City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Special City Council meeting for September 8th, 2026. It is 530 and we have a quorum. If we could begin with a roll call, please.

Council Member Maloney. Vice Mayor Pearson.

I'm present.

Council Member Mendoza. Here. Council Member Orleman.

Here.

Mayor Meyer.

Here. Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance. The public comment time for tonight's items will be three minutes each. To ensure that all speakers feel welcome to share their views, members of the audience are kindly requested to refrain from applauding or speaking to the council from the audience without being called upon first. In addition, in order to maintain decorum and ensure that no one's sight is obstructed, public commenters are reminded to not approach the dais.

At this time, the public is permitted to address the city council on items that are listed on the closed session or special meeting agenda. We did receive two written public comments in advance of tonight's meeting, which is summarized on the screen. First speaker I have is Danny.

This t-shirt says, love the process. I'm not wearing it because it's merch from Brentwood's award-winning artist Critta's fashion line. I'm wearing it because I believe and I love the process, except in this case. I believe this process is tainted because of outside pressures from a group of melanin-deprived men and women, the unwillingness of your administrative leadership to look in the allegations that I have made over the last three months, and wannabe. I don't know if you read the email I sent today. Despite what you think of me right now, I will go over some details I have yet to bring up in public. So in the little time I have tonight, my focus is gonna be strictly on him. First sir, I know what you did. When I'm able to speak upon it, I shall. Let me say this. It was truly the biggest laugh I ever got in my life. For me and eventually the council, his presence will confirm what I've always said. He is a living conflict of interest. It baffles me why after public and private conversations with me that he is still involved. I've had the opportunity to speak to three of you in private. If they wish to discuss what I brought up, not only do I recommend they bring it up tonight with the entire council, the insurance carrier, and our outside legal counsel, I beg you to bring it up. There won't be any Brown Act pitting against one another depending on what side of the neck he talks out of. It will be out in the open. I told these council members that it was tough to get his full professional history, but Tottenham, I have a 146 IQ, I'm OCD, and I'm bipolar. And I don't say that to brag. I mean, seriously, who brags about being bipolar? I'm just letting you know on the record, one, that I know more about you than the whitewashed Google searches show. Two, I've passed this information along to the council members I spoke with. I'll save my additional comments for later. In the last 15 seconds, Councilwoman Mendoza, you, if anyone, know exactly what it's like to have your name thrown out in them streets with the priest and the pitcher and how they try to tear you down. I hope you take that into consideration with the...

Next speaker I have is Laura.

Good evening, Mayor, council members, and other members of Brentwood's leadership. I'm here tonight because I want to express my strong support for the sale of the parcel at the corner of Windy Springs Lane and Lone Tree Way. As a resident of Windy Springs Lane, we know what the effects will be on our neighborhood as far as lights, sounds, even inconvenience for our neighborhood. However, we don't care about that. What we want is a fire station. We want emergency services in our community instead of waiting for them to come from other cities into our neighborhood to help those. We all know when an emergency happens, every second counts. and a new fire station in the northwest corner of Brentwood will be good for everybody. We want it, Brentwood needs it, do what's right, vote yes, stop the stalling. I appreciate your consideration, thank you.

Next speaker is Joan.

Good evening. I live on Windy Springs. I have lived there for the last 14 years. Um, it's been very disappointing hearing that the fire station is stalled. We need it very badly. Response time is horrible in this town. I just want to quickly mention that 10 years ago, my husband had open heart surgery. He was home for three days and his heart stopped. I had to call 911. It took 10, 15 minutes. for a response to the point where I had to run out of my home, stand on the sidewalk and look, where are they? Then when they finally arrived, I was waving, here, here, I was so desperate. Well, that was 10 years ago. You can imagine with all of the growth, what kind of a position we're in now. I implore you, to please, for the benefit of the whole city, please purchase the property on the corner of Wendy Springs and Lone Tree so we can have our fire department. Thank you.

The next speaker is John.

Good evening, everybody. My name is John Miller. I'm a Coast Guard veteran, a father, and a Brentwood resident living two blocks from the planned Station 90 location. Homeowners are already struggling to obtain and maintain fire insurance. We need this station for a faster emergency response that it will provide. Instead of getting that faster response, the project still hasn't even entered the formal planning process because the city's refusing to transfer the additional acreage. If another community meeting is needed, hold one, but please transfer the additional acreage to the Contra Costa Fire, accept the planning application, and resolve the remaining issues. This is our neighborhood, our tax money, and our fire protection. Now, please stop delaying station 90 and get a bill. Thank you.

Last speaker card I have in person is Karen.

Sorry, I'm short. Good evening, council and city.

Oh, Carrie.

Wow. My name is Karen Rogge. I live on Windy Springs. I have lived here for 34 years. I have been through the growth of this town from 13,000 people to one light on Lone Tree. I have seen the Northwest grow immensely. I sat on the 2000 general plan. I went to 10 years of fire district meetings I've seen them close our fire stations. I've seen my neighbors lose their fire insurance. I've seen the other ones and myself have our fire insurance quadruple four times. I mean, it just was ridiculous. I worked on Measure L. I know two times it failed. The third time, I mean, we lost track. So I was very thankful for our board of supervisor who made Measure X possible. and we also worked on that. So the fact that we, and in 2002, we asked for a fire station and it was supposed to be on Shady Willow and all the infrastructure was put in on Shady Willow for that station. I also know there's another location on Sand Creek next to Mary Black School and the infrastructure's put on that. Unfortunately, all of the, land that's vacant around me has contaminated soil. I know that. I have a soil report in my dining room. Okay, but I figured it wasn't a big deal to put the soil on there. Little did I know that it is a big deal and it costs a lot of money. So when the only vacant lot left was the one north of my property, which it is, and with this, with the approval of the .72 acres, that the city still owns that they eminent domain from property owners that had lived there for 50 to a hundred years. They kept it for a reason and it was a very good reason. And we all knew that on Wendy Springs and in our area, I know I only have 49 seconds. I'm just telling you guys, we have waited 24 years for a fire station and the fact that the County finally has money to build it.

And I don't know what's going on here.

Okay. I went on vacation thinking that it was a done deal. I came back home got a text message at 630 in the morning when I crossed the Canada border and worked on my letter to you guys, while I was driving home. This is just uncalled for you guys are all elected to be to help us to help the residents to bring us fire safety. So I'm asking you to please, please vote on this. Come to some kind of consensus because we've worked with the county. We have our issues settled as of right now. We're gonna have a heck of a lot of time. I know my time's, anyway, in the next two years, as we get through. Thank you very much.

The next speaker is Greg.

And I am taller. And anyway, Karen told me she was not driving when she wrote that letter. She was the passenger in the car. Anyway, my name is Greg Robinson. I am a 30 year resident of Brentwood, and I am here because I am so excited about some of the items on the closed session for tonight. The first one being the negotiation of real property. Luckily, we have enough information on this closed session that you are gonna be talking about the property on Loan Tree, since it says right there. It's not even an acre. Everybody should know that it's less than one acre. It's 0.172. It's a little tiny slice of land that is holding up the project. So I'm not sure why and what happened in the past. I just know that tonight you have a full council, and I'm hoping that you guys do the right thing, and that is to vote to make the sale that, from what I understand from the previous administration, all the details were worked out. It was waiting for a signature, and then we had a little chaos happen in our city that you're all aware of. So let's move forward, come out of that closed session happy and go, we have something positive to report tonight. Because many oftentimes you come out and say you have nothing to report. Come out tonight and say, we have something positive to report. We're signing the paper for the fire station property and let's move forward. The second thing I'm excited about is your second agenda item. which says employee performance review, city manager. We all know what's happening there. The guy is sitting at home collecting over $300,000. Unfortunately, last week or two weeks ago, you guys had to make a tough decision to give the guy a raise. based on Walter, my good friend who came in and all the rules of the, I don't know what it's called, but you have to pay so much over somebody else, right? So the guy's sitting home on administrative leave and he got a raise. How lucky is he? But tonight you guys have the opportunity to make a decision, make a final call. Let's do what we need to do. Let's get the city manager off the roster. Save us taxpayers $330,000. I know in this contract, he's got some sort of a buyout clause. I didn't look at it. I think it's a half a year's pay. So maybe you're gonna have to write him a check for $150,000. Write the check. Let's move on. Go to your planning commission, your closed session. Come out. We're looking forward to hearing some really, really good news when you guys come out. Thank you.

Real quick, I have a quick response, Mayor. Greg, you just said that there was a deal made with prior administration on the fire station beforehand. Before we go back, I'd like to know who made that backroom deal because no one in the council knew about that. No, no, we can't go back and forth. I'll talk to you on the way out because if there was a backroom deal, I want to know about it. There was no backroom deal. Okay, let's move on.

Are there any more comments? Next speaker is Anthony.

Good evening, Mayor, members of the council, and members of the public. Anthony Stevens, Vice President, Local 1230, here tonight to speak in favor of the land deal for Fire Station 90. and speak in support of the public showing up here tonight in support of the fire station to increase public safety, not only here in Brynwood, but all of East Contra Costa. I'm sure there'd be much more members of the public that would be able to make it here tonight if they weren't fighting traffic commuting back to their community here. So with that, I'll yield my time and ask for your support and support of the land deal tonight. Thank you.

I have no additional speaker cards in person, and I have no hands raised in Zoom.

Thank you. I need a motion to recess to close session, please. So moved. Second. All in favor with the roll call? Aye. We need a roll call.

Thank you. Council Member Maloney?

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza?

Yes. Council Member Orleman?

Yes.

Mayor Meyer? Yes. We are recessed to close session. Thank you for your comments.

I need to run to my clock.

Excuse me.

Good evening for those with us in the council chamber and waiting on Zoom at home. The city council is currently in closed session and we will begin the meeting as soon as they conclude in closed session and join us at the dais, thank you. Good evening, for those joining us on Zoom, the City Council is currently recessed in closed session. The meeting will begin as soon as they return to the dais, thank you.

Thank you for your patience, everyone. We are returning to close out our special city council meeting. We do have a report out on item E1. Mr. City Attorney, can you provide that please?

On 9 to me one vice mayor Pearson made a motion to spend that time and attention on the proposed transfer of property located at 6691 lone tree way to work with Contra Costa County fire protection district to negotiate price in terms of proposed transfer and to authorize staff to enter into the development application review process. Second on that motion was Council Member Maloney. The vote. Mayor Meyer, yes. Vice Mayor Pearson, yes. Council Member Maloney, yes. Council Member Mendoza, yes. And Council Member Orlemans, yes.

Thank you. On items E2 and E3, we have nothing to report out. Can I get a motion to adjourn the special city council meeting? So moved. Second. Can I get a roll call vote, please?

Council Member Maloney? Yes.

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza? Yes. Council Member Orlemans?

Yes.

Mayor Meyer?

Yes. Special council meeting is adjourned. We're moving into the regular city council meeting again. Thank you for your patience as we worked through our agenda items. We have a quorum. If we could begin with a roll call, please. Council Member Maloney?

Present.

Vice Mayor Pearson.

Here.

Council Member Mendoza. Here. Council Member Orlemans. Here. Mayor Meyer.

Here. Before we move into the Pledge of Allegiance tonight, I would like to take a moment to recognize that this week marks 25 years since the attacks of September 11th, 2001. As a community, we pause to remember the nearly 3,000 lives lost that day, honor the courage and service of the first responders and ordinary citizens who rushed to help and reflect on the families and communities whose lives were forever changed. I invite everyone to join us in a moment of silent and reflection. And please join us in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We are going to start with a presentation, item C1. I would like to welcome Nola Woods, Public Affairs Director with the Contra Costa Mosquito and Vector Control District, to the podium for tonight's first presentation. You can move the podium down to there's a black button on the on the top yeah.

