City Council - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the uh Cloverdale City Council meeting 4226. I want to do a quick call to order. Um and let's do the join me in the pledge of allegiance, please. 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.

All right, quick roll call. We I'm seeing all council members minus council member Laskkey for the record. Um, any conflict of interest declarations? Yes, Mr. Mayor. I have one F3. I am going to be recusing myself. That company was a donor to my campaign for county supervisor. Thank you. Any other? Seeing none. All right. Agenda review changes or deletions.

Yes, Mr. Mayor. I would like to move items D1 and D2 up to uh the next item and to be followed by public comment. Uh those are the presentations and the recognitions. Also for F2, we'd like to move that to a future agenda item. We want we want to make sure that we have uh Soma Water here to be able to speak on the topic as long as and as well as EKI, we want to uh provide a little more information so you guys can make a good decision on that. So, we're requesting that F2 be moved to a future agenda item. Yes, sounds good.

All right, let's move into we're going to go D1 first proclamation for Autism Acceptance Month. Recipients are Nicole Lavell, Nicole.

I'll read the proclamation. Okay. a proclamation of the city council of the city of Cloverdale recognizing April 2026 as autism acceptance month in Cloverdale. Whereas April is recognized nationally and internationally as Autism Acceptance Month and April 2nd is designated by the United Nations as World Autism Awareness Day. And whereas Autism Acceptance Month celebrates and honors the experiences and identities of autistic individuals, it emphasizes understanding, inclusion, and support, moving beyond awareness towards meaningful acceptance. Whereas autism spectrum disorder ASD affects individuals across all communities including Cloverdale with each person experienced autism in unique ways and contributing diverse perspectives, talents and strengths to the community. And whereas the city of Cloverdale celebrates the contributions of individuals with autism and the role they play in strengthening the community. And whereas families, caregiver, caregivers, and support networks in Cloverdale play a vital role in supporting individuals with autism. And the city acknowledges their ongoing commitment and resilience. And whereas school service providers and community organizations in Cloverdale and Sonoma County provide important support, resources, and opportunities for individuals with autism. And whereas promoting acceptance and inclusion within Cloverdale helps reduce stigma and encourages environments where all residents are treated with dignity and respect. Now therefore, it be proclaimed that the city council of the city of Cloverdale hereby proclaims April 2026 as Autism Acceptance Month in Cloverdale encourages all residents to promote understanding, inclusion, and respect for individuals with autism and their

families within the community. Dated April 22nd, 2026. So ordered. Mayor Brian Wheeler.

They're over here. Jeremy and Nicole are right here. Community Jeremy, can you push the button on that microphone so the light turns green? Just push it once and it should turn green. There you go. Thank you, sir.

Oh, there we go. All right. So, um, yes. So, thank you, Mr. Mayor, council members, families, communities, everyone. Um, on behalf of myself, my students, uh, my colleagues, the Cloverdale Unified School District, and Cloverdale in general, we, you know, appreciate and really love the attention that you guys have put towards disabilities. A couple years ago, you guys recognized July as disability awareness month, and now we're expanding that and looking more towards, you know, specific disabilities and looking at autism awareness month. Um, I think it's great that we appreciate everything that every community member has to offer to our society and I just, you know, really appreciate everybody's awareness of everything and I think that uh how the proclamation was written up was extremely well and just on behalf of everyone I would like to thank you. Thank you, Jeremy. I appreciate all the work you do in the community. Just want to uh emphasize that. Appreciate it. You guys do an incredible job in the school district uh for years. We we've done different projects and different things with you guys. And uh the inclusion and the uh the confidence that you give to all of the kids there, it's amazing. So, I know it's not an easy job. Uh but it's a a fulfilling job. So thank you guys for everything.

Jeremy, thank you so much and thank you for coming down and accepting this. Uh greatly appreciate it. And I come from uh I have a lot of uh special needs, special education uh teachers in my family and I see the dedication they put in and I know you guys are doing the same. So thank you for Cloverdale. Thank you for the community. It's really appreciated. Thank you. Anything else? Yeah. Hey Jeremy, you mind a photo?

Yeah, we'll get you guys. All right. If we hit the uh proclamation in the middle

kind of more in the middle just so proclamation can be there. I'm going to get a couple. One, two, three. One, two, three.

You guys Looks like you're still on the ground.

Yeah, dude. Crazy. All right. All right. D2 Proclamation um administrative professionals month and our recipient is Taylor Hernandez. A proclamation of the city council of the city of Cloverdale recognizing April 19 to 25, 2026 as administrative professionals week and April 22, 2026 as administrative professionals day in Cloverdale. Whereas administrative professionals week is observed annually during the last full week of April with the administrative professionals day recognized on the Wednesday of that week to honor the contributions of administrative professionals in workplaces across the nation. And whereas administrative professionals in Cloverdale serve a vital role in supporting the daily operations of business, government, schools, and community organizations. And whereas administrative professionals provide essential expertise in communication, organization, coordination, customer service, and the use of office technologies that support efficient and effective operations. And whereas administrative professionals within the city of Cloverdale and throughout the community, including those serving the Cloverdale Chamber of Commerce, play a key role in supporting operations and services and are often the first point of contact for residents, businesses, and visitors seeking assistance. And whereas the professionalism, knowledge, and dedication of administrative professionals contribute to the quality of service provided to the Cloverdale community. And now therefore be it proclaimed that the city council of the

city of Cloverdale hereby recognizes April 19 to 25, 2026 as Administrative Professionals Week and April 22, 2026 as Administrative Professionals Day in Cloverdale and expresses appreciation for the valuable contributions of administrative professionals to the community dated April 22nd, 2026. Six. So ordered by Mayor Brian Wheeler.

Uh thank you. I feel very honored to be accepting this proclamation. Um and I just want to say I appreciate everything that council does and everyone that works behind the scenes here in Cloverdale. and thank you for continuing continuously putting in hard work for our community.

Well, I second that, but I also wanted to thank you, Taylor, for what you bring to the chamber since you started working there in January of 2025. You are truly the glue, the connected tissue that holds the place together. your amazing ability with social media, with customer service, it it's doesn't go unnoticed, obviously. Thank you. Much appreciated. Thank you, council, city council, city department heads, and all y'all. Thank you. Any comments?

Uh, I just want to thank you, Nina, and thank you, Taylor. You've been a great addition to the Chamber of Commerce. Thank you. I want to thank you, Taylor, for helping to support the chamber and being a huge part of Cloverdale. Thank you. I see you're a little bit like your father that you pretend to be microphone and camera shy and then all of a sudden you just step right up and take Yeah. Good smoke show. But hey, you know what? You do a killer job for us and we really appreciate you and uh with all the different things we've done over the past year. You've been amazing. So, thank you. Thank you,

Taylor. Thank you very much. And uh I mean everybody at the chamber, you guys do an outstanding job and and you jumped right in. Didn't even skip a beat and uh just took off running. So good job, Taylor. We really appreciate what you do and I know everybody in town appreciates all the stuff you can get out. So thank you very much. Your wonderful smile, your baking, everything. It's wonderful.

