Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Yeah, so I'm gonna repeat that for the record here. I think I would know that by now to speak into the microphone loud and clear. So welcome everybody to the regular meeting of Cala Mesa City Council. We're calling this meeting to order here at 6 p.m. And we are gonna begin with a roll call.

Council Member Cundiff? Here. Council Member Garcia?

Here.

Council Member Molina?

Here, really?

Mayor Pro Tem Manley? Here. Mayor Cervantes?

Here. And for the record, our city manager, Cobol, is here. Our city attorney, Flowers, here. Our city clerk, Gerdes. Our finance director, Reed. Our community development director, Lucia. Public works maintenance superintendent is not here. Our city engineer, Thornton, is here. Our interim fire chief, Lindley, is here. And then our sheriff captain, Esquivel. Welcome, everybody. Thank you all for being here. At this time, we are going to have our pledge. And I've asked if a member of our community, Howard Reeves, would lead us in the pledge today. Thank you all. So at this time, we're gonna take communications from the public. This is an opportunity for any member of the public to speak directly to the council on any member on the agenda or not on the agenda within the council members subject matter jurisdiction. Members of the public may provide comment in person. You could do so by filling out a speaker slip. Those are on the podium where you walk in and handing those to our city clerk. You can also do so if you're watching remotely via Zoom by calling in and those detailed instructions are there for you in the agenda. You can find those, okay? So at this point, do we have any communications from the public?

We do. We have one, Elizabeth Avila.

Elizabeth, please.

Thank you.

I'm sorry? Okay.

My name is Elizabeth. I'm a resident of Cala Mesa. I am a senior and I vote. This is regarding the library issues 2.0. I've been here before. There are three issues that I'm calling attention to. One is is I need to know direction and who to talk to about these issues. One is the handicap door that has never been functionally used at all times. It's always been an issue. It's always been a concern of mine since there was an article in the newspaper that stated there was over $300,000 that was used for the handicap door. access when the door is not available. Obviously, all handicaps cannot use it. But whenever the door is used, it can be used when you open it from the outside, but not on the inside, the inside, not the outside. If the door is open and there's wind, it holds it open. If it's rain and wind, we get water inside. There have been towels during rainy times that have been covering the floor and of course it's wonderful for the kids because it's way slip and slide. So I would like to know who's gonna wind up taking care of that soon. The other one is IT techs. We don't have enough access to have them fix our computers. I had a keyboard stuck with a delete button and it took about almost four months to just get a new keyboard. That was way too long. and we had internet issue where one of them didn't work. Well, that gives us less computers. We only have six. We have one that's dedicated to library, checking in and out books only to look through the library. It used to be on an outside area, which would have been great because we gave us an extra computer. Any time there's a computer down, we get less computer access to it. So I would like to know who the IT department is or who can, Let me know why is it that we have to wait so long to get something fixed. We do have an issue with it right now where somebody increased the mouse, the little icon. It blocks a lot of the things when you're trying to look for things. And the office or the library manager can't fix it even though it says for administrative needs approval. He's not able to do it and it's on all of the computers. And it's pretty annoying and it just needs to be fixed. But I've been waiting over months now for that to be fixed. One other issue is of course parking again. I wanted to know because years ago when we came into the library, there was no red paint. When you come in the entrance on the left hand side, it was no red paint on it. I was told that the library manager, Allison, was the one who had that changed and the fire department had nothing to do with that change at all. That's it, thank you.

Thank you, I'm sure somebody's been taking notes and will be in touch.

Yes, we will inform the county members, the county facility, the county library system runs that. We were aware of the door issue. It's been extremely frustrating for their staff too to get it fixed. So they're aware of the issue and they're trying to work through that. But our project manager is very much aware of it and has been extremely frustrated with it as well. And then on the IT issues, we'll let them know. And then on the, we'll clarify on the parking issue on the red curb, but we will also pass along the concerns about that. So Darlene is our liaison with the county library, so she will let them know. Thank you.

Any other communications? Okay, seeing no more communications from the public, we will move on to our approval of the agenda consent calendar and the waiver of the full reading of ordinances. Before we do so, let me ask staff if there's any changes to the agenda or items that need to be pulled from the consent calendar.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor. We would like to pull item number five for further discussion and clarification.

Okay, item five is pulled. Council, any items that you'd like to pull from the consent calendar? No? Okay, so if I can get a motion.

I'll make a motion that we approve consent calendar items one through 11, excluding item number five, and waive the full reading thereafter.

I'll second.

Okay, all in favor?

Aye.

That's 5-0, none opposed. City Manager, item five.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor. So on this item, the nuts and bolts of it are in there accurately in terms of the reasons for the contract amendment related to the Cherry Valley Boulevard interchange design. But we inadvertently left out the actual contract amendment itself. So we're just going to ask the council, we're gonna modify our recommended action and our city attorney will provide what that is to basically authorize city manager to actually execute that amendment on behalf of the city. Um, with those specific items outlined. So it'll only be authorizing me for what specifically written, um, in the staff report and the attachments. So nothing's changing in terms of what you're approving in terms of the contents of it. It's just the mechanism of approval. So we just want to make sure that's on the record. So the city attorney will read what the revised recommended action is.

Thank you, so the recommendation as revised would be to authorize and direct the city manager to execute an amendment to the city's contract with MNS engineers. to amend the scope of services as requested by staff and shown in the staff report to extend the term to June 30th, 2027 and to increase, excuse me, to increase the total contract amount by approximately $890,295 to a total of $4,541,454 to account for the amended scope of services. Thank you. If there's no questions or concerns, if I can get a motion to that effect. So moved.

Second.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. That's 5-0. I'm opposed. All right. Brings us to our Cala Mesa Chamber of Commerce report. Tony is here.

Well, you all know I've been hiding out, so I'm back in the saddle, rock and roll again. Been doing some summer traveling, been fun. I got to go to Europe and see Budapest and all the way to Prague, Vienna. A lot of fun over June. And then spent some time in Vegas. Yes, I left my money there. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. It's true. So with the chamber report, again, thank you for the opportunity to share with you. The membership, this has been very successful. And members can now renew and apply directly through the chamber website, significantly improving efficiency and engagement. Since last report in July, we have received seven new members and one new renewal. The chamber breakfast update was August 11 at the Cafe Royale. The turnout was great. We had 35 attendees. We were honored to have Mickey Valdivia from the Beaumont Cherry Valley Parks and Recreation as our guest speaker. This coming September 8th at the Cafe Royale, Michelle Riggs from Crafton Hills College will be our guest speaker. So I expect to see Mayor Jeff Cervantes there because he has to be in support of Michelle.

Michelle's great.