Oh, thank you so much. Well, I want to thank you very, very much for inviting me here this evening, it means a lot to the district and I appreciate the opportunity to share about our public health agency with you. As a public health agency, we provide public health services to reduce the risk of mosquitoes, including providing mosquito eating fish for people who have an appropriate amount of standing water like a horse trough or a decorative pond or a large fountain or even an unmaintained swimming pool can be appropriate for mosquito eating fish because they eat the young mosquitoes as they develop in the water. We provide public health services for rats and mice skunks, ticks, underground yellow jackets specifically, and education, confirmation that they are honeybees and education for honeybees, which is a more recent service that we added because there are some residents in Contra Costa County who think every yellow and black bug is a bee. And so when we would go out, sometimes they were ground nesting yellow jackets and sometimes they were honeybees. So we did adopt that particular service. So the district is funded through property taxes and benefit assessment. So when a Contra Costa County resident requests one of our district public health services, there's no additional charge for that district service. And taking a look at the numbers of service requests in the last 12 months here in Brentwood we received 93 requests for mosquitoes service 19 for mosquito fish 22 for rats and mice 23 for skunks three for ticks to for ground nesting yellow jackets and none for bees from Brentwood. But the primary reason that I am here this evening is to talk about the make sure that you are aware about the fact that last month, just a couple of weeks ago, actually, the district found the non-native invasive Aedes aegypti mosquito here in Brentwood. This is not one of the 23 native mosquito species that we already have in Contra Costa County. This is an invasive non-native mosquito that district employees have been trying very hard to control. We have found these three years in a row over in Antioch and we received a request from a member of the public for mosquito service and it turned out that it was this particular dangerous mosquito. It's particularly dangerous and I say that in all truth because this is a mosquito that can transmit the viruses that cause dengue fever, Zika, yellow fever, and chikungunya from person to person. And we are seeing local transmission in Southern California right now. We are working very hard to prevent that from happening up here, but it is a truth with this mosquito. As I mentioned, in August, we received a request for mosquito service from a Brentwood resident. Frankly, the more places that we've been trapping, the more we've found of these mosquitoes. The key thing that we want people to know that this is a daytime biting mosquito. This is not your West Nile mosquitoes that bite in the morning and in the evening. This is right in the middle of the day and often below the knee. These mosquitoes will bite. This map that you're seeing right here is right after we found these This was the larval mosquito control areas that we focused on trying to stop these mosquitoes when they were young and developing in the water. But as I mentioned, as we continue to trap, we're finding more of them. The main thing, as I mentioned earlier, that that makes this particularly dangerous are the diseases, it can spread and the fact that it can spread them from. person to person, one of the things that most people in Contra Costa county are very aware of is West Nile virus well West Nile virus is something that. Humans are not able to make enough of the virus that another mosquito cannot. If a mosquito bit me, if I had West Nile virus and a mosquito bit me, that mosquito would not become infected and could go bite someone else and take it to them. It's impossible. Humans are considered a dead end host. That's why this mosquito is a game changer because they can transmit. If someone travels and comes home with dengue fever, If one of those mosquitoes bites that person it could bite another person and infect them with dengue fever. So it's incredibly important for folks to number one dump out any amount of standing water on their properties each week and call us contact the district if they're being bitten by day biting mosquitoes. That's why two things that we're asking here today is, as I mentioned, to dump out standing water. We are going door to door to meet with folks. We've sent out postcards letting folks know that we are coming to check front and backyards to dump out any amount of standing water they have on their property. Because if you dump out the water, because all mosquitoes have to develop from eggs to adult in water, that removes the place where these mosquitoes can grow. The second thing that I would like to mention is when we find these mosquitoes when we have information to share. I would really appreciate it if I could partner, perhaps with your public information people here in Brentwood to share the information. That they could maybe share and get to a larger audience here in Brentwood would be incredibly important to our public health agency. So that is the bottom line for me is that collaboration, because when we share information on a new area where we found it, we want to make sure people know we want to make sure they're wearing their repellent and one of the things that. People have mentioned to me lately at events that i've been working. is someone will say, I'm out with my family and I'm being eaten alive by mosquitoes, but my husband isn't. And that is, as a public health agency, we want people to understand the husband's getting bitten just as much as the wife is. The husband's allergy level is lower and he may not realize. So if you are going out and you find, you know, particularly we said for a long time, if you're going to be out in the evening, wear your repellent. Now we know because of these mosquitoes, it's really important to wear your repellent if you're going to be out even during the daytime because of these dangerous mosquitoes. And those are messages that we would love to be able to share with your public information people to share with more people here in Brentwood. I greatly appreciate the time you've given me tonight, and I'm happy to answer any questions if you have any questions.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Yes, a substantial number of residents have pools. Is there anything we should be concerned about, or would the chemicals involved in the pools repel the larva from reproducing?

That's an excellent question. Thank you so much for asking it. A well-maintained swimming pool that is chlorinated and taken care of is not going to produce mosquitoes. One place where folks do want to be sure to check just in cases in their filter area, sometimes that water doesn't get as much of the chemical treatment and there can be potential larvae there. But 9.9 times out of 10, maintaining your swimming pool is the best thing you can do to prevent mosquitoes if you have a swimming pool. Conversely, If there is an unmaintained swimming pool, definitely let the district know. On our website where it says I want to, you can request service under that on our Contra Costa Mosquito.gov website. And the unmaintained swimming pools can actually be reported to us anonymously so that the reporter doesn't have to be outed, if it were, as it were.

Are pool companies aware that they should be checking the filters?

It's something that we have been communicating to pool companies really since the Great Recession when so many pools were left behind. It's been quite a while since that, and so I think that does bear catching up with them and reminding them to make sure they check not only the pool but the filters as well.

Thank you. Other questions? And Terrance, can we make sure that we're working with them as far as the outreach? Yes. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Thanks for your presentation.

Moving into item C2, Theresa Fairbanks, Interim Human Resources Director, will lead the presentation on new employee introductions.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of City Council, staff, and residents of Brentwood. Tonight, we get to officially welcome some very amazing and talented individuals who have joined our city over the last four months. As a city, we strive to be an employer of choice, a place where people can build meaningful careers, create long and lasting relationships, and do work that truly matters. We know that these new hires had other opportunities and we want to extend a sincere thank you for choosing us and for choosing to dedicate their talents to our community. To celebrate this milestone, our department directors have worked together with Weplative to create a video that we will share to introduce our new hires and formally welcome them to the Brentwood family. I do ask at the end of the video, those employees that are here, we would like to have you stand up so we can acknowledge you.

I'm very pleased to introduce Amy Tilley as our new Senior Management Analyst in the Economic Development Division. Amy is a native San Diegan, a former college volleyball player, and has proudly called Brentwood home for the past 10 years. Her two daughters have also grown to love everything about being part of the Brentwood community. Amy is likely to be a familiar face to many in Brentwood. She brings nearly 20 years of experience in business development and strategy, marketing, and community engagement. She also served as the first ever executive director of the Downtown Brentwood Coalition. As a Rotarian, she believes strongly in the motto, service above self, and she's excited to bring that same spirit to the city of Brentwood. Fun fact about Amy, she loves collecting very old novels and hopes to write children's books someday.

The engineering department is happy to introduce two new employees to our now fully staffed department. The first is Monish Sen, our new engineering manager. Previous to joining Brentwood, Monish was a senior traffic engineer for over 20 years with Contra Costa County and worked in the private sector before that. As a fun fact, Monish prides himself as a history buff and delivers high praise for the new Odyssey movie written and directed by Christopher Nolan. We're excited to have Monish join the team and bring his unique county experience and knowledge towards managing and delivering projects identified in our capital improvement program. The second new addition to the department is Linda Sendik, our new administrative assistant one. Before joining the city, Linda was and continues to be a full-time mom raising five children. Prior to that, she worked for PG&E, where she provided administrative support to their field crews. A fun fact about Linda is that she actually discovered Brentwood by accident. While driving from San Jose to Tracy with her husband to look for a new place to raise their family, they got a little turned around and ended up finding Brentwood. They immediately fell in love with the community and the schools, made an offer on a home near Sunset Park, and the rest, as they say, is history. We're excited to have Linda join the team and bring her experience, energy, and unique connection to the Brentwood community to the department.

Human Resources is excited to announce the selection and hiring of Fran Cadero as our Administrative Assistant 1. Fran has been working with the Human Resources Department in a limited service capacity since August of 2025, but was recently selected to fill the position officially July 16th of this year. Fran's background includes 20 plus years of experience in human resources that includes employee benefits, investigations, and drug screenings. In addition, she has seven years of experience in business development, marketing, and event planning, and over 15 plus years of community service and volunteer work. A fun fact is that she is part of the leadership team of Brentwood Strong, where serving the community and creating meaningful impact is the heart of their mission. One of her favorite initiatives is the annual Adopt a Senior program, proudly partnering with the City of Brentwood and countless volunteers. They are able to make a significant difference for seniors in need, ensuring they feel supported, remembered, and celebrated during the holiday season.

It is my pleasure to introduce Michelle Magarell, a new Deputy City Attorney in the City Attorney's Office. Michelle has a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from University of California, Berkeley, and a JD from the University of San Francisco School of Law. Michelle comes to Brentwood with experience in municipal law and public service, most recently serving as Deputy City Attorney for the City of East Palo Alto. Michelle's legal background also includes service as a Deputy Attorney General at the California Department of Justice, as well as private practice. A fun fact, Michelle is an avid reader who is almost always in the middle of a good book. Michelle also enjoys traveling.

Officer Iacoppo Jake Sayamolo started his law enforcement career with the Piedmont Police Department in February of 2019 and joined the Brentwood Police Department in June of 2026, and we are thrilled to have him. Prior to law enforcement, Officer Sayamolo served in the military, Army Reserves, and then the National Guard. He's originally from Hawaii, and he speaks Samoan. In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his family, outdoor activities, and a fun fact about Officer Sayamolo is he has five sisters and is the only son. Congratulations, Officer Sayamalo.

Juan Fierros comes to the city of Brentwood with over 17 years of commercial driver and heavy equipment operator experience, with three of those years specializing in the solid waste industry from Silicon Valley to San Joaquin Valley. Juan grew up in Oakland, California and is the second youngest of six siblings. He has been a resident of Tracy for over 20 years and enjoys cooking and camping with his family and friends. He also enjoys coaching his children on their sports teams and tending to his guard.

Do we have any of our new employees here that we can acknowledge? Thank you, Teresa. Moving into public comments. The public comment time for tonight's items will be two minutes each. To ensure that all speakers feel welcome to share their views, members of the audience are kindly requested to refrain from applauding or speaking to the council from the audience without being called upon first. In addition, in order to maintain decorum and ensure that no one's site is obstructed, public commenters are reminded to not approach the dais. Thank you.

At this time, the public is permitted to address the City Council on items that are not on the agenda. Items listed under informational reports are on the consent calendar and requests for future agenda items, new requests. Comments for tonight's detailed agenda items or business items should be made when those items are called. Please limit your remarks to two minutes. The microphone will be muted when the timer expires. The first speakers I have is Attarve, followed by Arou, followed by Danny.

Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. I'm Antarv Bansal, a proud resident of the City of Brentwood and a volunteer of Hindu Swam Sevak Sangh. I'm pleased to share a community service initiative undertaken by volunteers of the Hindu Swam Sevak Sangh, or HSS, as part of the Backpack Seva, also known as the Vidyadhan Campaign, HSS volunteers came together to support BUSD with 50 plus school students in our community and 105 students across Contra Costa County by providing backpacks filled with essential school supplies. Each backpack included composition notebooks, pencils, pens, erasers, sharpies, pencil cases, geometry boxes, post-it notes, and other educational supplies essential to having productive learning. The Backpack Seva is a national community service initiative of HSS USA through which volunteers across the country collect and donate school supplies to help students begin the academic year prepared and confident. This effort reflects the values of Seva, or selfless service, and Vasudeva Kutumbakam, the world is one family. It is a wonderful example of community members coming together to support local students and invest in their education and future. We are grateful to all the HSS volunteers and donors who generously contributed their time and resources to make this initiative possible. I would also like to briefly introduce another initiative, Universal Oneness, which carries forward the similar values of community, compassion, and togetherness. We will be sharing more details about this initiative with the city council via email. Thank you for the opportunity to recognize this meaningful act of service in our community.

All right, good evening Madam Mayor and members of the City Council. My name is Aura Runtin and I'm here to provide a brief update on the Brentwood Youth Commission September meeting. So this month, the Youth Commission focused heavily on preparing and assigning members and commissioners for our events and to assigning ad hocs for each event. So on the following events, we assigned ad hocs for the following events, our youth friendly business, the multicultural fair, the craft night before Christmas, the career fair, and the STEM fair. The commissioners have now been assigned to these projects and so that planning can begin early and we can continue throughout the year. Looking further ahead, we have began preparing for the hometown Halloween event in October. This will be another opportunity for us to directly engage with the youth of Brentwood and their parents and to share like what the youth commission does and the opportunities that the youth commission provides along with some fundraising. We have decided on a very nostalgic theme that we are very excited to share, though it is a surprise for now. Finally, we have discussed new methods of fundraising for our Brentwood Youth Commission scholarships and other events, so we can strive to continue supporting students of Brentwood, and we are looking for ways to raise more funds for even bigger scholarships this year. Overall, our September meeting was focused on getting our committees ready, preparing for upcoming community events, setting the foundation for the Youth Commission's work throughout the 2026-2027 term. Thank you, Madam Mayor and members of the City Council. And that concludes my update. Thank you.

A reminder, please, for speakers that the black button on the top of the podium will raise it or lower it. And please make sure that the microphone is close to your mouth so people at home can hear and the recording is picked up. Thank you.

Okay. Well, I'm going to be doing a little free balling tonight. I mean, freestyling. Oh, man. Well, I say it in jest, but it's not a funny subject. And it has to do with one of your agenda items tonight. And I'm not speaking upon that, but I will speak upon the shenanigans, the dog and pony show, call it what you will, at the last county meeting between who I lovingly call the Mighty Munchkin. AKA supervisor Diane Burgess and our esteemed assistant chief who's here tonight. And when I say dog and pony show, it is really out of the same playbook they used for station 92. Blame the council, blame the planning commission, blame constituents, bring in folks or convince folks that it is not their fault. Now, you folks came out and said that you were going to go through the whole process of selling the land. That's a beautiful thing. But I'd like to remind those out there that that was always on the table. They wanted Station 92. They made up excuses all over the place why they couldn't use Lone Tree. But now all of a sudden it's, why can't we use this? Why are you guys holding us up and blaming us for the delays of Station 92? It's ridiculous. I have it on tape. Look me up on Facebook. You'll see.

The next speakers I have is Roger, followed by Rudy, followed by Rich.

Roger, would you prefer a microphone handheld?

Okay.

Here we go. All right.

Here we go.

Where's Faye?

Oh, hi, Faye.

