have been in business for since the 1960s with historic historic low rents consistently. So, thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments. Good evening, council, and thank you for considering tenant protections this evening. My name is Aaron Tedman, and I serve as the chair of the housing advisory commission, though my comments tonight are solely my own. I would urge the council to direct staff to develop an anti-harassment ordinance, just cause ordinance, and a rent stabilization ordinance. All three of these policies received the support of the hack and would help those in our community who are most at risk of staying in their homes with and help them stay in their homes without fear of being priced out of our community. As I say in more detail in the letter I sent into the council, I do not believe we can rely on state law to fulfill our community's needs. Simply put, those laws are extremely difficult to enforce, leave significant gaps in coverage, and do not adequately limit harmful practices. In the case of harassment, state law does not define harassing behaviors, making it n impossible for tenants to claim protections, especially as they usually lack the legal representation to do so. For rent stabilization, the materials presented this evening clearly clearly illustrate the need for local measures as they show the rent state the state rent cap would allow a 54% increase in 5 years. The fact that we have not hit this level with only a 30% increase in the same period does not mean the policy is not necessary, considering that either increase is completely unaffordable for the average working-class family. Furthermore, I find it a little confusing that the materials tonight suggest relying on the rent review program, which the hack concluded was not worth continued funding. Finally, on just cause, the materials this evening clearly show that around 15% of our housing stock is currently not covered by state just cause. The renters in these smaller properties are just as deserving of just cause protections as any others. In some I urge the council to reject the argument that there is no problem and even if there was, it would be too difficult to do anything. Our efforts to protect any members of our community from harm cannot be based on the frequency of that harm. No one should be harassed, displaced by a high rent increase, or evicted without good

reason, regardless of whether they are one of many or alone in their suffering. I thank the council for considering this tonight and I uh thank the HAC for their work on this. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. I have online. Is there any last comment from the audience? We'll move to online.

Evening council mayor and council members. My name is Sia Farakala and I'm a housing provider both in Alama and Albany. I want to ground this discussion in what is actually happening on the ground. Over the last two years, we moved in 11 homeless or displaced individuals into our Alama building. 11 people needed stability. Those placements required flexibility and screening, coordination with housing groups, patients, extra oversight, and real financial risk. We took that risk because housing stability matters. Now, here's the reality I need you to hear. In Albany, I've been carrying seven to nine vacancies. I have personally contacted housing groups. I've asked for referrals on onebedrooms, two bedrooms, and three bedrooms. In any family makeup, in any type of makeup, there are none. No one can provide me any kind of a referral. Not because we refuse them, not because we are excluding them, because they are none. At the same time, we're being asked to absorb more mandates, EV charging infrastructure, retrofits, heat pumps, regardless of the bandwidth of an owner. This is not about resisting progress. is about capacity. When you mandate upgrades, our ability to maintain the property responsibly, increase relocation penalties, and layer on additional regulation all at once, you're increasing pressure on the same small providers you're also expecting to take on higher risk placements. Insurance has increased, utilities have increased, labor has increased, materials have increased. These are not abstract pressures. They are monthly bills. At some point, something has to give. If operating in an environment that is too unstable to sustain, small providers will not argue. They won't protest. They will quietly stop participating. They will stop taking chances on complicated placements. They will put stop absorbing additional risk. They will pull back. Not because they don't care, because they can't carry more. And the people who will feel the

feel that first are not the owners. The next they are the next displaced family looking for a key. I'm willing to continue taking this risk for this community, but if policy ignores capacity and assumes unlimited bandwidth. Thank you for your comments. Just to remind the people on online, we we're on a two-minute clock.

Hello.

Go ahead, please. Go ahead. Uh uh uh dear uh council members uh I'm a small housing provider in Albany and I have a like a four points I want to make. The first is based on my own experience the rent increase from 2020 to 2025 is not a is not good way to look at the rent increase. you should in include both 2018 and 2019 because from 2019 to 2020 there is a significant rent decline um in urban and if you increase those years the rent increase per year will be much lower than your chart shows. Second um already has a rent review program and it's we know that it's not used sufficiently. So um we should use that program more for the tenant protection first. If it does not work then we can include more rent regulation. Number three uh California already has AB 1482 which limit any rent increase to 5% and requires a just cause eviction after one year tendency. So for a city like Armony, this law already provides meaningful tenant protection without requiring expensive local rent board, new fees and complex regulations. Number four, company should not create a new problem that does not exist. Based on the the research you showed, does not have a eviction problem for tenants. Thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments. Hi, I'd like to just point to the data that you guys have point uh have provided which is about.34 and 28 eviction filings per 100 render households. So about 90 95% eviction filings get settled and that means that in 2024 you have about 1 point um uh three eviction file evictions and 2025 you have about 1.1 evictions. So that's a that seems to me to be reasonably low. And then I also want to point out that after eviction moratorum ended, people were worried about the uh eviction tsunami. So Berkeley tracked eviction filings after the month after eviction ended. And it turns out the people that were evicting the most was Saha, the federally subsidized housing that was provide that was housing seniors. So they were evicting seniors out into the streets and filing notices for that. That was very alarming. And when people looked into that, it turns out that they have higher overhead costs as a nonprofit housing provider. They couldn't really compete with small mom and pops. A lot of them were immigrants, and they were willing to just work hard on weekends, painting, landscaping, doing roofing themselves. They weren't going to hire expensive plumbers, electricians. They did the work themselves, and they were able to pass on that hard work to provide more competitive, lower rent. They were nobody's going to beat out a hardworking um immigrant who were willing to sacrifice for their kids so they could put their kids to school and have

opportunities that were denied them. And so I suggest that you look at the most efficient ways to provide housing and support small local housing provider who do the hard work and essential services of housing uh and deliver it uh fixing leaky plumbings than doing things.