State of the City is taking place on September 17th at the Plantation on the Lakes. Planning is moving forward smoothly. We are meeting with the city this Wednesday, August 19th. It says August 19th. Is that right? Yeah, OK. At the Plantation for follow-up and update on progress. So we have, at this time, obtained 11 sponsors. And the guest count is currently at 58. So we're definitely looking for more guests to attend. And obviously, we'll take more sponsors, right? We look forward to collaborating closely with the city leadership to ensure a strong and well-executed event. The News Mirror quarterly ad. Thank them for being here. The Chamber continues its quarter-page advertisement in the news mirror. Our features highlight our newest members, Chamber and local events. This past month featured Salon Tranquility, the Chamber Breakfast, Mesa Grande Academy, Oakland Steakhouse and Saloon, the State of the City, and First Truly. It was in the spotlight for Trifolk as well. That was a surprise to me that they did that. But I'll take the advertising. Events committee update. Our events committee is actively developing new community events to engage the community and generate revenue. For the local businesses and chamber we are currently working with the city on the annual trunk or treat coming up I believe it's October 31st right Saturday October 31st at the Summer Wind Park That'll be a lot of fun. I've attended a couple of those missed last year But I'll be there this year and of course the up-and-coming get your lights on Christmas parade the first Saturday of December events We are discussing for the future, and I shared this with Councilman Eric earlier tonight, the duck race. I saw one on this. I was trying to figure out how we would do this duck race, right? So I saw one on Instagram where the fire department opened up a couple of fire hydrants on the street, and they just had a big rack of ducks, the rubber ducks, and they just let them go. and then the top winning ducks at the end of the, I mean, it went for quite a ways down the road, too, so it was pretty cool. So we'll be hitting up the fire department on opening up some fire hydrants for us. We're also looking at a color run, night at the races, another poker night, maybe doing another Texas Hold'em night or something, and a Bunkle event. So at that point, that's where we're at for the chamber. Any questions for me on what's going on?

A lot going on. Any questions, comments? No? Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Appreciate the time, guys.

Thank you. Okay, at this time, we are moving on to our business items. First up is item 12, and this is a presentation of Cala Mesa Community Grant Impacts from the grant recipients, and our city manager is going to lead this one.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor. It seems like that's what a lot of people are here for tonight. So the city's community grant program provides funding to local nonprofit organizations for program services and activities that benefit Cala Mesa residents as part of the program. Grant recipients are required to return to the City Council and briefly report on how the funding was used and the benefit provided to the community. For the fiscal year 2025-26, the City Council awarded $5,000 to Cala Mesa Youth Baseball and Softball and $1,000 to the Yucaipa Cala Mesa Veterans Committee. We have representatives from both organizations here tonight to provide their required follow-up reports. So with that, I'd first like to introduce Howard Reeves from Cala Mesa Youth Baseball and Softball.

Mr. Mayor, council members, city manager and staff, my name is Howard Reeves. I live at 1017 Douglas Street in Cala Mesa. I want to thank the city for inviting us here tonight to share how the youth program went from August 2nd of last year and basically to August 17th of this year. We shut the books down on July, the last day of July, because we start another year in August again. But I want to thank the council for their generosity of the $5,000. I didn't spend it in Vegas like this guy did. But we were able to purchase two containers. The city wanted not more than a 10 foot at Summer Wind and the school said we could use a 20 foot at Mesa View. And working with four container companies, I got it down to where we got two containers delivered with a security cover for the locks where nobody can tamper with the lock. for 5,050 bucks. So that's where your $5,000 check went. And that is so important because without those containers, where do we store our equipment? We have over 20 teams worth of equipment, plus pitching machines, plus chalkers and rakes and bases and all that kind of stuff on these fields. We're using the three fields. So anyhow, that was good. We ended up with 20 regular season teams, and then we picked up a couple of more teams halfway through the season, which was good to help our program get more exposure. But we had 20 regular season teams. We had a little over 200 kids, and with the new two teams, we were up around 230 players. And... And it worked out really well. And with everything that we needed, and with my persistence with Morongo, I started with them on August the 25th. And eventually got a hearing with the tribal on June the 16th. Then they invited me back on July the 7th and give me the check that you guys all got a copy of, okay? And that's really what helped us get over the hump because it paid off all of our vendors that was carrying us, cleaned it up, and we ended up on August the 1st, we ended up with $9,000 left in the bank to start the next year. So we ended up being solvent, but it took a lot of pain and agony and persistence not to give up here and there and what have you to make it happen. So everything that we have now we own. So we don't have to buy stuff just to put a team on the field or to start a game. So it went really well. So I'd like to answer any questions any of you council members have.

Any questions for Mr. Reeves about his program?

Not a question per se, but just rather, Howard, I've known you for a lot of years from the time that I went to school with Scotty and your family. And I've known your love for this community is clearly evident by the work that you've done here. And I just wanna commend you and your family and all of those that were blessed by your work on this. So you provided a great service for all these young ladies and all the participants that were able to take advantage of that. So thank you.

Now, go ahead, anybody else? Let me just also say thank you. Jeff, what I'd like to do now, we have a team here We were asked to bring tonight to have the ladies over there take the pictures and hopefully the news mirror. Rachel will get it in the news mirror so we can get some advertising. This is one of the teams that joined us halfway through the season. They're 14 and under girls, and they're good players, and they entered five, four, five all-star softball tournaments at the end. They ended up, they won one of them, which they have their banner here tonight. And they come in second in the other three, basically. So I would like to have the girls all come up so your photographer here can take pictures. And to get that in the newspaper, if you guys will indulge us in that, I would appreciate that. So girls, manager, please come forward. Come on.

Yep, there we go. Our photographer's right here. There we go. Yeah, go right here. We'll just stand here. Should we stand behind or come along? Yeah, we'll go around.

Hey, Jeff. Mr. T's embarrassed with all these jewelry.

Yeah, where's mine?

No, you didn't play.

No, no.

Good morning.

Now, gentlemen, I think you guys, the city staff should recognize this gentleman standing here beside me. Is that correct? I know he does a lot of work for the city. Right, Kelly? Okay. He has a daughter on this team. And he has an office right over here where the vacant scat track building is. He has an office there as a civil engineer. And so I just wanted to introduce him to you guys so you'd see that. you do have somebody local that you're familiar with. Thank you.

Thanks, Howard. Thank you.

Yep, thank you. Thanks for being here. Thank you a lot. Thank you.

Now you can bring up the veteran, even though I'm a senior.

Okay, next we would like to welcome up Rachel Gustafson and George Sarteson with the Yucaipa Cala Mesa Veterans Committee.