Photo time now. do the same thing. Now we're going to move into item B1, verbal comments. Any person wishing to speak on an item not listed on the agenda may do so at this time. Pursuant to the Brown Act, the city council is not allowed to consider issues or take action on any item not listed on the agenda. Three minutes are allotted to each speaker. Public comments. Please state your name.

Yep. My name is Jason Tmino. I'm your PG government affairs representative. Um, and I came here tonight for several reasons. One, just to introduce me. Uh, just to introduce myself. Um, every time I come to the DAS, I kind of think of a Norman Rockwell painting. So, it's kind of fun to be part of the democracy. Um, I'm here to support you if you have questions. Um, you don't have to have a rolodex at PG. You just call me and I'll find the right person for you to talk to. Uh, I'm a good person to talk to about the Potter Valley project, which I know is, uh, a concern for Cloverdale and the rest of Sonoma County. Um, and then I want to talk about the, um, wildfire fund, which is a state initiative. So, the California Earthquake Authority just came out with their report. Um, I know that for most of us in Sonoma County, uh, wildfire is a real issue. Uh, this report has gone a long way to outline all of the various issues that we face. Uh, and there's going to be I have I have a real ask. one is if you would email me that you support the idea of a better insurance system in California, that would be great. Um, we want to send the message to our state- elected officials that everybody is concerned about this issue. Um, at some point in the future when there's actually a real bill with real language, you'll get an email back from me or from my group saying, "Do you want to support this or not? If you don't reply, we don't put you on the list." Um, but we're trying to garner a lot of support to say to our elected officials, this is a concern for everybody. At the end of the day, in the last 10 years, certainly um wildfires around the world um have wiped out neighborhoods and affected people in a way that they didn't 40, 50 years ago. And we need to evolve our systems. And so PG Genie uh

as an entity that cares deeply but has also been the source of many fires um once a whole society solution to this big challenge that we face today. Um so thank you very much and have a great evening. This is Susan Nurse, Pine Mountain Road, Cloverdale. Good evening everybody. I attend this evening as a voice to support the ongoing Esmeralda development. From the knowledge I have gained through public presentations from the development team, this could be the best thing to happen in our town for 25 years. 25 years that I have lived here. I remain optimistic that we can reap many benefits from this development. economic benefit from property taxes and toot to support our city infrastructure, services, roads, schools, additional business opportunities for our existing businesses as well as attracting new ones. additional jobs, quality of life in terms of parks, open space, river access, and of course the much needed additional housing at all time at all levels as we work through the general plan of growth to 12,000 population. As for the negatives, some will certainly arise. City requirements are rigorous and we can all monitor the development milestones and timelines as

we as per these requirements. There will be obstacles as with any development large or small. Public input will be sought and examined. For myself, so far the benefits I see are greater than the drawbacks. jobs, more housing, more financial stability for our city, and more customers for our existing businesses, as well as attracting new businesses. What's not to like? I personally remain optimistic about the future of Esmeralda and I urge Clover Dalians to stay involved in the challenges while also embracing the opportunity to welcome our benefits. Thank you.

Thank you, Susan. We don't we excuse me. Excuse me. We do not be disrespectful to people in here. Okay? They will be not they won't be disrespectful to you. You don't do it to them. Flap the comment. I boo the comment. Did Eric write your speech? You might be wrote for the city and follow get your tomorrow. Angela, um could we uh could we not disrupt? We need to have a um we need to have this meeting go good. Be fair. We are being fair. Be fair.

I am. And we're trying to we're trying trying to conduct a public meeting here. Please be respectful everybody of this. Be kind to people. People have things to say. We are going to be fair up here. I don't want to have to issue out warnings and go that route. Just let people say their piece. We're giving three minutes to each person. Thank you. You know, I say my piece and I get retaliated on that. But here we are. Angela, could you I'm going to give you your first warning on this.

How many did I get? Three. First warning, directly address the individual, which is you. You're out of order. Please stop your disruption so the meeting may continue. And it says, "Note that continued disruption may be result in removal." And we don't want to do that. We want everybody to be here, but please can we just let people say their comments. Thank you. Okay. Uh hello council members, department heads, city staff, and interested citizens. My name is Nina Hanchchett and I live in the city of Cloverdale. First of all, let me state that I am speaking on behalf of myself as a 25-year-old Cloverdale res sorry not 25year-old 25 year Cloverdale resident. My comments my comment concerns the Esmeralda project proposed for the former Alexander Valley Resort property southeast of downtown Cloverdale. From my vantage point, I think it's still very early in the approval processes for this project. I will also comment that I've never witnessed a developer reaching out into the committee, sorry, in in into the community for comments, recommendations, or the like. In all the time I've lived and worked here, I've attended several town halls andformational meetings presented by the developers and by the city council asking for input. um the developers asking for input and sharing comment and features of what the what possibly is being proposed. It's ve still very early days and the scope could change and I'm very interested in what the development and the features entail. So, while I remain a proponent of what I've heard and and seen so far from this developer, I I want to see the project of the sorry, I want to see the project as it is unveiled and examined by all the experts tasked with ensuring

its viability. I'm not a soils or a water expert, so I'll rely on the findings of those agencies and experts who are. I am also hopeful that our community will let the information come forth in a way that allows hope allows interested residents and businesses the chance the chance to to know about this development and learn and should you and should you support it be able to do that without fear of reprisal or animosity. It's just too important to squander this opportunity. It may not come away or again. Thank you. Thank you, Nina.

Any other public comment? Oh, can we get a microphone up to Jennifer, please? next to me. Hold. Would you mind? I have Parkinson's so I can just say like off the clock. I just want to appreciate I want to say thank you to you guys. Uh this is Parkinson's awareness month. I've had this disease for 12 years and I just appreciate uh you doing this for me. Thank you. Okay. So, my name is Jennifer Sullivan. I'm a resident Cloverdale resident. This letter is for the residents of Cloverdale who support Asmeralda are neutral or are on the fence about it. I've been asked would I oppose Esmeralda even if they do a new EIR? Yes, I would. As lead agency, you can stop the legally precarious addendum path right now. It should only come to the council as an EIR. Coming before the council as an addendum should never happen because the risk is real that it will pass in that form. I have been unable to find an EIR that the city has required since 2009. That was the Alexander Valley Resort. The property is still contaminated. The two final case closure notices from the regional waterboard state the following. The first quote as Meralda cites repeatedly on their fact page. Case closure is pro is proposed. Case closure is proposed as the site has been fully assessed and remediated to the extent practicable and the current site conditions pose little risk to human health or environment. But they don't mention this one. Note that case closure