Thank you for your comments. Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Kieran Shenoi. I'm the government government affairs director for the Bridge Association of Realtors. On behalf of uh Bridge A, I want to thank staff for a thoughtful data-driven analysis of local tenant protection measures. Too often in the Bay Area, rental regulations are advanced first and justified later. That is not what is happening here. staff examined eviction trends, rent increase data, enforcement realities, and the existing state law framework before recommending next steps. The report shows Albany has a very low eviction rate, limited rent increases relative to state caps, especially when not including data from UC Village, and no evidence of widespread harassment and discrimination. That kind of factual grounding should guide policy. Cities like Oakland and Berkeley have often moved forward with sweeping rental regulations based on antecdote alone. And we continue to see those jurisdictions return year after year with claims of crisis despite everinccreasing regulatory frameworks. Albany staff should be commended for taking a more measured evidence-based approach. We also want to express our appreciation to Mayor McUade for engaging thoughtfully with all stakeholders and for fostering open and constructive dialogue on this issue. That type of leadership strengthens the policymaking process. Bridge A looks forward to partnering partnering with the city to help educate residents on existing state tenant protections and available resources. Please follow staff's recommendations, not the hacks unsupported position. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Good evening, city council members. Derek Barnes here, CEO of East Bay Rental Housing Association. We have about 1500 owners who operate about 60,000 homes across Alama County and Contraosta County, uh, providing homes for about 140 residents and most of our members own fewer four or fewer units. I also serve on the boards of Homebridge and Homerise and they provide permanent supportive services um, in these facilities. I want to thank you for this informative report, but please tread carefully. Always ask the question, what is the the problem that you're trying to solve? Please consider the impact to the community. More small owner operators are getting out of the business. We did a recent survey of our of our members and about 34% indicated that they wanted to exit the business within 24 months. Um, fewer below market rate housing is available. We're seeing vacancies across Alama County as high as 8 to 12%. We have to keep our eye on that um and figure out ways to bring those units back into the market. Um higher rents long-term or due to less availability and inventory. Please focus on education, education, education. As everyone said earlier, establish a housing hub, a one-stop shop for both renters and owners. Um also mediation first programs are very effective to ensure avenues of effective alternative dispute resolution between renters and owners and then also provide incentives for our legacy owners to keep them in business because they are the lifeblood of our most affordable units. Um and also offering incentives for developers to produce more housing so that you can meet your arena goals. Again, please focus on these important areas. You'll get the greatest ROI. education and

client and compliance. That's what we do at Ebra. Emergency rental assistance uh is also important because 90% of the eviction filings are due to non-payment of rent and alter alternative dispute resolution method. Thank you for your comments.

Okay, great. Thank you all for your comments and for your uh cooperation with each other. Let's bring it back to council. Who wants to start? Yeah, I can clarify one thing that just came up. I know in the question and answer there was some discussion about eviction rates in UC village as well as rents in UC village and why um my colleague here Chris asked accurately just you know relate that we can't kind of disperse or um take that information out of the data we have. I want to just clarify that any local program that the city would adopt would not be applicable to UC Village as a um as a California uh state campus. So, just wanted to get that out there before the discussion started.

Leslie, if I could follow up on that. Um the question I was going to ask earlier but I realized maybe it's would work at discussion level was um I appreciate staff's effort at getting the data and so using the the census and then filling in Zillow and in the means um in some ways I would love to see actually the Zillow data just from 2020 through 2025 and the um the census data just to have at least the Zillow data would be consistent across that basis. Um I will also say that uh that is not necessarily key to my decision any any decisions I might make in the future or or frankly even today uh because I I'm fearful always of analysis paralysis. Uh one can always hope for cleaner and better data. Um and I think uh sometimes you have to use what is what we are able to gather and use it as maybe not precisely exactly the rate of increase of rent but the trends. Um, and so I I would be interested in understanding the Zilla data from 2020 through 2025, but I don't um I would say that's not necessarily going to hold me up from from having a discussion today or or making some recommendations to staff.

Do you have any other comments relating to Sorry, I should have asked. No, not at that time. No, thank you. Okay. Um, I just want to bring up something about the Zillow data and I'll agree with one of the speakers that spoke earlier is that the Zillow data is not always accurate or you know I mean you might see something advertised but by the time it actually gets rented it's it's a much different price. Okay. Who would like to start the discussion? Sure. um your name who

whole position again. Yes. Uh just to follow up on that the and I'm understandable that this wasn't included the the 2024 American Community Survey estimates came out I don't know three weeks ago or so. Um so I looked at those and uh and to one of the commenters points of not just starting with 2020 of going back further um that data series which is a a rolling five-year set of statistics because of Albany size started in 2015 and what it showed is basically across the range of of rents as percentile um the increase since 2015 it's been about 1 to 2% % above inflation. It was basically flat through 2020. It took a big jump in 2020 and then has flattened out again. Um so looking over the long term. You take that for what it's worth. Um for me and for other reasons that makes me not inclined to rent stabilization. Um the only aspect of it that does interest me, but I don't think use a phrase the mayor used. um I don't think the juice is worth the squeeze per perhaps is that we have a large number of rented residences that are not the businesses have not applied for business licenses. We don't have a current estimate on that, but I know in the past it's been as many as nearing a nearing a thousand of the residences in the city. And so we have a lot of um rental providers who are not abiding by that aspect of the city's law. And so one of the propositions that was put forward under rent stabilization, one of the ideas that was put forward in the staff report was that um those businesses would not be allowed to raise their rent unless they get a business license because we need to know

um what those businesses are up to. Um we need that tax revenue to operate the city. But again, I think the the apparatus of having that probably is not the best way to accomplish the goal. But I would look to the city manager. Maybe that's something we can we can include as this um in this discussion. Just cause for eviction. Um again a suggestion was to require a business to have a business license in order to have access to eviction and I am in support of that. Again, given this very large gap between what the census says is the number of rented residences in the city and the number that are licensed um with the city and uh I am also interested in expanding the the housing types to which just cause um applies beyond what state law has. Uh and then for anti-arassment discrimination, um one of the letters we received indicated that MTC has a a template that brings much more specificity than state law has in that regard as to what behaviors are considered harassment and I am interested in that. Um I found that ABG actually has a a template ordinance and so the lift for staff to create that ordinance would be much reduced by utilizing that template. So that's where I'm opening my part of the conversation.