All right. Good evening, City Council. Thank you all very much. I've got a lot of people to thank tonight. First of all, I want to thank Amanda for putting up with me. She's done a great job. I want to thank Lindsay Pinnell at Park and Recreation Department and Officer Bollinger at the PD for working diligently on the project to have the Community Outreach Officer come to the Senior Center. Secondly, I'd like to thank the following people working on a project involving Shea Holmes who cable locked a real estate sign to the traffic and pedestrian crossing pole at Grant and Sunset here in Brentwood. The incident report number in case you want to look it up is 260-905-0105. The non-emergency operator was 670. Officer Deakins took it. and did an excellent job on it. It has been forwarded to Ariel at the Community Enhancement. I'd like to thank them for their timely and professional handling in this case. And I must not fail to recognize the efforts of the Brentwood Police Department's Records Division. Brentwood works when all partners work together. Hopefully Shea Holmes will be a good corporate partner and advertise responsibly and not cutting off pedestrian accessibility and handicap accessibility on the crosswalks. So hopefully they'll get that together. Again, I want to thank the city council. I want to thank the city staff. And I'm going to stop now and let someone else come up here and speak. Thank you.

Next speakers are Rudy, followed by Rich, followed by Paul.

Good evening. Last council meeting, Roger, who just left the podium, reported to the city council that the senior citizens were afraid of calling the police for any reason because of what happened to my wife who died in police custody. The officers involved were never taken off of work until an investigation would be performed. I don't even believe there was one performed. The citizens, maybe they should have, they probably do have a valid reason to be afraid because the city chief and the two officers are still working. You would think that they would want to wait until an investigation was done to see if things were done properly. They were not. And now he's the police chief. He doesn't seem to be a good leader. You would think that he would be concerned about having two people already die while he's been in charge. Nobody's ever held responsible. The two officers that are involved, Peachman and Tagia, whatever her name might be, they're still working. What happens if they hurt another person You didn't resolve the first one. What happens if they heard somebody else, Chief? What are you guys gonna do then? It's gonna cost you guys money. You know that, we know that. We were hoping somebody would be decent enough to listen and talk with us, but nah, it's been all silent. I feel sorry for the citizens of Brumwick.

My name is rich ramirez i'm the son of rudy and ilana ramirez my mom was killed by Aaron peachman of the Brentwood police department and, to the best of my knowledge, he has not been disciplined, along with Danielle to gia. let's look at the totality of the facts. The arrest was on a premise of a citizen's arrest. In order for that to happen, he was not present to witness an alleged coffee mug break of $12. He needed the accuser to sign paperwork. He arrested my mom and never obtained that. When he arrested my mom, he told her she was impeding an investigation of a crime, but yet did not list the crime, did not tell her that. He used aggressive arrest tactics when he arrested her, handcuffed her. She was in pain, screaming. Forces her into the car, hitting her head not once but twice, leaving her in the prone position and leaving her unattended for over 20 minutes. And then when the paramedics come, he deliberately fails to mention that she hit her head So this is, I don't have no words to say about what's going on with our family here. We're getting no support from the leaders here. You think that he followed policy and procedure? He's a woman abuser, an elder abuser, and a flat out liar. He lied at the coroner's inquest that he did not see my mom hit her head. He's not blind, he's not deaf. She cried in pain, and then he lied. The speaker's timer has expired.

On September 26 is when Yolanda Ramirez was killed by Officer Peachman over a minor dispute, a domestic dispute. She should be here today. As a retired federal investigator with the US Department of Labor Wage Hour Division, I know about investigations and I know about how you build a case. And when the family came, again, she died on September 26, was taken off of life support six days later. We got here, the first city council meeting, November 12th. There had been no action by the chief, by the officers. A report came out and it was full of lies. November 12th, the family came here. And we told them, what are you doing? The very next day, November 13th, a van load of Brentwood policemen and detectives get out and start interviewing witnesses. And there were six witnesses that saw everything. And in their interview statements, they said it was, she was brutalized. A 72 year old, not more than five feet, one is dead. a missing grandmother, a missing wife of 50 plus years. And for what? This family had made sure that justice is gonna happen. We have a coroner's inquest that came out that changed the cause of death. We have the DA currently doing a criminal investigation of the Brentwood PD and the department. That's what the family has done. The city of Brentwood, the city council, the leaders have done nothing.

The next speakers are Becky, followed by Kiko, followed by Sandy.

Whoever's idea it was to show us an edited footage of my mom in the back of the police car should be ashamed. Watching what happened to her at the inquest was way more gut wrenching than devastating that I could have ever imagined. She asked Siri to call my dad, not once, not twice, but three separate times. And anytime I think of her, the first images I see are her in the back of that police car. It's hard to bring up the happy memories when all I see is just her suffering in the back there. We teach our kids that there's consequences to their actions. when they have a lack in judgment. When you work, you learn that there are consequences to your actions and having a lack in judgment. Officer Peachman and Tagia, they had a complete lack of judgment in handling my mom. She did not deserve to be treated the way she was, and yet there have been no consequences to their actions. No consequences. They are still out on patrol. How is the community supposed to feel safe? You can claim all you want that it won't happen. We thought this would never happen, never in a million years that it would happen to my mom. And unfortunately, here we are. So again, if you wanna teach your kids that there's consequences to their actions, to let them know that there's right from wrong, and if they do something where their lack of judgment just went haywire, then you need to show that and discipline these officers.

Hi, my name is Kiko. I'm Yolanda and Rudy's son. I used to be proud to say I was from Brentwood. Today, because of the actions of the police department and the silence of the council, I feel very differently. My family's roots run deep here. My mother Yolanda worked for Contra Costa County Health Services for years. My grandmother, mother-in-law and father all served our local school system. My dad, Rudy, was even honored right here by this city with a plaque for his service in Vietnam. We are Brentwood. You constantly talk about community, but when this community actually needs you to step up, all we get is silence. You claim the officers followed protocol. I wanna ask you directly, is leaving an elderly citizen lying in a prone position in the back of a patrol car with her hands cuffed behind her back proper protocol? It has been almost a year and you have done nothing. Time is running out on the one year statute of limitations to bring charges. I'm here tonight to ask Mayor Meyer and the City Council to publicly demand that the District Attorney file criminal negligence charges against Officer Aaron Peachman. I am also asking City Manager Davis and Chief O'Grodnick to place Officer Aaron Peachman on administrative leave immediately. In Georgia, an officer was placed on immediate, was placed on leave after accidentally killing a young donkey. It is unacceptable that an officer involved in the mistreatment of my mother, Yolanda, an elderly resident of our city, faces fewer consequences. Stand up for your residents and show us that accountability actually exists in Brentwood.

I'm not that little. I gotta talk for two minutes. Okay, I gotta hurry up. My name, first of all, is Sandy Heinisch. I have lived here in Brentwood for 25 years. Tomorrow, I will have celebrated my 50th year as a nurse. Yolanda Ramirez was a member of my community of Immaculate Heart of Mary. I've always been respectful of the Brentwood Police Department. I have worked side by side with them on many occasions, representing Immaculate Heart of Mary. After the incident and murder of Yolanda, my head is lowered with shame with anger, disrespect, and sadness. How did this happen? Yolanda had a Dexcom blood sugar meter. I saw it on her right upper arm in the police video. So they should have known right off the bat that she was a diabetic and that she had better be treated accordingly. I watched that video, And I was shocked. Oh, my goodness. I only got 17 minutes. What the hell happened, guys? What the hell happened? And why are you sitting on your hands? Do something that shows that you care about Brentwood. I'm sorry.

The next speakers are Franklin, followed by Paul Jay, followed by Karen.

Hey, y'all. I'm back. I'm hoping you all tried to make some change in this city. I haven't been here in a minute to be able to speak since that time. The coroner's inquest happened that changed y'all's ruling from accidental, from natural causes to accidental. Y'all hired a new police chief who was filling the interim. In my opinion, that was a bad choice, and I'll tell you why, sir, because you stood up here and said those two officers done nothing wrong. You heard it tonight, you saw it yourself. They left her an elderly woman handcuffed behind her back in a prone position, which would have led to a positional asphyxia if she didn't write herself why she was in the back of that car. At the coroner's inquest, Aaron Peachman said he did not notice until watching the tape that he smashed her face into the, into the metal frame of the car. So which is it? Is he incompetent to notice that he smashed a woman's face in the car or did he not see it? Which one of those to you would call for discipline? Any of those yet? The prone position? None of that? Failed to get timely medical care and didn't mention the blow to the face. left her in handcuffs, didn't give her water. None of that is gonna lead to any sort of discipline. I'm running out of time, but I will say you guys are failing as leaders, you included, because you're not stepping up for this family. You heard how much they are part of Brentwood. What are you all doing to make sure this doesn't happen again? you're gonna pay out your blood money and you're gonna have a chief that was responsible for the biggest payout you guys have.

Speaker's timer has expired.

Good evening. We live in a time of severe mass psychosis. Examples. We all know about the horror of a mother who one at a time methodically strangled her three babies with an elastic band. Each baby suffered four minutes of choking, thrashing, and anguish before dying. Yet women protesters and other elders online called for her acquittal. We had right here in this chamber, people who thought the slaughter of Jews at a concert by Palestinian terrorists was justified. These included strangulations, rapes, cutting babies out of mothers, beheadings, burning alive and other atrocities. We have people who are okay with the murder of babies in womb by dismembering their bodies and pulling out their body parts. were sucking out their brains with a vacuum tube. Also OK is selling this fetal tissue for research. Planned Parenthood has enabled the murder of over 60 million babies and fetuses since inception. Yet you'd be arrested for praying across the street from an abortion slaughterhouse. other psychosis around the world and beliefs perhaps right here in brentwood include indoctrination uh drag queen hours to our kids the stoning of women public hanging sexual mutilation of children through surgery or drugs a death sentence for being gay cast an endorsement of fraud and theft among many the may 12th brentwood ordinance to define and quote public publicly Disruptive behavior is a step in the right direction. We set expectations for behaviors in our community by not giving way to certain cultural and public practices, such as those highlighted. Since I last spoke about the hacking vulnerability of municipal water supply systems like ours, Minnesota community experienced 30 such incidents. I hope our city manager takes notice and has initiated the protective measures I described. He must be preemptive and not fail like Mayor Karen Bass failed Los Angeles. Thank you.

The next speakers are Karen followed by Pastor Wardlaw and Ray.

Hi, my name is Karen Rogge. I live on Wendy Springs in Brentwood. I wanna tell you thank you first for your vote tonight and your closed session. I appreciate that very much. I just hope this means that the city will be able to sell their property to the county, because I didn't really understand what you voted yes on. You voted to work with them, but we would like to see you actually sell it. It's very, very important for the access to the fire station. And they won't be able to, you can't make improvements on somebody else's property. So you can't have a right of way. So it's really, really important for the development of this station. And I'm just asking you guys to think of your community and think of how important this is. I know another gentleman said something, but he doesn't understand that we need a fire station in Northwest Brentwood. Okay, because we only have one station in Brentwood right now and it's on Balfour and the only other station besides Antioch Station and the one in Oakley and the one way down at the end of Cypress is all we have for our area. We are growing constantly. They're building new homes everywhere. Our demographics include Antioch, Oakley, Knightson, Discovery Bay, Bethel Island, all of that encompasses east county and that fire station will offer services to every one of them so thank you very much and i hope that this i hope that we will all be able to continue to work together because this will not be the first time if you guys do approve it i'm going to be here for the next two years while construction is going on thank you

Thomas, can you give a brief explanation as to why the report is limited when we come out of closed session?

So we did report out on action today, but when we look at the process for real property negotiations, there are particular types of negotiations that have multiple steps in the process. And so there's a limited report out when you're at the beginning of the phases or steps that are necessary to complete the process. Sometimes when you're hearing that, that's what it is. There are multiple steps in a process and you can only sort of advance through each step, one step at a time.

honorable mayor and city officials. My name is Pastor George Wardlaw. I come so that I could give thanks in advance for you all who have considered the health fair that we're having on September the 19th at the community center, the Brentwood Community Center. I know you guys are extremely busy. Some of you have checked your schedule. Thank you. for speaking with me a couple weeks ago i want to thank uh vice mayor pearson for speaking with me in the garage the first time we got here and i also want to thank um i want to thank councilwoman mendoza for emailing me um back and forth and getting the information and her letting us know that she's gonna do her best to come by and have words so that the residents, and we have like 200, almost 300 people now who are coming, that the city is concerned about their health. And so I just came to say thank you all, all of you who considered coming. who are still considering coming. I appreciate it. I appreciate Director of Parks and Recreation, Mr. Alim, who I saw in the store, who talked to me. And I just want to say thank you. I really appreciate your consideration.

Pastor, I do want to say publicly, it sounds like an amazing event. And I'm sorry, I can't make it have a conference. I'm throwing the exact same day. But hopefully you have an amazing turnout.

And Pastor, I did email you that I would be there.