Thank you very much for having us here tonight, honorable mayor and city council members. We appreciate this opportunity to thank you for the very generous $1,000 Cala Mesa Community Grant. I am here today with George Sarteson. He is our extraordinary treasurer and also master of ceremonies for our two programs. We have the Memorial Day event in May and then we also have the Veterans Day event in November. So I'd like to start off by thanking Mayor Cervantes for being our speaker at the Memorial Day event. You did a wonderful job and we appreciate that. We are also pleased to announce Mr. Eric Cundiff is going to be our keynote speaker for Veterans Day this year. So thank you for doing that. I am going to introduce, again, George, and he is going to go over the money portion of how we spent that money. And again, we appreciate it. Our job is to highlight and thank our veterans at both of our events. And we do it year round, and we really appreciate your ongoing support. Thank you. And here's George Sarteson.

Mayor, again, I would like to thank you for being our guest speaker on Memorial Day and welcoming Eric to Veterans Day in a few months. We're just starting to, we no sooner get over one event and we take a month or two or three off and then we start gearing up and planning for the next event. So we are kind of a year-round group. I hope all of you have the little handout I prepared that shows pretty much our budget that includes your $1,000 sponsorship through the program here. Most of the items near the top are pretty much fixed for our event. They may vary a little from year to year, but our budget is usually in that same amount. There's a few non-recurring items in there. We had to buy a roll call bell when we do that part of the program. We relied on another organization that wasn't always readily available until we were ready to ring the bell, literally. And so I hope this helps out for you to understand the importance of your sponsorship. And we had the largest crowd we've ever had this year. I'm not going to blame it on the In-N-Out Burger truck. It may have had something to do with it. But personally, I got a lot of feedback from people after the event, because most of them remember my name and not some of the speakers probably, because I'm in the program more than once. But we have people come from the surrounding communities, not only Cala Mesa. So it really exposes your community to the event that's held in your city that allows people in this general area of the past and Inland Empire to come to a program. There are other programs, but they're dispersed throughout the two counties. So I think it's really important that your continued support in our endeavor to continue this will lead to more visitors. We've added a few more chairs this year. Our chair rental went up. But they provide us a really good bill on that and everything. So if anybody had any questions, I'd be happy to respond to you. Questions? Council?

Again, no question, just a statement. Yes, sir. As a veteran and attending those memorial services that Rachel and George, that you participate in and spend a lot of time to organize, thank you very much. The memorial service, for all those that have passed, you guys do it in such a respectful way. and to honor them and their memory, and that's just a wonderful thing. So thank you guys very much for keeping veterans at the forefront of what you do. You're more than welcome. Thank you.

Mayor, I'd like to speak.

I, too, am very familiar with your group. I was one of your group for a long, long time. But what I most appreciate is the Memorial Day event held in our city is such an educational event. kids who maybe don't have families that have military influence, this is an education for them to know what it's all about. And I know many kids come from the school, and I know we used to go and explain to them what the flags meant and all that, so that's important to me, as well as acknowledging our veterans and our veteran families. Ray Quinto was a councilman and started away back when, And so his son, and I don't know if Pat still comes, his wife, but it's just something that never goes away. It's always so successful, and you see the same faces every year. So congrats. The handful of you that run the event all year long, the same group of people do the same thing. I don't know how you do it with the budget that you get, but somehow you pull it off.

We pick up a few people here and there.

And I'm very, very impressive and very, very impressive. And the people appreciate it. I appreciate it as well. So thank you for everything.

And just a note about the youth. You know, we are really enthusiastic about involving the youth. One of the items in here, Tournament Hills Fifth Grades, we started donating to their field trip program. And I probably mentioned this when I came before you asking you to support us, but the Friday before the event, They all leave the class and walk down Desert Lawn Drive with their teachers. And even the Beaumont Junior ROTC Air Force, I believe, they come over and help to get a little credit thing for their program. And to know that they've come over there to spend like about 40 minutes, maybe an hour, to plant all those flags. on the veterans' headstones, it's really special just to sit back and watch it. And when they leave and you see them all just going down and way down and walking back a mile and a half back to school, it's very rewarding to know that we can recognize them. We always do that in our program. And the same is the youth that provide music that came this year. This is the first time we've had the Yucaipa High School Choir there. And even though they're a big part of the Veterans Day there with the symphonic band and the choral group. They just, you know, it's so important, and it's so rewarding for them, and I think for everybody that even comes to the program to see that. And we usually have a youth leading the Pledge of Allegiance. So I probably used up more than three minutes, but I see I wasn't on the clock anyway. But thank you again for your long-time support. We appreciate it, and I'll pass it on to the committee when we start meeting next month. Thank you.

Thanks again. That concludes our presentations.

Yes, that is correct. This is just a receive and file item.

Correct. Okay, so moving on to business item. Well, as our youth exit, thanks again for being here. It's good seeing all of you. Good luck next season. I know Howard's already planning it. All right, business item 13 is related to the resolution providing for appointments to the office of city council member that were to be elected on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026. And counseling that election, our city clerk, Darlene Gerdes, is going to handle this one.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. As you know, the general municipal election is scheduled for Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026, and we have two council seats up for this election, which are the seats of Mayor Cervantes and Mayor Pro Tem Manley. The nomination period opened on July 13th and closed on August 6th, and at close of the nomination period, there were only two candidates, being that of Mayor Cervantes and Mayor Pro Tem Manley. The Elections Code states that if there are not more candidates and offices to be elected, then there are three courses of action that may be taken by the City Council. One would be to appoint to the office the persons who have been nominated, two, appoint to the office any eligible voter if no one has been nominated, or three, hold the election for the two seats with the two nominated candidates. The elections code further requires that the city clerk publish a certification of a notice of facts in a newspaper of general circulation in the city pursuant to section 6061 of the government code. The required notice was published on August the 12th in the Press Enterprise and the notice was also posted on the city's webpage and at our legal posting places. The certification of the nocefax was also included in your packet as attachment one to the staff report. The elections code further requires that after the fifth day following the date of posting or publication, the city council shall meet to either make the appointments or direct an election to be held. The person or persons appointed, if any, shall qualify and take office and serve exactly as if elected at a municipal election for the office. If by the 75th day before the municipal election, which would be August 20th, no person has been appointed to the office pursuant to one or two above, the election shall be held. So if the City Council makes an appointment pursuant to the Elections Code, the City Clerk shall not accept for filing any statement of write-in candidacy, which is submitted after the appointment is made. Staff is respectfully recommending that the city council adopt resolution number 2026-48, providing for the appointments to the offices of city council member that were to be elected on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026, and canceling that election. A certified copy of the adopted resolution will be forwarded to the Riverside County Register of Voters. The formal appointments for the two seats will be made at the first city council meeting in December, along with the council agency reorganization. And one thing I would like to clarify is that canceling the city council election does not cancel the election in Cala Mesa. So I think some people get a little confused about that. So I just want to clarify, it only cancels the voting for two council seats. Everything else on the ballot remains and the voters will get to consider and vote on. So that concludes my report. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you for that, appreciate it. On the resolution, just wanna make note of one typo issue. The first whereas has the date August 6th, 20,262. That would be a very long nomination period. So if you could just correct that for the record. I will correct that. Any comments, questions, motion?