does not necessarily mean all contamination has been remediated. The proposed Esmeralda property is contaminated with pentaclorenol. It's in the soil. Contaminated soil under the railroad tracks was never removed and it's in the groundwater. Pentaclorenol is a broadspectctrum bioside banned in over 150 countries. It was widely used as a wood preservative but has largely been phased out due to its high toxicity and environmental persistence. Imagine pouring molasses or maple syrup onto a gravel dirt driveway and try to clean it up. It sticks to everything. It's heavy and it sinks deep into the ground. The site the site was a managed super fund site by the state and never should have been reszoned mixeduse residential in the first place until the site could actually be proven safe for residential development. There are deed restrictions in the land use covenant on the property. Esmeralda is not even allowed to drill a well because the regional water board is concerned it could mobilize the pentacllorphanol plume currently in the groundwater. What is most disturbing is Esmeralda's specific planning documents they presented to the air airport land use commission. Not only are they writing Esmeralda Not only are they writing Esmeralda only rules that will supersede Cloverdale's but the way these plans are written are a future but the way these plans are written a future Esmerald de buyer may not naturally understand from the parcel map alone where contamination related restrictions attach unless the covenant overlays maps title reports subdivision conditions and sales disclosures are exp all all ex extremely explicit it. I've just got one paragraph left. The SP2 zoning text says it says compliant phase application shall be approved by the planning director and no public notice or appeal is provided for phase

development review. If the big land use and contamination framework is locked in now, later parcel by parcel or phaseby-phase implementation could become less visible to the public. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, JENNIFER. ALL RIGHT. DO WE HAVE MORE PUBLIC COMMENT? UH, city council. Thank you. Um, and by the way, I wrote this myself. Um, I'm Rob Kazlowski, a resident of Cloverdale, and uh, since item F2 was removed, um, this is now my public comment. It's related to the EKI study and transparency. First of all, on transparency and vetting of policy ideas with associated spending during subcommittee meetings. That's a positive process for city council. So, I'd like to see these sessions restarted so at times residents could participate before these things get brought uh to the city council for the before the full city council. Second, I asked the question in an email to the city about uh why is the EK1 study necessary in the first place and how does it affect our water rates since you're looking to raise them again? Um, what are the new deliverables for the $50,000 spent on a consultant, which was raised to $70,000 and then $77,000? Why does it cost an extra $7,000 for an in-person presentation to be given to city residents? Why doesn't the city of Cloverdale also learn from the city of Ukaya's costly lessons of introducing purple piped or recycled water? Also, the funding is open-ended and tied to a time and expense scope of work. Consequently, such a study could escalate into the six figures range, and such a number could be used to pave more straits in the city of Cloverdale. Further, if the city is providing the

consultant with all of the requisite data, why is this external party needed to review the city figures and determine our water situation? It just doesn't make sense. And apparently, it didn't make financial sense for the city of Ukaya. I implore you to have a co-presentation if you move forward on that kind of study with EK1. I would say let's not go down the same path where economics and practicality take a backseat to virtue signaling. Thank you very much. Angela Cordova. So, I have a couple different things. When is Eric Terrar's uh purchase involvement going to be on the agenda? Why doesn't the city attorney write up the uh purchase agreements or any of those types of things? Why would we pay somebody $33,000 commission who sits on the chamber, which is a direct conflict in many people's eyes, may not be policy, but it is conflict. But why do we have a city attorney who can't even perform that simple task when other cities do that? You sit here and say that people have the right to speak and say what they want to say, whether it's in opposition or it's for it. No, that's not true. I was personally retaliated against and each and every one of you know about that because I spoke in opposition and only when I spoke publicly on Facebook about it did I get personally attacked which there is a criminal investigation on that matter right now which I'm sure you're probably aware of by now. So don't sit here and say that everybody in this room is safe to say what they want because there's many people that won't even come to these meetings and say a

damn word because they are afraid of retaliation. That is pathetic that Esmeralda would bring fear to our community to people that have a voice that should matter and you don't even look at that. You don't even acknowledge that. You don't even listen. But yet you have a piece of like Eric Terrari dictating what goes on the city of Cloverdale page verbatim what he sent in on public comment. You got this guy typing away. So what does Eric Terrari run the council? Does Eric Terrari run the city manager? The the city attorney. Is that what he does? And Ron Pavevela. Eric Terrari. Ron Pavevela is his puppet master. You don't think he got part of that commission? You think I stand here and I'm stupid? I'm not. And it's not okay. And as far as Esmeralda goes, you have all these people coming out of the woodworks. People that don't even come to these meetings to speak, to even just sit because they're afraid to speak. Listen to your constituents. Just listen to them. Emeralda might be better for our community if it was changed. if it wasn't the actual people that are involved and you get people that aren't here to try to act like a little cult because that's exactly what they are. Every person in this room researched it. Every single person saw the same damn thing at the end of the day. How many heads are in here? Not one. Every single person saw that at the end of the day, their objective is to create their own city within our city and then their own government, which excludes all of you. And how can we be confident in city attorneys, city managers, city council when you couldn't even, not you personally, but our city

couldn't even read the fine print on the stupid apartments that we have. It's supposed to be low income for everybody, but it's not. Because why? Our city failed to read the fine print. Thank you.

Any other public comment?

Hello. Hello. Uh my name is John Spiker. I have a house on School Street. Uh I'm here to support the village project and the edge group that wants to build it. I imagine that most of the council's time has been spent on regulatory details. And today I want to tell you at least what I see as the big long-term uh uh goal and advantage of the village. Hey John, could you speak into the mic a little closer, please? Thank you. How's it? Yeah. Perfect.

Um, first I've spent two months with the edge group. Um, they have these events in uh, Helsburg. I spended two full months with them. Virtually every edge person I have met is honest, intelligent, capable, loving, and most importantly, they have a real desire to make the life of everyone better. The whole objective of EDGE is to promote community connection and improve the world through out ofthe-box thinking. It is a testament to the Edge group's dedication that they annually travel to Helsburg for one to four weeks to work together toward this goal. For some of them, it's an easy financial thing. But many come on a shoestring budget. They volunteer their time. They in return for a ticket they sleep in their vans. They sleep on people's couches. Edge people are dedicated and resourceful. Many have ed uh entrepreneurial aspirations. I expect many small businesses to come out of a village if it's built and they will provide local jobs. I also think there's a good possibility that something really big could come from this group. I don't know what it'll be. Maybe the next cure for some version of cancer. But if there's any group that can do it, from my experience, this group has got as good a chance as any. Young people of the in this young people like the edge people are the future of our our lives, our communities. If we are to prosper, we need to we need to foster innovation and build supportive communities. Building the village will

be a step in that direction. Let us not stand in their way. All they are asking to do is build some houses close enough together that they can walk or ride their bicycles to their friend's house where they will work or play or dream or invent. raise their children in a place where everybody knows the kids, supports the kids, and they know each other, and walk from their walk from their front door into a a nature preserve, which anyone here can visit and eventually grow old together. In my 70 years of life, I have not met a group of people I'd rather live nearby. Help them build the village. Thank you. Thank you.

Any more public comment?

