City Council - Regular Meeting

Belvedere City Council meeting for Monday, July the 13th. Beth, can you call the roll?

Council Member Cooper. Present. Council Member Burke.

Here.

Mayor Wilkinson. Present. Council Member Mark.

Here.

Council Member Carapiet.

Here.

Great. We will adjourn into closed session. Do I have to read the items or not? No. Okay. Sorry, not awake. Is there any public comment on the closed session agenda items? There are no public present. Okay, thank you. And we will adjourn. Great, I will reconvene our City Council meeting for Monday, July 13. There is nothing to report out from the closed session. We will therefore move on to item number three, which is reports and presentations. So firstly, City Council reports, does any council member have a report?

So I attended the RBRA meeting this month, or actually last week, and we were able to receive funds from the Marin Community Foundation to grant for the monitoring of the eelgrass with a new submersible device. And also that the county added to their 2627 budget, the $300,000 shortfall for the housing in the current RBRA budget. And a big thank you went to Supervisor Stephanie Moulton Peters for her champion this with the County and for, um, future County, um, resources, um, to provide, um, the housing, uh, portion of RBRAs, um, mandate. That's it. Anybody else?

Okay. Council member care and I attended the annual a bag meeting in June. And unfortunately, the report from them about the housing element number seven was not very positive. They think the numbers are going to go up. And they also said on what they considered plus side that the state will be releasing the numbers. HCD will be releasing the numbers a year earlier than they did in the past. and that jurisdictions should consider beginning their process as soon as they hear what their number is and not wait, even though the date that element six is finished is 2031. So they were recommending people start even as soon as 2728, given that the number will be given out at that point. So not a fun meeting, but we were there. That's it. Thank you.

Anybody else?

Nothing to report.

Kate, I just wanted to report briefly on Marine Clean Energy, or MCE, as it's now known. I serve as Belvedere's representative to the agency, and MCE provides electricity generation to almost all residents in Belvedere. It's gone through some pretty significant changes over the last month. There was a very critical grand jury report that was published, and the longtime CEO departed from the agency in the past month as well. It's a challenging time for Marine Clean Energy, but I regard these changes as an opportunity to strengthen MCE and the board is working aggressively to hire, has hired an independent governance consultant to look at the board structure, as well as put in place a search committee to look for permanent CEO. Sitting on this board, I have always advocated for strong governance and procurement decisions that balance affordability, reliability, and our climate goals. And I will continue to do so and do think that these changes, while difficult, will lead in that direction. If nobody has any further comment from the dais, can I see whether there's any public comment on city council reports? Seeing none in the room, is there anything online? Mayor Wilkinson, there are no hands raised. Great. In that case, we'll move on to 3B, which is our city manager report. Robert.

Yes, good evening, Mayor and Council Members. We do have a full agenda tonight, so I'll be brief. I wanted to point out a new item category on the agenda this evening. It's number seven, future agenda items. Many agencies include this as part of the regular meetings. I think it's a helpful tool and a transparent way for Council Members to suggest issues or topics for future consideration. I'll describe the functionality and parameters of that item as we get to it later this evening. Switching gears, Mallard Point has seen some significant movement in the past month. After confirming with legal, the city has determined that most of the conditions of approval for the demolition permit have been met. Staff held a community meeting last Thursday to discuss the nuances of the project with residents and answer questions. The city committed to double checking again that all the conditions of approval for the permit have been satisfied and also posting some requested documents to the city's website. As of today, we do expect to issue the permit very soon. One ongoing challenge with this project has been communicating complex ideas and consistent updates to the community. To address this, the city has established a working group that will meet weekly to review the project status, timelines, deliverables, and community inquiries. On the Monday following each meeting, the group will issue a weekly update to community members subscribed to the Mallard Point updates. Members of the working group will include the director of planning, the building official, city engineer, and council members Burke and Mark. In the meantime, the community members can submit questions or feedback via the report an issue feature that is on the city's website. So that's all I have for now. I'm happy to take questions.

Do council members have any questions for our city manager?

I did have one question about Mallard Point. I know that there was a lot of comments at the meeting on meeting the COAs, as you mentioned. And I know in the past, our engineer, Mr. Moe, had written completeness letters. His most recent one was June 22nd but I wondered if he had written a completeness letter for what's um what's complete at this point is he planning on doing that or not yes I'm guessing it's coming soon at this point we um

He's finished his sort of completeness check and it has been deemed complete. However, we are double, triple checking all of the conditions of approval. So there will not be another completeness or incompleteness letters.

So they're really incompleteness letters, not completeness letters. Exactly. Okay. Thanks for explaining that. Sure.

Any other questions from council members? Seeing none, let's open this up for public comment. If anyone would like to make public comment, please come up to the stand. Although it's not required, if you wouldn't mind just saying your name and limit your comment to three minutes, please.

Speaking to the mic, please. Is it on?

Is it on now? No? Yeah?

Yes, it's exposed to it.

Closer? Yes, like that. Okay. Good evening, council members and Mayor Wilkinson. My name is Robin Watson, and I'm speaking on behalf of the Belvedere Residence for Intelligent Growth, BRG. On July 9th, our attorney sent Director Marwick a detailed letter about the Mallard Point demolition permit. that letter isn't a request to open the mallard point approval it asks the city to do something much simpler explain its reasoning in writing before 22 homes come down and the residents displaced specifically we asked the city to confirm that the june tentative map extension did not approved standalone demolition. We asked for a determination on whether demolishing first before the final map infrastructure and bulkhead work is a minor detail or a material change to the project as it was approved. And we asked the city to confirm that conditions marked pending or not needed on the compliance table are actually satisfied, not just checked off. None of this is complicated. It's simply asking the city to show its work. Right now, residents have a spreadsheet with check marks and no explanation. That's not enough when the decision is irreversible. Again, we're not asking the council to deny this permit outright at this time. We're asking that before it is issued, the city respond in writing to each of the six requests in our letter and that our letter be placed in the administrative record. Belvedere residents deserve to see the reasoning, not just the result. Thank you.

Is there any other public comment?

Good evening. My name is Randy Binstock and I'm a Belvedere Lagoon resident and have been since 1984. I want to ask a simple question tonight. Why is there a rush to issue this demolition permit right now? The city's own June 8th staff report said the demolition permit, the infrastructure permit and the bulkhead permit were not before the council. Staff said the applicant hadn't yet met all the required conditions. And yet weeks later, we're told a compliance table shows everything is basically ready to go. Demolishing 22 homes is not something you can undo. Once those structures come down, there's no putting them back. If it turns out the sequencing wasn't authorized or the bulkhead work stalls or financing falls through. So what is the harm in slowing down and making sure the conditions of approval are truly met? If the city is confident every condition is truly met, not just normally checked off, but backed by complete reviewed and publicly available materials, then a short delay costs nothing. But if the rush is because of pressure from the applicant's schedule, that is not a good enough reason to accept the risk of a demolitioned, unstable, half-finished waterfront site. We're asking the council to direct staff to take the time needed to make these determinations properly in public before any permit is released. Since it was the city council's decision to deny CEQA involvement, the city took on the entire responsibility to make sure that the environmental conditions of approval are met and that the lagoon remains in the pristine condition it is today. Before any permit is released, please slow down and get it right. Thank you.

Thank you. Do we have any other public comment in the room?

Good evening, Mayor Wilkinson and City Council. My name is Kathy Storr and I'm a resident here in Belvedere. I want to talk to you about what actually happens on the ground if this goes wrong. First, the Belvedere Lagoon. The bulkheads along this site are old and the Army Corps authorization for that work has already expired. The applicant's own materials say there's no construction or drainage work included in this permit. But demolition equipment operating right next to the aging, unpermitted bulkheads is not nothing. If those bulkheads are disturbed or destabilized during demolition, we could see erosion, sediment, and water quality impacts in the lagoon that this permit was never evaluated against. Second, think about what the site looks like the construction doesn't follow on schedule. This applicant has told the city, there's no material change to its plans, but It's now proposing to knock down 22 homes as a standalone first phase with the final mapping, financing, infrastructure, and bulkhead replacement all still unresolved. If any of those pieces stall and big waterfront projects stall all the time, Belvedere is left with a fenced, vacant, demolished lot on the lagoon. not for months, potentially for years. We are asking the council to require a real stabilization plan and a bond big enough to actually secure the site, not just covered debris removal, so that if this project stalls, Belvedere isn't left holding an eyesore and an environmental risk on the waterfront. Thank you.

Thank you. Do we have anybody else? Come on up.

Jill Barnett. And I've been coming to these meetings and coming to these meetings because I want to keep trying to understand what the rules are for this project. What they require and whether they are being consistently followed. One condition says, let me read it. All demolition and site work, including cleaning, Clearing of all debris and materials from the site shall be completed within 75 days of issuance of a demolition permit. So that's 75 days. All demolition and site work, including clearing of all debris and materials from the site shall be completed within 75 days of issuance of a demolition permit. That's not just the building demolition. It says all demolition and clearing of debris and materials from the site. But the current demo permit application is only for the buildings, not for the bulkheads, not the roadway, not the utilities, not the docks. Those demolition permits are still to come or pending with unresolved technical issues, various approvals and expired agency authorization still being worked out. So here's the question. How exactly does a 75-day clock work when major parts of all demolition and site work aren't even part of this demo permit? Is it the city applying the 75-day deadline only to this particular demolition permit? And doesn't that contradict the condition as it's written? Then what if the rest of the demolition work can't realistically happen in 75 days? What happens to the site after 75? If bulkhead permits, site improvements, final map approval are still pending, will it be left vacant until the bulldozers move in again? Before the demolition permit is issued, we're asking the city to require the applicant to show in writing a realistic schedule that actually accounts for all for the full scope of demolition work. The condition requires not just the portion that's convenient to schedule first. That seems like a reasonable request to make sure the city is following its own rules. Thank you.

Thank you, Jill. Is there any more comment in the room? Seeing none, is there any comment online? There are no hands raised. Great. In that case, we'll move on to 3C, which is our police chief report. Jason, good evening.