I'd like to please and honor to make the motion to have the City Council adopt resolution number 2026-48, a resolution of the City Council of the City of Calamasa, California, providing for the appointments to the office of City Council members that were elected on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026, and canceling that election.

A motion? Second motion, aye.

So we have a motion. Can we get a second? Yes. Yeah. So we have a second. So all in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Was that an aye, aye, aye? No. All right. I have 5-0. Thank you all for the confidence. All right, moving on to business item 14. This is the appointment of the League of California Cities voting delegate representing Cala Mesa at the annual league conference. And our city clerk will also be handling this.

So good evening, mayor and council once again. The annual League of California Cities Conference is gonna be held on September 23rd through the 25th, making our state of the city have to be changed, if you remember that. Usually they have it in October, I'm not sure why they're doing it in September this year. At the annual conference business meeting, the league requires that each city appoint a voting delegate and an alternate voting delegate to represent the city and vote on any business of the league. Mayor Cervantes and Councilmember Cundiff are both registered to attend the conference, and so staff is requesting that the City Council select a primary voting delegate and an alternate voting delegate, and I will inform the League of your appointment. And that concludes our report.

Thank you for that. Okay. Who, so it's just Council Member Cundiff and myself who are attending. Are you gonna be attending as well? Okay, so I'm happy to defer to either one of you if you would like to be a voting delegate. Linda, you have in the past been our voting delegate.

Yes, so you probably would like to do that for your first time. Eric, I don't remember if you participated in that last year.

No, I did not attend Cal Cities last year. I haven't been for years.

There are times when there are no resolutions at all. So this year there happens to be a need for it. So it's a prestigious thing to do, to represent your city and vote on important league things. So I'll leave it to you two. I've done it before for that opportunity.

So for the voting member and the...

alternate alternate do you both participate in the so both attended the voting in yes so so when you get to the conference when you register for the conference um there's a separate table and if you're the delegate you go to that table and you're noted um as the as a voting member for the city and they give you certain criteria and they'll give you the schedule when that election is going to be and they have a special little voting voting um What do you call those little? It's a voting process. And so you'll sit in a separate section of the conference, but everybody attends. So it's a simple thing to do.

I'm happy to do it. Okay.

I'd be happy to be the alternate. Bring that up? Okay. The caveat, I shouldn't say caveat, but one of the things that we are concerned with, as we all remember signing a support letter for the cause that Marietta was championing. So this is going to be something that we're gonna most likely have to voice our support for as the voting delegate for. So that would be the only thing that I would ask, as long as we're fine having mayor represent us that way, you know, still support this resolution that Cal Cities is looking to do?

Yeah, I can give a little background on that. So the City of Marietta is pushing, is put forth a resolution, which is kind of what Council Member Molina is referring to, regarding creating a working group in Cal cities to advocate for local control and housing decisions. And so they have asked for the delegate for each city to pledge their support for their resolution. And it's in the form that we had presented previously for a letter that you had signed. I think several council members actually pledged their support for that. That being the case, and I think that's just what council member kind of is requesting, is that you will, as delegates, support that, unless there's any objection from the council.

No objection to that on my part. Any council members have a problem with that? Okay, so if I can get a motion.

I can make a motion to appoint Jeff Cervantes as a voting delegate, and there kind of as the alternate.

And I'll motion second for that. Thank you.

All in favor?

Aye.

Thank you for that. 5-0. Moving on to item 15. And this is the consideration of rejoining the Yucaipa Sustainable Groundwater Management Agency. And so I will hand this over to our city manager to get us started.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This item comes back just at Council Member Cundiff's request from the June 15th meeting to evaluate whether there would be value in the city rejoining the Yucaipa Sustainable Groundwater Management Agency, or SGMA. Staff report provides quite a bit more detail on the history, so I'm not gonna go into all of that, but in brief, Cala Mesa was an original member of the Yucaipa SGMA when it was formed in 2017. The city withdrew in 2018 primarily because of concerns about costs and governance, including the costs associated with development of the Groundwater Sustainability Plan. Since that time, the GSP has been completed and approved by the state, and the SGMA is now focused on implementation, monitoring, recharge, groundwater storage, and accounting and periodic updates to the plan. There are some potential benefits to rejoining. Most importantly, the city would once again have a formal seat and vote on decisions affecting groundwater management with the new type of basin. That could be useful as Cala Mesa continues to grow and as land use assumptions, future water demand and recharge opportunities and infrastructure planning become more increasingly important. Although as a land use agency within the basin, the UKIPA Sigma is required to consider our land use patterns. There are also limits to what participation would accomplish. Rejoining would not give the city authority over water rates, connection fees, recycled water requirements, service territories, or sewer capacity. Those remain under the authority of the individual water and wastewater agencies. And as mentioned previously, the Eucalyptus Sigma is already required to consider the city's general plan and the land use assumptions whether or not Calamace is a voting member. We also maintain relationships with both of our water purveyors. And again, whether or not we are voting members, and we do that to advocate for the city's interests. Cost is another consideration based on the existing cost-sharing structure and recent expenditures. The city's direct UCIPA SGMA assessment could generally be in the range of $10,000 to $12,000 annually. Although that could vary depending on studies and other work undertaken by the SGMA. There would also be an internal resource cost that is harder to quantify. Meeting full participation would require reviewing technical materials, preparing for meetings, attending meetings, and following up on those issues. Our city engineer would likely take the lead on much of that work. And because our engineering services are provided under contract, that time would result in an additional direct cost to the city. I would also expect to participate in matters involving policy, governance, land use, or development. So for a relatively small organization, that commitment of staff and consultant capacity is part of the overall consideration. rather than make a recommendation for or against rejoining staff has laid out the history potential benefits potential costs commitment resource commitments and limitations so we're looking for council direction as to whether you would like us to pursue membership further and that concludes my report and be happy to answer any questions that you may have

Thank you for that. I'm gonna open it up at this point for questions, any clarification questions or more information.

I think there may be public comments on this one.

We have a public comment, so we'll handle that first. We'll take public comment on this item first.

Okay, that would be Dave Armstrong.