Good evening. Um, my name is Tasha Hart and I live here in Cloverdale. Um, I wanted to read something that I had written on Facebook and I added a little bit more here. Um, the opposition to Esmeralda isn't just the necessity of an EIR. Please really look at Cloverdale and then drive to Hiltsburg and look at Mil Street. The main drag through town, then mosy on over to Grove Street. It's becoming unrecognizable to what it was 20 years ago and more so to what it was 40 years ago. What was the charm of Hiltsburg? Small, quaint, beautiful, people you knew and waved to. Now, what is it? A combustion of noise, traffic, and annoyance. What their er e failed to address and recognize. People who have lived there all their lives admire Cloverdale because it was what Hilsburg was 30 years ago. We can preserve our little town. We can also help our town grow in a gentler way rather than stomping on it with 600 slapped together unbecoming units. There has to be a better way and there is if we work together to create it. Note my opposition. Don't bank on the fact that this won't follow your legacy as city council members and the reputation that you hold. And trust me, I will be there to remind you who allowed this invasion every time I see you on the street. There has to be another developer suitable for our community, not some weirdo cult. Thank you.

Any more public comment? Okay, I'm seeing none. We'll go ahead and close public comment and we will move into student liaison report.

Hello, good afternoon. My name is Valyrian Ganiano. I am your student leen. I'll be starting off with academic planning and student pathway. Clover scholarship list offered on Google Classroom. The list is organized on an Excel sheet and includes local and regional scholarship opportunities. New scholarships will continue to be added throughout the remainder of the semester. The progress report ended on Friday. Teachers will have Wednesday by noon to end grades. You will be you will be able to see your students grades on Thursday. Cloverto High School events. Join scholarship advisor Becca Leapman for three workshops that teach students and parents how to find, apply, and manage scholarships. Sessions will be held April 16 and 23 23rd from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. at the Cloverdale Library. This program will cover strategies for finding and applying for scholarships, tips for writing strong applications, guidance on navigating the scholarship process, family and community engagement. Parents and caregivers are invited to boost their capacity to support YAL mental health in a series of free bilingual ver virtual workshops hosted by Sonoma County Office and education and community partners. School climate and stu and student life. Senior trip confirmed to Santa Cruz Thursday the 23rd. Community service hours all due by May 8th. Portfolio night May 7th from 6:00 to 700 p.m. Spring sports Wednesday the 4:22 track senior night. So far spring sports doing well. Cloverdale High School sophomore pitcher Cameron Bird retired all 15 of all lower league batters she faced Thursday afternoon as Eagles beat Rohans 14-0 in the North Central League. Thank you.

Any comments from the council? Thank you Valeria for putting together the report. Thank you. Yep.

Thank you once again. A great report and very well laid out. Appreciate it. All right. Cloverdale Healthc Care presentation. Healthc care district. The ambulance presentation. Mr. Eric Poland, please. Wait for my presentation to come up there. All right, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, community members. Uh, my name is Eric Pull, the CEO of Cloverdale Healthc Care District or Cloverdale Ambulance. Um, I was asked to come here today, do a presentation overall, give a overview of the ambulance service that's provided to the citizens of Cloverdale as well as the surrounding community. things I'm going to go over today um is the response area and annual call volume, fleet and equipment, our annual budget and revenue resources um what I call the anatomy of the 911 call and also discuss some of our partners and we'll have a question and answer at the end. Next slide. And next slide. So who are we? So Cloverdale um so the Cloverdale Healthcare District was originally formed in 1958. Unfortunately in 1962 there was a failed bond measure. So the hospital district to create a hospital in the community of Cloverdale failed. After that there wasn't much of a mission left for the Cloverdale Healthcare District itself. Um the volunteer ambulance company which was established in 1952 uh was created and then run by the believe veterans at that time. And then the first ambulance was bought for the Cloverdale Healthc Care District in 1977.

And the Cloverdale Healthc Care District uh oversaw and began oversight basically in running the local ambulance company. There are five elected board members to a special district which is our governance. Uh we hired our first paramedic which was Tom. Many of you know him. He's been in the community for a long time. Uh Tom was actually one of the very first paramedics in Sonoma County. So they were very lucky to get him when they did. Uh he is still around. Uh although he did retire a few years ago. Um I assumed his role uh basically two and a half years ago when he retired. Uh I myself have been in the community and running calls working not only as a paramedic and then operations manager and then taking the CEO role from him um basically for over 15 years now. I'm also Cloverdale resident. So we used to be pretty much an all volunteer agency. We had two paramedics that were running calls most of the time. They were coming up. They were being paid a stipen type pay. And then the individuals who were responding in the ambulance um at that time um they were first responders and then up to EMTs were community members. A call would come out, they would get toned, they would then respond from their homes to the station. And there usually was anywhere from a 5 to 7 minute delay until the ambulance actually got on the road responding to calls. We now have a full-time CEO/paramed. I'm also a responder as well. We have two full-time paramedics, two full-time EMTs, uh five part-time EMTs, and seven part-time paramedics. We're staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Uh the ambulance responds with people from the station. There's no longer any delay and are usually route the calls within 60 seconds to 2 minutes. Next slide, please. So, our response area and annual volume.

Next slide. So the district covers approximately 85 square miles. We cover even a small portion into Menesino County to the north. We also cover a small area to the west going up towards MountainHouse on up Highway 128 and south uh to the border of the Geyserville area. Uh we had over 1,400 calls of service in 2025. We've been seeing at least uh anywhere from 8 to 10% increases almost every year. So, we're constantly seeing our growth and responses increase. We have a wide range of calls. They range from minor injuries, any illness, major traumas, uh medical emergencies. I mean, we all know everybody calls 911 for everything. So, you can imagine the calls we get. Anything from a paper cut to traumatic injuries, cardiac arrests, vehicle accidents, um industrial accidents, anything. We respond to it all. Uh we also provide paramedic and EMT standby services for the community events as well. Next slide. Talk about our fleet and our equipment. So our current operational fleet, we have three uh physical ambulances and a QRV, which is a quick response vehicle, which is mostly what I'm in all the time. Um the primary ambulance is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We have a second ALS ambulance, meaning a paramedic stocked ambulance with all the equipment that is available as needed. Then we have a reserve ambulance, which is mostly used for our BLS standbys or basic anything for just EMTs. And that ambulance also could be upstaffed to paramedic if needed. Um, all of our vehicles that are on the paramedic level, all vehicles have state of art life pack 35 cardiac monitors. They are the latest and greatest in technology. They were just released um not even a year plus ago. We were one of