One second, please. Ready? Thank you. Good evening, Mayor Wilkinson, council members. Tonight, I am pleased to present the police department's second quarter report for 2026. During this quarter, the department handled 819 incidents, which included zero part one offense and four part two offenses. The remaining 815 incidents were classified as all other incidents. And also during this quarter, the department conducted 33 traffic stops, made one arrest, referred one case for prosecution and assisted Tiburon Police Department on two occasions. During this quarter, we also updated 27 lexable policies in alignment with best practices for legislative updates. And these updates are detailed in the staff report. And regarding our RIPA data, officers detained 35 individuals stemming from 33 traffic violations, one suspicious activity, and one court order violation. The perceived racial compositions consist of 26 Caucasians, seven Hispanics, one Asian, and one Black. Of these 35 contacts, 33 were officer initiated, while two were related to calls for service. In all, BPD issued seven citations, gave 26 warnings, made one arrest, and no action taken. During this quarter, PD personnel also attended in-person or online training that were either mandated or for knowledge and skill enhancements. And lastly, as part of our community policing, we always take great pride and joy in participating in community events. And I'll just want to update, unrelated to our quarterly report updates, the PD is currently working with HR on the open announcement to fill the three-year term police officer position along with reserve officers positions. And with that, I'm available for questions.

Thank you, Chief Wu. Does any council member have a question?

Thank you, Chief. I appreciate that update. On your previous slide, you mentioned assist Tiburon officers who are two for this quarter. Do you have the reciprocal reverse of that? How many times did Tiburon assist us?

No, I have not been tracking those. However, I can start tracking those.

I'd just be curious. It'd be interesting to see on a reciprocal basis how that works. Thank you.

Any other questions? Seeing none, Jason, just like to comment again that the increased patrols around the community are very much appreciated by many people in the community. So thank you very much for organizing that. Thank you for your kind words. Okay, let's open to public comment in the room. Seeing none. Do we have anything online? There are no hands raised. OK, great. OK, we'll now move to item 3D, which I think most people in this room are here for. So sorry to keep you waiting this long. This is for the swearing in ceremony for the promotion of police officer Katie Cullen to sergeant. So I think this is for you, Jason.

Thank you very much. Honorable Mayor Wilkinson, council members and distinguished guests. We are here tonight to celebrate a major milestone for our department and our city. We are not only swearing in a new police sergeant, but we are also swearing in the first ever female police sergeant in the history of the Belvedere Police Department. It is with great pleasure that I present Katie Collin to the City Council and the community as Belvedere's newest sergeant. Before I continue, I'd like to acknowledge the presence of Katie's parents, Captain Tom Collin and Mary, siblings Therese, Kelly and Brian, Tiburon Fire Captain Mark Fitzgerald, and other very close friends from Belvedere PD, Sheriff's Office, Mill Valley PD, and Tiburon PD, including her boyfriend, Patrick Kerslake, who will do the honor of pinning Sergeant Cullen's new badge. Katie began her law enforcement career with the Marin County Sheriff's Office in 2016, where she served as a deputy and a hostage negotiator. Since 2019, Katie expressed her interest in being part of the Belvedere Police Department. She was eventually appointed as a Belvedere police officer in May of 2022. Since coming on, she has served as patrol officer, vehicle maintenance officer, certified crisis intervention officer, and field training officer where she hoped to shape next generation of officers for the department. In her new role, I have no doubt that Katie will represent the future of the department through her dedication to mentorship and training. commitment to community caretaking and her desire for betterment of the community and the police department. One of the greatest honor for a police chief is the promotion of a highly qualified member within the department. And with that said, I would like to bring up Sergeant Collin and Patrick to take the oath of office.

Can I ask you who our youngest audience member is here?

One, two, three. and the Constitution of the State of California, against all entities foreign and domestic, that I will bear truth, faith, and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of California, that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties upon which I am about to enter. And staff is available for any questions.

Do we open this for public comment or not? Yes. Okay. We'll see if there's any public comment in the room. Seeing none. Is there any online? I see none. Okay, great. Congratulations, Katie. And I think you are all free to go and have your beer or whatever it is.

That's good.

Okay, we will move on to item 3E, which is an update on the Beach Road Seawall Stabilization Project. Tony, I guess this is from you. Okay, great, go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor, and good evening, Council Members. As you are aware, the Beach Road Stabilization Project has been in the works for some time now and is planned to move forward in the next few weeks, despite a late potential stumbling block. The oversight committee has met three times in person in February, March and May, and staff provided an update by memorandum to the committee in June. City Council approved the award of the construction project construction contract to Gordon and Ball Construction in April. And at that time, the outstanding milestones for the project were. temporary construction easements from the property owners of the three buildings over the water on Beach Road, environmental permits from the Army Corps of Engineers and BCDC, and PG&E's schedule of work for completing their utility modifications in the roadway, which are necessary before the sheet pile wall can be installed. In addition, staff were working with Hadley Construction to determine how best to address the three gangways and utilities at the buildings over the water, which were required to be removed and replaced for the sheet pile installation. This aspect of the project has proved to be a complicated coordination of carpentry and different utility services, both private and public, and the cost estimates from Hadley continued to change as they grappled with the details and scope of the work. Because of this, the engineering team changed tack on how to approach this element of the project and landed on a solution which utilizes soil injection of permeation grout behind the seawall at each gangway entrance. This will allow the gangways and utilities to remain in place for the duration of construction, resulting in far fewer utility disruptions for the residents. The actual costs of this method have been difficult to quantify as exact quantities of permeating grout to be used are unknown. However, the contractor's estimates put the costs in the same ballpark as the Hadley's estimates, which are within budget. Although a small portion of the budgeted construction contingency may be required. Returning to the project at large, the easement agreements have been signed and the environmental permits are now in hand, and staff has held a meeting with the most impacted residents in the homes over the water. A notification letter to residents informing them of the traffic and parking impacts was due to be mailed last week. However, a change in PG&E's schedule emailed to the city last Wednesday paused the project schedule. PG&E informed the city that their crew was delayed by three weeks. And instead of starting work on the 13th of July today, they could only start on August the 3rd with an anticipated completion date of August the 14th. This would have pushed the Gordon End Ball schedule beyond the October 30th deadline. The city escalated its communications with PG&E And today they informed staff that they will be starting sooner than the August 3rd date, possibly on July 20th, and even possibly later this week. Staff met with Gordon and Ball today to share the PG&E update. They will be meeting with PG&E later this week to discuss whether an overlap in work schedules will be possible. And they've expressed willingness to coordinate with PG&E to keep the beach road project on schedule. If there is no option but to delay their start until August 3rd, Gordon and Ball will have exactly 64 work days until October 30th to complete their work, one less than the scheduled 65, but a much more manageable schedule change than two full weeks. Finally, staff are aware that a project that lasts for three months will have impacts on residents, not just in the vicinity of the project, but across the city. Staff will continue to work with the oversight committee on project progress. And along with staff, the construction management team of Foth Engineering will have Adrian Cormier on the ground to interface with residents on any questions or concerns they may have. A web page on the city website will go live this week and will provide information and updates. And an item will be included in the Belvedere Breeze this week and likely in the coming months to share information and updates on this critical infrastructure project. And with that, I will be happy to take any questions.

Any questions for Tony?

Just real quick, you mentioned the breeze as well as the traffic and impacts letter to the neighbors. Don't lowball that, would be my suggestion. Really let people know what it is. I don't know if you want a single topic blast, but certainly something, I would get that information out there, what people to expect as far as, Any traffic disruptions, there's always going to be parking disruptions and some traffic disruptions during the times. But be clear and explicit about that so people know what to expect.

Yeah, absolutely. And the notification letter that we're sending as well includes a QR code that will let people go straight to the web page on the website, which will have a lot more information available.

What's the radius of that, though?

Well, we were discussing that this week because it's actually quite difficult to draw a line around where sort of impacted residents, but not too impacted, where that might be. So at this point, we're looking at a citywide notification letter.

Okay. I would support the citywide notification letter just because no matter where you live you drive down Beach Road at some point and sometimes other people do use it more really no matter where you live so um at some point everybody hits Beach Road often during the week so it's probably a good idea at least for that initial one that everybody knows

Yeah, definitely agree.

But that was great news. I was expecting lots of horrible news from you. So you started out with this depressing news, but you turned it around. So about the walkways was great to hear. The PG&E responded to the city's requests. This was great to hear. So let's hope they do what they promised.

Tony, thank you for that report. I did have one question as I was listening to you. When you talked about that, they would be able to have hopefully 64 days to finish the project. If you get into that position where things, days and everything start really counting, would the city consider looking at our normal construction hours and maybe allowing construction to start a little bit earlier? or even consider, I know, the third rail of working on weekends if really got pushed into it, just so that we could meet the deadline as sort of an absolute outside consideration?

Yes, I think that is definitely something that we would look at, and hopefully we wouldn't have to deal with it, but that would be one way to give them a little extra time.

Great, thank you.

And the 65 days was the full scope of the work. That's not necessarily the in-water work. And so hopefully they can skew that to the earlier part of the project. I know they can't do it exclusively, but some flexibility there for sure.

Yes. Yeah. And actually a little less flexibility than I had expected. Yeah. Basically, they've they've sort of organized a very efficient sequence of work. And the last item is to cut the sheet piles down to size along the seawall, which is on the last thing here in the beach. And that's after, because there's a concrete, a layer of concrete that needs to set and cure for seven days before that. And so they have to wait for that before they can cut it. Yeah.

One final quick comment. The escalation that Tony is referring to is some work by our mayor. So thank you. Thank you on that.

You're welcome. I have a couple of questions. So during the PG&E work, will there be road closures during that time as well, and the other utility work, or will the road complications only happen when the actual project begins?

There will be traffic controls in place for PG&E's work. They haven't submitted any plans for road closures or any permit requests. So we're anticipating that the road will remain open, but there will be traffic controls in place. And actually this evening on my way up here, I saw that they've put no parking signs up along Beach Road. So there it looks like they are hoping to start sooner rather than later.

Okay. Do we have, you know how Tiburon has one of those boards that can give information. Do we have one of those where we can at least flag direction to wherever to get more information?

We don't have one of those, but we actually included it in the RFP documents for the contractor to provide one. And so we met with them today, and that was one of the things that they brought up was that they have it and they're ready to bring it out. So that'll probably be placed next week. And those signs are quite... There's actually not much information you can get on them, but... It's a good point. We could refer people to the website for more details.

Right. And I agree with everybody else here. The more communication and the earlier comprehensively we can do it to everybody in the community, I think that's super important so that people aren't caught out.

Thank you. Yeah, definitely.