Good evening, council. Thank you for having me here. Yeah, this is a big item. I was excited to see that you guys were actually considering getting back into SGMA. It's an important role. You guys are the land use agency, and that's really important to us because we want to tie together your city general plan and our urban water management plan, and the Yucaipa Sigma plan. It all ties together. So as a land use agency, I think it's really important. The water pumpers pay the majority of the fees. We are the largest ones. We have to pay, and when it comes to planning, I just think, as you're seeing right now over on 4th Street, That was a big undertaking. It actually came from a staff member at Cala Mesa who was here before. She brought up the idea of putting recharge in this area because we were always looking for a spot. That is going to bring state project water down and recharge in Cala Mesa for the first time ever. When Linda Molina was mayor, I got her to go with me with Valley District. We went up and we got to tour the Sacramento Delta, the whole facility, and to think that that very water is going to come down here, and it meshes. The fact, Sigma's not just about water. It's about land, too. So you guys are seated at the table. In my opinion, it's very important. I would love to see you guys back at it. You guys are going to vote the way you're going to vote for your best interest, and that just makes sense. I totally agree with that. But I think knowing what's going on for future planning, how water is going to be brought into the area for your development, I think is crucial. I really do. So I encourage you guys to get back into the Yucaipa Sigma. I think it's just a, you know, the city of Yucaipa is in it. In fact, our meetings are held at their office. But I will tell you, right now, we're standing on top of the largest basin in the whole Yucaipa Valley water. That's the Calabasas Basin. I know I've showed that to you guys before. And it's so important to think about how we're going to plan for the future to bring water here, put it in the ground, and how we're going to provide for the next 20, 50 years is what our plan is with Yucaipa Sigma. So I would encourage you guys wholeheartedly to get back in and really... be a player and have your seat at the table restored, because I think you guys have that place and you've earned it. Thank you.

Okay. Council, questions, comments, clarification? If you have questions for Mr. Armstrong, we can bring him back up as well. We want to get the discussion going.

I'm all for it. I was very impressed when I went on the water tour. Learned quite a bit about it. And it is right here in our backyard. It is in our yard. Right next door to the Forestry Park. So I'm very happy to support it. I remember when we... I don't remember the exact year when we pulled out of it.

2018.

Yeah, what the issues were way back then. I don't know if you, or Darlene, if you want to recap that, but I think it's important for us to be at the table like Dave says, and so.

I will say that the reasoning that, from my understanding from reading through the staff reports, number one, it was a financial consideration, but number two, and part of that was tied to the selection of the consultant that actually put the GSP together. And so there was pretty big discrepancies in the different bids. And our feeling was is that there wasn't enough consideration for an agency or a firm that provided a lower bid. And so because that was gonna inflate the cost for everybody. Mr. Armstrong said the cost is majority is to the water purveyors themselves. It's a 75-25 split between the purveyors and non-purveyors. So the 75% is shared among those, and then the 25% is shared among the non-proveyors. So city, the wholesale agencies. And so, but that was part of the consideration at that point.

Thank you. Thank you for the history. I'm good.

So not knowing all the history prior to asking city manager to bring this up, I was very surprised, I guess, by going through. I figured there would be some sort of cost, but for us to have a $10,000 to $12,000 a year, roughly, just for the cost of that, I don't think that's something that I would support paying into. especially when I don't really see, there's value in meeting with folks and having that face time. And I do think that we appreciate and enjoy a good working relationship with South Mesa, as well as our other water agencies to include Yucaipa Valley and the pass. And I think we have a good working relationship with them already. And for us to pay that, to get some sort of sufficient value out of it, I'm having a hard time seeing that. I would not be in favor of us paying that to get back into it, understanding that it's not going to give us any kind of voting or control over anything. And I would just rather look at more governance in our own city and see where we can apply participating in commissions or things of that nature where we can have more control over that. They're doing a great job, as I see it, all of them involved already, so I just, I don't see, I don't see getting involved in that as being overly beneficial for us.

Thank you, sir. Garcia or Mayor Pro Tem?

Go ahead. I agree with Eric as well, too. If Will can explain a little bit more about, even if we do decide to vote for it and join... Would it benefit any within our city team or us to make any direction, or would it just continue how we're working with our neighboring water agencies, how we're having a good relationship with them at the moment?

It would allow us to, you know, as Mr. Armstrong said, it is true that we'd be a voting member of the SGMA going forward, but we would be one of eight. Right now there's seven agencies involved, so we would be the eighth agency. And so... To the extent that there's things that would impact the city directly, it's probably minimal because like I said, there is a lot of things that they already have to do that they're required by law to consider from the city standpoint. And so to the extent that there are disputes between water agencies, we're kind of getting in the middle of that too with something that's ultimately going to be decided when we're the end user, right? Again, from that perspective, there is some say, but some of the things that we care about is outside the purview of SGMA itself. It's more relationships directly with the respective agencies for things like water rates and dual plumbing requirements and those kind of things. And I've had conversations with Mr. Zoba that they have their water supply plan that they have in place. And we provide the feedback to them in terms of what some of those impacts are to the development community, for example, and the impacts of the cost of development, things like that. But those are all things that are outside the SIGMAS purview, right? They're things that we deal with directly with those agencies. So to the extent that there's governance issues that are in the basin themselves, we would have a say in that. But at the end of the day, the ones that are gonna execute are the water agencies.

Perfect, I think that actually answers the question pretty straightforward, and I thank you for that. So yeah, I'll stick with, I do not agree with it as well. Chair Prozano?

Thank you, Mayor. Just to add a little bit, I think some of the concerns that I have is going to be the cost and also, I think, staff time. So we know we have a small staff, so we're going to have to assign somebody. They have to keep track of what's going on to participate and vote. That's going to be on our staff and not on the council itself. So I think that's even a greater concern than just the cost, the cost of it. I think it is an important issue, and we do participate in some way already, but I think at this time I don't think the tradeoff is there for me as far as the cost and the strain to staff, so I'd be opposed to it. That's all I have. Thank you.

I think I'm hearing a consensus among council. So if somebody wants to make a motion or a recommendation or is that what we're looking for at this point? Is this just a...

I think that there would be, if the council, if the consensus of the council was to direct staff to bring back something to have us join, then we would have something further to do. But if that is not the direction of the consensus of the council or the majority of the council, there's no action that's required.

Okay. So at this time, we just need a recommendation from the council?

Yeah, if there's any member of the council that would like to recommend us going in, they can direct staff to do that, but then we would need a majority vote from the council to take that action.

But to stay out of it, do we need to make a recommendation or no? No, no. Okay.

Status quo doesn't require any additional action.

So at this point, I think we're just gonna continue to table it and keep it as an option?

I think that's appropriate. Keep it as an item that we may revisit later on down the road.

Yeah, there's nothing that says that prevents us from doing it later. if we're watching things and say, okay, we need to jump in and do something about it, or financially, it makes more sense for us in the future, depending on where, you know, we have some things coming up that could, you know, materially change our financial projectory. That's a less, yeah, and add staff. So it might be less of an issue from the concerns that have been raised that maybe the circumstance changes at that point.