the very first agencies in Sonoma County to get those monitors and in service. Uh we also have video lidoscopes uh which were purchased last year. Those are used to um for innovations gives us the ability to clearly see vocal cords for clearer and more appropriate and safer innovations. Uh crew members also participate in uh the EVOC program or emergency vehicle operation program. They go down to the SRJC. They have a track there. They all go through a training program to operate the ambulances safely. Next slide. Annual budget and revenue sources. So, we have an operational budget of basically a little under $1.3 million. Our transport revenue is roughly a million dollars. It goes up and down based on call volume. Uh we have a partial assessment which brings in $27,000 a year roughly. IGT which stands for intergovernmental transport supplemental um that is a program we'll talk about that in a second when we talk about the two different other funding sources uh that assists in offsetting uh lower reimbursed calls. So we have a large population of individuals on Medicare or partnership or um you know nonprivate insuranceances and unfortunately they also Medicare they are also one of the lowest reimbursing um funds that we get. So these programs assist in offsetting some of the expenses that are still incurred and not reimbursed through normal billing. Um our largest expense is payroll and benefits. So roughly just under $800,000 a year is basically going to uh salaries and benefits for EMTs and paramedics. Um we talked about one of the programs is IGT and there's a second one which is

lots of acronyms. So public providers so PPG MT so public providers ground emergency medical transport that is a fund also that is available to public agencies to assist in reimbursement to get up to the ex the the cost of a call. Uh an example of these both programs are what are referred to as paytoplay. We pay a significant money into accounts four times a year for one of them, once a year for another, and then we get that money back plus additional money back from uh the state or federal funding. That makes up some of the difference of the money we lose on calls. Years ago, a medical transport or partnership transport was $118. That's doesn't cover anything for when you want services 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. So these two programs, which could be what's referred to as a temporary program, we don't know if they were new. So we're very careful when we do our annual budgets to not always accept to have that money because they could tell us tomorrow that those two programs, one of the programs has ended and might not have another option for us to look at. So, we're very careful when we do our annual budgets, when it comes to our staffing, equipment, and so forth to not overextend ourselves and put ourselves into a position like we were in years ago where we're almost negative every month, which is not where we want to go back to. The funds that we receive now for these programs, we're taking advantage of that. We've been able to replace our equipment on on, you know, a regular schedule. We have um new the the cardiac monitors, new equipment for the crews and so forth. So we're we have our autoloading system now which just went in service 2 weeks ago. So if you ever see our ambulance now, not only do we have a gurnie that goes up and down, we now have a gurnie that loads itself into the ambulance. So it decreases the chance of injuries to our

staff and employees and also is more comfortable and safer for the crews. It locks in. It's rated at up to 800 lb for lift. So, it could do it on hills, inclines, and so forth. So, that was one of our opportunities that we're able to do. Um, stair chairs, uh, with also some assistance from, um, some of the local groups, we're able to purchase stair chairs for the Amazon as well. This year, we had one, we were able to get a second and a newer one. So those funds that we get from those programs have given us the ability to purchase things that we normally wouldn't be able to purchase or have to purchase them over time. Next slide, please. So now what seems to be very important to a lot of community members is what I refer to as the anatomy of a 911 call. How it starts, how it ends, and what happens in between. So key points, how do 911 calls received? So 911 calls, we all know 911, three digits, that's what we dial normally, that's how we get help. Can be called from a cell phone, a landline, even a phone that's disconnected but still has a dial tone that you can't dial. You can still dial out 911. We also see some calls come in on seven-digit numbers. That can be to the sheriff's department. It could be to Cloverdale PD. It could be directly into Redcom. Could be directly into the fire department. I get calls in the office sometimes, people asking for help. They want us to send them the ambulance. They don't call 911. They just call us direct. We always refer them back to 911, take that information and make sure that all the appropriate resources are sent. Um, so fire and medical calls, uh, once calls are received, they may be transferred to REDCOM. REDCOM is a regional dispatch center for fire and EMS. Uh, they then receive EMD, emergency medical dispatch pre-arrival instructions. For those of you who called 911 and they're giving you instructions when you have chest pain, possibly taking a baby aspirin, they're

unconscious, rolling them over, CPR instructions, they're the first line giving you the information you may need to assist someone who's having a medical uh or emergency crisis. Uh Cloverdale ambulance itself, we're dispatched by the Cloverville Police Department. So when you dial 911 in the city limits, you're getting law enforcement and you're getting us dispatched out of that directly. Um the call is still transferred to RedCom. Redcom then dispatches the fire service. It used to be St. Helena or Cal Fire and now it's to RedCom which is recent. Uh Northern Somi County Fire Cloverdale is dispatched by Redcom. Next slide. So what happens after 911 is called in the city or county area. So, like I said, it goes to one of the two primary paps usually. Well, let's say three, I'm sorry. So, it can go to directly to the Cloverdale PD. It can go to the Sonoma County Sheriff's Department or it could be routed to the CHP depending on where you are. When you dial 911, your location is usually provided to them via GPS or different location services that are provided under the 911 system. um for so county areas and so forth, fire later calls, public assist, hazardous conditions, smoke checks, uh even though they do come into a primary PAP and all primary PAPs are always law enforcement agencies. So when you dial 911, the first person you talk to is always a law enforcement center. They call that a primary PAP. Um REDCOM itself is what's considered a secondary PAP, meaning that they receive the call after someone else does transferred to them. Only exception to that is when they're called in on a seven-digit number. Um, so all fire calls and so forth, they're trans if they're coming to Cloverdale dispatch or transfer to Redcom for the appropriate dispatch. And they also do a fire dispatch. Uh, similar to EMD, they'll go through a

whole group of instructions for that as well. And also what I didn't mention earlier is that during the EMD process, it dictates the response of the resources. Meaning that as it's triaged via all the medical questions, it may dictate that the ambulance or fire engine or both respond with lights and sirens or no lights and sirens, just responding routine. They screen those calls during that process. They call it priority dispatch. Goes anywhere from what they call alpha calls all the way down to echo calls. Echo and Delta calls always being the most emergent. Charlie calls still with lights and sirens. And then you start getting to Bravo calls where they start triaging it down to one unit may go code three, another unit goes with no lights and sirens. And the reason why they do that is to number one decrease the potential of an unnecessary um accident or something of someone responding through with no real reason to be responding with lights and sirens. All right. Um, law enforcement may be dispatched automatically or by request of another agency. So, even though a law enforcement receives the call in the primary or uh and their primary PAP doesn't necessarily mean that officer responds. And we'll talk about that a little more in a minute. Next slide. So, what happens when an ambulance or fire department is on a call and other calls come in? So we currently staff one ambulance here 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We have what's called automatic aid or mutual aid. And what happens that if our ambulance is unavailable, the QRV is dispatched to provide uh paramedic services. So there's always a paramedic that's in route to a call. And then after that, an mutual aid ambulance is requested usually from Redcom. That ambulance most of the time comes from Heelsburg, could come from Windsor. There's three additional ambulance that are staffed. Uh, so two 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in Hillsburg and Windsor. They have a third unit that comes on that's 7 days a