Okay. If there are no more questions, we'll open it to public comment. Seeing none in the room, is there any online? Okay, great. In that case, we will... close item 3e and we're going to move on to the consent calendar the consent calendar consists of items that the city council considers to be routine or council has discussed previously and do not require further discussion unless any item is specifically removed by any member of the city council the consent calendar will be adopted by one motion council will take public comment on all items on the consent calendar when the calendar is called So can I first ask my colleagues whether anybody wishes to have any item removed from the consent calendar?

I don't know if I need it removed, but I have one question about B, one question about C, and one question about D. Okay.

Anybody else?

Did you say B? No.

Okay, so rather than pull these, Andrew, I can just ask the question directly or ask Jane to ask a question directly.

Yes, let's see how simple or complicated the questions are, if you don't mind, Mayor.

Okay, and if it can't be answered now, this question could be answered another time. It's just that it came up. I was asked to explain what the 980 work week literally means. And so I don't know if you can explain that in a short, compact way.

Yeah, so most staff work the 980. It's five days one week with an eight-hour day on Friday. And then on the second week, it's four nine-hour days. So it's a 36 and a 44.

Okay.

They're always nine hours, except for the one Friday. Okay.

For nine hour days. Okay.

Nine, nine hour days. The second week is for nines. Right. Hours.

I didn't realize that.

I never knew that. Right.

Now it helps. Okay. And then, um, Do you want Pat to ask her B question?

Which one? Oh, D. Okay, sorry.

Then in attachment A under salaries, just out of curiosity, where would our new sergeant be placed on that salary schedule? Do you know that? Where in the police salary?

Yes.

Yes.

I believe she was placed at step C. D. C. C. Yes.

In the hired before July 1st, 2026.

Correct.

Okay.

Okay, thanks.

And then for D, my question is, have we really received $80 in 50 years from that block grant? There's a block grant in there and it said we've received $80 in 50 years. And so my question is, are we required to be part of that block grant or should we just, I think it costs us more to produce the paperwork on it.

So mayor, yeah, so mayor, if I may offer recommendation, it sounds like I think we can proceed with items B and C. and maybe pull D, so Council Member Keropi, I can also pose your question.

It was the same question, $80, if that was- Okay, so you want to pull that item and discuss it?

Okay, fine. So in that case, can I get a motion from someone to approve items 4A through 4C and 4E through 4H?

So moved.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Great. We'll move on to 4D. Oh, I'm sorry. Not awake. Do we have any public comment on the consent calendar? There are no hands raised. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So moving to 4D, who would like to answer that question?

Yes. I'd say it's a great question, and they're referencing all of Miranda's that statement, it looks like. So I'm guessing that's perhaps a typo. We can look into it. more than $80, certainly. However, it is a good question about how much does Belvedere receive from that. I think historically, not much, if any, just given the mission of this organization. So it's possible with the housing element and new housing laws, we may end up tapping into this or being eligible for this as we get more affordable and affordability of those types of units in Belvedere. But I think the takeaway is it's better to be part of the program than not. at least going into this from where we are with regard to housing.

Most of the prerequisites are 100% affordable. They literally have a floor on 100% affordability.

So maybe it was with Farley Place that we got some money. Yeah.

Okay, with that, does that sufficiently answer your question? Beth, do we have any public comment on item 4D? Okay, so can I get a motion for 4D? I make a motion to approve 4D on the consent calendar. Second. All in favor? Aye. Motion passes. we will now move on to our item five which is our public hearings and this is uh fiver a an introduction and first reading of an ordinance amending the belvedere municipal code to establish rules for commercial drone delivery in belvedere um is andrew is this you or is this robert

Yeah, I'll go ahead and start off. Thank you, Mayor. So earlier this year, staff began hearing from some private industry experts that commercial drone deliveries specifically are expected to become an increasingly common as retailers, restaurants, and delivery service providers expand operations throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Rather than responding after commercial drone delivery becomes established, the proposed ordinance takes a proactive approach by establishing a local regulatory framework that addresses the ground level impacts of these operations, while also recognizing the Federal Aviation Administration's exclusive authority over aircraft operations and airspace. Consistent with that division of authority, the ordinance does not regulate drone overflight, flight paths, altitude, or aircraft operations. In broad terms, the ordinance does four things. First, it regulates where commercial drone delivery facilities may be located. Second, it establishes rules for delivery-related activity on both public and private property. Third, it includes standards to protect privacy, minimize nuisance impacts, and preserve public safety. And finally, it provides the city with enforcement tools should violations occur. The ordinance is intended to ensure that commercial drone delivery can occur in a manner that's compatible with Belvedere's residential character, public safety, and quality of life. Barring any changes this evening, staff is requesting that the city council introduce the ordinance. wave of first reading and direct staff to return for adoption at the next regular city council meeting. Andrew and myself are both available if you have questions.

Do any council members have questions? Kevin?

I just had one. In the amendment, I think it was 20 more deliveries per month shall constitute repeated or systematic use of the property. I'm just wondering where the 20 came from.

That was a number that was selected in consultation with the mayor. And certainly that is not a number that is set in stone. That is something within the council's discretion if you want to move it up or down. Thank you.

Any other questions?

I have a ton. Okay. Sorry. So... Let's see, let's go to, I guess a lot of my questions refer to things like authorized by the city. So it's not clear in this code, What that vehicle is going to be? And how we're going to have authorized by city? Is it going to be done with a permit? Is it going to be done with a license? The same around written consent? What's the vehicle? What are the control measures? How do we know who has or who has not given written consent? Is it going to be something that's going to be done online? I mean, it says we're going to be doing this, but there's nothing here that says you have to get a permit or it's a license. That'll be an online registration. I mean, who's going to control this online registration of who's signed up or not, nuisance impact on neighbors, what might be fine with me may not be fine with another. And then that comes into how do we define what a nuisance is? I mean, do we use our noise ordinance? But then how do we regulate the sound of a drone and what that sound is, depending on who the delivery vehicle is? And then we're in the future going to establish a complaint and investigation process. My questions were, is when are we going to do that? Who's going to be responsible for that? And then does anybody else have questions? Cause I can, I then go into certain sections.

Why don't we, cause you've listed about 20 questions. Should we take them one by one? Is that going to be easier?

So yeah, Oh, so that's where we are. So in the actual staff report in the purpose of the ordinance. In number two, it says required conditional permit for commercial drone delivery facility. And then it says elsewhere in the city. I'm not sure if elsewhere is the right word or if it should have been anywhere. I just questioning that. And then in number three, it talks about prohibited commercial drone deliveries. And it says authorized by the city. And so the question is, should it be... Should we be more direct in that? I was just wondering what vehicle are we going to be using? Did you want to answer these as I go, or do you want me to just rattle on?

Well, we'll try to tackle a couple at a time, and we'll see how much progress we make.

Okay. All right. So now we get down to it. Okay. For written consent before private property is used. Okay. Is there going to be an online registration? How do we control, how do we know who's approved, not approved? Would it be better to do an opt-in, or I mean an opt-out versus an opt-in, because it might be lesser people? I mean, how are we going to manage this?

I could take a stab at that issue, if you don't mind, council member.

Yeah.

Yeah. So we didn't, as a first pass, we didn't build in a lot of specificity of how that written authorization is to be provided. Certainly the council wants to be more specific. We can certainly head in that direction. But I think the idea here was to be flexible, especially since we are talking about regulating a new Not necessarily sure if it's new technology, but at least a new potential business practice that we want to maintain some flexibility. Certainly, if the council does prefer something more formal, we certainly understand that we can build that in, but it'd be helpful to know exactly what the council would like on that front. But on a first pass, I think we're trying to be flexible as a general matter.

Because I think, Pat, the question's really valid, but whoever's delivering the package has to get the authorisation. They are required, if you're getting food delivery from whoever, you have to essentially consent to it being delivered on your property. But you're right, the city doesn't have any evidence that that has taken place. So I guess your question is how do we...

Well, I read it more that the city was going to be doing this versus the drone people. Anyway, so if that's the case, it just wasn't clear to me that we were talking about that the drone people would have to get this consent. But then how do we know who has consent and not? I mean, it becomes, you know, I can see this, you know, My great neighbor next door to me on the right wouldn't care, but my other neighbor on the left who wouldn't care either, but might care. I mean, and he calls and complains, then where does it put the city? Are we creating a situation that we have really no control over?

Yeah, so at least with respect to commercial drone delivery facilities, I mean, that would be subject to a conditional use permit, which would be granted at a planning commission hearing, et cetera, et cetera. So that is purely formal in terms of process. But in terms of, for example, use of certain public areas or if someone is receiving a package through the drone deliveries, you know, a low level of, I guess, authorization would be required. And again, it was intended to be flexible. But again, if the council feels like it needs to be more prescribed, I think we're certainly open to suggestions and guidance.

Yeah, I think, I mean, I was involved in creating it, but I've spent a lot of time with it. I think... as far as that issue goes, it does a good job of separating commercial drone activity through the use permit process, which can add, as Andrew talked about, far more specifics and far more detailed requirements if and when there's a use permit applied for. And it's providing the flexibility for homeowners to receive deliveries and or become a delivery, not a delivery center, but have more ground-based services up to a limit to be determined, I mean, 20 here, but can be subject to change, with the onus on the delivery agent to get authorization, as it says in the ordinance, not in the staff report, in the ordinance, might only be a checkbox, you know, to agree to something as you place an order. So it's intended to limit structure, keep it on private property, keep it away from public spaces, and so forth, and limit it from commercial activity, but give the requirement that you have to have some written approval by the person who is receiving it the property owner not just from the property owner and uh uh i i applauded actually for for creating a framework but not making it over restrictively going forward but but knocking out the big risk which is the commercial drone aspect of it in public spaces and even on on private residences i only say that because i think that knocked up a couple of your questions okay um

So, okay, so then I go into, did anybody else want? No?

I have a lot of comments, but let's do the questions first, and then we can bring it back.

I realize that the staff report is bringing up things that are in the municipal code. They're not writing in the staff report, what exactly? The process.

Well, I know the code is more valid, but it's not also addressed in the code either specifically.

Yeah, I mean, I had a lot of questions along the same.

So I can go into the code and let's see. Oh, yeah, I question the 20 deliveries. So in 8.34.040B, and that has to do with the commercial delivery. And it says it will not impair residential privacy, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, emergency access, which I don't have problems with. But this is in reference just to the boardwalk. I just question when we say residential privacy, quite an enjoyment, are we knocking out the possibility of the boardwalk using any Belvedere property? as a commercial use because they're right up against the back of Cove Road.