It sounds like something we can keep our eye on and see as it develops. It's an important agency. It's an important consideration. But at this time... We've gotta explore the ROI. So that leads us to business item 16, which is the review of the current city commissions and possible future amendments to the Cala Mesa Municipal Code. And our wonderful city clerk will again get us started.

All right, once again, good evening, Mayor and Council. Periodically, staff provides a report to the City Council regarding its city commissions and boards, and the last thorough review was completed in 2013-14. So it's been a while. Substantial changes were made with the elimination of what we had as a Housing Advisory Appeals Board, Public Works and Safety Commission, and the Trails and Open Space and Beautification Commission. At that time, it was dissolved and they were replaced as a standing advisory committee under the Planning Commission. So at that time, no changes were made to the Planning Commission, Community Services Commission, or the Mobile Home Rent Stabilization Board. In 2015, an amendment was made to the municipal code with the adoption of ordinance 333 that added a time period in which each council member should make their respective appointments. At that time, we had a couple of council members who had not made appointments to the commissions, which caused meetings to be canceled due to lack of quorum, and therefore delaying business or action taken by the commissions. And so there was council member requests to include this item. to include this timeframe in which to appoint members. And the code now requires that appointments be made by council member within 60 days of receipt of a completed citizen service application. And if an appointment is not made within those 60 days, then a nomination could be made by any member of the city council and approved by majority vote of the council. have we ever done that had to use that no so just so you know but it's there in 2020 the code was amended to remove the trails open space and beautification as a standing committee under the planning commission and to reorganize the community services commission to include the duties of the trails open space and beautification and with that the change to the name came and it was now what it is now as parks trails and community services commission And then in 2005, by council action, the Mobile Home Rent Stabilization Board was dissolved and replaced with a hearing officer process for petitions submitted under the Mobile Home Rent Stabilization Program, adopted as chapter 905 of the Kalamazoo Municipal Code. City commissions consist of five members each, each appointed by a city council member and ratified by majority vote of the city council by resolution. We did that last meeting when, Christine was appointed to the Planning Commission. The person appointed must be a resident of the city, shall act solely in the public interest, and shall serve for the term of the city council member who appointed them. Further, the person appointed shall serve at the pleasure of the city council and may be removed without cause, either A, at the request of the appointing city council member with a majority vote of the city council, B, at the request of a city council member other than the appointing council member and with a four-fifths vote of the city council, and C, at the request of any member of the city council and with a majority vote at the city council if the person was appointed to the position by the city council rather than an individual council member. We currently have three active city commissions. The Planning Commission, Parks and Trails, and Community Services Commission, and the Library Commission. The Planning Commission meets the second Monday of each month at six o'clock. From time to time they may have a special meeting on the fourth Monday of each month at six p.m. The Planning Commission has many duties, such as revisions to the general planning administration of specific plans, zoning, subdivision ordinances, and other functions as required by the Planning and Zoning Law, and as may be provided by the City Council, including conducting studies, preparing plans other than those required or authorized by the Planning and Zoning Law. The Library Commission meets on a bimonthly basis the months of February, April, June, August, October, and December on the first Tuesday of each month at 4.30 p.m. And they are responsible for recommending policies and procedures to the City Council for the administration, operation, development, and improvement of library facilities and programs. The Parks, Trails, and Community Services Commission meets the first Wednesday of each month at 4.30 and is responsible for recommending policies and procedures to the city council for the administration, operation, development, improvement, and maintenance of community facilities, including parks, trails, recreation facilities, park and recreation programs. And they also serve as the historical commission and meet in that capacity only on an as-needed basis. So for the Planning Commission, staff would not recommend any changes to the Planning Commission as they serve a vital role to the city and should continue to serve as it was established. For the Library Commission, with the completion of the new library building, the duties of the Library Commission will need to be reviewed, and the current Library Commission members have expressed an interest in serving as a city historical commission responsible for compiling city history and working to curate the city's historical museum. At the beginning of 2026, the Commission made the decision to shorten the amount of meetings each year by meeting bimonthly rather than every month. Meeting attendance by commissioners is pretty consistent. However, in 2025, there were only four of the nine meetings that were attended by all five members. In 2026, there has only been one meeting with no quorum. For the Parks, Trails, and Community Services Commission, staff continues to plan annual events for the community and successfully implements each one with limited resources and limited volunteers. The commissioner's role is to assist in the planning and implementation of these events, but it is a challenge to get full commission participation in attending the events. The commission also serves as the historical designation commission and are responsible for trails and beautification throughout the city. Meeting attendance for 2025 had only two meetings of the 11 scheduled where all five members were in attendance. There were four meetings without a quorum and the other five had at least one commissioner absent. In 2026 of the six meetings held to date, five had at least one to two commissioners absent and one meeting had no quorum. So I would like to provide a suggestion that we look at the duties of both the Library Commission and the Parks, Trails, and Community Services Commission and consider an option of establishing one commission that would encompass the various duties of both commissions. The commission could consist of seven members rather than five, five appointed by each member of the council, You know what I mean. And then two at-large members, one appointed, both of them would be appointed by the council as a whole, but one with a term of four years and one with a term of two years. Staff would research what an appropriate commission title would be and bring those options back with proposed amendments to the code at the October 5th meeting. And also with the establishment of that commission, they could have subcommittees to where maybe two members could have the historical job, two could be trails, two could be parks, two could be events. However, we could divvy those things up, but we could create subcommittees under that one commission and give them special projects to do.

And on that, just under this suggestion, since there's seven members, you could actually do up to three. So they could do two or three member committees and still not have a, because they're not a quorum, so there's no violation of the Brown Act.

So tonight we're just seeking direction from you as city council regarding the commissions and how it relates to their duties, membership, impacts the community, et cetera, and staff's willing to explore various options and bring back for your consideration at a future meeting. And any changes made will require adoption of an ordinance and amendments to the municipal code. So with that, I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you, Darlene.

And before you go into that, I just want to make one mention of one thing is, out of the three current commissions the planning commission is the only one that on certain matters is a decision-making body the other two commissions are purely advisory so they don't have any formal authority to make final decisions on things they're just an advisory those are both advisory commissions so i just want the council to be mindful of that too

Thank you, fantastic. I think this is something that needs consideration, something that needs a little updating. And so we're gonna open it up for discussion and thank you for getting the discussion going, Darlene. Those are great ideas and Council Member Molina.

I think it's a great idea. I think I've sat on every commission over the years. And because to our advisory only, I think that kind of explains why you don't always have a quorum of everybody. And while it's important to have community input on governance here, it's... It's a lot of work for staff and because we're kind of catching up with other cities and developing, I think there's really not a lot of work that has to be done where we call the commissioners together and sometimes it's just to have a meeting that's not a good reason to have a commission. And so I think maybe if we went to a quarterly meeting of commissioners once we decided which commissions are needed, and until we build our next two communities where we'll have more parks, maybe a school, and get busy on our visitor center, I think it makes perfect sense. It saves staff time. It takes a lot of staff time to coordinate the meetings and for the commissioners who do come, it's not fair to them if there's not a quorum and they have to disperse without having a meeting. So I think it makes perfect sense. It'll give us time to analyze the purposes of the commissions and which ones, as we develop, will be more important to have and to staff. So I think it's a great idea, good work.