The last two speaker cards I have in person is Ray followed by Frank.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council. My name is Ray Elizondo. I recently purchased Rubiano's, which is now called Magano's Well, at 235 Oak Street. I just wanna give you guys a heads up that I come from San Francisco, where I've owned some property, and the permit department there is very helpful, very user-friendly. They help you navigate the system. You come in, you tell them what your issue is, they sit you down, they point you from A to Z what the process is. It's smooth. I come here now. two, three weeks past my opening date, and I still got issues. I had an issue this morning. It was upsetting, and I think you guys need a welcoming committee. I think you need to offer a downtown welcoming committee from the planning department, permit department, someone from the council. Say, Mr. Elizondo, thank you to the neighborhood. What do you want to do? Well, let's help you. You want to do this? We'll help you. Here's A to Z what you need to do. But just let me in there, go cold, and not know this business, because I've never owned a restaurant, never owned a bar, and I'm just trying to navigate the system, but I'm having so many roadblocks and hurdles, and it's costing me a lot of money. I don't know many people here that are gonna spend over $2 million to beautify downtown. I've spent $2 million plus. I don't see anybody else spending that kind of money. You guys should be embracing me, saying, welcome to our community. What can we do to fast track this so your restaurant opens immediately? And that's my major concern. You guys just don't have that committee in place. There's gotta be a welcoming committee made up of planning department, permit department, and council, That brings us in and helps us navigate this. Other than that, stop the bicycles and those scooters from driving down the sidewalk. They're going to kill somebody. And since I got 22 seconds, given your new employee things, I like puppies, exotic plants, and I studied Zen in the 70s.

So I'm going to move this up a little bit. My name is Frank Bermudez, local resident, and on behalf of Ray and Magana as well, I did want to just piggyback a little bit on what Ray was saying. I've been friends with Ray for quite some time. He originally lived in Livermore, and his whole vision on Livermore was to beautify Livermore. He had so many ideas that he took to the city council, and they pooed him, and they said, no, it's not going to work. And since he's left Livermore, almost everything he asked livermore council to do look at first street look at what what livermore has has become and a lot of that was the vision of what ray had done years ago when he lived there he has now bought the old rubianos you've all had pizza there you've had wings what he's done with that place since he's purchased it about four months ago has been incredible you can see visions of it from outside His vision from the beginning as his friend is insane and awesome and wonderful for the city of Brentwood, for the families, for the kids, for the children of Brentwood. And he has been hit with roadblocks. And I think for you as the council members to just say, this is coming to town. Yeah, we had Rubiano's. It was kind of flailing. It was just this restaurant. And for Ray to come in and say, I want to do this for the city and make it awesome. I almost say, I say the red carpet. You don't have to break rules or anything like that, but just open arms to him. When he comes in, he's asking for a permit. He's asking for, City plans to be approved. There's protocol that will get him open. 21 TVs in the front room. NFL starts next week. Y'all, you're all NFL fans. I'm sure you are. Raiders, Niners, whatever. Seahawks. Don't say Dallas Cowboys. But bottom line is, help Ray. Help the community.

I have one additional speaker card in person. Greg?

Good evening, mayor and city council. One of the things I love about democracy is public records requests and emails that are dated so that you can come back and have facts. There was a question earlier about whether some of my facts were correct. I'd like to go on record stating some information. On November... Come on technology, November 12th, 2024. I don't remember exactly how many of you were on the council, but I believe some of you were. But I have a memo here from the city manager. to, it was also with Darren Gale, Ricardo, Abraham, wonderful people who aren't even here to talk about what was talked about before. But it's a memo saying that last night, They had a city council that last night there was a closed session and that the council agreed to move forward with the purchase. It even has a price, $190,000. So I don't know how anybody back room could be making a deal when the attorney is sending out an email to the rest of the staff. followed with a message from the acting or the current city manager, letting them know the fire department says, hey, yesterday we had a closed session meeting. The attorney put out the official memo and I've been authorized to work with you to purchase the land for $190,000. So go back and check the records. This all happened before. Thank you for moving it forward. But it's again, waste of taxpayers' money. Just sign the paperwork and be done with it. Not waste any more time and money. When people are saying that you guys aren't supporting FIRE, we know that's not true. But when you don't move fast, the perception is that you feel that way. There's a saying, it hangs in my office. It's called perception is reality. Change the perception, not on this, but several other topics that you guys got to work on.

I have no additional speaker cards in person. I do have one hand raised in Zoom. Two hands raised in Zoom. First speaker is Jean. Jean, go ahead.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. I have to voice my displeasure and disbelief of code enforcement and code enforcement officer Jody Williams. On June 23rd, I sent her a plan for my front yard plus all of the links needed for the grass that I picked and everything else. On August 12th, I actually installed the plugs. Actually, I installed the plugs before that. On August 12th, she came to inspect the grass plugs. now somehow on september fourth at ten a m friday before labor day she emailed me didn't see it then today i have a notice stuck to my door threatening that i'm going to get sued or fined all kinds of money on saturday because now she doesn't like the plugs They're not close enough. This isn't sod. These are plugs. She's had this information since June 23rd and yeah, yeah, yeah, OK, OK, OK. This is special Buffalo hybrid grass that will grow four feet down in roots. Take one quarter of the water and be mowed less. It crowds out weeds. It's great. It's perfect for what I need. How in the world am I in trouble now? Because I did what I was supposed to. And she wants it closer so that everything's covered like sod. By the way, these plugs have doubled in size and they're sitting out shoots and spreading like they're supposed to do. They're doing very well. My landscaper went into the hospital twice due to heat stroke during this project. I paid all kinds of money with the plumbing coming into my house and my sprinklers. I even had to go to the urgent care because of my knee. And now I have an MRI scheduled in two weeks, all from this project. But yet it's still not good enough. I don't understand what else I need to do. Grass needs time to grow. And this was approved. And it was never said, no, you can't do this back in June 23rd. She approved them. and looked at them on the 12th of August, and now on September 4th, they're not acceptable. What's going on?

The speaker's timer had expired. The next speaker is Rod. Rod, go ahead.

thank you amanda um a while back there was a an item brought forward i think by council member or lemons talking about um uh needle disposal um program for uh people who are possibly using drugs illegally and um just need a place to confidentially dispose their needles and i think that's a good idea i've seen a needle laying around in deer ridge and i apologize i've been involved in a lot of things this year so i don't know i remember vice mayor pearson mentioned that also maybe look into people that are just using drugs legally they they would possibly need help since then i've become aware that the state of california has a free program that people can use they'll send you a sharps container you can fill it up and just mail it back in the same box and it costs nothing so um i still agree that people that are um maybe don't have a home or uh maybe don't want the other people in the house you know knowing what they're doing they they still need a place but for people that um have you know just a need to get to dispose of sharps that they're getting legally um they can call uh eight four four four take back which is eight four four four eight two five three two two or visit sharps take back california.org and they can get a free sharps container they can do this as many times as they want anybody can do it you don't have to prove anything i i mean they'll just give them to anybody so they're free and i just want the community to know and i want the city council to know so that if we're still contemplating maybe coming up with a print program for brentwood we don't need to there exists one at the state and maybe just put some notices in the press. Thank you.

Next speaker is Ian. Ian, go ahead.

Can you hear me?

Yes, we can. Go ahead.

Good evening, Council. It's been a while. I've been busy being a senator for my university and representing students instead of being here in the chamber. I'm not even in the city right now. I'm in the community home going over a long commute. but I wanted to say on August 14th, while my mother frantically called 911 and my grandmother was witnessing the loss of her husband, oh God, I don't remember how many years, Brentwood PD, I forgot the name of the officer, but it was a Spanish speaking officer, was there, ran in and killed my grandma as the EMS fired another officer, tried their very best to save my grandfather. while I was feeding back like living hell from Concord where I was working, just like when that's where jobs are. You know, it sucks that I had to stay on Highway 4 to catch my grandfather before they called time of death, which I fortunately made it. But my point is, Brentwood PD still has good cops, but we need to root out the bad apples that killed Yolanda. Pittsburgh PD Chief Justin L. Presbyterian saying, hey, it was one of our officers who screwed up and almost got their partner killed. Why is the city of Brentwood not saying, hey, maybe we actually did kill? I get lawyers tell it to be quiet, but Brentwood PD, I still have hope in them for saying that they helped my grandmother during one of the darkest moments of our lives. And, you know, unfortunately, we lost my grandfather. He was dead by the time anyone got there. He unfortunately had said that he was 92 years old. There was no saving him. But the fact that that one officer had compassion towards my grandmother, meant the world to my family and that reinstated very little scope in rebel PD but there's still some hope and I hope that we can start rooting out our police department and fixing it and this starts on the very top and it goes all the way to the very bottom rebel PD used to be good I don't know what happened thank you I have no additional hands raised in zoom

thank you amanda moving into consent calendar calendar do i have a motion of approval for a consent calendar minus item e3 make a motion to approve it minus e3 second can i get a roll call vote please council member maloney yes vice mayor pearson yes council member mendoza yes council member orlements yes mayor meyer yes um For item E3, we would like to invite D. Almedo to join us at the podium for the presentation of the National Hispanic Heritage Month Proclamation, which will be read by Councilmember Mendoza.

Do we usually do a bio first or the bio first, right? Okay. I want to say welcome to everyone. This is an important month for us. Go ahead. It's Hispanic Heritage Month, and in this month, a lot of our Latino American countries celebrate our independence, so we're here in honor of Hispanic heritage. And a little bit about Dee. If you've attended a celebration in Brentwood, there's a good chance you have seen Dee Olamado's work, and you've probably taken a photo in front of it. Dee is the proud Hispanic business owner and designer behind Soiree Love, but behind the balloons, colorful installations, and celebrations is a woman who cares deeply about community, culture, and creating a sense of belonging. Dee founded Soiree Love online in 2015. After connecting with the Makers Boulevard in 2021, she brought her creativity into the local community through balloon installations. She opened her first downtown Brentwood storefront in 2023 and expanded into a larger space the following year. Soiree Love has received Best of Brentwood recognition since 2022, and these work now ranges from local grand openings and community celebrations to projects for holiday heroes at Oracle Park, an annual installation at the Children's Discovery Museum in San Jose. She also offers local classes built around the philosophy she values deeply, collaboration over competition. That same spirit guides Dee's community involvement. She creates photo op installations for downtown Brentwood Coalition events and joined its board of directors in 2023. In 2025, she was elected vice president. She has also contributed to Brentwood Chamber of Commerce events, served as a holiday parade judge various years, and supported countless local businesses behind the scenes. But the work closest to Dee's heart is the work that celebrates and uplifts our Hispanic community. She is a member of Alianza Red de Apoyo Entre Negocios Latinos, supporting connection and growth among Hispanic-owned businesses. She also annually sponsors Icaz del Campo's holiday celebration for local campesinos and their families, giving back to the agricultural workers who contribute so much to the community. Since La Gran Fiesta began in 2022, Dee has sponsored the celebration and created its main photo op. Her involvement with Dia de los Muertos also began that year with the balloon installation. Her contributions grew increasingly elaborate photo experiences, and in 2025, she joined Miguel of Azucar Luzeria, the leader and driving force behind the event, and its small six-person organizing committee to help plan and execute the large-scale celebration. When Dia de los Muertos moved to downtown Brentwood, it created an even greater opportunity for the Hispanic community to proudly share its culture and traditions. Growing up in Southern California, Dee was immersed in a community where Mexican culture was an everyday source of pride and celebration. Its color, artistry, symbolism, and tradition shaped her identity and gave her distinctive creative perspective. To Dee, design is never simply just decorations. It's storytelling. It can preserve memories, honor culture, and help people feel seen. After moving to Northern California in 2008, Dee realized how deeply cultural visibility matters. She and her husband made Brentwood their family's home in 2022, where they are raising their two children. Her children are one of the greatest reasons she shows up so fully. She wants them to see their culture and heritage represented and to understand the importance of serving their community and helping create positive change where they live. Dee is proud to be a Hispanic business owner in Brentwood. She hopes to work open stores for more Hispanic entrepreneurs and helps ensure that Hispanic culture is seen, understood, respected, and celebrated as an essential part of Brentwood identity. And that is Dee in a nutshell of sorts. And so now I will read the proclamation. Whereas National Hispanic Heritage Month observed each year from September 15th through October 15th celebrates the rich histories, cultures, traditions, and contributions of Hispanic and Latino American to our nation. And whereas the Hispanic and Latino community enriches Brentwood through family, entrepreneurship, education, public service, arts, agriculture, and countless contributions that help make our city a welcoming and vibrant place to live, work, and raise family. Whereas the 2016 being embraced by National Hispanic Heritage Month partners, Unidos Somos Mas, Together We Are More, reminds us that our shared strength grows when we celebrate our diverse backgrounds, learn from one another, and build community together. Whereas in this special year, as our nation celebrates its 250th anniversary, we honor the generations whose hopes, hard work, courage, and traditions have helped shape America. and look forward with optimism to the future we will build together. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the City Council of the City of Brentwood does hereby recognize September 15th through October 15th as National Hispanic Heritage Month and encourages all residents to celebrate the many cultures, stories, achievements, and traditions of our Hispanic and Latino neighbors. Thank you, Dee.

Do you have some words?

Oh, thank you for doing that. There you go.

Sorry, I wrote it down because I knew I was going to get nervous.

Thank you, Madam Mayor Jovita, City Council, and the City of Brentwood for this incredible honor. I'm honestly still a little speechless. Being chosen to receive this proclamation and represent our Hispanic community means more to me than I can express. I'm so proud for our heritage, proud to raise my children here. Sorry.

and help and proud to help make our culture more celebrated in the city we call home. Yeah, me comunidad latina muchisimas gracias por todo su apoyo. Recibo este reconocimiento con mucho orgullo y comparto con todos ustedes. Espero que sigamos apoyándonos, creciendo juntos y abriendo más puertas para los que vienen detrás. Gracias de todo corazón.