I mean, my view, I think that comes to the Planning Commission for a discussion, correct? Is that right, Andrew?

Yeah, that's correct. The Planning Commission will consider, I guess, the proposed facility in context. And so I can imagine some could be designed with appropriate respect for pedestrian access. Some may go too far, but that would be in the Planning Commission's discussion.

Okay, and then...

I actually had a question about 040 also. Do you want me to add it in?

Yeah, yeah.

Or do you want me to come back? No, go ahead. Start over. Okay. So I was curious about C in that section. Will not create repeated or concentrated delivery activity inconsistent with Belvedere's residential character. I don't know what that means. I mean, what are we getting out of that?

I think it's just sort of the amount of use that is being proposed. There is no hard number in there. Certainly if the council did want to provide a hard number, so the planning commission does.

I think we had a hard number somewhere else, right?

Yeah, for the 20.

But that was for residential.

Exactly, that's for residential.

How I read this, Jane, or the analogy I had for me was this would be like an Amazon warehouse for a drone. Like what if somebody decided to set up, with a commercial use permit, where lots of drones came for all of the Tiburon Peninsula. So they're just, every second there was a drone coming and this was their central hub and then they would send it out or something. I mean, again, that would be just an excessive use of a specific location that would be out of character, I think, for our community.

Right, and this is a criteria that was intended to be flexible, again, so the planning commission considered the proposed use. But certainly if you did want to provide a hard number, you could as a bright line. I think there's pluses and minuses to either approach.

I think one of the problems for me is that we have a lot of municipal code that's flexible and then it get turns against the intent because it's too flexible and nobody knows what it means. So I think my questions are, you know, without it, first of all, this seemed overly long and repetitive to me. but at the same time, certain parts of it were not very specific. And I worry that a company that's very sophisticated would come in and figure out a way to manipulate it because it's not very specific. So that's my concern going through a lot of this.

Yeah. Again, this is just the first pass.

I know, but I thought that we were being asked to not have this be a second pass, is that correct tonight?

No, so as an ordinance, this will come back for a second reading in any instance.

But Jenna, I mean, I'll jump in a little bit because I had some involvement in this. I think part of the push for this is that we want something on the books before this comes to life and to get ahead of it as much as we can. And really the risk is around these drone delivery facilities and what can we do about to provide some regulation and this will, I'm sure evolve over time as the industry evolves, but to have the biggest concern, as everybody said, is that we have this centralized depot where thousands of drones are flying over every day. And if it is on the boardwalk and it's in Tiburon's territory, we can't, control for that. And so that's why in some ways there should be at some point in these discussions with Tiburon to see whether we can have some combined regulation around this. So it's really a first attempt to put something on the books to begin that discussion. But I don't know that being very prescriptive about this question of will not create repeated or concentrated delivery activity inconsistent with Belvedere's residential character. I don't think we can put a number on that.

I mean, that would be- I just wonder if it needs to be there at all, I guess. It doesn't mean anything to me. It's not saying anything.

It's just a finding requirement for the use permit, which gives the planning commission more discretion. If it's not there, they don't have discretion over character.

So I guess I'm confused, which I fully admit, because I found this very confusing. And I read it many times until I was going crazy. This facility thing can only be constructed in a commercial zone, not in a residential zone.

Correct. Not allowed in residential areas.

So since it can only be in a commercial zone in Belvedere, our only commercial zone in Belvedere is the back parking lot of the boardwalk and maybe the nursery school. yes okay very small areas about so we've written this whole thing about that those two small areas and i think that's what's confusing about it because i don't know why we just don't say there's no you know these are where we have commercial zones and this is where it relates and then go into it rather than the confusion of feeling like it could be on private property, or if someone uses it more than 19 times, it becomes a facility, but yet can't be a facility because it's a residential. So that's where my, I'm just confused by it. We have such a little commercial area and I agree with Sally. I think it's mostly Tiburon that could have a facility there. And then we really do need to work with them to figure out if they're going to set anything up because For us, this whole thing is only relating to a very tiny section of possibility.

But if we don't have something on our books, Amazon just decides to buy the nursery school and we have nothing there and they set up their drone delivery.

I'm not saying we have nothing on the books. I'm saying this is so complicated.

But I think it's trying to balance... Denise, some people are going to want to take an occasional dinner delivery from San Francisco and we shouldn't disallow that. And some people want medical deliveries and those things should be allowed. It's a question of when does it become a nuisance to the community at large? So having some cap on the number of deliveries a month and who knows what, I don't know what that appropriate cap is.

19 per household seemed very high to me.

Well, I think in five years that might not, that might be pretty regular.

And I mean, I did watch all the videos. I mean, at this point that we're writing it, they're only delivering things that are between two and four pounds and they can't deliver on hills and, uh, a lot of foliage and trees, they're hovering 25 feet high. Right. And then they lower it down to a flat area. And if you notice in the videos, everything is, looks more like you're not in California or maybe you're in Novato and everything's flat.

Right.

And, and so it's,

But the technology will evolve as well. I get that.

But then our code would also need to evolve. I'm just saying right now, we are coming at this so early in the process that we don't know what's going on with Tiburon. I'm not against having something. I just think this has a lot of loopholes. And I think it's confusing. I think we should have something. I'm hoping that we could have something that's easier to read and easier to understand. And I don't know what that means. I mean, you know, I wrote like, could we use the word residential in some of these where it's hard to even know, is it residential or non-residential? And, um, you know, no person may use private property for delivery. Well, do you mean an occupant? Do you mean a company? What does that mean? No person may use private property. Isn't it a company that's delivering it? There's no person in the drone.

Right. But the idea there is that they need the property owner's consent before doing that. Right. Before delivering the package, it needs to be the owner asking for it. Right. Right. And

And the other thing, if we don't put anything down on paper, if these deliveries start happening and people don't have space on their own property, because a lot of people don't, they might start getting deliveries in the middle of the road if we don't regulate.

I think all the public stuff should absolutely be there. And I think specificity about the only appropriate place for a facility is in the commercial non-residential.

Doesn't it say that?

It says it in a lot of many places and very confusing words.

I think we should continue taking comments and do what the process is intended, is to take those comments and then go through a rep.

I have three more comments.

Yeah, but I think this is actually why we have two readings.

Pat, do you want to continue with your questions? Sure.

So this one, these are much easier, I think. So 2034.050C, it says interfere with emergency vehicle access as a public nuisance. and i'm and maybe immediately abate it don't you think that should have a stronger word than maybe like shall be or should or must or something i mean maybe immediately abated that what that doesn't seem for an emergency vehicle a very strong word yeah we can certainly make that change okay see it's getting better then on eight three four point eight oh Just a typo. I think you're talking about California. Oh, maybe it is California. I thought it was our code. Never mind. That might be right. California has longer code numbers. Then in the next sentence, it says... It's saying that a commercial drone may not intentionally collect, use, retain, sell, or disclose images, video, audio, or sensor data. What is a sensor data?

I think sensor data could be anything, uses positioning sensors to find out where it is in the world and it could somehow scan a property or a house. Yeah, something like that.

All right, those were my questions.

Jane, do you have more questions or should we go to public comment?

I've got one quick question. I'm trying to find it, Rebecca, and I'm not able. In our commercial zones, is there any misunderstanding that someone could identify drone deliveries? A drone delivery facility would be an allowable use? I don't think so.

No, it's not. I don't think so either, but let me see if I can just find the muni code really quickly.

So that brings up another question.

Sorry, can I ask one follow-up? Would it be like a warehouse type use? Or I guess I'm not familiar with what a drone facility is. I know.

The origins of this is the fact that... I think the real risks here are the important things, the prohibition on residential space and so forth. But we don't have any prohibitions or requirement for use permit within a commercial area. So my guess is someone would have to really thread that needle currently to have that use in a commercial area that fits with what's allowed in that zone. So I'm just trying to gauge our risk about right now in the commercial areas. Residentials is an existing risk. I understand we want to clear that up.

But is it better to define if there's any grayness?

I agree. I'm just trying to get a sense for us all as far as the urgency to do something.

Yes. When it comes back, I'll look into commercial.

Yeah. Just in the next report of it, you know, and your way in from a land use perspective, how vulnerable are we in our commercial areas to commercial delivery facility, drone commercial facility in our existing allowable uses?

Thank you. And do we really have commercial zone? Don't we have mixed use zone now?

It's mixed use and we do allow equipment rental leasing, package delivery, Office security, I don't know. It seems like it could sort of manipulate itself into that. Yeah, one of those uses.

So do we need to change where we say our commercial zone? Because we don't really have a commercial zone anymore. We have a mixed use zone.

We should say mixed use. We should say mixed use.

Should we go to public comment before we bring this back for further discussion? Beth, is there anybody online?

There are no hands raised, okay.

All right, so who wants to go first in terms of next steps or discussion?

Well, it sounds like there's a fair amount of comments on this. And it's probably more sufficient than a second reading would tolerate, I would imagine. Would it just make sense to have staff consolidate the comments? Because we can all go through it here, but it might be better offline. I don't know. Consolidate the comments, come back with a revised ordinance.

I think that's right. Do we want to have a discussion around the number of deliveries in the residential that it was, it's just a sticky finger in the air. So is there any viewpoint there? And we've given exceptions for medical deliveries.

Maybe start lower and you can always go up. I mean, you can always adjust it.

Medical delivery doesn't count. No, there are exceptions. Exactly. There are exceptions to that. So we don't have to talk about that. So I did a little research with the Google one wing. And actually, they have a very nice YouTube on Wing that you can watch for several minutes. It's very interesting. Anyway, there's a limit of how much they can deliver. And even Amazon Air, which is available in some cities, however, none in California, their limit is, I think, five pounds. So... I don't think we're talking, you know, like you get a big package from Amazon and Wing is only right now with DoorDash and Walmart. So I'm not sure how many people use DoorDash and I'm not sure how many people use Walmart. I could daily if I'd let her.

But I think I see the biggest just as like food deliveries from San Francisco restaurants, which I could see people wanting to do that.