week that operates from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. And then if for some reason none of those resources available, we'll get a unit from the Santa Rosa area where they have anywhere up to 16 17 unit staffed per day depending on the time of day. Um, as far as for the fire service, they also staff a single resource every day, but have the ability now that they have multiple crew members to be able to split that resource into two. So, they may have a squad with one or two people on it that responds when the engine is unavailable on another call. CalFire during certain parts of the year is available with two engines and available to respond as that additional resource. And then for some reason everybody's unavailable, next closest resource is dispatched. me that Kaiserville goes normally. So there's always going to be a resource that's responding to a call and that's important to realize although there may be a slight delay in the transport ambulance care and service is still being provided and I as a paramedic who responds in that vehicle can do everything but transport carry all the same equipment as an ambulance can provide all those same services initially and if you're doing treatment on scene you still need that 10 or 15 minutes nothing's instantaneous so when you see us on scene we're starting IVs and doing all that kind of stuff that's all things that take time. So the transport ambulance doesn't necessarily need to be there as long as someone else is there to be able to provide excuse me able to provide that care. So that kind of breaks down the how it works when multiple calls go on and that's been a big concern to a lot of community members saying that we need to have you know we need more ambulances. So to address that in the future and as you know the growth of Cloverdale increases um there may be an opportunity and the ability to fund that second ambulance. But when we talk about our budget of being $13 million and 3/4 of that is already paying for salaries. If

you double that to put on additional ambulance, you're looking at a negative amount of money. There's not. So, I hate looking at ambulance services as a business, but if you don't have money coming in, you don't have money to go out. And so, we look at that and at this point, um, we do have the occasional need for additional resources to come in, but not at the point that it says we need to have that second ambulance here 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Now, could that change? Could the hours change that we need a 12-hour unit or, you know, a unit that's on from specific parts during the day? Absolutely. And that's something that we look at regularly. We look at the total number of times every month an additional resource has to come into town to run and take that transport and then we'll look at that and see we also get a lot of cancellations. So we get sent on one call so it's ends up being lift assist or no medical merit or no necessity and we get our ambulance back right away. So a lot of things to look at. Uh next slide please. So our partners next slide. So EMS is a team sport. So all emergency calls require team effort. That starts at the time the call is received in a dispatch center to the time that the resources are dispatched to the time the resources respond on scene and provide the care that's needed. We respond to all medical and non-medical responses. Um and in addition to all fire that's nor I'm sorry Northern Sonoma County Fire which is local fire Cloverdale Fire Department. They respond to everything that we go to. In addition to that, they also respond to um you know all fire calls, hatters calls, lift assists, anything that you call 911 that doesn't require an ambulance, they're usually coming to. Could be an animal locked in a vehicle, so forth. They respond to first responders and EMTs. They we talked about a little earlier, they have the ability to uh split crews for multiple calls. They carry first responder gear and AEDs. Also included

in that now are epipens, Narcan, and aspirin. Uh, Cloverdale Police Department. Uh, all the officers are trained in CPR and first aid. They carry AEDs and Narcan. And they respond to all cardiac arrests, vehicle accident in the city, law related events, and as support when requested. And the reason why that's important is is that all agencies require help. And if other resources aren't available, the Cloverdale Police Department will respond. They'll do hands-on. They'll assist us even though that's not their primary responsibility. They respond to those calls and half the time we don't have to ask. They're informed of anytime there's a medical aid and a call and they have the ability to respond as needed and appropriate and as requested. Next slide. Um so Northern Sonoma County Fire expanded partnership. So the QRV program which we mentioned is primarily supported by Northern Sonoma County Fire. It started off as a pilot program and it's still pretty much in that pilot phase and during that time u there was no funding for it. You know the ambulance uh district at that time wasn't able to afford funding it. So Northern Soma County Fire through funding that they had assisted in purchasing uh a new QRV which is the vehicle that I'm in now. Um, Cloverdale PD also, we couldn't have even started this program without them cuz then as we were waiting for that one vehicle, they were able to give us one of their surplus vehicles. I say give, I did pay for that $1. Parker doesn't like it,

but we did end up paying that and that that gave us the boost that we needed to get the program in place and getting responding to calls and starting that service. That's also part of what a partnership is. Um, they financially assist in covering the cost of the QRV right now. um as we move forward um that partnership and the way it's designed it will change um as we all contribute to the program. Cloverdale Ambulance as we see you know if we're maintaining you know positive funding you know we'll be able to contribute to that and then it'll be probably you know a two three-way partnership between uh Northern Sonoma County Fire Geyserville, Northern Sonoma County Fire Cloverdale and then Cloverdale Ambulance. Uh the QRV um it's a northern Sonoma County resource. So my district that I cover in the QRV is everything from Geyserville all the way out to the Napa line all the way up to the Menesino border. I go into Menescino as requested when there's no other ALS available. Um I'll go up highway 128 also up the 101 corridor. Uh staff of the paramedic to ensure rapid uh advanced assessment and treatment. And the QRV carries again all of the equipment that an ambulance has. I just don't even have I just don't have the ability to transport. I even have backboards. Uh next, please. So, that concludes the the primary portion and I'm happy to answer any questions and respond to anything um anybody has on it.

Uh yes, thank you Eric for the presentation. Absolutely.

I had a lot more questions before the presentation. So, so that was really good. Um just want to thank you for your coordination, you know, with all the first responders that um getting this work done. Um one one of the things that really points out is the quick response vehicle that that really did fill a lot of gaps that you you have a backup vehicle that can respond once one vehicle's out. And I know that that was always the concern. um you know that that if if somebody needs assistance and the main ambulance is out um is there any chance like if somebody needed to run to the hospital that if it was just kind of maybe put him into the passenger seat and get him down is so there's never an absolute but legally yeah

I can't provide care and drive and provide services and legally I cannot transport a patient to an emergency room who's receiving care from me. So, um, the QRVs were never designed to fill that transport role. They are used as supplemental transports. We have areas that are off dirt roads up in the hillsides. They are able to transport down to an ambulance, okay, and so forth in in that type of scenario. But legally, um, them to transport to the hospital, I you just you can't do both. And it's also not set up for that. You know, providing even though I can give oxygen on scene, long-term oxygen may be an issue. if I had to lay someone down to do CPR, all those things are not able to be done inside of a of a vehicle that's not set up or configured that way.

Okay. Yeah, I understand it. The um two things that I was, you know, I think this was a presentation would accomplish is uh one just educating the public of what our services are available here. I think you know folks do move from bigger cities and just think that there's all these ambulances available. So u people can better kind of prepare and understand if you know what their emergency plans are. Um you know and some folks might come from a more rural area where they're like you guys are lucky to have uh you know these options here. You're not being just put in the back of a truck and hauled out. So, um, if there's anything that, you know, us as council members or the city can do to identify funds or, um, you know, acquire them, you know, please let us know. Appreciate that. Thank you.

I have two questions. Um, the first question is, um, this was like two or three years ago. My neighbor called, um, 911 and he has the area code from Boston. Mhm.

So when he called, he didn't get the Cloverdale dispatch. He received the CHP and they had no idea where Cloverdale was and he called because another neighbor was having a stroke and we're within um Cloverdale city limits. were at Kings Valley. And so, um, he kept trying to tell them where Cloverdale was and the CHP just really had no clue and our poor other neighbor was having a stroke and, you know, finally somehow he got through to them where Cloverdale was. But is there a way to prevent that glitch from ever happening again?