Vice Mayor, would you like to jump in? Okay. Council member Mickey,

maybe I'll I'll start with what actually um I do want to just express gratitude to the HAC and all those that participated and um I think the work that was done there is foundational to what was able to be presented today. Um I really appreciate staff and the consultant for what you have brought forward. I appreciate the breakdown of data. I I appreciate having a finer grain data but as I said earlier I also don't like to get caught up in analysis paralysis. It was helpful for me to understand that the 97 units that are in UC village what percentage that is in particular with the types of rental units that we have in the city. And so that framework is very useful in my mind. Um, as a former UC resident, um, I will say that, you know, I I I definitely on council have said I take issue with the presentation that 50% of Albany is renters because it included UC Village. I want to emphasize that is not because I do not um I remember living in the village. I remember the rent cost increases. I remember the burden that was on us, but our ability as city council members to affect change there as council members through legislation is not possible. As advocates for UC Village residents, we have a lot of power. But I bring this up because so many people I have met who have lived in Albany at some point in their life lived in the UC village. and the vast majority of those members were able to find someplace in Albany as part of a transition when they left UC Village. To me, UC Village is such a vibrant place that brings so much to us as a community. And the protections and things that we are talking about today,

while they do not apply to UC Village residents today, those who are able to find an affordable unit from many of our local providers who are saying they provide at a good at a low market rate. These are things that will assist them as they do this transition from being a UC Village resident to being um finding long-term housing in Albany. Um, you know, the issue we run in today is, you know, the result of 50 years of policy, right? We as a city, sorry, the city and its residents at the time, you know, changed our housing policies to say that we could only build single family houses in parts of our community and many parts of our community. And so I look at the efforts that the city has done, previous councils and this council in terms of saying San Pablo Avenue, yes, let's build more housing. I look at the state level implementation and our ability to implement ADUs and rejoice at the fact that we have 89, last count that I know of, we have 89 new rental units in the city of Albany. Um, and I say this because, you know, the policy of San Pablo Avenue specific plan, frankly, I think is was 15 years too late. We missed the last boat that raised new buildings being built all along San Pablo Avenue, and we don't know how long it'll be before that boat comes back. I'm a property owner. Uh the first property that my wife and I bought was a duplex in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania because we couldn't afford a single family house. But having a tenant meant that that helped us be able to afford to buy a property that frankly costs more

than a single family house, but helped us cover that mortgage and helped us be where we are today. Um and so I definitely can relate to the issues small property owners have. insurance costs, all the costs are going up. But on the other hand, regardless of whether or not the actual numbers are specifically correct about the percentage increase that we've seen for tenants, whether it's 24% as described in the document or 20%, that is that is for those at for those who live in Albany, regardless of what level income you are at, is extreme. I mean TW I I did the math and like uh $500 increase in monthly rent which is about what which is what the number shows at least in the data set that we have there equates to $18,000. So if if you assume if you follow the federal mandate that says you should spend no more than 30% of your in of your income on housing and transportation. Just that $500 increase means that you need to make $18,000 more a year, a fiveyear period. That is I don't know many people who have gotten that kind of a raise over the last five years. And that doesn't even include the cost burden that has increased in terms of transportation. And I would emphasize that those who are renting a single family house or living in a duplex are usually in a commercial building of less than four units. Those residents are also suffering from the increase in PG& costs. They are also uh if they're not in a in a building that uh the landlord pays for waste manage paying for the increases in waste

management. So the rental increase that we're seeing is only showing one piece of the picture for renters. Um, I I I would love to see more data. Not going to stop me making decisions tonight or in the next few weeks, but because I think we need more data and we need finer grain data. I actually believe that maybe we think the the juice isn't worth the squeeze. I disagree. I think we need to go after those landlords who are not following the law and doing getting a business license. I think we need to require a rent registry so we actually understand like Elserto found out that there are apartments are actually generally renting for less than market rate. One of my concerns with the rental rates and I'm not asking for an answer tonight is like how much are single family houses or duplex units skewing the numbers. Single family house is going to rent people will pay way more for a single family house than they will for uh an apartment unit. And so if we had an actual rental registry, if we actually went after people to make sure they had business licenses, we would have much finer grain data to truly understand what the issues for us to truly understand where are our rents in comparison to the market to our neighbors. Um I'm also uh in complete support of the anti-harassment. Um, as council member Jordan said, a bag has a policy, a template policy. Um, with a rental registry, I also am in in favor of rental inspections being mandatory. I think the nuances of what that looks like can vary. Um, but I think we should have a rental inspection program. Um, and I would hope that we

would continue to fund the mediation program we have through Echo Housing and the emergency rental assistance program, which is more of a general assistance program. Um, that's kind of where I land is I think we actually have to push really hard for the business license, get the rental registry, and really have an understanding of what is our true spread of uh rental uh costs and increases. Um I would agree with council member Jordan Nosa with the um eviction processes uh being contingent on someone having a business license. Frankly, if someone is implementing eviction process through the court system uh and they don't have a business license, I would say the city should be going after that landlord because they uh explicitly are not following the law today. Sorry, I said a lot there.

Council member Lopez.

Yeah. Yeah. I'll keep my comments brief for this evening. Um I think I'm on the similar boat as council member Mickey. I'd definitely like to see more information to work with. there are components that I think I would readily be agreeable uh at this juncture. However, it's also very clear that this is just a staff report. We're not making decisions. Um and it's very particularly clear in a staff report as well what the next steps are going to be. Um which is for the more more information to come down the line. Um you said much of what I wanted to share. you stole my thunder around um you know the whole contextualizing the the ecosystem of folks who come from the UC village and often find themselves living in Albany proper um in the ways in which that's facilitated um and maybe not by intentional design but it's it happens and you know I I made it very clear like that's a goal I I also have like you know we moved here because we wanted this community to be our forever community. Um, I don't know how people feel about my chief of staff living here permanently. Um, I know he raises a lot of hell around the city, but um, I think about that a lot and I think a lot about some of my neighbors who couldn't stay here anymore um, because of, you know, not just challenges of, you know, cost specific to Albany, but just a lot of what we're dealing with the, you know, our income not matching up with what we need to have, you know, livable wage to, you know, take care what we need to take of take care of. Um, you know, I'm very transparent about my situation in the village since moving here in