We don't have any time restrictions around this. I mean, we have some things, there's a net flying around. whoever talks. We don't have any time restraints. I mean, I've looked at some other cities that have had drone, like LA and Rancho Mirage and a couple other cities. And some of them say it can only operate till sunset. They don't allow it when it's dark. So I don't know if that's something that should be considered, you know, or maybe not... sunset but say not after you know i mean who wants to be in bed at 11 o'clock for those of us who go to bed early and want to hear a drone delivery of a pizza next door i mean that would be a nuisance to me yeah and if we're talking about our two small um potentially commercial areas for a facility do we want to put anything in there about um

A distance from houses, could we add something like that that it we we couldn't have a facility, even in a commercial area unless it's more than 200 feet from a residential. a resident.

I don't know if that's that wipes out the whole boardwalk. I mean, why? Why even bother? Why even bother? Because we're going to be within 200 feet. I mean, the whole back of the our mixed use zone is within 200 feet of houses in every direction, anything that's zoned them you. So we would just rule out any commercial use at all if we did that.

Andrew, if we had that, could Tiburon just ignore anyway if our regulation said you can't come within 200 feet, but it's our rules, not theirs, could they ignore that?

It's just for a facility. Not for dropping off.

So if we had saying you can't have a commercial drone facility within 200 feet, so essentially all of the road behind, that could be problematic if Tiburon chooses to adopt To allow that within the boardwalk, would our rules apply?

So they would, I think they'd have to, the operator would have to comply. Well, Tiburon can establish its own rules, obviously, for its jurisdiction.

Right.

Right. We can't regulate activities in Tiburon.

Right. So if it's wholly within- I mean, I'm just throwing out 200. I don't even know how far 200 is. Yeah, but that's, I mean, I think- I don't know.

I think Council Member Carapia is probably right though. If it's 200 feet, it's basically saying, we're not allowing it.

Right.

And if that's the case, maybe we should just say it.

But I mean, over time, behaviors and expectations will change in terms of the community as well and what they want as this evolves. And so I think ruling things out completely-

You can do it, yeah.

Isn't necessarily the right, in the commercial mixed use zone, isn't necessarily the right thing either.

Right. But certainly to one of your earlier comments, Mayor, I mean, given that the boardwalk is a likely location for some of these, at least commercial drone activities, I mean, it does seem that cooperation and coordination with Tiburon would be ultimately be required. So wherever we go in this ordinance, I imagine it might be helpful to have a conversation with them.

I mean, I think this is a very good conversation and I do think that this is going to happen and it's going to happen quickly. I think what we need to optimize for is the use cases that are going to most impact the community. I agree with Jane. I think if we have such limited opportunities for commercial use cases in our mixed use zones, I mean, if it's just those two, I mean, really for me, what I found very satisfying about the ordinance is that It's trying to protect from all of these drones dropping into Belvedere using public space to deliver to homes. So envision sitting in your home and the drones are landing in the middle of you know, Edgewater or Golden Gate Avenue to deliver something to a resident. And so I think what this does is it starts to protect those public spaces from use for residential benefit. And I think that's the most important thing right now because I think that's going to have the most immediate impact on our residents. I do think we have to have something for mixed use as well, but I feel like that's not an edge case, but it's certainly a smaller use case than I think what could happen if people just decide they can land drones anywhere for residential deliveries. Because especially in Belvedere, where not many people have, not everyone has a level yard, not everyone has a driveway. I mean, so I think people will just naturally turn to public spaces in order to get these drones to deliver items.

But so what are you proposing for the mixed use zone?

For mixed use zones, for those two small places, I think we should, there's a lot of good thinking in the ordinance for that. And so I think we should definitely, you know, require a conditional use permit and we should go through planning and there's a process for it. But I think for me, the thing that is most urgent is to ensure that we are clear that public spaces are not available for drone delivery or landing, because I think residential use is going to be the primary use case in Belvedere, at least initially.

But Jane, your main point is to just make it simpler, make it easier to understand.

Fantastic because of traffic.

You know, I mean, I think in a way it sounds amazing because it would cut down on cars going up and down our streets and Tiburon Boulevard. Um, so I'm not anti drone delivery at all. I'm just trying to under, this just reads very confusing and a lot of repetition and a lot of areas where it says, um, you know, like, um, If a company, I had a question of if a company, it has repeated violations for either nuisance or noise or delivering in the wrong location. is there a way to suspend that delivery company from coming to Belvedere? I mean, you know, it's sort of like we write about a lot of nuisances, but what options do we have? What would be a legal remedy for us? And I think that was kind of missing. So, I mean, people have to sign off, but what about the company signing up in a way?

You know, I don't know. Right. I mean, there are some, I mean, we try to build upon sort of existing remedies and procedures that we already have in the code. Now, whether those fines or penalties would be a sufficient deterrent, that's kind of another question. I mean, I think we've seen in other arenas, technology companies maybe not, maybe sort of acting first and dealing with the consequences later. So it's hard to say what would change that commercial behavior. I mean, I'll be honest about that. But to go back to the earlier, I guess, it feels like people would like to move in the direction of simplifying the ordinance, at least.

I may be the only one. I don't know.

I think a few have spoken to that. Well, simpler is always better.

Yes.

Yeah, I mean, would it be something so drastic as taking out the provisions about, you know, commercial drone facilities and commercial areas or mixed use areas? No, that's an important aspect. Okay. I mean, I was just, I mean, since people said it wasn't sort of, I think Kevin laid it out very well.

The priorities just, You know, a generation ago when pizza delivery was a big deal, you know, it always went to, if you live in a rural area, it would come to like a local park. Then you'd have to meet them there. That might be the first step here. And so this needs to protect against that. It needs to protect against dropping in edgewater and Golden Gate, as Kevin talked about. So I think the residential prohibition on residential issue and defining how and where and when it can be and when, as Pat talked about, can be used is important. And then segue to the commercial aspect of it, where it's limited to that. I'd be as flexible as possible there as you have already with the findings necessary and the types of things that you're suggesting the Planning Commission would consider because we don't know what it'd be. I mean, the land company could redevelop that property with a three-story building and they have a facility on the roof that accepts all these things, which is probably a great solution for the area because it's above people's own and you wouldn't care about 200 feet at that point. And maybe we want all the tax revenue. Maybe we want that adjacency. It might not be a bad idea. So I don't know if we want to necessarily limit it, but we should want to be flexible and let the use permit on the commercial side be fully discretional. Discretion. I can't, I don't know what the word is. At the discretion of the planning commission. I'm sorry. But I think if we can simplify it, having some experience with COVID, it's hard to simplify that because you... you do get circular references all the time, you know, going back on it.

Right. So, so it sounds like at this point, we're not staff is not eliminating sections per se, but certainly looking towards where we can streamline the ordinance a bit.

Maybe the flow should, it should, it should approach the priorities that, that. Yeah.

I was just going to say, I mean, there's the purpose, the definition, then there's residential use rules, commercial use rules, and then general.

Okay. That's helpful. Thank you.

And then I think that might be more straightforward.

Okay.

okay uh you have enough direction there andrew and robert yeah okay perfect and thank you for this because i i i i see how it makes sense to get it on the books and i know it's maybe we'll be a model for other communities on this certainly the mayor has been helping us lead on this issue it might be a big ass mistake but let's see um okay we are moving on to other scheduled items uh number six six uh six a is an update and discussion of the fire annexation with the tiburon fire protection district and the genesis of this was really that robert had essentially said to the council members that we would we're still in process but that we'd come with a update for the council and the community in terms of where that negotiation apparently stands so robert this is all yours

HELGA AND I DID DISCUSS IT AND SHE'S GOING TO BE INTRODUCING THIS ONE.

THANK YOU, MAYOR WILKINSON AND CITY COUNCIL. BEFORE YOU TONIGHT IS THE UPDATE ON THE CITY'S REVIEW OF LONG-TERM OPTIONS FOR PROVIDING FIRE AND EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES, INCLUDING AN EVALUATION OF POTENTIAL ANNEXATION TO THE TIBERON FIRE PROTECTION DISTRICT. As the council is aware, the city has contracted with the Tiburon Fire Protection District since 1980. While the partnership has consistently provided high quality fire and EMS services, the current expenditure-based contract has become increasingly difficult to sustain financially. Fire parcel tax revenues have not kept pace with contract costs. And in fiscal year 26, 27, the tax is projected to fund only about 47% of the city's $2.67 million contract cost with the remaining balance paid by the general fund. Over the past few years, the city has evaluated several long-term financial options to improve the sustainability and predictability for fire and EMS services. In 2023, the city explored voter feasibility polling for a supplemental fire tax, which showed support well below the two-thirds threshold required for a special tax. In July of 2024, the city began exploratory discussion with the Fire District regarding possible annexation, including a joint task force with Tiburon Fire District and Marin LAFCO. City gate associates were hired to provide financial modeling to evaluate a fair allocation that would be sustainable for both agencies. In addition, the city obtained separate legal and financial analyst analysis on several issues outside the scope of city gate. Most importantly, whether we could legally transfer our fire parcel tax to the fire district or retain it under an annexation agreement. The city was advised by Marin LAFCO that annexation could increase the risk of the fire tax being repealed over time. As the purpose of the annexation became less familiar to voters. The city also considered replacing the fire tax with a new emergency services tax. However, passing a new special tax with no sunset and two thirds voter approval would be very difficult. and was ruled out. In March of 2026, the Joint Task Force reconvened to discuss the findings, and due to the risk of the fire tax repeal, ultimately determined annexation was not practical at this time. Based on those findings, staff and the fire district believe the best path forward is to negotiate an updated service contract, which was last revised in 2000. The joint task force will explore transitioning from an expenditure-based model to a revenue-based model with clear definitions of the properties covered. The goal will be to develop a more predictable and sustainable funding model while maintaining the high level of fire and emergency medical services. Once negotiations are complete, the proposed agreement will be reviewed by the Finance Committee before returning to the City Council for recommendation. And with that staff will take any questions.

Does anybody have questions for staff? Jane?

Can you remind me how Tiburon covers their, how do they pay the Tiburon Fire District?

It's through their property tax. They do have a small fire tax as well.

So it's not a parcel tax.

I mean, they have a small parcel tax, but they can start and stop their parcel tax.

So what's your money? To remind you, the district doesn't overlap completely with Tiburon, and the district is paid for as a direct appropriation of their taxes. So the 1% that goes to, that's a tax, a fixed percentage goes to the district if you're in that district, and a lesser amount goes to the town of Tiburon. In our case, we don't have anybody going to the district. It comes to us, and we have a special tax on top of it combined, which we pay.