I just want to say thank you for everyone for showing up. And thank you for everything you do. If you've ever gone downtown during a Maker's Market, she's the one that puts all of the balloons together. And I'm sure every family in Brentwood has a picture in front of some of your work somewhere. So thank you. And thank you for all you do in donating to so many organizations that benefit from what you do for them. When I go to that Christmas event with all of the field workers at Campesinos, it means a lot to me that you and so many others donate their work, their time, and really love on the people there. Thank you.

I wasn't gonna say anything because I'm not sure this was gonna be all you, Jovita. Dee, you've been just a sparkle in the whole community of Brentwood. I think you brought a lot of smiles to residents here and not only for the balloons, but for other work that you've done and the ways that you've given back. So we are honored when Jovita brought this forward. Council Member Mendoza brought this forward. I was thrilled to say yes, I totally agree with her. So congratulations. Congratulations to your family and to our community for you being a member of it.

I would like to add something real quick. Just thank you so much for everything that you do in our community. You leave such a touch all over the place and you leave such a beautiful mark for everybody. So thank you so much. And you are so well deserving of this award. Thank you so much. Don't forget me in the picture.

Do we need a motion for the item pulled? No, I think we're good, right?

I think we're good.

Yeah. Okay.

Through the mayor, we did the consent calendar when you made the motion, you did it excluding the proclamation. So just for the formality, if you want to adopt.

I make a motion to approve the proclamation recognizing September 15th, 2026 through October 15th, 2026 as National Hispanic Heritage Month.

I second. Roll call vote, please. Council Member Maloney.

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson.

Yep.

Council Member Mendoza.

Yes.

Council Member Orleman.

Yes.

Mayor Meyer. Yes. Congratulations again. Moving into item F1, Tianyuan Recreation Manager will present the next item regarding an amendment to the 2025-26 CAP and schedule of city fees related to the Second Street event lot rental fees.

Thank you, Mayor. Good evening, Mayor. Good evening, City Council. As mentioned, tonight staff is bringing forward to City Council a recommendation to amend the 2025-2026 cost allocation plan, specifically the effective date of the Second Street event lot. So a little bit of background for this item. Back in April of this year, City Council, by resolution, did approve an agreement with the City of Brentwood and DJA Properties LLC for lease for the use of the 2nd Street parking lot. On May 12th, 2026, City Council did receive a special event update from our Parks and Recreation staff. Within that update, we went through a number of items related to special events downtown. One of the directions that City Council did provide us was for the city staff to explore the feasibility of moving existing events from the grass area of City Park to the Second Street parking lot. And then on June 23rd, 2026, city staff came with an amendment to the 2025-2026 cost allocation plan and schedule fees. Included in that public hearing were new fees for that Second Street parking lot being established. And so for reference to that, this is the parking lot that we're referencing, this one on Second Street. On that item on June 23rd, 2026, as mentioned, we did introduce new fees to use that parking lot. However, I overlooked in adding those new fees, they got lumped together with all the other fees that the Parks and Rec Department typically takes for an effective date for November 1st, 2026. So I apologize for that oversight tonight's action. that we're requesting for City Council is to correct that error by allowing us to pass a resolution to make those fees that were already approved and reviewed effective following a resolution tonight. So did want to clarify, that was a lot of talking, but did want to clarify these aren't new fees. City Council has already approved and reviewed these fees. Tonight's action is requesting just to change the effective date from November 1st to tonight. So staff's recommendation is for city council to adopt a resolution amending the city of Brentwood's 2025-2026 cost allocation plan and schedule fees to update the effective date for the second street event lot rental fees. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for questions.

Any questions for staff?

And Thomas, let me know if we can't talk about this right now. And I had brought this up. when it's not being used for events i was under the impression we were going to use it for parking is that um is that still up for for something or i mean i don't know where are we with that because we used to we used to rent it and it was up for parking we used it you know

So sorry, council member, just so to provide some context. So there have been some conversations among staff and members of the community about returning the lot. And as you indicated, using it when it's not being used for special events. The current lease agreement and the reason that Parks and Rec has brought this forward is because these are typically either revenue generating or economic positive events. Certainly right now we do not have a structure or we do not have the ability to prioritize the use, the dates, et cetera, of when that lot would be used. uh i would also say that the lot has some minimal improvements that were made for special events but it's not striped fully striped it does not have ada etc nor is it have trash service or some of the other things that we would typically associate with a public parking lot that all being said certainly if the council is interested in staff exploring that is something we can take a look at come back and let and advise on what the recommendations might be or staff or excuse me if council has some specific directions around what particular days of service we're certainly willing to take a look at that and make sure we maximize it for the community so there are some barriers i would say but they're nothing that are insurmountable

And to your question, that discussion would happen under future agenda items because this one's kind of narrow.

Okay, thank you. If there are no other questions, we can move into public comment and open the public hearing.

At this time, the public is permitted to address the city council on this agenda item. If you're participating via Zoom, please raise your hand. If you're participating in the chamber, please feel a speaker card. Your microphone will be muted if you speak on items that do not pertain to this agenda item or after the timer has expired. We receive zero written public comments in advance of tonight's meeting. I have two speaker cards. Tom.

Good evening, everybody. So I just want to talk about that a lot a little bit. So back in the day, one of my last years that I leased it, I offered it to the city for $25,000 a year. I thought that was a pretty fair deal. It's what I paid in rent each year. I would have still been out $2,000 or $3,000 to personally insure it to be the middleman, but I offered it to the city because I thought this downtown could use parking. I brought it to city staff. That city staff's no longer here. But they told me that the downtown community did not need additional parking and did not deem that it worth $25,000 a year. And now I think we're paying $42,000 a year. So seems like we lost some common sense. That parking lot, we'd figured out how to have free parking there. We put signs up if we didn't want the high school kids to fill it up. Every business downtown got a little pass, they could hang in their window. We never had garbage. Wasn't ever an issue. I picked it up if it was, so it wasn't that big of an issue because I didn't have to pick up much. The handicapped stuff is still there. It's not bright and colorful, but it probably meets code. Most of that parking lot is still striped. If it only gave you 40 stalls tomorrow, it'd be 40 more stalls downtown Bretwood would have that it doesn't have now. And so most, if you go to any downtown business and say, well, do you think parking's an issue? The answer is yes. Everybody's going to say that. Not me, I'm kind of on the other side. But everybody in downtown core is going to say, yeah, we need extra parking. So to use taxpayer dollars to pay $42,000 a year to rent it for a handful of events and not open it the rest of the time and then now charge private organizations that want to rent it as well, it just doesn't seem right. I mean, at least open it up for parking. It makes no sense at all. I think the chain actually came down or somebody broke it. people have been parking in there if you want that chain to accidentally get broke tonight i can take care of that for free thank you greg good evening everyone greg still here for 30 years

Anyway, so history on that lot, Tom did it. It was great. I am a merchant downtown. I have 14 employees and they asked me where they park. And I said, you park anywhere you want because they don't enforce the parking downtown. Which is, I hate saying that because that means the people that have restaurants and retail stores, they are losing parking because all of our employees for all the merchants downtown are parking on the street. That was an employee parking lot. I saved everything. Here is the past that the downtown coalition along with the city of Brentwood came together and said, let's open it up for parking. The big issue was the high school kids are all gonna park in there, free parking. We put up signs and said, two hour parking, unless you have a permit, here's a permit. We never had an issue. Unfortunately, she didn't tell me until afterwards, but one of my new employees, I said, park in the parking structure. I forgot to give her this. She came to work the next day. She had a parking ticket. I'm like, when do they start enforcing parking? Anyway, she paid it right away. I didn't have to call in any favors, but she paid it. And it's like, we have these, let's make these. We can get them. Let's the employees park in the parking structure. Let them park in that lot. And I surely hope the fact that you just move the date from whenever it was in November to have it be effective today. I know of at least two organizations. I think two that are planning on using that lot and they weren't told there was going to be a fee. I just hope they're not going to make that retroactive to some of these organizations that were planning on using that lot in the next 30 days and all of a sudden tell them they have to pay a fee. And again, for 30 years, we've been using that a lot for events. We never paid any money to the city to use that or to the previous landowner. And I just think it's kind of a shame that we're going to charge a nonprofit $800 on top of the fee for the park, on top of the fee for the other stuff. When we have a public park that should be a public park, it is a public parking lot. The city's paying for it. That's it.

I have no additional speaker cards and no hands raised in Zoom.

Thank you. I will take a motion to close the public hearing. So moved. Second. Roll call, please.

Council Member Maloney?

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza?

Yes.

Council Member Orleman?

Yes.

Mayor Meyer?

Yes. Thank you. Any council discussion on this item?

Nope, and I'm ready to make a motion.

Okay, motion is fine.

As detailed in the staff report, I move to adopt a resolution amending resolution number 202666 and the City of Brentwood 2526 cost allocation plan and schedule of city fees to change the effective date of the Second Street event lot rental fees from November 1st, 2026 to September 8th, 2026.

Second. Roll call, please. Council Member Maloney. Yes. Vice Mayor Pearson. Yes. Council Member Mendoza. Yes. Council Member Orlemans.

Yes.

Mayor Meyer.

Yes. Motion passes. Thank you, TN. Moving into business items, item G1, Jennifer Hagen, Principal Planner, will present the next item regarding a downtown specific plan amendment discussion.

Thank you, Mayor and members of the City Council. Tonight, we're here to discuss and receive direction on a downtown specific plan amendment related to body art, including permanent makeup and tattoo facilities. A draft ordinance was originally presented to the City Council on July 28th. At the hearing, the Council requested additional information needed in order to provide further direction. Based on that direction, we have provided additional information summarized into the following categories as shown here. In the first area related to the legal framework for regulating body art, local governments may apply content neutral land use regulations to body art establishments subject to applicable constitutional requirements. The city is able to consider content neutral land use regulations addressing the location of body art facilities within the downtown, which is a uniquely important geographical area within the city by analyzing and establishing restrictions based on time, place and manner regulations. The court's decision in Anderson versus the city of Hermosa Beach does not prevent the city from regulating the location of body art establishments in the above mentioned way. The next area for clarification is related to the definitions. The downtown specific plan does not provide definitions for body art or personal services. The municipal code, however, does include a definition for tattoo parlors. Under the Safe Body Art Act, the state defined body art as body piercing, tattooing, branding, or the application of permanent cosmetics in the health and safety code. The state definition leaves very little distinguishable or objective differences between tattooing and permanent cosmetics outside of the intent of the application. Under both the state and county regulations, the acts of traditional tattooing and permanent cosmetics are regulated and licensed the same. Because of this, staff is recommending to leave the definition of body art intact as one umbrella category, and in this case, separate it from personal services. next area provides a breakdown of the downtown zones in order to get further direction on where the council would or would not like body art or personal services within the downtown one area of distinction is the downtown in the downtown is the downtown core the dsp identifies a downtown core as including oak street and first street and expressly describes the area as the heart of the pedestrian oriented shopping district The specific plan further identifies Oak Street as downtown's primary shopping street and states that the intersections of Oak and First is downtown's most vibrant intersection where activity-generating shops and services form the crossroads of downtown's shopping experience. Any implementing regulations should narrowly tailor the restrictions to serve the city's significant governmental interests in maintaining this active pedestrian-oriented commercial environment, protecting the economic vitality and the distinction of the downtown core. The last area is how could body art or personal services be potentially regulated? The initial and typical way to regulate land use classifications is by requiring a conditional use permit, which the city council is familiar with. An alternative option that the council may consider is establishing a downtown personal services or body art license permit, similar to our tobacco retail license. This type of license could run with the business or operator and not run with the land. It would be reviewed and renewed annually based on a set set standards, which would typically be linked to the public health and safety and operational characteristics of the business. The council could consider establishing a cap under each of these options, although it would be easier and more equitable through the license process, requiring all current and new establishments to get a license to be reviewed and renewed annually. So with the information provided in the staff report related to what can be done and the potential options, staff is now looking for council's direction on how to move forward. Staff listed in the council's motion on the 28th, their staff listened to the council discussion along with the full discussion that night. And based on that, staff believes that based on council's overall goals, we've provided list of recommendations that we believe best achieve the goals while keeping in mind what can reasonably be administered and enforced to preserve the strength of downtown's economic vitality. Tonight, we are requesting final direction on what is being defined, where should it be allowed, and how it should be regulated. So for what is being defined, after reviewing the potential unintended consequences of existing personal service uses, staff believes that there is significant governmental interest in maintaining the economic vitality, pedestrian oriented character and distinct commercial function of certain geographic areas within downtown to provide and create distinct separate definitions between the two land use categories of body art and personal services. If council supports this, staff is recommending incorporating the two definitions as shown here within the downtown specific plan. The next is where should it be allowed? After reviewing potential unintended consequences to existing personal service uses, staff recommends that only body art be prohibited along Oak Street and First Street storefronts, allowing them on the second floor and to be further clarified that they would only be prohibited within the first 65 feet of the first floor as measured perpendicular to the street frontage. This is consistent with a separate regulation regarding our downtown retail requirement measurements. And the last question is how is it regulated death is recommending that a body art license or permit be created. To best regulate existing and future facilities, this would allow each facility both existing and new to be reviewed and renewed on an annual basis. With set standards related to public health safety and location requirements, as well as state licensing requirements. Staff recommends allowing establishments with current county approvals to first apply for a new license unaffected by the cap with a total of four total establishments allowing for two more future establishments under the cap to regulate through the license permitting process. Then last we come to timing and implementation. Implementing an amendment to the downtown specific plan and creating a new body art license would require drafting a new ordinance and creating a license processing fee that the city council would have to approve. The earliest new ordinance and amendment to the downtown specific plan that could be brought back to council would be October 8th based on legal noticing requirements. This could then be followed up by an ordinance related to the actual licensing and the fee, which we brought back to council in November to allow sufficient time for the ordinance to be drafted and obtain legal review. Based on that staff, this concludes staff's report. Within our agenda packet tonight, we did include a decision matrix, which I can pull up once we get to the discussion portion tonight to help guide some of the direction and discussion, but staff is available for any questions.