2022. I think I'm now paying almost 550 more than what I was paying uh when I first moved here. And that's partly because uh they got a little sneaky and uh decoupled the our parking uh space from our rental agreement. So there was this latent cost that they put in there. Um but that neither here nor there. Um but just to say like that concept of recognizing that when one large group of the community is costburden whether or not they you know any policy that we are trying to create or curate or debate or discuss. Um, even if that policy doesn't directly impact or benefit them, um, there's still something very intrinsic about that advocacy that makes people feel like, okay, this is where I want to live because I know this community gots my back. Um, and that's a lot of what makes Albany what it is. That part of that small town charm. Everyone knows each other and everyone knows that, you know, we're we're always looking out for each other. Um, all that just to say too, you know, when we can find ways to alleviate what it means to feel like we live in a striving ecosystem that doesn't always have to feel combative. We can make a lot of progress. Um, I'm thankful for witnessing what I witnessed this evening. I know you know we have a lot of opinions and views across the table. I've talked with uh you know folks uh within the landlord group and you know those respective stakeholders to understand better understand perspective understand you know where there might be common ground um and

such. Um, and even with that said, I still think there's a lot more that I need to digest and process in order to make uh decisions that I feel are of of the most benefit to the product community here. Um, but on the note of lack of folks resing their business license or res, you know, registering and getting their business license, I think there is a common theme happening here. Um there need there definitely needs to be better accountability there uh for folks who are out of compliance and um you know if they're getting away with that what else are they getting away with? What else is you know flying under the radar? Not saying people who don't get their business license uh aren't, you know, up to no are up to no good or anything like that, but sometimes that can be indicative of a slippery slope that's occurring. Um, but I also want to hold space and acknowledge that perhaps the bulk of the folks just don't recognize or realize that they're supposed to be getting their business license. I think that's the case and it does require it does warrant and require more education, more engagement with our folks to make sure we're we're breaking bread properly and making sure folks uh are where they where they need to be at in terms of being in alignment with our own policies here in the city as they exist right now. Um, I think for me that's the biggest thing right now is making sure that we are getting things up to speed and people up to speed with where they need to be as as they're supposed to operate within our codified language right now as a city. Um, and I think simultaneously we could, you know, do two things at the same time

where, you know, we're not monolithic people, but I think doing that, I think, could make it much more easier for us to then start identifying much stronger next steps and what that could look like because then we'll have more information, more data to work with, and have a better a better picture of what's happening here. Um, I'll I'll leave it at that. And I know I said I was going to keep it short, but sorry. Before we go on, it's 10:20. I'm going to move that we extend our meeting until 11:00. And mayor, would that include all the remaining items so that we could capture that?

Um, at this point, the next the next motion may change that. I'll second that. We have a roll call. Um, Council Member Lopez, yep. Council member Mickey, yes. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero, yes. Mayor McCuay, yes. And Council Member Jordan, yes. Carries.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. You want to go? Okay. Yeah. I thought you were keeping that short. Geez. Anyway, um all right. Well, let's see. As many of you know, um I'm fourth generation Albany. Um sitting in this room here tonight, I know a lot of people that are uh parents of friends of mine. Um a gentleman in here that I used to hang out with his mother and bring her firewood and and eat her cookies. And uh you know these are these are the landlords that I know and I am a realer but I'm also a tenant. And when I left my husband five years ago or more now um we had to sell our house and I had to find someplace to keep my kids here in Albany schools. I was fortunate enough to find a property provider who she had the house as her first house and um decided to make it a rental and bought another house and she has not raised my rent in over five years. She finally did just give me a rent increase of $50 per month. So, um, she's always been there. Whenever I've had any issues or anything breaks, I can call her and I can say, "I can fix this." Or she goes, "Oh, no, no, no. I'll I'll take care of it. I'll be over." Um, there was something that you had brought up about um the annual inspections. I don't want somebody coming around annually inspecting my stuff. And quite frankly, a lot of the insurance companies are already doing routine

inspections because they're dropping everybody's insurance. Um, you know, it's really hard for property providers and just for people who have homes right now to find the insurance they need that they're constantly being dropped um because insurance companies are finding it too expensive and too difficult to do business in our state. Um some of the other things that uh you know came up were um the one thing that I do have to say is again thank you for the staff report too you know because I really do believe that education is really our biggest lack um and you know really our our biggest need here is is the fact that we need more education not just for property providers but we do need that educ education for tenants as well. And um so that and and that was one of the reasons that I was very um grateful uh that my employer uh Daniel Winkler uh chose to agree to be on the hack committee so that I could bring in some sort of education because what I was constantly hearing throughout the community was misinformation and that's why I was very um en encouraging to to bring someone on there who understands the rules, the regulations, the laws, and everything else that goes into um being a property provider and also being a tenant. Um with all of the things that we face on council of you know um the uh seismic retrofits, the uh balcony uh you know

reconstruction safety issues, all these other things that are just mounting costs upon costs upon costs and they are getting unsustainable for the property. providers because we can keep pushing that but then we want to limit this and at some point it breaks. It doesn't work anymore. Okay? And I have talked to many property providers who have been here who have been good long-term property providers who I have friends who've been here for 30 plus years who are still living in the same house and have barely seen an increase over time. And I just think that, you know, a lot of our property pro providers should be commended for just how well that they've worked with their tenants throughout uh the years. And the fear that I have because I know that this is a fear my property provider has is as soon as you put in these stipulations, as soon as you make these requirements, then that sends fear into the property provider's head. Meaning now those people who've never had an increase in five years, like me, will now get increases every year. Because I'll tell you, when I lived in Dublin in an apartment complex, you better believe it, every January I would get my property increase. I would get my rent increased. Every year I lived in an apartment in Pleasanton, I'd get my rent increase like clockwork. And it was always the maximum that they could possibly do. And when you called them on the phone, they didn't care. So there's a big difference between who we have here and the corporate landlords

that do not exist here because we haven't had the restrictions because we haven't mandated extra regulations and laws and everything else. So just really really give a good thought to that. Can I respond to Council Member Hansen Romero's comments briefly? Um, many communities have annual inspections that are a simple form which the tenant can fill out. And I I find or I have found is an opportunity for for a tenant to understand is there something that's missing in the unit that should be in the unit. Whether that's a smoke detector, the fact that it is an issue if your gas range is not working, if not all the burners are working. And so it is not inherently a burden on the landlord and it is not a requirement ne depending on how the program is written uh that someone other than the tenant has to do the inspection but it is an opportunity both for education and understanding of what is the condition of my unit and what should the condition of my unit be. So I just want to raise that I totally agree. I think um myself I don't necessarily want someone walking through my house and inspecting it. I doubt that many of my tenants really want to do that either. Um so I would just raise that that that a rental inspection program does not have to mean that someone outside than the tenant is in it and it is all in the details of how the program is written. Um I would like to address one of the issues that you raised which I think is really important. We are fortunate in Albany that we have so many either long-term landlords or new landlords who have um not gone to the extreme of pushing the limit on how much they can increase rent.