Fantastic. Any other comments on that? Oh, we do have, hand it to the city clerk. We'll take your public comment on this. Any comment first? So do we wait? Yeah, we wait for. Let's do public comment, yeah.

Okay, well, one is I want to make sure that the commission, obviously, I think you made a comment on it, they're not, the library commission will not have any say-so as far as monies, is that it, budget?

No, the Library Commission's role, and maybe Darlene can expand on this, but essentially the Library Commission's role was the construction of the new library. So they were created for the purpose of replacing the old library that was in a modular building that was kind of falling apart. And so their mission was to build the new library, and the new library has been built. So Darlene, do you want to maybe add to that?

Yeah, so we also receive an annual amount from what used to be in the Beaumont Library system many years ago. And so we receive an amount that helps kind of purchase books and supplies and things like that. And so the Library Commission has always been one to oversee that part of the budget so that...

but it's lower now, obviously, because we haven't gotten any new books, DVDs, any supplies, or not supplies, but like prizes for school reading programs.

I don't know about that. I just know that that's what those monies are for, that the city gives.

Yeah, we do have a special fund that that money goes into every year, and we do provide for, there is, sometimes it's not new stuff, it's replacement of, it's circulation. So a lot of times with libraries, it's a circulation thing. So they remove old things, replace it with new. But that tax increment is used for that purpose. And the commission's role even in that for the library commission is still a recommending body. It's still a component of the city budget that ultimately the city council approves. So even in that role, they're still just their advisory.

Right, and then through the years, they did a lot of fundraising. That was their role also to help with getting a new library. And so a lot of those funds that we raised are also going to help with the purchase, or excuse me, the building of the new library.

Well, that's an issue also because we haven't had the Friends of the Library back. We haven't had the donations being allowed back.

The Friends of the Library dissolved many years ago. And so unless another nonprofit comes and starts the Friends of the Library, we don't have that.

So does that go through the Library Commission? No.

And correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Riverside no longer want to receive book donations?

That's correct.

People in the community used to love to donate books. They used to take them to the concerts and have tables set up. And so a lot of things have changed. Yeah, yeah. A lot of things have changed. That's another thing.

And again, as I mentioned before, the city is of limited role over the library anyway. The only thing that we have a contractual relationship is a ground lease. So we own the land underneath the library. We don't own the structure. We don't own the collections. None of that is, with our purview, it's a branch library of the county system. It says Cala Mesa Library because of its location, but it's not the Cala Mesa Library. It's the Cala Mesa Branch Library, and it's a branch of the county library system. So I think that's important clarification, too. So the city... you know if there's like a complaint about certain types of books or something like that city doesn't have a control over that that's the county is the one that that and so to the extent that there's issues with the library i think your best bet would be to contact the supervisor's office um or the li i would start with the county library system and if they're not helping you then you can escalate it to the super the supervisor's office because he's the one that would be able to make things happen on the county side

Okay, but as far as the land, the paint, can it be removed and can the chains come down now that we're now in a hot?

Well, we talked about the chains last time and there's a lot of the codes to that. I'm still working with the public works crews on what that looks like, but there's a lot of implications on there.

But that's nothing that's going to help as of starting tomorrow when the library opens.

No, because you can't, yeah, I mean you can't, we can't just magically make that parking lot ADA compliant, for example, the way it's at, the way it sits right now. Okay. So.

Thank you for your comments. Appreciate it. All right, so getting back to the discussion about the commissions, we have any other comments?

So I had a question. Well, first I agreed with everything Councilwoman Molina said as far as all of her comments for the commission. For Darlene, so by going to one, it's gonna free up staff, right?

Yeah, so going to one, we would only need one secretary and one staff liaison.

By one, we don't mean, we're excluding the planning commission. We're keeping that standalone. That stays as it is, yeah. Talking about the other two commissions.

So there would only need to be one staff liaison who would be either, you know, city clerk, maybe public works director, and then there would be someone that would be the secretary who would be the one to do the agendas and the minutes and those kind of things, and that's how they are right now. The Library Commission, I do solely both of those myself. With the Parks and Trails, Mahdi is the staff liaison, and Yeza is the secretary to the commission.

So it'd be safe to say that by freeing you guys up with that, it would lighten the load? Perfect, okay. Yeah, I agree with everything that Council Member Molina said on that.

Fantastic.

One last comment.

We don't have a lot of people coming to the city asking to be a commissioner, but just importantly, for the ones that do come, we have to respect them for them wanting to participate and it's not fair to them when they come to a meeting and there's no quorum. And to me, that's disrespectful. And so I think if we have the time to revamp the commissions on what's needed, we value the input. It's not that we're trying to take away the input from the community, but rather honor their commitment wanting to participate and contribute. So we need to work together with them. I think this is a great idea to put time into what those commissions should be and how we could get commissioners to participate.

I agree. I like the idea of having a planning commission. I don't know what the name would be, but it could even be like a community service commission and under that it has several different things. history, heritage, and parks and trails, and it's whatever.

Yeah, I went online today to try to find some exciting, kind of fun names.

Yeah, well, and I will say community services probably does encompass that, because a lot of cities, cities that have their own library, that have their own library system, A lot of times they will actually bundle the library under community services. So the librarian will work for the community services director, same as Parks and Rec. So it's not unheard of to have those different functions all fall under the purview of community services.

So it's not an exciting name, but it might work, we'll see. Any other comments? I'm hearing a resounding approval of the direction here.

Yeah, I'll just kind of echo the same. I agree with everything that's said. I like the idea of going with seven, combining them, having subcommittees. People can find their interests within that one committee. So I think that's a great idea.

Yeah, I agree too. Based on what was mentioned earlier, I agree. And then just to, you know, sometimes if the rest of the commissioners are not able to make it, you know, It could be for so many reasons, family emergencies, and unfortunately, if they all line in one day, sometimes they won't be able to meet all together. But I do agree that we could move forward with your suggestions.

Thank you, everybody. I think we have our recommendation is let's go for it. All right.

So now we do have enough time to put that together and make those modifications so that we're ready to go when it's time to make those appointments in December. Sounds good. That'd be ideal.

Perfect. Fantastic. So now it's mayor and council members reporting on county and regional meetings and conferences. Let's start with council member Garcia.