Thank you. Any questions for staff?

Yeah. What analysis did you do to come up with for permitted downtown?

So since it's currently not a permitted use, it is prohibited. Nothing in our analysis says that it is permitted. The county licensing is very distinct in that it only reviews and approves the health safety aspect and does not provide any land use approvals. So No businesses in downtown are currently permitted in any shape or fashion in terms of land use regulations. There are two current approvals for county health and safety approvals, but that does not constitute a city land use approval.

Okay, so what analysis was done on financial impact on sales tax revenue for the city by allowing four?

The floor was based on council direction at the last meeting. Staff has not done any financial analysis.

OK, so there's no financial impact of this. And just to be clear, though, the there was only one the day we had our last meeting because i actually pulled it up from the county and sent it to alexis so now there's two but there were there was only one at the time so i don't think it's fair to say that there's two because there wasn't two when we last approved it they just got that health from the county so i think that's misrepresenting a little bit what exactly is happening

Yes, staff has been unable to determine when the actual licenses were issued. Staff has reached out to the county department, but we did not get verification of when the actual permit was issued. All staff has received is clarification that they do currently have a license.

Okay, but when we had our last meeting, they did not? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

I have a couple questions, sorry. Maybe just for a little bit of clarification, how's the licensing the body art business different than a CUP?

So a conditional use permit would go before the planning commission. It would be a publicly noticed hearing that we noticed all properties within a thousand feet. Um, and then it would be presented to the planning commission, um, in which staff would make findings and present a presentation to the planning commission. Um, and that board would, basically review it against public comments and approve or deny the application. A license is a little different. A license is set on standard specifications, which would be within the municipal code. And it would be for the most part based on location requirements. And it would be a lot more clear cut and objective. There could potentially be penalties or the types of violations within that or parameters that they would have to meet. But it would be an administrative approval based on what is outlined in the actual license and the admissible code.

And just to expand on that, a CUP is a land use entitlement. So it's really a process that's about land use review, consistency with general plan and zoning and other development standards that may be in the municipal code. A license would be much more tied to just public health and safety. A conditional use permit is an entitlement. So it goes with the property in perpetuity unless it's replaced or revoked. So meaning if a tenant changes over the CUP is still in effect unless something changes in terms of it's revoked or replaced by another tenant. License is typically an annual process that is expires and it's not an entitlement. Once the license expires, if it's not renewed, it goes away.

Okay, thank you. When I was reading over the staff report, I was looking at, and then we use the same terms here, requires a license excluding the first 65 feet on the first floor as measured perpendicular to the street front. What does that mean?

So from the property line along the street, you would make a T from the property line and 65 feet directly back from the street on First Street within that first 65 feet. That's typically what we call in our downtown specific planner retail zone. And so within that first 65 feet, it is meant to be regulated in a way that has more pedestrian activity and provides more back and forth daily traffic. Outside of that, so if you have a building that's 100 feet deep and you have tenant spaces within the first 65 feet, if you have a tenant space that starts at 70 feet, that doesn't have its actual storefront, doesn't have a window directly facing the street, you could have it in that location, in that suite, in that building. but you can't have one that has an actual window or door that fronts on the street within 65 feet of the street.

Okay, so it means a corner, right off the corner of 65 feet from Oak Street down first or down second.

It might help if we show the map of the downtown specific plan. So there's a hatched area in the land use map. So the specific plan, this is a mechanism the specific plan already uses to limit office uses from being directly on the street. So it is just perpendicular. It's not necessarily a corner location. So if you look in that red area, you see the hatched lines within that red downtown core. I'm not sure if it shows up well on your screen, but you see the little darker areas with the hatch lines. That's the 65 feet for all those buildings that are limited to retail uses to keep that active street front.

Thank you.

Other questions? Okay, moving to I have a question. Go ahead.

I've noticed with Contra Costa Health, they have two different licenses, one for body art, and one is specific to semi cosmetic or permanent cosmetic. Why didn't we define that? Because that's something that we asked for, if we can have a different definition for both.

So talking to the county health inspector, an actual technician can get an individual technician license for either of them, but for a facility, facilities where they practice are all actually regulated the same. It's not regulated as just a semi-permanent cosmetic facility or just a tattoo facility is my understanding. They are all regulated as a body art facility. facility, while individual practitioners each then have to be licensed as well and may have some different requirements. The actual establishment itself in which they practice is under one license.

Can I? Oh, sorry. Go ahead, Faye.

No, I'm done. She answered my question. Thank you.

But there's two licenses, right? The one that's $430 is the body art facility tattoo body piercing branding permit. And then the one that's 370 is the body art facility semi-permanent cosmetic permit. So they're different.

They might be different fees, but my understanding from talking to the actual county inspector is that they're the same county regulations.

Yeah, but what they can do is different. They can't do the same thing in their business. They have different licenses. So if someone that has the semi-permanent cosmetic does a tattoo, they're breaking the law.

Possibly, but when, as I included in the staff report, there's a state definitions and based on the two definitions in terms of how community development would enforce the difference between those two separately defined regulations. is really for the most part based on the intent. It is not an objective standard in which a city employee can go into a facility and determine whether it is a semi-permanent cosmetic, or a tattoo. They both include the same type of machinery, the same type of ink, the same type of placement under the skin. And so the definitions, which were both in the staff report, are very subjective and are based on the intent and the purpose of the tattooing and therefore staff is not recommending it and it's not common practice to actually define them separately because it would be highly problematic for staff to ever enforce the intent of what is getting tattooed.

Okay, I'll think about that a little bit, thank you.

Wouldn't we be able to differentiate the intent from the type of business and the advertising and the marketing that's being done? I mean, one place is a tattoo parlor, the other place is a cosmetic versus salon type. I'm having a difficult time comprehending that.

So from a code enforcement perspective, it is the activity, not the intent. It's what we can witness and observe. So someone can advertise all kinds of things. That's a free speech issue. It's what we can observe and base a case off of. So, um, advertising is not an activity or an action within the physical space. So that's what makes it difficult. That can certainly clue us into things that may need to be investigated or followed up on. Um, but we still have to have an observable act violation in the premises in order to have a code enforcement case, if that makes sense.

Is there any type of training that's provided to the employees to differentiate regular body tattoo art versus micro shading, microblading? Is there any type of training that's offered?

To our employees?

Yes, or like code enforcement in general, not just to our employees, but is there sort of health and safety training that actually shows them how to distinguish between the two?

Not that I'm aware of. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's just not right now. We don't have to differentiate because it's not permitted downtown. But our understanding from the county is the equipment is exactly the same.

But you could say that a primary use has to be a salon with an ancillary use of semi-permanent. We could say that.

Yes, Council could absolutely do that. So when we were bringing back definitions, in the staff report there's two options. One is a personal services definition that includes body art, and one is personal services without and body art separately. Council can certainly, if you look at that main definition as an example in the staff report, could say that permanent makeup ancillary to the salon is allowed. It's just we're back to the- Well, semi-permanent makeup. I'm sorry. Semi-permanent, yes, sorry, you're correct. Semi-permanent makeup ancillary to the purpose of the salon is a permitted use, for example. We would just have to be very precise in how we define it, and I would just want everyone to be aware that it could be an enforcement issue at some point when someone says that's what they're doing and that's not what they're doing. it it just makes it hard if someone does complain and we go in and it looks exactly the same as a tattoo but we could do decoys just like we do with tobacco right well i mean if you if you suspect someone's breaking the law i would think you could do the same thing so that so that would be a question for the city attorney and police department code enforcement does the administrative process does not operate that way HAB-Masyn Moyer- And it's not a criminal violation, it would be an administrative violation at that point.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- Because of.

HAB-Charlotte Pitts, I would say if staff walked in i'm sorry I would say that if staff walked in and they would be able to differentiate easily by the type of activity that's being done, whether it's semi permanent makeup versus an actual tattoo.

Possibly, yeah. I can't foresee every scenario, but in some cases it may be very obvious and in some cases it may not be. You know, just based on the type of equipment is exactly the same, the activity is exactly the same, the chairs look similar. So it's possible they could differentiate and they can have a defensible way of documenting that as a code enforcement case. Sure.

Can I ask a question? I guess this is for both of you all for legal, because I'm sitting up here trying to figure out how to make it make sense and why this is going so deep. When I got my eyebrows tattooed, when I got a microbladed, it was a tattoo gun that was used. It was a tattoo. I don't know what level of skill you all need to be able to go and learn the difference between what how deep something goes into the skin and not to make it not permanent or permanent but what here's my thing from a legal perspective a lot of things are done behind closed doors so How much discretion do you have in someone's business to just walk in? Do you guys have, like, is there a Fourth Amendment right to violate, to walk into a commercial business while someone is getting a private treatment, to go into a treatment room to see if someone is getting microbladed or tattooed if someone created a treatment room? how far can our code enforcement be allowed and when i got mine done it was in a private setting and i'd be damned if somebody walked in to a private setting of mine and say i'm code enforcement i would i would be all up trying to help represent that business to sue the city for some type of violations of a fourth amendment right so i guess i'm trying to figure out like how far are we trying to have our staff go and i don't understand why we're doing this

but we can see people come out they come out of their arms covered or you know i mean you can tell when someone leaves with a tattoo well and this steps back to the issue of when we're talking about the definition that we have for body art when we look at this at a statutory level you've got body art means body piercing tattooing branding or application of permanent cosmetics and so that window that they're looking at when they're trying to define these things if we're trying to split What is actually happening? So, yes, there's a certain level where staff does it to where staff to enter in certain situations is obviously putting the city at some degree of risk. That's true. What is also true is the way that this definition is formulated. As I just mentioned, I mean, it combines these two things of body piercing, tattooing, branding or application of permanent cosmetics. And so to try to disaggregate the two and then you're disaggregating them because you want to provide some sort of differential treatment. But the idea is you want some uniformity in how you're treating them because they're really under the law, the same thing.

Yeah, I'm not questioning the definition. Excuse me. I'm not questioning the definition. I think it's great how they just broke that out. I think that was one of the suggestions we made. I'm really questioning, like, there seems like there's a constant questioning of staff of, like, can't you just walk in there? Can't you just look and see? And I'm just wondering at what level, how much search and see, like, searches can we do under code enforcement?

Yeah, and so two things. One, there are standard procedures under which they operate, and those procedures are operated to keep them within the legal bounds. And an analysis of whether or not they've gone beyond that would be a case-specific, fact-specific analysis. So... they could tell you if you ask them what their you know particular approach is when they go into and that is a line to keep them within the legal boundaries so um i know i don't think that in you know the example that you gave where somebody's in there having a personal procedure and you know but you need the full factual context to be able to understand we're telling them they need to go in and distinguish between a tattoo and well i

permanent or not permanent art or how we've defined it. I think it's something we need to know also, the parameters for which they can or cannot enter into a facility. How deep can you go into a room or not go into a room? I think there's other things to consider because we throw out these suggestions to you all and not think about them in real practice and execution. And my concern is how much more liability do we have and what are we trying to prevent? I'm so still lost.

So if Council's goal were to separate semi-permanent makeup from tattooing, then that would be challenging from an enforcement perspective because in order to document a violation, let's say we receive a complaint and tattooing is not permitted, The fact that if we walk in, and we're allowed to enter businesses if they're open, the business hours, if we walk in that business and there's no observable equipment or activity going on or there's private rooms, then we cannot act on, as far as we know, there's nothing to document. If we walk in and there's tattoo equipment and it's not being used, We also have a difficult case. We have more information than we had before that we should probably come back. We could follow up, but just in fact that the equipment exists also does not necessarily equate to a violation. We have to have some observable activity that violates the municipal code. Okay, so it is challenging, it's not impossible. If that's how council wants to regulate it, I just want to make you aware that it just creates a difficulty and we may not catch all scofflaws in that scenario because it would be made more difficult. It's not impossible. the fact that someone enters a business with tattoos on their arms and leaves with tattoos on their arms, we get complaints and we respond to them. We're not necessarily posted out front or have a business. If we are, we have no evidence on the outside of the building that they received a tattoo. right i mean you would be relying on my staff to be observing up close how many tattoos someone had on the way in how many they had on the way out that doesn't prove they got a tattoo because we didn't observe it so again this is an administrative process it's different different than a criminal process um it's not perfect it's it's not simple um all i'm here to do is just make you aware of the pros and cons of whatever approach that council chooses and we will follow council's direction certainly

And well, I'm sorry, Mayor. The one last question is the of the A, B and C fast, that will be the easiest to execute as to the three questions you presented in the staff report for how to define it. Staffs recommendation is which one? I just want to make sure we're clear.

Staff was recommending including a personal services definition that does not include body art and then have a separate body art definition that includes tattooing, piercing, permanent and semi-permanent cosmetics. So that would be item B? Yes.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. If there's no other questions, we can move into public comments on this item.