But the one constant that we know is that um and I will say this only because the properties that my wife and I have been able to purchase were properties that were a motivated seller and the vast majority of those people were people who inher in inherited the property and they just wanted to sell the property. So the in the the goodwill and the good intent of the existing landlord does not protect the future the the the tenants to a future purchaser. I just want to raise that that I I want to acknowledge that we are fortunate that we have many landlords in Albany who are either renting at below market rate or not increasing rent frequently. But that is not an indicator of what it could be in the future. Uh so I just want to just say that I will also say that you know my wife and I we own a forplex in Berkeley and the only reason we could actually afford the forplex in Berkeley was because there was rent control because we had tenants where if you base the price you were willing to pay on what the tenants were actually paying. That's the only way we were able to afford the property. And that was a good number of years ago. What I have witnessed is there are many people going in and buying properties now where they don't they pay outrageously large prices that are not based on the rent. Um and so why do I say that the people that I generally have noticed who are paying way more are as you described the larger corporations, right? because they're the ones that can pay that bigger price because they have a 30-year look on what what the value of the property is going to be. Um, so funny enough, the rent control program in Berkeley actually meant that my wife

and I could actually buy a forplex in Berkeley. So I anecdotal, it's just one example. It's not exemplary of everything, but um I just want to raise that that like I I am not prepared to move forward on a rent stabilization program. Not because I don't think we shouldn't have a discussion, but because we have time, right? The existing state law stays in effect until 2030. I think it will become very clear as we get closer to 2030 whether or not the state legislature is going to extend that. But it also to me adds more emphasis that we need the business licenses, we need the rental registry, we need the data. So in 2028 2029 or essentially before the state level just cause and rent stabilation program sunset that we have better data to be able to make decisions based on sorry I didn't let you you have not had a chance to say

it's okay I'll wrap it up um again thank you to staff and our consultant for an excellent comprehensive report. And the one thing I just kind of want to back on to what or piggy back on to what you said is this is not going to be our final discussion on this. We're not going to make a final decision tonight, but we are I think going to be able to move ourselves forward, at least a little bit. Um I think what's what's come out across the board is education. We we need to do a better job of providing information both to the tenant and to the property owner because we've heard examples of property owners not knowing certain certain things. Maybe they don't know that there's a rebate their tenants could have or there's, you know, a variety of things. And it seems to me that we have we have a really strong property owner association right now. We can use you and we we we need you to help us in in this. And I think that by working together, property owners can help get the word out to their tenants of what their rights are and how they can have this. You know, the the rent review program, I will totally agree, is not working. But it's not working because nobody knows about it. And we need to make sure that the tenants know about it. We need to make sure that they know about the rent rebates. And I don't know that we know the tenants, but we know the property owners because you have business licenses and we're going to deal with those that don't. But those of you that do, we can communicate with you and you can help us get the word out of of what is available both to other property owners and to tenants. Um, you know, the one thing that I'm concerned about as we're winding down our app money at the end of this year is

that we figure out how to provide some rental assistance to people who need it. I think that's where we need to be really what we really need to be thinking about in the coming months, how we can do that. What could we shift around to get some revenue for that? What is the county really going to be able to provide through me measure W? far we haven't really seen anything, but maybe we we have friends in the county. Maybe they can help us on this. Um, I would like to add some anti-harassment language. I don't know what's in the AAG um template, but I'd like to see language around non-traditional families, uh prohibition of retaliation, um for tenant organizing, any sort of threat about immigration, um you know, those kind of things. I'd like to look at that again and and in the more near future. One idea that someone else brought to me and I thought it was a good idea is to require property owners to file eviction notices with the city. Not that we would say you couldn't evict anybody. That's not our purpose, but it would enable us to reach out to that tenant and perhaps offer them some assistance and maybe they don't need to be evicted. And and you know, it's just a little piece that maybe we could help with. Um, you know, we can't stress enough about the business license and I know that we're working on that, but that's really critical that everybody has a business license. And I saw in the staff report the idea of anformational expo to to provide information to both tenants and and property owners. And I'd like to see that as one expo where people come together and learn together and not siloing property owners and tenants, but coming together and learning together. That's what I would I would really like

to see. And with that, what else? What do you need now from us? I think what we need is a decision from the body as to what we should follow up and come back to you with specifically. I'm willing to make a motion. Okay.

Okay. um to ask staff to come back with an anti-harassment discrimination draft ordinance based on the AAG template um and the considerations that were raised in the staff report and that the mayor raised um to bring back an ordinance and and yeah and to bring back an ordinance for just cause for eviction that includes requiring a business license for eviction authority and to require filing of eviction notice with the city and to expand the the housing types that just cause for addiction applies to to um single detach residences and residences less than 15 years old and I think I'll stop there.

Could you repeat the third item? Uh well there was said there were well there's two two general items but in the I think maybe referring to the just cause for eviction item which is to there there's a table in one of the attachments um which is shows to what types of residences state law um currently applies and what types of residences a local ordinance could apply and so I want the I'm moving to have the local ordinance cover the range of residences that are allowed by a local ordinance to be covered um again this would be a draft that would come back so there could be further discussion at that time.

Um, Council Member Jordan, if I if I if I may, uh, what I hear is you're you're asking them to bring back policy options three, four, and five under just cause. The three was expanding to other housing types. Four was requiring eviction notices to the city, and five was requiring a business license for property owners required condition of eviction. Is that correct? That is correct. Thank you, Council Member Mickey. I'm sorry. Three, four, and five. Correct. In the interest of time, can can you remind me there was a summary of overall costs for various programs. Could you remind me where that is?

That is in attachment the last attachment which I think is attachment four. Yes.

And I guess to be to be clear on that um these are ordinances that would come back. So this is whether the city adopts these ordinances or not is not coupled with the city then spinning up some administrative process to enforce these ordinances necessarily. That would be a separate discussion. Um so a lot of the cost information in that attachment is discussing what other cities have done and how other cities have created administrative apparatus um for enforcing various of these My intent is rather that these will be on the books for use by tenants and awareness of rental providers um should uh the latter need them, the former need them.

Was there a I'm sorry I'm not seeing it right now. Was there a cost you know some of these definitely have cost comparisons with other cities. Does just cause have a projected cost to the city?