And the reason that, exists is because the fire district existed when Prop 13 happened, but we had an independent voluntary fire department. So if we had already been, there would have been an allocation directly from our taxes, but it wasn't. And that's why we have a contract for service. Okay.

That's the piece I was forgetting. And then, yeah. So about the contract, is that something that'll come back to the council to discuss or how does that move forward?

So we will, the task force will work on a proposed contract and then we'll go to the finance committee and then I'll come to council.

Okay.

Any other questions? Okay. Let's open it for public comment. Beth, is there any public comment?

There are no hands raised. Great.

So does anybody, we don't need any, there's no motion here. Any other comments or? No, that was very easy. Okay, in that case, we will close the item. And we will move on to item 6B, which is a discussion and possible action on an RL in the public right of way for the property at 180 Beach Road. Rebecca, I think this is you.

You hear me? Yes. Good evening, Mayor Wilkinson and council members. For your consideration tonight, this is a revocable license application for an existing curb and new pavers at 180 Beach Road. On June 11th, 2025, the city granted design review exception for a small addition, deck extension, elevator and window and door changes. As a project progressed, the applicant proposed new parking on private property with a small portion of the paving due to the design and angle of the parking space in the city right of way. So you can sort of, I don't know where my cursor is. I lost my cursor, but it's down at the bottom there, the shaded area. Here the draft revocable license shows the existing curb and proposed pavers shaded within the beach road right of way. Additionally, it was determined that the corner of the carport also encroaches into the right of way. And so should this revocable license be approved tonight, we will update the exhibit and shade that corner. That carport's been there forever. It just was realized as we were putting the presentation together today. And so that will also be shaded as well. There's also that low neighbor's landscape wall. I don't think it should be incumbent on this property owner to take on responsibility and liability of their neighbor's wall. So we will address that with the adjacent neighbor. So tonight, staff recommends that the findings for the revocable license can be made as a project benefits the public.

Okay, any questions from council members?

Hi. Just to confirm, so the shaded area that sort of protrudes into Beach Road is on city property and is contemplated to have pavers?

Correct.

Okay. Just comparing.

And is there also a curb on that shaded area?

Yes.

So they would construct a curb partway along there.

Um, Yeah, there's a curb. Yeah, there was an existing curb. And so they're going to replace the curb.

But there's no curb right now. It's all gone.

There isn't one right now because of their construction staging. Previously, I think. Well, that's their low wall. That is the curb. Yeah. So there'll also be a curb. Yeah.

Can you can you pull up the next slide again? Yeah, that seems like a really difficult parking space to navigate into. Because you've got you've got the carport there.

Well, they have a driveway that's half of that carport is driveway.

Yeah. And so I think they'll level it. It's it's if you go up there now, it's like, because of their staging, but I suppose what they're going to do is level the driveway is pretty steep, but they'll bring that grade down.

Can you go back to the original picture?

Yeah.

So that whole parking area, Sally, is where that stone wall is and all those bushes.

Yeah.

All that's been pushed back. Back, back, back, so that where their car is right there, they could just go right in front of that park car and enter. the parking space is behind that stone wall. The legal, that's their property back there. So it's actually pretty easy to enter it. And also if the curb were not there, which I do not support the curb, if the curb were not there, they could even come in coming down the hill and just turn right into their parking spot in the other direction.

And if you went and visited the site, you would see they've already constructed the retaining wall behind it, and it's all open. So you can see how it's pretty easy. Yeah.

Okay. Any other questions for staff on this? Seeing none, we will open this for public comment. Sorry, Alec Wilson has his hand raised.

It's the architect. Do you have any questions for the architect?

I don't think we have any questions. In that case, let's bring this back for discussion. I think that Kevin wants to go first.

No, I don't need to. I think it's a great way of... You know, leaving some of the parking issues in the city, and I think this seems like it's a win for both the applicant and the city. The only issue I have is with the papers that are in the public domain. that bleed over into public land or city land. I think we've made that accommodation before in the past. And in hindsight, I think it was a mistake. It creates confusion when you're driving down the road. It's like, is that part of the road or is that part of somebody's home? And so I would strongly advocate for just ending the pavers at the property line. So we're not allowing people to change the physical makeup of city land to suggest that it's private land.

Is there a chance that without that, it could be seen as a public parking space?

Well, no.

Can I jump in here real quick? First of all, there is a parking space there, correct? Which the staff report doesn't address. There's a parking space.

Wouldn't that be removed? There's a painted line.

There's a parking space immediately outside this local license area and part of it. Public space, which is going away.

Isn't that being removed?

Possibly, yeah. And to... The drawing's misleading to what's actually there because, I mean, it's accurate, but it's misleading in the sense that the fence line, if you go completely horizontal left of the gate, is that old curb and what they're proposing for the new curb going there. So it doesn't stick out into the road. There's no road in that gray area. So it looks like a six out of the row, but it really doesn't. That right there has always been, I'm not saying it's their property, but it's always been defined as their property. If you go back to your first slide, with the picture of it, that's what that line is. Where the old curb is, That's what the gray area demarks. It's the same what it was. And so there's no confusion that the road is there because the road is outbound of this. In fact, there's a parking space there. I would actually, I do have a big problem with this because they're privatizing a public parking space here. There was a parking space that was out there that wasn't theirs. They're now taking their property and our property and making a private parking space. And I was just they want to do that. They should limit their access and keep the outside parking space, meaning they should they should keep the curb there, keep the parking space and have a more restrictive access to their parking space. I mean, I don't know why we're allowing them to have a really flexible private parking space with access to and from it while removing a public parking space in the street.

So I guess there should have been more context here because one of the main recommendations of the Traffic and Circulation Committee way back when was that this congestion point is a nightmare for everybody. So taking away the parking space is a good thing? It is a hugely beneficial thing. And so Rebecca actually approached the homeowners to see if they were willing to put a parking space on their property so that that parking space could be eliminated. It was the key recommendation of the traffic and circulation committee. So it isn't privatizing anything. They agreed to do that because we- Well, it is their parking space.

I mean, no one will park there now.

Right, right. But I guess they were the ones that were primarily using the public parking space, correct, Rebecca, or not?

Oh, yeah. Or people coming to their house to help out. So this will eliminate that public space and create a more open area where we all know there's a pinch point on Beach Road. And there was a recent police ambulance activity that, you know, it got up there, but it was a tight squeeze.

So for the record, we want that space gone.

Yes.

It's not a detriment to the public park. No, it's a benefit. Okay. I wasn't aware of that. I'm sorry.

I should have been more clear.

No.

I can jump in. I visited and I saw exactly where the property line was in relationship to everything that's shown here. And I think that our code says a parking space is eight feet by 18, I think, eight feet wide by 18 feet long. And they seem to have more than enough space on their property, 100%. I would not support changing the street and adding pavers there. I think it should look like street, which is what matches the driveway and everything else. And it does widen space. that terrible choke point there, one of the choke points. And as far as the curb, I think the curb chokes it again. So if they want a curb, I think they could put a curb on their property line. They can put a curb there, not come into the city-owned property. And I think they did us a favor by removing That curb so we didn't have to ask them to remove it, so thank you for doing that, and I agree that the painted parking space should be eliminated there. And, in fact, if I had a choice, I would ask the neighbors next door if we could eliminate the one in front of them that house, because those two parking spaces. really are horrific for that corner into Bayview and truck. Every truck gets stuck there. I walk it at least once a day and it's a nightmare anytime, but terrible in the morning and evening. So getting rid of both those would be ideal. I don't know if we're able to do that, but I don't, I think they can do everything on their own property. And that's what I would vote for.

Rebecca, can I ask a question? Because right now, until they've applied for this RL, even though there isn't an existing RL, they have that land right now, correct?

Exactly. It won't change. The circumstances won't change. The road won't get narrower.

Right. So they could just turn around and say, actually, if we take this away, we don't want the RL.

They've already built it.

But it's already in their existing plans until we ask them to submit for this change, they effectively already had that land, correct or not?

No.

I don't know. Let me look into that. Okay.

No, I mean, it's our property.

They can't build it. And they actually can't. If they hadn't demolished it, they could have left it alone and not sought a new broker license. They've demolished it, so they can't rebuild it now necessarily because they don't have a license to rebuild it.

So that's true, Rebecca. Even if there wasn't going to be a parking space, they'd have to apply for an RL right now because they've removed...

They can fit their car on their own property. They can fit a curb on their own property.

I understand that, but I'm just trying to establish the process here.

Alec, do you mind unmuting yourself? Or you should be able to speak.

Yes. Can you hear me? Hi, Alec. Hello. Alec Wilson, architect for 270 Beach Road.

180. Sorry.

Look at that. That was a good slip. 180 Beach Road. Have it.

When your original design review project went through, Alec, did you guys have any, was that front retaining wall or front low curb and plants part of your original design review?

No, our original design review was to leave all of that intact.

But then through the construction staging, you demolished it.

Correct. There was a construction staging permit and they applied for that work to to create an off-street parking space for staging of the construction process, which has been very useful. Indeed, that is an extremely tight, extremely dangerous corner.

And the intention was to build it back as is.

Yeah, the original intention was to build it back as is. And in conversations with you and my clients, the prospect of getting a safer place to park Outside of the traffic on that corner was how we came up with the scheme in front of you, which is indeed a parking space completely on private property. If you drive in and back up a little bit, then the car is parked on their property and not in the revocable license area.

And do you need that curb in front?

The curb was there. If that parking space were to remain, it gives definition to that parking space, not having that parking space bleed off into our client's space. So it's about defining that space. And also defines the front entrance. Like that's the front gate. And the front gate, as you walk down there, has a short curb wall on both sides. It's kind of classic for old Belvedere Island to have those little curbs on either side of the gate as you walk in.

Okay, thank you.

I mean, I think he clarified that the curb could go on their property. I see a curb like a fence. It's a permanent, and we don't know.

Just as a clarification, if that curb was to swing onto the property, I would not be able to get the car into that space.

Alec, could you swing that curb? I agree with you that the... Hi, Alec. This is Peter. Sorry. The... I think the curb on either side of the fence is continuity and that works well. Could you swing that curb around on the side and stop it at the new retaining wall? That's going in.