At this time, the public is permitted to address the City Council on this agenda item. If you are participating via Zoom, please raise your hand. If you're in person, please file a speaker card. Your microphone will be muted if you speak on items that do not pertain to this agenda item or after the timer has expired. We receive zero written public comments in advance of tonight's meeting. I have three speaker cards. I have Estrella, followed by Chris, followed by Tom.

Okay, so I'm not good at this as usual. I wanted to touch on one thing. It was mentioned that there's only one person who's registered. That's not true. My business is registered at 737 2nd Street. I've been registered since I opened August 2025. I have my facility permit and I have my practitioner permit for permanent cosmetics. And I also have what a practitioner permit looks like for a tattoo artist. And they are literally the exact same page, zero difference. It doesn't say who does what. There's no difference. Same with this. It's one for both. So, you know, that was pretty much all I was going to say. But if any of you guys would care to look at them, they're right here. This is what they look like from the county originals. Also, the reason why you can't separate permanent cosmetics from tattooing, you have an event happening this Friday in downtown Brentwood. They're advertising tiny tattoos out of a salon. That person also does permanent cosmetics. What are they gonna do? Tattoo little hearts on the body. There's no way to separate the two. So either you allow them all or you allow none. There's no way. I'm honestly, this is, I don't know where the targeting is happening. This is two years in, like make a decision yes or no.

good evening uh council and city staff i had some stuff written out but uh i think my wife did a fantastic job um i just want to say i i hope this moves in a timely manner like it's been 20 months since it originally got brought up it's been 16 months since it was voted on and i feel like we had talked about having a target on your back i feel like uh it's it's been nothing but that the harassment um of our businesses it It's getting a little too much. I just hope that this moves in a timely manner that we can get this done. So everybody operating similar or hopes to operate similar to us like we do like we want to operate like everybody else is down here that it could all be done and Over with and everybody could be on the same page and we can just continue to move forward with this. Thank you

I just want to say this young couple here, they're being crucified. And we want to grandfather in the ones that have been here illegally doing it. They're the only ones that have brought this to the attention of the council to make everyone doing it legal. Everyone's been violating the zoning for months or years. And so this is the couple that wants to make that legal for them and everyone else that we're going to put through the wringer for 20 months over this stuff? It's completely ridiculous in my opinion. There are people in downtown, people you know, people that are friends of yours, that are not just doing cosmetic tattooing, they're tattooing. We're not trying to hurt anybody else. That's ridiculous. So what we're trying to do is make them legal. On a side note, I know that there was some discussion about the 65-foot thing. I'm that guy that likes the people that have been doing it in Brentwood and opening their doors seven days a week. to stay. So I'd like to see the people that are already doing it grandfathered in. I think that's a good idea. The Studio V, I hear nothing but wonderful things about that gal. I don't know her at all. She may be in that 65 foot. She's at the back of the building. If you guys decide there's that 65 foot range, I would love to see it shortened for this enough to make sure she could stay in business as well. Okay. Thank you.

I have no additional speaker cards in person. I do have three hands raised. First speaker is Rod. Rod, go ahead.

Thank you, Amanda. Quickly, I think ABC has shown us how we can regulate this. ABC has a license, a 47 license that you can sell alcohol, but it can only be 50% of your business because you have to be a restaurant. so instead of saying a tattoo is cosmetic or not you could say whether or not it's done in a cosmetic establishment and limit the percentage of revenue that they took um for for tattooing and then you know if they did a permanent or not at least it would it wouldn't be a big tattoo shop if they were only doing uh 25 of their business or less was was tattooing as opposed to having a tattoo shop i also object to uh council members pearson and orlemans being voting on this as they confessed to the last time they responded to me they both had a meeting outside of public view with a private person and came to a conclusion that this is something that the city should do so this is not the way that you're supposed to do things under the brown act under the brown act all decisions must be made in a public meeting, such as you're having tonight, I think they've disqualified themselves. And I do also have a couple of court filings where Patnisha Davis is listed as attorney for plaintiff. And so I know that she has represented somebody that she says she has not. 30 seconds left. I think that this whole matter could easily be set aside for a couple months until these two have left the city council. They're lame ducks. They have no intention of returning. And then let the new city council objectively and with no prior exposure to it, make a decision in full public view, in full compliance with the Brown Act, and with no suspicion hanging over your head. Thank you.

The next speaker I have is Cincy. Cincy, go ahead.

Hi, good evening. I am just so tired of this conversation. Please stay in line with what downtown Bretman's specific plan stipulates. All I hear in this discussion is potato, potato, tomato, tomato. or body art or microblading, all the things that don't make sense and literally just waste our tax money. uh the three people who support uh tom gregory modifying our downtown specific plan are um also in support of a county supervisor who keeps complaining about uh our brento planning commission and brento city council You know, spending extra my hour of our tax money and constantly complaining about how Brentwood is so difficult. So. The 3 of you are very difficult right now and you please make sure you stay on topic. It's on point. I'm sorry. Um, I'm really sorry. So, here's the thing. if the people who own the tattoo parlor did not read the terms of their contract or lease or whatever they closed with Tom Gregory, they're exactly the same as Tammy Zicker of Harry's Tavern who didn't read her terms with Emporium and that's why her business closed. So we need people, solid business owners downtown No tattoo parlors. Those are not revenue generating. So just stop this conversation and stop our wasting our time and tax money. Thank you so much.

The next speaker is Vanessa. Vanessa, go ahead.

Hello, this is Vanessa Vincent, owner of Studio V. I wish I was there in person, here with the kiddos. Anyways, I just wanted to clarify a couple of things. I did wanna mention that freckle heart fine line was mentioned, and I did want to clarify, there is no fine line being offered at my salon. I will be offering a part of a permanent cosmetics, which are little freckles, the size of a freckle, Using different pigment. So I just want a clarification on that. I wanted to say thank you, Tom. Those were kind words. I am not. I am not in the hatched area for zoning. I made sure all of these things, because before I signed a lease, I wanted to make sure. That I was doing everything correctly. I do have approval as well as I noted in the last time. that the way that the city was approving me was because i am in a salon doing a cosmetic service that they considered me not i have an email with that approval saying that it is not considered um i'm and so i just wanted to remind you guys on that um and yeah i i just uh i think that you can tell the difference when you enter in a beauty salon versus a tattoo shop i'm not against a tattoo shop, I want to clarify that as well, I just wanted to give my perspective and some reminders and clarification, so thank you so much for your time.

The next speaker is Chris. Chris go ahead. Hi, thank you.

I just wanted to say that when you're walking into a tattoo parlor or a cosmetic studio, there's literally no difference. You can't see if this person is getting a tattoo or a cosmetic procedure done. I have both. I have normal tattoos on my body and I also have microbladed Tattoos or excuse me, eyebrows. So there's really no difference. So if you were wanting to send a code enforcement officer in to try to tell the difference, they're not really going to be able to because all of the same materials are used. Pigments look exactly the same. I just don't see why this is such a big deal. I think tattoo parlors are definitely a tax revenue. It brings stuff into the city, especially on Main Street, where there are a lot of stuff happening. in downtown so i just i don't really understand why this is such a big deal um tattoo parlors have such bad reps and it's really not as taboo as it used to be um tattoos are beautiful people get beautiful art portraits all over their body and it's beautiful and i just don't really understand why this is as big of a deal as you guys are making it Yeah, I just wanted to mention that because it's just kind of crazy how big of a deal this is all getting. That's it. Thank you for your time.

The last hand I have raised is Tracy. Tracy, go ahead.

Okay, I'm back. You know, again, like I said, I'm not against tattoos or tattoo parlors. I moved, I don't know, like maybe four years, actually almost to the day from Pleasant Hill and the Pleasant Hill downtown, unless they've changed it in four years, they did not have an actual tattoo parlor. They did have salons. I don't know if they might, I don't recall if they had, you know, the eyebrow business or whatever. But there was tattoo parlors, you know, not on or in the little two street downtown or one street, really. They had them, you know, like across the street or down Contra Costa Boulevard. It was surrounding that particular area. But again, you know, I just, I mean, Brentwood's different, but I really did enjoy the Pleasant Hill atmosphere. I thought it was good for the kids. There's tattoo parlors, just not downtown. Now, as for the microblading, I don't know, maybe they do that now, whatever. But like I said, I preferred our downtown without tattoo parlors. They were available everywhere else. Anyway, thank you.

I HAVE NO ADDITIONAL HANDS RAISED IN ZOOM.

THANK YOU, AMANDA. I'M GOING TO START OVER HERE. DID YOU WANT TO SPEAK OR FOR THAT MATTER, MALONEY, EITHER ONE OF YOU WANT TO SPEAK ON THIS IN DISCUSSION?

I'LL WAIT. I'M GOOD. I'LL GO. I've made every effort not to answer people that are making public comments. So I'm going to continue that tonight, and we'll just move on with this item. I don't see the difference between applying tattoos to somebody's body or putting on temporary tattoos for makeup. It's the same business. We have many, many... studios in the city of Brentwood that are applying permanent makeup, permanent art. And I don't know if they have CUPs, but everything outside of the downtown that applies tattoos is supposed to have a CUP. So if they are, and we've defined it as a tattoo, in our own words we've defined them as tattoos, then are we gonna run around the whole city of Brentwood and shut down all the salons that are applying permanent makeup? All this was brought forward for was the downtown specific plan being separated from the rest of the city. I just wanted it to be the same as the rest of the city. I don't see a difference of the downtown specific plan being an amazing place that has to be protected from these horrible businesses that are called tattoo parlors. I don't see that. it doesn't appear that way to me it appears that everybody in Brentwood would like to go where they want to go to get the services they want to get and if one of those businesses are in the downtown where they should be permitted just like the rest of the city with a conditional use permit in the downtown then let them be in the downtown Why is it different? What's separate about the downtown specific plan that is so different that we have to give it its own zoning and make it different than the Brentwood Boulevard specific plan that we have to make it different than how many planning districts do we have? 72 or 85 or something that we all have to be different and they all have to be different because who said so? Let's make them the same, which is what I originally tried to do anyway, was draw all the planning districts into and have a common planning district to make it easier for small businesses to come to Brentwood. give the small business all the rules laid out in front of them, give them to them in advance, and let them do their job, which is open a business. We just had one of our restaurant owners in here telling us how hard it is to open a business in Brentwood. but we're gonna continue to make more rules to make it harder for more businesses to wanna come to Brentwood because the downtown is so great and so different than the rest of the city, we have to treat them differently. All we're trying to do, my original intent was to make the citizens of Brentwood the same no matter where they lived. No matter which side of Brentwood Boulevard they lived on, no matter which side of Sand Creek they lived on, all the businesses, all of them are the same. But we're going to continue to separate it. It doesn't make any sense to me. I would like... to see this move forward. Define body art separately and classify it as a separate land use would be fine with me. Prohibit body art within the first 65 feet of the first floor along Oak Street and First Street. Consistent with the DSP retail required measurement and then required administrative body art license permit. The two existing downtown body art facilities would continue, allow two additional body art establishments for a total of four. And that's what I would like to see.

So you didn't call that a motion, so we're going to assume it's not.

I'm not making a motion because I'm giving everybody the opportunity, but that's what I would like to see to happen. And I'm more than ready to make a motion whenever you're ready for it.

Thank you. Who'd like to go next? I thought she said she wanted to wait. Did you want to go, Council Member Mulaney?

No, I'll wait.

I completely disagree with everything Tony said. Downtown is such a special place and it needs to be treated differently. I said it before, when we look at our downtown, it is an economic driver. You need to look at it as a mall kind of when you do the zoning and what you desire to have in there. You want to create an area that fits what you want for your downtown. That's why most downtowns don't have tattoo parlors downtown. They don't bring in traffic. And we've said that, I mean, people can say they do, they don't. They don't bring in sales tax revenue. People can say they do, they don't. I just, I am not okay with having tattoo parlors downtown. I said last time I would be okay conceding to having them on the second floor. I know I've heard a major landowner already said three other tattoo parlors wanna come downtown. I also am not okay, and this isn't their fault. This is more Tom's fault because he rented in the place before they had the license. You've been tattooing in there already. Okay. I've seen the videos. So my thing is I'm not going to reward bad behavior. I don't. I want to follow the rules and I don't think that we should reward bad behavior. And when I sent the list of the license from the Contra Costa County Health last meeting, they did not have a license for that location. They might have had personal licenses, but not for that location when I looked online. So I don't reward bad behavior. It's not something we allowed. And it's just, I think it will change the downtown and it's just how I feel. Some people might think we make it hard to do business in Brentwood. It's because we have high standards. We should have high standards for our town. It's not like I don't see anything wrong with having standards. I don't want to dummy them down, which is what I feel like we're doing. And we are sacrificing our downtown financial vitality when we do that.

So, I'm sorry, you've said the existing business, I'm assuming you're referring to Golden Hearts, is permanently applying tattoos right now, and you have proof of that somewhere?

Yeah, and I sent the videos to staff. They have the videos.

We have proof of that somewhere. Yeah, I sent it to staff. Okay. And you know for a fact, although they're standing right there saying they have a permit to apply for body art, that you're saying it didn't exist two weeks ago, but they're showing us it does.

Yeah, but I sent it to staff.

Can you hand that to the city clerk so I can at least see it?

Council Member Maloney, do you have anything to add at this point?