Excuse me. Um, drafting an ordinance and working to produce an ordinance will not be a significant cost to the city. That could be done with current staff time. Um, just as part of our workload. The it would be associated cost of anything that you choose to do in terms of um kind of the monitoring and operations if there's any enforcement of any of the words that we the ordinances that are adopted. The actual ordinance adoption fiscal costs are minimal. It's actually establishing the program to follow up even if it is establishing um we haven't gotten there like a registry. what is that going to look like? Who's going to be gathering the data? Who's going to be following up? Ensuring that folks are um submitting for the rent registry if they haven't already been submitting, you know. So, it's establishing in and of itself as long as it doesn't involve creation of new software or something is is cost minimal. It's the the followup and enforcement is where we can depending on what you move forward with tonight, we can move forward with some um more detailed cost analysis.

To be clear, we do not have that staff person. Uh so this would be a new program, a new administration overhead. Uh so we would need to come back with some numbers and some resources on how we would

staff this. So, so again just to reiterate, my intent is not implying that program is implying just the adoption of the ordinances so that those are legally available as protections um to tenants. And so they would be able to avail themselves of that that protection, but the city wouldn't necessarily be having a program to enforce a monitor. Now, we could discuss having a program to enforce a monitor, but that is not part of my motion. My motion is just to get these ordinances I guess I don't understand why you would have an ordinance that you knew you weren't going to be able to enforce. That doesn't make sense to me. But that's Well, so for instance,

well, it's it's sorry, it I mean it's essentially an ordinance that is enforced on on a um it's it's like our parking ordinance. No one the police do not drive around seeing if you're blocking a driveway. They only do it when someone calls to say someone's blocking my driveway. Uh a little more complicated.

A little more complicated, but but it um you know, and and and what I would say um uh what I'm hearing from Council Member Jordan is we can pass these ordinances and choose to staff it and enforce it or choose to simply have it on the book. I will tell you now that my preference is that we staff it because I believe the other programs which were not included in council members Jordan's motion or uh uh will need staffing. But I I will make that as a separate motion because I do not I I would like us to make a clean vote on what council member Jordan has proposed and then I would will be raising other issues that I would like us to vote on. Is there

and now I have completely forgotten what council member Jordan asked for outside of the three just cause items. Just and just checking. Do we need to vote or is it just giving staff recommendation? Well, I I think it's helpful for us to at least vote on what our recommendations to you are. Is that correct? Yes. I have not heard a second on this. Um if council member Jordan would indulge us in repeating what happened before just Cause. Yeah. So, what happened just before Just Cause was the um bringing back a draft ordinance based on Abag's anti-harassment template

with consideration for the the various matters that the mayor raised, which I think from reading the template were covered, but some of them may not be. So, that just needs to be a check. So, it was just those four items. So, I will second that with the understanding that now wait a second. But we also had been talking about you wanted more there was more data needs for things. I I will I will have a follow-up motion after this. Okay. I I I don't want to mix in things that not everyone might support and I'd like us to understand where we stand on diharassment and the three just cause items. So in that sense I will I will second this motion. Okay.

Um there's no other discussion. Let's move to a vote. Council member Jordan. Yes. Council member Lopez. Yep. Council member Mickey. Yes. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero. Yes. Yes. Mayor McQuay. No. The motion carries.

Um like to make a motion. I would like to make a motion uh that staff uh explore the rental registry, rental inspection. Um and I'm going to leave business license out of that because as the mayor mentioned, there are already processes going underway for that. Is there a second for rental registry and rental inspections? I'll second that. Is there any discussion there?

Yeah. So I I expressed previously that I think I know the data is not perfect but because of the American community survey data I was not necessarily inclined to this expense. Um given attachment four it appears that if this were to come into existence it would be a fee. It's on each rented residence, at least the ones that have business licenses. Um, is that how you envision this would be funded if it were to go forward?

I would love for staff to come back to us with an understanding of what kind of cost it would be for these items so we understand if that is something that uh how we would cover it. So, I I I will be honest with you, I don't know if that's a fee. I don't know how, but those I think are things that I think are important for us to have because again, I don't I have not looked at the American community survey information. So maybe it breaks it down much finer grain than just that average that we saw. But if that average is including single family houses, right, it's going to skew that number because houses not all well the houses that I know of around my house, they go for a very large number.

Yeah. So and that would skew things. And really the American Community Survey has breakdowns by well has 25th, 50th, 75th percentile rent. It has one, two, and threebedroom rent. So those are the breakdowns that are that are available. So you know there is some granularity there. Um is Could you restate your motion? So I um it was uh for staff have to come back with a rental registry and rental inspection program ordinance. a draft program. Sure.

Okay. I mean, we we are going to get we are going to see what staff says. We're going to understand hopefully we'll have a ballpark cost estimate, right? Is this a staff person? What what what to what extent is this? Um, and the reason why I asked for this if we are going to I I kind of agree with council w with Mayor McCuade that passing an ordinance that we are not going to actively be on the on your previous motion. We're not actively going to be trying to implement and and regulate. Um, I'm very interested in hearing that discussion when it comes back to us. But if we have that and we have a sense of that cost and we have a sense of what it would cost to add this other program, maybe it's a small percentage increase of the program, the motion that we just passed, right? Or maybe it's outrageously large, right? Like I don't the the examples that were given by staff are helpful to frame, but they are not um they're not exactly what we're asking for. And so it would be helpful to have a sense of the range. I'm finally looking at Leslie because I recognize that there may not be better data than what she's already provided us, but I I I'm simply asking this question.

Yeah, I guess I don't see the nexus between this program and enforcement of just cause and harassment. I mean, this program would be more rent related to rent stabilization data as I, you know, as I understand because it's purely cost data. It's not about eviction, why people leave, things like that. Okay. Just wondering if we have a housing officer who is covering many things. Okay. Thank you.

Uh did we have a second? I'm just verifying that we actually Oh, yes, that's right. Sorry. Can I just clarify really quick? it. So what you're asking is is this similar to what we had brought some time ago regarding measure R is I'm asking because I'm curious are the numbers going to look the same from what we've previously looked at already because I do worry about laboring staff if the work's already been done. So I think me measure R the only of intersection of the sets. Okay. As I understand it would be the um inspection component.