Technology speaking. So, there's a couple things we didn't touch on. So with the transition in technology, there's a lot of service that provide what's called voice over IP. They're now internet phone lines. And same thing on your cell phone. When you set up your phone for home Wi-Fi, it wants you to verify the address that you're calling 911 for. When you utilize some of those services, the GPS or location services aren't always readily available via dialing 911. calls that are outside of geographical zones will go to specific centers. So if you're in the east side, so across the the river and you dial 911, it should go to the sheriff's department. If you're calling from a cell phone or if you're calling from a landline, you're calling within the city of of Cloverdale, it should go to Cloverdale PD. And same thing on the 101 corridor or freeways or highways, you may get the CHP. enhancements in that have been done over the uh the last few years. Maybe Parker could touch on when they went to what they call enhanced 911 um which gave cellular the ability to be more accurate and give geolog or geographical locations on GPS. That's an enhancement that's happened over the last few years to take care of that problem. Area code shouldn't matter. Everybody I mean anybody who moves anywhere that has a cell phone, you know, most people keep their numbers. They don't want to change them because everybody has that one number. But it's technology, you know, would it ever be 100%? I would hope it would be. Um, there's always enhanced systems that are coming out and, you know, Parker can touch on how the comp center here is, but I know that Redcom, uh, the sheriff's department, CHP are all always trying and here trying to increase technology to ensure that that happens less frequently. Can never say absolutely. So

my second question is I know um like some people for whatever reason take ambulances frequently and you know you may see them coming back two hours later in another ambulance and it just seems to be some people do this well if if they have say Medicare who's paying for all these ambulance rides

billing so so first off we we don't provide non when I say non non-emergent. I'm going to say hospital to hospital transports. It's not our primary focus. We're not staffed to do that. It would take our ambulance out for hours at a time. Um so we don't provide that service. Um insuranceances, I can't tell you what everything covers. Medical and Medicare are restrictive on what they do pay and what they don't pay. Um I don't want to cross over in those lines because I don't know exactly what the cut offs are. I can tell you that they're always hesitant to pay non-emergent, which is the transports home unless they have what's defined as medical necessity, which goes through a whole another thing about, you know, what government payers will pay and so forth. Private insurance, same thing. Pre-authorization, all of those things. Those are all things that are way above what this, you know, what I can answer for you here. Um, and also for non-emer there are pe there's a lot of citizens here that require transport to doctor's offices. Um, that's not something that we do. There are services out there and if they're covered that's all again something you have to check with your insurance company to see what's covered and what's not.

But well um the particular like I'm not going to name names or anything but the particular person I'm thinking of often takes your ambulances.

Oh, okay. Well, so if you're talking about the re So yes, we have a lot of individuals who utilize the ambulance as their own means of transportation for one reason or another. Um, when you call 911, we respond um and we transport, you know, and there are individuals who know that and take advantage of it. They don't really care if it's covered. they're not going to get a bill for it and they'll utilize the service as they see fit. Um, we're in a predicament. We although we evaluate and we assess the ultimate decision to be transported after we go over all the things and give them options comes down to them.

And so we still don't really know who who pays for all those ambulance rides, I So I I could tell you that anything that's usually transported from a house to an emergency room in most cases, I hate to again I'm not going to use absolutes, in most cases are covered by insurance. Insurance companies who see that the individuals have no medical necessity or constantly doing that, they can do whatever they like as a company. Uh Medicare and medical a little bit different. Um, there are laws that have gone into play about what's considered medical necessity. What what determines a 911 call, what's an emergency to one person may not be an emergency to someone else. So, what I consider to be emergency after, you know, being a professional or whatever may be different what the lay person or an individual in a home thinks. So, they've taken and made some rules that allow for that to happen. So, I will say that with these programs we talked about and we don't know if they ever go away, IGT, the PPGMT, that's what's making up the difference in that transport revenue. When those programs go away, we're definitely going to have to look at if there's alternatives. And although we haven't done it, there are things that can be done for individuals who are repeat patients. They're just very challenging cuz again, what they consider to be their emergency might not be mine. But

well, thank you very much for answering my questions. First off, thank you for your time that you put in doing this hard job. We really appreciate it. My pleasure. Uh I I won't go over a lot of stuff. A lot of the questions have been answered, things that I wanted to say. So, uh I really appreciate the response times all the way up here in Cloverdale. uh keeping us safe and get people stabilized as needed cuz we're a long ways away from u medical services or and you go further when you start heading out to like Pine Mountain House Road like you talked about as a partner with uh Northern Sonoma County Fire. Do you have any access to grant funding or do you guys do any partners together on any grants currently?

So we haven't partnered on grants specifically. We have applied for grants. Um unfortunately we've been unsuccessful in trying to get those grants. um we in the bigger scheme of thing unfortunately are not a priority for most of the grants that we apply for or are eligible for. Um we probably could do a better job I could do a better job at probably trying to find other grant opportunities but it's also difficult because as we still right now are getting an influx of of additional money um that has to be used and put back into the service. So it's kind of hard to ask for grant money. Yeah. Yeah, I mean we can use grant money for staffing probably, but then again we get in the predicament that the grants could be anywhere from one year, three year, 5 years with no commitment of, you know, reoccurring dollars. So then that liability would come back to the district. But

well, I appreciate you guys living within your means as Cloverdale grows. We know you will continue to grow because you're budgeting and doing it correct. So we appreciate you, Eric. Thank you very much. My pleasure. I'm not sure why this isn't working. Thank you. Hello. Hello.

All right. Thank you very much. I know what you guys go through and I know the funding out there is can be chaotic, but what I'm what one of my concerns is and the reason I say this as a as a previous EMT, um I know that it can be the things that are seen by both police officers and EMTs, paramedics can become a real drag on and and lead to burnout and mental health. Uh you know, some things. So, I was wondering if there's anything that's ever been integrated into your budget maybe or even chief can answer this of any type of uh counseling that could be your crew. Yeah. And actually some law went into effect. I want to say it was

three or four years ago. So, before we even required to do it, we have EAP for all of our employees. They have availability to counseling 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Um there's also a critical debriefing team which we actually utilized recently. Um that is available through the county. We can request them through Redcom. They'll make arrangements to have a you know an incident debriefing on on any critical incident that we request them for. Um we take the mental health of our personnel very serious and you know even currently we're dealing with personnel that are having crisis and our job is to support them through that process. um not only through the EAP program, but also just doing peer-to-peer support as well. So, um in addition to EAP, which is a service available to them, we also have, you know, those programs.

Thank you, Eric. I appreciate it. I just know I can see that burnout comes on quick and then some people don't want to say anything and absolutely and and keep going and keep going, you know. So, uh we appreciate what you do and your response times and uh and that you've got all the partnerships set up with, uh you know, the Southern Ambulances if need be and everything's working good. So, thank you very much. My pleasure. Yep.