Didn't attend any meetings, but I'm still kind of planning with the Cal Cities. So September, just got to see my schedule. I have a few meetings that I have to kind of look around for my kids for the school. But just want to keep the team pending on that, if I will be attending or not, just to kind of give you an update on that, Darlene. Besides that, I don't got nothing else to report besides thanking the staff and the team here and the committee as well. And congratulations to both of you guys.

Thank you, sir. Appreciate that. Thank you for your report. Council Member Molina?

I actually attended two meetings. It was so good to get out of the house. I haven't been able, I still can't drive, but I got rides. So on August 10th, I attended the Riverside Cal Cities division meeting hosted by the City of Wildermore at their Inland Valley Hospital, it's a new hospital. And the guest speakers there were, which are both partners of Cal Cities, was Institute for Local Government, Melissa Cune, I can never pronounce her name, Cune. was the presenter, and then California Strategies, and their rep was Matt Clint, so they talked about the two entities that they are associated with. Then on August 12th, attended my first RCTC commission, Most items are receive and file. I brought for you tonight, and I'll have this distributed to you, the Measure A renewal, which is a big deal. So I'll have Darlene copy these for you. It's good information on what's gonna happen. This has been a controversial thing, but Measure A is very beneficial to us as a small city, so I'll be sure to distribute that. At their meeting, they had two organizations, ACG, which is Associated General Contractors, who are partners with RCTC, and they came and did a presentation on future construction cost trends. That was really important, because that's the bottom line, what it costs for projects. And then the other presenter was, and you probably are familiar with this, RAMP, which is, advanced mitigation program. They had Hector Casillas, which is the right-of-way manager at RCTC, he presented on that item. And so if you want more information on those, I can provide that to you. And then they had a closed session. So it was a very light meeting, kind of like our meeting. Closed session was longer than the regular meeting. But I did, and I brought Will the budget for this year so he could take a look at that. And then, and measure A is gonna be on the ballot this year in November, so people are, the community will vote for it, or voters, I should say. And then just an announcement, at the August 27th RTA board meeting, there will be a ribbon cutting for their hydrogen fueling station there at the Third Street location, so if anybody's interested in attending that, just thought I'd share that. Thank you for letting me speak.

Thank you for that report. Council Member Cundon.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I was traveling with my wife for a vacation, but I was able to remotely, I couldn't be part of the admin and finance for WRCOG because I didn't disclose the address of the airport that I was going to be sitting in. So, unfortunately, I couldn't weigh in on anything. You've got to love the Brown Act, even though I was in South Carolina. But I do have some information to share with you regarding that meeting, so I will pass that along to the councilmen and women when I get that. On the 13th of August, I did participate in the PACE introduction with WRCOG, and that was a whole lot of information that is going to be important for all of us to be aware of, so I'm sure from your time there. So once I get a little better handle on that, I will pass that information along to you guys as well. And that's all I have.

Thank you, sir.

Mayor Pro Temp.

Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to thank our Captain Nescaville for their operation they did on August 5th, so their quality of life sweep that they put together, so I appreciate them taking time to coordinate that. There's a number of different law enforcement agencies, our public works, code enforcement, so they got a lot of people together to put that operation together, so That was pretty successful. I heard comments from the community and stuff. They saw them out there and they're making contacts and cleaned up some of the encampments that have been around that we're getting some complaints about. I appreciate all their efforts. I think it was a success on that. Thank you for everybody that was involved with that. That's all I have here.

Thank you, sir.

Mayor, I forgot one thing. Yes, please. I just also wanted to extend my congratulations to both of you on your appointments coming up for another four years. Congrats. Wow. You guys really contribute to the city. And we'll thank you for your manager's report. It was informational.

So I did not attend any county or regional meetings or conferences this last couple weeks. It seems like a lot of things were dark for the summer and I know I had a lot of things going on personally. But that is gonna change here coming up very quickly. I think everything gets going again in September. Let's see, also want to, well, most of the members of the public are gone, but those who were here, thank you for being here and for the presentations. It was great to see all the kids in the house and hearing from members of the public. That will conclude my report, and then we do have a city manager.

Since we did talk about the Cherry Valley Boulevard interchange design contract, I just want to give a quick update on where we are with this. This is something I've shared with council, but I think it's something that deserves to be discussed publicly. That is our efforts to get construction funding for that project. It's an $80 million project. Very high dollar amount. As the council knows, we pursued a build grant through the Federal Department of Transportation. And I think the community may not realize just how close we were to receiving that grant. Two projects in Ken Calvert's district received funding and they tried to get a third but they just weren't quite able to get it. So RCTC received $25 million and the city of Lake Elsinore received $25 million. And I can tell you it was close because I originally got an email telling me we did get the grant. But unfortunately, it was a mistake. So it was- Darlene could hear me hooping and hollering from my office, and then I started thinking about it and going, wait a minute, I had heard otherwise, so this is interesting. But nonetheless, we are still pursuing other grant programs, both at federal and state level. We've submitted an infra grant, and that is a much larger program. And so our application for that was just over $40 million. And so we are hoping to hear something in the next couple of months, but we are advocating very heavily in the meantime. We've been in contact with Ken Calvert's office. We only have him for a few short months, but he's still very supportive of our project and we're working with his office to try to make sure that DOT knows the value of our project and the fact that we're shovel ready. So we extended the contract to the June 30th, 2027 for the design. So we do expect design to be completed first half of 2027, which means that we have construction documents ready to bid. All we need is the funding. And federal grant programs always score that very, very highly. We scored very high. We were project of merit under the build program. We expect to be the same thing in infra. For on the state side, we're also gonna be seeking a similar sized grant. And those applications will be going in the next couple, actually I think in the next week or two, is when the notice of funding will be available on that. Caltrans will be a, District 8 will be a co-sponsor on our application, which helps with CTC consideration. And if we are able to successfully get the INFRA grant, which we should hear word on before TCEP makes their decision, that also factors into their scoring as well. So if we are successful in INFRA grant, our chances of success on the TCEP grant, which is the state program, would be very, very high. Staff continues to be optimistic about our opportunities there and to bring in a major, major project that will benefit our communities for decades to come. So just wanted to give you that update. That's all I've got. Thank you.

Important updates. Thank you for that information. We do have two closed session items, so I will let our city attorney make those announcements for us.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. There are two items on the city council's closed session agenda. The first is conference with legal counsel regarding anticipated litigation, significant exposure to litigation pursuant to Government Code 54956.9D2. There is one case. Second item is conference with legal counsel regarding existing litigation pursuant to Paragraph 1, Civil Division D of Government Code 54956.9. The case name is City of Calamasa v. Everest Reinsurance, pending in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Central District. Thank you.

Thank you. And that concludes this portion of our meeting. We will adjourn after closed session ends. So thank you all for coming.

And just so the public is aware, our next meeting will not be until Monday.