Okay. So measure R would have funded the emergency rental support for households that had financial difficulty and legal representation for both um rental providers and tenants. And then the property property inspections or Yeah. So I think it was only and I I will come back with the housing inspection side of it. There's a wide spectrum of what that could be. And so some cities it's simply a form that's filled out, right? And you tenant signs and the property owner signs that this is this is the as opposed to sending a inspector to a building which is a different enforcement side of things.

Did you Oh, go ahead. I I just have a clarification on the motion. Um I don't know if this is the appropriate time to ask. Um, but for the second motion, I'm you mentioned drafting an ordinance and I'm wondering if you wanted to have further information on kind of program availability like more detailed program options before we drop yes an ordinance as well as associated costs. Ballpark costs ballpark. Well, yes. I I think they'll end up being ball park anyway. More details. Ballpark cost, not an ordinance. Yes.

And did you give us ballpark cost on the registry? Wasn't that included somewhere? It is an um attachment for what other costs? We would assume depending on the scope of the pro uh the the program being adopted that at a minimum it would be one uh related to a a senior level planner and I costed out um one and a half being a full senior and a half assistant. So the the price I put in there was one and a half. So again, if it's just a rental registry, we'd probably go down to one, you know, once it comes into inspection followup. If there's other um it's really dependent on the scope of what this council decides. Okay.

Just to clarify again, is this just the rent registry part or is this the rent registry and the inspection? My motion was both. Okay. Thanks. Okay, let's vote. Mayor McCuay, no. Council member Jordan, no. Council member Lopez, I'll have to abstain at this time. Council member Mickey, yes. and vice mayor Hansen Romero. No motion fail.

Um I'm wondering do you want to move just the inspection part? I I think it sounds like you might want to move just the inspection part. I I will move um to bring back models of inspection programs um perhaps in consultation with council member Mickey given this I think this is an area of at least some expertise of your part you seem to know about different models that exist. I have some experience with different models. Yes. Okay.

Um I'll second that. There any discussion? I'm assum you guys are jumping in at this point. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero. No. Mayor McQuade. Yes. since it's only coming back with information. Council member Jordan, yes. Member Lopez. To Mayor Mcuade, yes. And council member Mickey,

yes. Motion carries. I just want to clarify for everybody that's in the room too, a lot of this is just bringing back information and um kind of regardless of of how these votes go, we're asking staff to bring us back additional information to review and um understand further. And that is part of the education that I think a lot of us are all wanting to have just in general again the education and the transparency of things. So I just want to reiterate that.

Mayor I had one more motion or actually maybe this is a request of staff first. Maybe it doesn't need to be a motion. Uh so um uh during the presentation uh it was mentioned that many cities have a specific landing page

for housing that was meant for both tenants and landlords. Um I would love if possible for staff to move with haste to create such such a website. um knowing that some we already have plenty of data or information that could be on that website, but I look at it as the ability for tenants and landlords to understand in one place what is being what are their roles and responsibilities as stated under um city of Albany. I don't know if that needs to be a motion. I don't I'm looking at Nickel. Understood and already underway.

Perfect. I I like that even better. Anyone have any other motions to make? We got a big one in a minute. Um, I have a motion to extend if we want to handle the last item. I have a feeling it's going to go pretty fast, I suspect. Um, so I will I will move to extend to 11:15 only to cover and I forget what number it is, but to cover the 111 11 um and not to go through the rest of the agenda beyond that. I'll second that.

11:15. Yes. Um, council member Mickey. Yes. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero. Yes. Mayor McUade. Yes. Council member Jordan. Yes. Council member Lopez. Yep. Extended to 11:15. Okay. Um there anything any last words from council on this? Are we done? I'm done.

Okay. Thank you all. To those of you that are left, thank you for being here. Okay. That brings us to item 11-1, heat pump rebate program. Thank you for hanging in with us, both of you. No problem at all.

Okay. Uh, yeah, good evening, council. Michelle Plaus, community development analyst. Going to do my best to be very quick. So, I've got an update um and also a recommendation on the heat pump rebate program tonight. Quick background, this program was created four years ago now in March of 2022. Um we launched in June of that year and then in February 2023 uh updated the program to create a moderate income level rebate. Updated again in February 2024 to create uh or to increase the low and moderate income levels. And then most recently in July of 2025 created water heater rebates and also ended the standard income HVAC rebate. So just you know for simplicity we're currently in stage four of the program. The previous stage was stage three. Next slide please. So this is the program as it stands right now. As you can see for folks that are not income qualified the only rebate available is for the water heater. uh that's a $500 rebate and there's a electric panel bonus. And then for moderate and low-income folks, that water heater rebate is 1,500 and 3,000. And then there are 3,000 and $6,000 rebates for ducted HVAC systems for heat pumps. And then also the ductless system is 1,000 and 2,000 which gets doubled or tripled for multiple ductless units. Next slide, please. Um, so overall the program as a whole has reserved or paid 139 rebates so far. 20 of those have been for low-income households and 18 for moderate income households. Um, and we've paid out a little over $260,000 in rebates, either paid or reserved. And

um one of the really big things that we've seen in this most recent stage in the last 7 months or so is a really big jump in income qualified applications. 350% increase compared with stage three. And you can see um in the chart here there's just this, you know, this huge bump. We've seen growth steady over time each time we've updated the program, but this one has been even more significant, especially in that moderate income category. Next slide, please. Um, so I'll dig a little bit more into the details of what's been happening over the last few months. Um, so with our water heater program, these are the brand new rebates. So far, we've had 11 rebates reserved and two more in process. I think they're actually reserved now. Um, two of those have been for low-income households and three for moderate income. It's been a little bit smaller of a number than of rebates than we expected, but a slightly higher proportion of those income qualified ones. I had kind of, you know, projected that the the money saved from ending that standard income HVAC rebate would effectively pay for the water heater rebates. And so far that's been proven to be basically true. Um, so it's good news. It's about as many as we were hoping we would get. We've seen growth in heat pump water heater installations and of course with the rebate applications. So that seems to be chugging along well and about as we expected. Next slide, please. The big shift that we didn't expect and is good news is a huge growth in incomequalified HVAC rebates. So we've seen just a massive surge in applications uh since that program change in July. So in stage three on average we were seeing you know about 04 lowincome applications per month and.3 moderate income applications. In the last several months, it's been one low-inccome application per month