If you look at our drawing there, we've got four foot five approximately of, of curb on the left side of the inch of the pedestrian entry as you come in. And, and, you know, if it went four foot five or six feet instead of the 14 feet, I just want to establish that there's like pedestrian entry is separate and distinct from the from the vehicle entrance. That's the most important aesthetic part.

That seems more in keeping with what we're trying to do there is to turn that curb, you know, as much on the applicant's property as possible and tie it into or butt end it to the new retaining wall that surrounds the new parking space and having the local area be more, you know, public-facing, public-appearing, and widening of the road that was there. In practice, it's still going to be accessible for that parking space, and it actually makes that easier because you can go out forward or backwards at that point.

Yeah, I mean, I think the biggest thing as far as widening that road for the people driving by is the limitation of that parking space. Once that parking space is gone, if that parking space is gone, then that's a much wider road at that point. One of the things I was dealing with here is that the existing – asphalt road of beach road there has some kind of retaining wall supporting the edge of the road and the reason we're using pavers instead of concrete or asphalt is so that the existing structure remains intact and then the pavers are floating on fill held by a new retaining wall rather than trying to connect all of the structures and so that was a fundamental reason i have pavers is to have a flexible connection between the two structurally flexible connection between the two rather than um tying it all together and having a load of Beach Road beyond that parking space.

You also have a grade change there, don't you? That is something.

Yeah, so as you were asking earlier, so we're going to be coming in on a little bit of warp. There's a warp driveway leading down to the existing carport, which will remain, so you can still get into the existing carport. And then that warp will lead to a largely flatter area of that parking space, but it will be set up so that the entrance is really Primarily from the driveway rather than from the nose up where and that's the other reason I had that curve was to help me differentiate the slopes so that that 10 foot curve on the right side there helps me differentiate the slopes from one side to the other where, you know, it's pretty steep over there.

Yeah. I also think that, I mean, to our goal here is to limit the 10-foot section of the curb there in the RL area. Having it there just gives the possibility someone could park there, and not having it there maintains the widening that we're looking for.

Yeah, I mean, I think that's 100% true. The widening, though, will be better than without the parking but someone could still stop there but someone could still park there even though there's no you know because it's it's still it's still 14 feet some you know someone could easily park there yes yeah so limiting that 10 foot length to i don't know if it stuck out a little bit past that other wall would help with the transition but uh it doesn't have to be 10 feet for certain

I would propose to solve most of the problems that that little wall that comes out adjacent to the entry gate there turns and does the four and a half feet and makes its way. However, the architect can integrate it into the retaining wall, but not have it go into the local license more than a small little wedge. If at all, I mean, you keep it on the property, that would be better still.

I think you could fit it all on the property. I don't see a reason for the RL unless you have to bring us a different one just for that corner. But for this...

There still needs to be an RL for them to do any work to replace the existing paving in some form or another because it's dirt right now.

But it's not our property in there.

No, the gray area is ours. And that right now is dirt.

Oh, okay.

And so we need to authorize it in some way to repair it.

Right. So what's your proposal? Can you...

I see Alex concerned about the jointing and the materials between the existing old paving and what they're doing new and the different retaining structures. So I think that's, aside from the aesthetic aspect of it, they're trying to give some flexibility so it has a greater lifetime based on the improvement. my sense is I don't know how they're going to resolve that grading, but I don't think if that were paved, it would be part of the road because it's a dip into their, into, into what is perceived to be their property. So I don't know that you're getting the benefit of that with there anyway, and there may be a great change to do so. So I think the, the, the, the paving is probably okay, but I'll be, I'll be, I'd be okay with making that paving as well to match the road. But I do think that we should, as Jane was pointing out, turn that small curb retaining wall that exists walking up the pathway as close to, if not entirely on their property as possible, so that it retains the grace of that entranceway, but not... blocking off the parking space because I think there is flexibility to get in and out of it without the curb there. And also we have always been striving to not build restrictive structures on our city right away.

Alex, does that seem acceptable to you?

Yeah, I'll have to verify that with our clients, but I understand what you're saying. I do think the parking space going away or not going away is an important aspect of all of this. But I understand what you're saying, which is less construction in the street right away.

Okay. And unfortunately, Alex, we have had, as Council Member Burke mentioned, instances, one in particular, where decorative paving was used instead of road. And then someone put up signs and said, no parking allowed, even though it's really city property. And, you know, so we haven't had a great experience with allowing what is normally considered roadway or cement or whatever, like your driveway, the same as the driveway entry, having it be a decorative area. And then all of a sudden, you know, people not pulling into it when there's two cars coming up against each other, which is the point of the removing the public parking space there is so that they could actually pull off a teeny bit more than what we're seeing existing right in the original photos. So I think that's part of our issue there.

Yeah, no, I've driven up and down that road enough to understand exactly what you're saying. Yeah, so I'll certainly review that with our clients and we'll submit a revised revocable license application to Rebecca to show that if my clients are comfortable with that. Unfortunately, we're not able to join tonight, so I can't speak to them.

Peter, I had one question just in terms of your suggestion is if you look at the street sort of going down, how do you address or do we need to address just the visual symmetry of the street? Like, is that a, you know, as I'm looking at it from the now the gate down, it's like, how does that work? So it doesn't look like a jagged.

Well, what they're proposing right now, anyway, I'm sorry, Rebecca, we go back to last one.

This visual is probably... Yeah, that one here.

What they're proposing is right where your cursor is... Yeah, right here.

Right here.

On the other side of the fence. Yeah.

Right here. Right, right, right.

Is that... Can you go left again? A little more left. Yeah. Pretty much. Oops. No. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.

I know, I know. It's not working. Right there.

No, go to the other side. OK, stop there. That's good. Go back a little more left. One more click left.

It's going to go too far. It won't let me.

OK, stop right there. That's good. That's fine. That's fine. This plan, the gray line, is intending to match this existing curb exactly.

Right.

Except that right where your cursor is, or thereabouts, that wall would end. That little stone curb would end. And all those bushes would be where the car parks. Right. And... The property, but there's a triangle here because their property goes from the fence where the front door is and it angles in at a more acute angle than the street is at. So it's that triangle space that's shown in this property, which would be that. So what I'm proposing is that from the white fence where the front door is to about four and a half feet, which is what Alec was talking about, right about there would turn in and match the back retaining wall or butt to it, however they resolve that architecturally, which is now in place with pressure treated wood, but I'm sure it talks about it being a wall eventually. which marks the inward part of that parking space. So that this curb wouldn't exist anymore, Alec was proposing differentiating the same line with materials, asphalt on the right-hand side and the pavers on the left-hand side, which would still retain the same look and feel as this road, but with wider opportunity because the parking space wouldn't be there and you could dip into their property if you need to, much like the pavement down below.

Got it. Thank you.

Okay. So I guess we're just, they will come back next month with a revised RL application. Is that correct?

Yeah. So perhaps one option that council would consider is, and I understand the architect needs to still check with the property owner, but assuming the owner does sign off, I think we can simply implement council's direction.

Oh, so you don't need to bring it back.

obviously the owner does not agree then we'll certainly need to come back do you need us to vote on it i assume you do yes okay does that seem acceptable to everybody would you like my opinion yes well i didn't think so anyway um i have to agree with um council member cooper and burke i don't think that the uh Shaded area should be in anything other than the asphalt road. And if they want to do a differentiation where they will have the pavers on there so people will actually know that's a private parking space. I think the point of the road is to widen it. and to allow cars to be able to move over so two cars can pass at that pinch point. And I'm fine with what a council member Mark suggested that they do a little curve just to define the front gate. But I agree with council member Cooper that they should be able to do that entirely on their property and connect it into that retaining wall. And I think a visit up to the site would have been very clear that all of this is all open and able to be navigated. And they do have some barriers because of the construction. But I agree that I wouldn't be able to approve this RL. And I would kind of like to see how they're going to, I think we need to decide if we're going to allow the turn of the curb to be in solely on their property, or if we're going to allow it into the RL, how much we're going to allow. Otherwise, I think it needs to come back to this council for review.

And I don't know if we've actually satisfied, are we in sync on where the dark shaded area, which is the portion of the street in the RL, are we aligned on what that is supposed to be? What the material is?

I mean, why couldn't they come back next month with an exhibit and put it on the consent calendar if it's all okay?

Yeah, certainly the council would prefer to see the update exhibit again just to confirm that everyone's on the same page. That's certainly also fine. I'm just trying to give the council options.

It sounds like we need to reach agreement on the materials though right now.

I'm fine with it being paving. match the road and i'm i have no problem with that if that's if that's easily possible and i think the architect and the applicant will look at it see if it is possible the i think i think one one additional thing is um just from a technical technicality perspective uh i would imagine they're gonna have to repave the portion of um their driveway in front of their their covered garage that's in the city right away that's not shown in this rl because that's pretty beat up too And that would go to both Jane and Pat's perspective that if in fact they're going to maintain the asphalt, they may want to dip into that area as well. So it goes all across and it really creates a widening of the road there. Because that should be, it's not just this section because they're obviously doing some repair in front of their driveway, in front of their carport as well. And that's, they obviously, I think technically don't have the right to repair that either without a license. Right? I mean, if they demo it and they ruin it and they want to put new concrete there, they should have a license for that in our space.

Yes, they should have a license for the driveway.

But I agree with Pat that it should definitely come back.

Just as a point, that could be September if we end up not having an August meeting.

They're not going to be done with their project by then.

uh okay so that's the direction you're rebecca you'll they'll come back next month if we have a meeting or september uh and we'll decide whether it should go on consent or for discussion at the time yes okay so we will close the item And we're moving to item 6C, which is a discussion and possible action on revocable license for the in-public right-of-way for the property at 47 West Shore Road. Is this Rebecca or Sammy? Go ahead. Sammy on this one.

Thank you, Mayor Wilkinson and council members. For your consideration, this evening is a revocable license application for new landscaping within the public right-of-way for the property at 47 West Shore Road. On April 21 of this year, the Planning Commission granted design review approval for a residential remodel, deck enlargement and landscaping. The project proposed new landscaping and maintenance of an existing 35 foot wide concrete driveway and lawn area, all of which encroach approximately seven feet into the West Shore Road right of way. Highlighted in yellow, the area with new landscaping in the right-of-way includes two Japanese maple trees listed to grow up to 15 feet tall and two fan palms, lavender, and succulents within a movable prefabricated metal planter. The planter box will be two feet tall and two feet seven inches deep and set approximately seven feet from the sidewalk. Here the draft revocable license exhibit shows the existing and proposed improvements within the right-of-way shaded. The driveway and lawn highlighted in yellow would not be modified. For council's consideration, the proposed planners have been revised since the planning commission approval in April. At the planning commission chair's request, the applicant revised the planners in the right-of-way to be movable rather than permanent and concrete. So staff recommends that the findings for the local license can be made as a project benefits the public. The existing driveway permits two off street parking spaces. And then the planter enhances the aesthetic quality of the streetscape without placing a permanent structure in the right of way. Thank you. And we're happy to answer any questions.