I'll reiterate what I said last time. I do believe that we need to be very thoughtful in what we do in our downtown because it is the center and the heart of our city. I don't believe that HAB-Juliette Boone, Every single area needs to be treated the same we have industrial zoning we have commercial zoning we have. HAB-Juliette Boone, Our downtown we have streets of Brentwood we have PA one everything has to get treated the way that it needs to, and I do agree with what we have in the general plan and the downtown specific plan, but I do believe that. I am okay with having tattoo parlors in our downtown but it needs to be done in a thoughtful manner especially knowing that there is zero tax generated revenue from a tattoo parlor so I wouldn't want to see five or six next to each other in our center of our city basically in our heart of our city to take away from PB, Lupita D Montoya, Businesses that would allow for foot traffic, whether it's restaurants or clothing or whatever the situation is so i'd probably say that I am okay with having like what I said last time to. PB, Lupita D Montoya, And grandfathering what we had previously and just having the limited strict so I would have to see the map and the options again.

thank you um thanks um a couple of things i don't know i'm a little over the conversation as well because i'm i'm still there while we go we go we're going so hard on this one um it's the the council i mean i'm sorry the staff i appreciate you in your thorough report um i appreciate you all trying to figure out some way to work around all of our concerns and questions. I do feel like at the last meeting, there was a little tug of war on what direction would be best. And I appreciate all of us trying to work cohesively to try to find out some remedy or some way to rectify it to make it amenable. So thank you. I thought your suggestions were timely. And I thought they were great. I do, Tony, you're good. I'm going to actually say something. I normally don't give clowns soundbite time, but I'm a little concerned that I have been consistently accused of violating a law. And I take that very seriously. And I've already been acquitted by the FPPC and by the state bar, by the same people who consistently keep filing complaints. And they go nowhere. It's probably cost the city already in illegal fees. And it works to $75,000 to defend me. and my family. And nobody said it was illegal when council member Mendoza and the mayor brought back a joint agenda item for the, what is it? Something in the park, the holiday event that we're gonna do. Nobody said anything about it when Council Member Mendoza and Council Member Maloney are bringing a future agenda item request for potential for us not to have any type of AI centers. I can keep going down the list. Whenever Council Member Orlemans and I do the same thing that we have the absolute legal right to, We are dragged through the mud. People try to come for our families, come for our income. We are. We are dragged through the mud. It has been like this since day one. And it is disgusting. And we are accused of things that we didn't do. We brought a future agenda item request. There was lies told last time that I met with the business and Councilmember Orlimans. I never said I met with the business. I actually said the opposite of that. Two Councilmembers Discussing bringing a future agenda item request is not a brown act violation, I would suggest that people, especially people who are elevated to positions. When they should know these things really study hard to figure out and make sure they're representing correctly versus making inflammatory criminalizing and statements that are completely. PATENTLY UNTRUE. THAT BEING SAID, WE'VE TALKED AT LENGTH ABOUT THIS. I THINK THERE ARE SOME THINGS THAT I AGREE WITH A LITTLE BIT OF WHAT A LOT OF THE PEOPLE SAID. I THINK COUNCILMEMBER MALONEY SAID IT WELL ABOUT where she landed at tonight um i you know i i wanted to talk about i don't want to do anything procedurally that one puts us at legal liabilities but also makes it procedurally ineffective for us to execute from a enforcement perspective so i think that as you all presented it in the staff report um for items b b and c I think that that's where I would head tonight. But I haven't had the benefit of hearing the mayor speak. And I would love to hear what the mayor has to say.

Thank you very much. First thing I want to say is that one of the things I think I agree with, I think most people here is that this has taken way too long. The conversation has gone on way too long. You've been waiting for a decision way too long. And I personally feel really bad about that. Regardless of which way this goes, that makes me feel really bad because you've come in, you've brought your kids, you've made your statements. So first of all, I'm sorry about that. This has never been about tattoo parlors for me as far as like not being inappropriate walking spaces or Inappropriate around schools or any of those things and I've said that before I still feel really strongly about that. It's self-expression And I think that is absolutely something that people should celebrate All those things like I still have hesitations around the idea of amending the DSP I have hesitations around the cap of four I actually heard that two different um property owners downtown had each been receiving phone calls about additional tattoo parlors that would like to move here so i'm not good with a free-for-all um i think if i'm hearing correctly what is probably going to end up happening and i could be wrong is that your business would be approved to to finally be legal um if i had my druthers i would say i really prefer the 65 feet out not in the downtown core or the second story that's my personal preference um i did speak with one of the stakeholders that was part of the dsp planning the first time around um and and they told me that the tattoo parlor uh pro prohibition was not even questioned. There was nobody in the committee at the time that thought that was an odd thing at all. Instead, what they really had contention around was office space. There was a lot of back and forth about whether offices should be allowed downtown when it takes up very valuable retail space. I think that the calls coming in, the idea that there was a stakeholder group that was gathered together to have this discussion about what's appropriate downtown. And I will say, I very definitely think downtown does need to be treated differently based on the, it is the heart of the center of the city, the amount of people it brings in economic development wise, the fact that it brings people in here that then go other places, it's tied to our agricultural tourism. There's so much about downtown that needs to be held up high to a different standard, in my opinion. one of the things that i've heard is that some of the members of that committee to plan the original dsv or the most recent i should say are questioning why they went to so much effort to make that happen and to work so hard on establishing what was the appropriate zoning and then city council is able to change it without another community group gathering um and i understand that feeling i think i feel like that that is a valid feeling um especially now looking at the streets of Brentwood and the way that's been turned around, there's a lot of economic development opportunities coming there. I have heard from businesses downtown that there is concern that foot traffic and patronage from residents and outside of the city also are going there instead of downtown. So I think we have to be very careful and very cognizant of everything that we're doing and how it impacts downtown. So What I'm saying, again, I feel awful this process has taken this long. I would prefer second story 65 feet out, but not in the downtown core. I don't think I'm gonna win this. I think there's gonna be a different vote. Again, speculating, I don't know anybody's vote for sure. But if you do end up becoming legal, Congratulations, this has been a long, hard battle. And with that, I think what we, I don't know if there's anything else to talk about. We've all really expressed how we're feeling about this. I just don't see it as something that belongs in the absolute core. The extended areas outside of the core itself, yes, I see that. So with this, if there is a motion coming, that's fine. Any more discussion, that's fine too.

I can make a motion. I was looking at Tony because I was about to make one.

Okay.

So I'll make a motion to adopt staff's recommendations. And just a moment. My motion is that the staff define body art separately and classify it as a separate land use, that we prohibit body art within the first 65 feet of the first floor along Oak Street and First Street, and that we require an administrative body art license permit with the two existing downtown body art facilities continuing to allow two additional body art establishments to apply for them for a total of four. And that's my motion.

And I'll second.

Council Member Maloney?

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson? Yes. Council Member Mendoza? No. Council Member Orlemans?

Yes.

Mayor Meyer? No. And the motion passes. Congratulations. Moving into item H, which is informationals. Council Member Maloney, we'll start with you.

Since our last meeting, I met with Lily Pierce and I was educated on everything that Brentwood Community Trust has done for our community and what they continue to do. So I'm really excited about the future things that they're going to be doing. I also went to the city attorney's office and congratulated Yvette Toland on her retirement after serving the city of Brentwood of 24 years. I also attended a meeting to go over our LLADs with our finance department. I attended the elected women's luncheon in Pleasant Hill. I attended the financial ad hoc committee with Councilmember Mendoza. I attended the school interagency committee meeting where we discussed our last council meeting within regards to the reach topic and also e-bikes. And I also visited businesses downtown and a few businesses off of Sand Creek to listen to some of their concerns that they've had.

Thank you. Thank you. Council member Orlemans.

Uh, since, since our last meeting, I attended the tri Delta transit meeting, uh, I'm gonna spend a half a second on the Tri-Delts Transit. The Contra Costa County Transit Authority came and gave us a presentation during the meeting. And out of all the presentation, one of the slides that popped up was a... a map of Contra Costa County with all the different cities, not all, with several different cities listed on them. And it was titled growth since 1990 to 2024, I believe, 24 or 25. And almost all the other cities were in double digits, kind of in that 25-20 range over that 30-year period. Brentwood grew by 684% in a 36-year period of time. Just thought it was interesting and I would share it. I attended the DBC general meeting promotion ceremony at the PD for Sergeant Alonka Interbeakler. Congratulations, Alonka. And I attended a gender review.

Council Member Mendoza.

I attended a TEACH event at Trilogy where they gave scholarships to, I believe, five individuals. Trilogy does a great job at fundraising for scholarships for LMC students that need financial help. So it was great to be there for them for that. Attended the 101st anniversary of the VFW downtown. Thank you, DBC, because I know you guys helped put a lot of that together. So thank you. attended our budget subcommittee, attended our DBC general meeting. It's nice to have a meeting that anyone can come to because it was super packed. Great turnout. Let's see. Oh, attended a Cal Cities meeting where they went through veto suggestions and support suggestions for different bills that were happening in Sacramento that you could write your governor.

Vice Mayor?

Well, I came to say bye to Yvette Tolan, but she was busy doing the work of the city. So I got to write in her yearbook without a photo. But hopefully she knows that I appreciate all her years of service. I did that same day meet with the interim city manager and with our parks and rec staff. regarding our debrief of Juneteenth. And it was an amazing meeting. I think that we found out that we had over 3,000 people in attendance for Juneteenth. A lot of the new things that we put in place, which was the space that we have for people who may need a more quiet space with accessibility and resources was very well received. And we did have a huge turnout for the American Red Cross for blood donation. The event was very well received and it was amazing. And we had conversations about I had no bad feedback for them. They were like, OK, what can we do better? Which I love. A lot of our staff will show up in a meeting after they've executed an excellence and always ask how they can do better. And they do not get offended when we give feedback, or at least they don't let us know. And so I'm just so I have so much gratitude, not just for Parks and Rec, but for all of our departments. So I just want to say publicly and corporately, thank you so much for your willingness to always be open to feedback. But I had absolutely none. You guys killed it. So thank you.

Since we last met, I attended the same Tri Delta Transit meeting that Council Member Orlemans was talking about. I was also rather shocked by that number. Even an additional shock came from the projection of growth that they had for the future of Brentwood, which actually would have taken us outside of our Capacity, yeah, I can't think of the word, thank you. So it was an interesting transportation presentation. I've actually seen it three times now. And I have a transplant meeting on Thursday and I get to see it again. I had a meeting with Dr. Samir Noor, the principal of Pioneer School, to discuss participation in an upcoming national campaign related to the local government. The TEACH Scholarship Awards to Los Bonanos students held at Trilogy. The VFW opened house for the 101st anniversary. The Contra Costa elected an empowered women's luncheon, filmed a video for the Contra Costa Business Conference with the acting city manager. Did go up to say farewell to Yvette Toland to congratulate her for her retirement from the city attorney's office. We had a special Ag Enterprise Committee to clean up MOUs. Councilmember Maloney attended that with me as well. The Open DBC meeting, which really was incredibly packed with a lot of people very excited to be a part of that energy. Presented the state of the city and updates to the Brentwood Lions along with Terrence and our chief. went beyond our time for the presentation. There was a lot of questions and there were moonwalks happening on both sides. There were some that got it on video and I know who they are. attended the Cal cities webinar call to action sign and veto request, attended the mayor's conference in Moraga. There was a presentation by St. Mary's college and had a meeting with a parks and rec commissioner talking about just future ideas and agenda items potentially. So at this point, do we have any future agenda items that are new?

Go ahead.

I have a question. Who can moonwalk better?

I am not going to answer that, but I will say, I will say that Acting City Manager Terrance surprised me a bit with a Michael Jackson kick at the end. Chief, I knew you could moonwalk. I knew the Chief could moonwalk. I did not know that our Acting City Manager Terrance could.

So the mayor and I emailed Terrence about a future agenda item, probably kick off after the holidays. We would like to review the downtown specific plan and all of the uses. Do we want to pull back any uses or expand any uses? But we all think that looking at the downtown and bringing the community in is important. So while we do make some changes appear next year, we would like to redo that downtown specific plan and get the businesses inside and the community.

And I did forget, I'm gonna go backwards for just a moment, I apologize that Terrance and Thomas, if you had something you wanted to share for our informational section, I forgot to ask you that.

Thank you, Mayor. Just one item. Once a month, city staff have a booth out at the farmer's market. And so I think the city clerk has been out, right? So several members of the team, public works has been there, many familiar faces. And thanks to the staff for that opportunity for us to interact with the community. I will be there on Saturday with the police department. I'm not sure whom will be there. And I might moonwalk. Okay. So see you Saturday.

Two quick things. Thank you to all the council members who showed up to see Yvette. It really meant a lot to her. And so that was, it was just great. And for signing the book and all of that. Yeah. And the staff members. And then the second thing is, so you saw today, Michelle Magarell started in the city attorney's office on September 1st. And so very happy to have her. It's been very helpful. And thank you so much to council for allowing that. Thank you.

Any other new agenda items? Okay. Then I need a motion for adjournment.

Motion to adjourn.

Second. Roll call, please.

Council Member Maloney.

Yes.

Vice Mayor Pearson. Yes. Council Member Mendoza. Yes. Council Member Orlemans.

Yes.

Mayor Meyer.

Yes, we are adjourned. Thank you, everyone.

I thought that was going to go faster tonight, by the way. I know, I know. I didn't say that tonight, though. I kept my mouth shut. I didn't.