and 1.4 moderate income applications per month. So, almost five times as many moderate income applications. Um, and about two and a half or whatever times as many lowincome applications. So, really, really large growth. It's been pretty consistent over those seven months as well. It's not, you know, huge waves and valleys or anything. Um, we're not entirely clear on what the reason is to be honest. Um, you know, it could be related to the federal rebates going away or that, you know, the tax credits going away. It could be related to, you know, just general market conditions. It could be that as we've been chugging along and spreading the word, it's finally started to really click and more and more people know about it. It's hard to say for sure, but it is good news that we're we seem to really be making an impact there. The flip side of that equation, of course, sorry if you could go back for a second, um is that it is a much higher cost for the rebate program. Um, you know, basically taking this rate that we've seen and projecting it out for the full fiscal year, we're expecting that it'll cost $75,000 more than we expected it to over the course of the fiscal year just for these income qualified HVAC rebates. So, that is a big change. Um, but as I said, it is good news that we're making an impact. Um, you know, these are really the folks that we've been trying to target with every change of the program, trying to find a way to reach these people better. Um, and from our survey data, we know that the program is really helping them make that decision and making it financially feasible for them to electrify. Um, you can see here, especially for low-income folks, there's a huge number that are saying they probably wouldn't or definitely wouldn't have chosen a heat pump if it weren't for the program. So, it's really the main thing making that difference. And that's true for a lot of moderate income

folks. And a lot of moderate income folks are also sort of on the fence, maybe not sure, and it's helping them jump to the other side. Next slide, please. A few other notes on the program. we had a sunset period um for those those standard income HVAC rebates so that we didn't kind of leave anyone in a lurch when they were halfway through, you know, getting their project ready. Um and we did see about twice as many applications during that period as I expected us to. You know, I thought we'd have a bump, but we actually had 12 applications in that two-month window. Um, so I know just anecdotally that there were some folks who really like made the decision because it was ending and it really got them over that hump, which is great. Um, but again, also increasing that cost more than we expected. So those 12 applications cost us a little over $10,000. Um, and then we also had some holdover rebates from last fiscal year that, you know, just got delayed for one reason or another. Um, so that was $16,000 that were reserved last fiscal year but paid this fiscal year. Which brings me to the budget. Thanks, Ann. So our budget for the program was $30,000. So far this fiscal year, we've paid $87,000. We've reserved $30,500. And based on the application rate that we've seen, I'm expecting that through the rest of the fiscal year, we'll have about $52,000 in applications coming in. So that leaves a pretty large gap. As I'm sure you can tell, there's $139,500 needed to cover what's been paid or reserved and that projected cost for the rest of the fiscal year. So a very large chunk of money. Um the climate action and adaptation reserve fund does have a balance of 152,362.

Currently 125,000 of that has been appropriated for the gas line decommissioning project. Good news about that appropriation is that it's really not necessary anymore. That was made during a time when it was really unclear whether the Department of Energy grant funding was going to come through. And since then, we have been given access to those funds. We've been getting, you know, paid regularly by the Department of Energy. It seems like we're not having an issue with that anymore. So, you know, we as staff feel like there's no issue with unappropriating that funding effect effectively and using that for the heat pump rebate program. Um, so with that, the recommendation, thanks an uh, is to adopt the resolution, which I'm sure has a number by now. Uh, sorry about that. Um, which resins resolution 20257, which was the one that, uh, authorized those funds for the gas line decommissioning program. Um, and authorizes the appropriation of 139,500 of the available fund balance of the climate action adaptation reserve for the heat pump rebate program. Thank you. Are there any council questions? There any anyone online? All gone to bed.

There are people online, but no one is. Now we have a hand up.

Wow, guys. I thought uh I would have to raise my hand after the questions. No one has any questions. Well, this is Nick Peterson with Albany Climate Action Coalition. Man, I almost didn't last through all the last ones. Um, thank you staff. Thank you Michelle. This is really success of this, especially with the low and moderate income uh applications going way up is just really great and you guys have done a fantastic job on this. So, this is probably the mo one of the most successful things we've done has had a really big impact. So, I just I'm very supportive of uh making the payment uh the 139,000. Um it it's already done good work. We don't need to worry about DOE bailing on us anymore, which is great. Um, the other thing I I'm wondering about, and again, this is just having a little bit more transparency on the climate action reserve fund, is supposedly we're getting in about $300,000 a year for that. And I guess the program has only been going for two years, but it'd be really interesting that I mean, it isn't like measure DD is shutting that off. We're still going to be getting more. So in depleting that fund uh you know we're not it's not like then we have nothing left or virtually nothing left. So anyway I I recommend or or strongly um request that the council p accept this. Thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments.

Is there one more? Okay. I Yes. I hope I'm the last one. This is Gene Woo and I um commend um everyone for um approving this program and then also for modifying it to really provide a pathway for low-income and moderately low-income people to do the electrification that we all need to do. Um, I'm concerned that the amount that's going to be left is small and wondering what the process is and how we know how much is going to be coming in and when and if there's going to be a potential halt to the program because there'll be a gap in the funding. So I would really um like that if we could learn more about how the program DD the funds are coming in and also potentially to save off any potential gap in funding so it doesn't have to stop and start um stopping and starting in tech clean and some of the other programs has caused tremendous havoc with electrification and planning and people who think that they might want to do it and then the thing stops and then they just say forget get it and they don't even want to consider it again. So making sure that there is no gap will be really important to continue the momentum. Um so yes, I urge you to vote yes. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Any final comments from council? I'll just offer I think some of the the conversation that commenters were um suggesting maybe could happen in the context of this plan update. Yeah. Okay. I see the city manager nodding. So, with that, I will move um passage of resolution 202610. I'll second. Council member Lopez. Yep. Council member Mickey, yes. Vice Mayor Hansen Romero, yes. Mayor McQuay, yes. And Council Member Jordan, yes. Motion carries.

Thank you. All right, we're skipping 12. We are skipping 13. We are skipping 14. Things are on the website. That will bring us to adjournment. But wait a minute. I do have something I'd like to say tonight as we close. As we close tonight, we hold in our hearts the many families, including members of our own community, who are affected by violence and instability abroad. We think of the children, the loved ones waiting anxiously for news, and those serving in harm's way far away from home. We grieve for those who have died. And we recognize that lasting peace depends on reasonable, authentic, responsible dialogue grounded in justice. And with that, we are adjourned.