Do council members have questions for Sammy? I have two quick questions for Sammy. Go ahead.

The grass area that's on the right side of the driveway, it's going to remain a grassy area, but it's in pretty poor shape. Are they going to be replanting that or putting in new seeds to get something growing because it's pretty brown?

Right, this is the, here is the landscape plan right now. It's just to be maintained as a lawn area at this time.

Okay, because it doesn't look very good. It would be nice if they replaced that. The other thing is I don't have a problem with any of this. It's great they changed the planter. The only question I have was when I looked at the European fan palm that it's considered not totally... allowed by the fire district. However, it's not recommended. And that if it is planted, that it has certain restrictions. And I just wonder, since it's not supposed to be within so many feet of a fence, if that is the proper plant for that, if that has been looked at. Okay. as a proper plant for that location? That was my only question. Because they had several recommendations of how they would have to maintain those European ponds, palm trees, because of their farms.

That's a good, great point. I don't know that the architect knew about that consideration as well. She's here with us tonight.

Well, I mean, I just think that that should be looked at. I mean, I don't have any problem with the RL at all. It's just that my concern was, is I don't think we want to, they should be aware of what the requirements are because we don't want to recommend something that is a potential fire issue. That's it.

Any other questions? No. Let's open for public comment. There are no hands raised. Great. So I'll bring this back for discussion or a motion. Anybody want to go first? Jane.

I'm happy to make a motion unless somebody wants to discuss. Oh, go ahead. You do it. No, I'm good.

Only just one quick comment. I do think, and this is now, I guess, seven on the agenda where I can propose this, but I mean, I think moving the planters to movable versus permanent makes me more comfortable. I'm just trying to find what is our consistent approach to RLs and what do we allow in terms of being built or permanent structures versus not? I mean, so I think this looks great visually, but it is, you know, making city land appear to be private land. And I don't have an issue with this RL just based on what we've approved over the course of our history as a city. But I do think it just raises a question for us to figure out how do we better define what's acceptable and not acceptable in RLs so we can better govern both from a planning standpoint and a city council standpoint. And when I say better governance, just be much more consistent in our application. But again, because these are movable, I can get comfortable with it. If they were permanent, I would say, well, no, you can't put a structure in city land.

Thank you for the comment. Jane. Okay. I would like to make the motion that we approve the replicable license for existing and proposed private improvements in the public right-of-way along West Shore Road for the property at 47 West Shore Road.

Second. All in favour? Aye. Motion passes. Okay, we're moving on to item seven, which is our new item, future agenda items. City Council shall propose and consider items for future meetings. City Council may refer items to staff for further development before they appear on a future agenda. Does any council member have a suggestion for a future? Kevin, go for it.

Oh, what would it be? RLs? I do think it's appropriate for us. And I think we can be thoughtful about managing the timing of this. But I think bringing RLs to the council would be a very helpful and productive process. Second, if I can nominate two, I would like to get the tree ordinance to the council this year.

Do I have to get a vote to accept these things as future agenda items?

So I've got some tables on this one.

Okay.

General comments. I think it might be helpful if I read those out. Just how we look at this item and how we use it in the future. Any council member can suggest a future agenda item. However, requests requiring more than minimal staff time, research and preparation of a future staff report. should generally reflect the direction of the majority of council. So if that's the case, I think it would be helpful, certainly if there's a difference in opinions to memorialize that. And then just from a Brown Act perspective too, I think we should limit the discussion to identifying the topic and determining whether consideration is warranted rather than deliberating on the merits of the issue. Not that we've done that tonight, but just a reminder.

Okay, so can I ask just a follow up question to the staff that would be handling these two items within all of the work that you currently have on your plates? Is this these two items something that you could be considering during the remainder of this calendar year?

Well, the tree ordinance itself, I know we spent some already considerable amount of time prepping that and getting it ready. I think there's maybe, with the exception of one section, less work on that one. RLs is a big discussion. Right. And I'll defer to Rebecca on where we want to fit that in. Maybe it's a question we can bring back to next meeting.

Right, because meaning do you want to pump this to next year as a sort of key item that the city council agrees at the council retreat, or you feel like you have the bandwidth this year to be working potentially with a council member or two council members on this question?

I think although the tree ordinance has been looked at in the past, it needs a lot of work because trees go through chapter 20 and chapter... 8 and chapter 19. Okay. So to answer your question briefly, within the next calendar year, yes. The trees, I think, should come back. Okay. It's been a long time coming. And the RLs, I guess I would need more direction from a council member on exactly what you're looking for. We have a lot of history here, I think, of RL reports that have come to council. So I mean, with a little more direction.

Yeah. I mean, what I mean with Robert's further context, I would absolutely put the RL. I didn't realize about the tree ordinance. So maybe now I would put both of them in the category of requiring a bit of a heavy lift from staff. And so this isn't something, I mean, the RL, if we're already in July, we may not meet in August that leaves. Yeah. I mean, it's unlikely for this to come this year, then I would, probably put it as a key item to discuss on the at the retreat next year and we could decide you know when we could get it next year if it's a priority

And define scope, because we would be able to discuss that in more depth.

It's a meaty topic, the RL in particular, and I think it is going to require quite a bit of work.

And I would suggest that the RL also, we have to remember, encompasses different aspects of the whole community, and certainly we've asked Parks, Open Space and Lane to collect information. along the strip for all the RLs. So I think all that would fold into it. And they were planning on coming back in December, I think. And so I think pushing it would work because then it would fit with what we've already asked Parks Open Spacing Lane to do.

So I think that's a great suggestion, Kevin. And so I think we, you know, already in terms of the council retreat, that those will be two items for discussion and Kevin will be mayor and he can lead all of that. Okay, are there any other future agenda items that anybody would like to raise?

Everything on my list will be considered a heavy lift.

You can raise it and we can... All right, now you want to go down that road. Beyond those two, are there other items that you just want to flag?

So do you wanna, okay, so it would be good to know on our housing element, what progress we're making on our HCD requirements, such as our policies and goals, but that also encompasses a lot of code changes, cleanup and in our code and additions. That's two. I can go to three. I think we need a new... section in our municipal code that deals with development and how developments like future developments in our R2 and R3 zone and or municipal or municipal code mixed use just because I think we a code that specifically deals with development that doesn't fit into our normal code and i think that's become evident in mallard point that there's processes there that are different than what we normally do and i think we need to codify something um and that's a really super duper heavy duty lift but i think it's something that needs to be addressed sooner versus later so that as we get future development, which will be coming, that we do have something codified that addresses some of the things that we've learned from Mallard Point that we should be putting into a development code so that it's easier for the community, it's easier for the developer and it's easier for staff. So I just think there needs to be an injection into the municipal code to to deal with that and not that I admit is a very heavy lift. But I think it's really important and needs to be something we address sooner versus later, because we are going to get developments again. And I think that we can definitely use what we've learned over the last several years and put it in so that it's a smoother process for everybody involved.

Are you talking about, like, I understand sort of the key takeaways or learning, you know, things we've learned from Mallard, but are you asking for like a revision of the R2 and R3 in terms of the zoning ordinance? Or are you saying like all multifamily developments are required to have a development agreement? Here's an example of a development agreement. Or can you give me an example of what you mean by development section of the code?

So normally our process is you're building, tearing something down, building a new structure, you get one permit with everything in it. Now with a development, you might want to have something in there that breaks up that process and is more clear on how it can proceed through not so much the Planning process valid would help with the conditions of approval, so it would be kind of with the planning process, but also how it's going to proceed through into entitlement. So that it's it's it's a clear process that you know there could be a DEMO permit given before you have your building permit because. They need to demo it, and then they need to do their improvement plan, i.e. infrastructure, and then they're going to do their building plan. So this first process is over here, and then the next process is there. I think having things in there, such as, you know, bonds that would need to be required. I don't know if we need a user fee study for something like that to include that in a net user fee update. I just think that some of the things could be a little clearer and make the process easier for everyone to understand going forward because I mean, there is gonna be further development And our code, I think, is primarily written for single family homes and duplexes. It's not taking into consideration larger projects that could come forward. And I mean, there's, for instance, there's some communities out there that have a strict process they have to follow on the improvement plans. And that's all outlined in the municipal code of if you want to get your improvement plans, you have to, you know, DPW says, ABC. And then so and so says you have to do EFG. And then finally, you get to the point where you can get your improvement plan. So I think we just need to look at how other cities handle these. Even though people don't consider it big development, what we get in Belvedere to us, it is big development. And I just think that if there is a section that addresses some of these issues, that it just would make it easier for everybody involved for yourself, for for the community, for the developer, just to have everything kind of spelled out a little clearer, because our code doesn't really go into major redevelopment. We haven't had it in 60, 70 years. And so we never addressed it because it was like, who is going to build a duplex? Well, now we do have that. So I just think that we need to consider that kind of addition to our code. so that it's a better process for everybody all the way around.

Okay. Everybody seems to be in agreement with that. Rebecca, I'm assuming, again, that that's a giant lift and this is something that we pushed into 2027. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. All right. Or eight.

Exactly, or 2029 or whatever it is. Okay. Are there any other suggestions? I guess we have to open this for public comment. Is that right, Beth? There is no public comment. Okay. Unless there's further discussion, I think we can close item seven and move to item eight, which is our open forum. This is an opportunity for any member of the public to briefly address the city council on any matter that does not appear on this agenda, but that is within the city council subject matter jurisdiction. Upon being recognized by the mayor, please limit your all statement to no more than three minutes. Under the Brown Act, council members may not deliberate or take action on this item, on an item not on tonight's agenda. Matters that may warrant a more lengthy presentation or council consideration may be placed on the agenda for further discussion at a later meeting.

There are no hands raised.

Okay. With that, we can adjourn. Good night.