I just want to say real quick, number one, he stole my this is a team sport thing. Uh, but we work really closely with them uh with them and the fire department. Um, we're always talking I talk with them at least once a week about different things going on. Um, they're really supportive of us. Uh, they do, you know, uh, transports like our 5150s and stuff sometimes. Um, and these guys, so if there's a a scene where someone hurts himself or something, we go in, make sure secure the scene, we stage them, they come in, and then uh take care of the the prisoner or patient. Um, and all different things that you can think about. If there's an active shooter, they stage and they come in. Now, they're on rescue teams where they'll be teamed up with the fire department, one of us, and a few others where we're going in and triaging people. Um, and so they've done that training as well. Um, and so we support each other a lot and I support, you know, he's Eric's a great guy. The his whole team is very knowledgeable. Um, the the EMD thing, it drives me nuts. Uh, I had to give the phone to my wife one time cuz I couldn't couldn't deal with that. Um, but you know, if to answer your question,

Chief, you have the next item. You can talk then, too. Yeah. Yeah, I know. Yeah. But I just wanted to I want to support the the you know we work well together. Uh we appreciate their service and because they they're they're they come and save us too. So thank you. Thank you. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Do we have any public comment on on Eric's presentation?

I I have to fully disclose that I'm the perpetual secretary for the ambulance board. Um, I just want to say that if you want to know what's going on at a particular time, you can go on the website and they'll give you an incident summary and it's very interesting. Cool. So awesome. And it's a great board by the way and thank you Nina for being one of our board members and supporting us.

Do we have any other public comment? Okay, seeing none. All right. Thank you, Eric. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Yeah, I'll make this quick. My voice is not I think your voice is fine. Chief, we had some members of the public come down today to uh uh for the presentation on the ambulance and I know that they they had left. So I think the presentation was very well done that answered all the questions that uh they did they didn't make a public comment. Want to thank Eric again. Uh ready ready to go. Chief, you're up.

All right. Uh I I I've been sick last few days and uh I just came back from a a conference in Sack today. Um so this is our annual report for 2025. I'm going to go through it real quick. It's on it'll be on your on the website here pretty soon. Um you go to page three. This is pretty much my message to uh uh my staff and uh the people that you know support us. uh our mission statement for the police department and then our value statement is on page five. You'll notice the working together safe to working together for a safe community that's on all of our cars and that that's where that comes from from our value statement. I won't go through that whole thing. Our org chart just kind of shows um our staff how it's structured um and uh where everybody's at and pretty pretty basic. Um the stat statistics page page seven just kind of gives you a quick overview on the stats that we had in 2025. Our calls for service at 11,357 officers cases uh at 709 total arrest 266 misdemeanor arrest 205 61 felonies and then um uh citations issued at 709 and 57 total accidents um last year. Um so they the um we had eight patrol officers uh for a period of 3 months during that year and then six patrol officers

um for uh a few months as well. And so, you know, a few slides uh few pages down, you'll see our stats for um over the last three years. And it's important to understand that, you know, it dips. Uh but well, we keep the same service levels even though we're short staffed. Uh we are fully staffed now, but um uh which is an anomaly in Sonoma County. Uh so our traffic uh related investigations um we had 31 collision investigations, 18 hit and runs um and eight minor accident reports. arrest activities, 266 arrests. Um uh the major arrests were uh misdemeanor offenses totaling 205 which commonly include violations such as DUI, theft, drug possession, uh outstanding warrants um and 199 involved adults, six involved juveniles. Uh felony enforcement uh remained a critical component of the police efforts and with 61 felony arrests made during the year and then uh our citation activity. Okay.

Which is uh 709 citations uh for traffic violations uh and different things. We had um 180 parking citations. Someone calls up district vehicles has been there for a period of time. We'll go out there, red tag it. Um, and then after the 3 days are up, 72 hours are up, we'll go out and sight it and then tow it. Sorry. Uh and as far as uh traffic, so we um we do do directed enforcement, which means we'll send an off when someone calls and complains, hey, someone's running a stop sign, uh they're speeding on this street, we'll assign officers to go out there to work that stop sign or the speed on that street and then we'll do enforcement. That's what we do for directed enforcement. Uh the department the department responded to 11,357 calls for service during that year. And um if you go to page 10, our most frequently calls service is uh ambulance medical assistance and that's dispatch taking those those calls in. Not necessarily we're responding to those. Um traffic stops. We had 1,00 uh 14. I'm just going to gonna tell you the main ones on page 11. Animal complaints 136 loose animals 98. Uh vacation checks we did 87 of those properties uh found property 128. Page 12 suspicious circumstances which can range from uh suspicious vehicle or uh person which is also listed in here. Um, it could just be a strange circumstance that, you know, really doesn't fit in the other into any other category.

Um, 206 suspicious persons, uh, someone sitting in the park, um, in the middle of the night. Our parks closed at 10 p.m. Um, uh, suspicious vehicle. Uh, whether it's occupied or unoccupied. uh page 13. And that's where I talk about direct traffic enforcement. We did that 47 times last year. Uh one of those times was at the Washington School in response to u the um ebikes in Escooters. We put an officer on um each side of the school on Washington. Wait for the kids to come out, contact the kids, contacted their parents that were riding the scooters. Next day there was none of that there. Um, so we'll do stuff like that. Petty theft is one of our kind of a major things. We had 71 of those petty thefts. Um, and really petty theft is a crime of opportunity. uh you you know you it's usually um somebody uh parks a work truck out front. They don't lock the the u the storage containers in the back and someone's walking by flipping flipping door handles and they go in there and they take some tools and things. So lock your stuff please. Um overall oper the operational workload uh we had 16,819 incidents recorded by the by our system. Um that that that also includes our community service responding to incidents. The on page 16 stop data reporting and these are just you'll see the two graphs here. Uh there's many

more. Uh but stop data reporting is has nothing to do what you know if they stop an African-American adult has nothing to do with what their actual race is or anything. It's what the officer perceives when they first contact that individual. We don't verify anything. We don't ask them about their nationality or anything. Um but it's just what the officer perceives and that's what they document after their contact with the person. 17. You'll see our uh supervisor staff and kind of their their responsibilities. I think two of them are back here right now. Bo and uh John, we go to 18. These are two uh two new police officers and there is a size difference and there's a size difference in real life. Just saying. Um uh both great guys. the Lloyd, which is the guy on the the left if you're looking at it from me. Um he just got off FTO and he's you'll see him out on his own. U Officer Eubank is still in FTO. He's just finishing up. Um and there are great additions to our our staff. Again, we are fully staffed. Uh and I I go to these conferences and you know, they actually John was at one just today. They asked who here isn't um is that full staff. I I didn't want to raise my hand because I already knew the answer that no one else is fully staffed. So um uh but it's it's really amazing that you know it was one of my goals before I retire is to become fully staffed for the next chief when they come in have to worry about that. Uh and we have a great group of people uh with our staff. the uh if you go to page 19 which is our community outreach we do all these events throughout the year um hopefully

they continue one of them was a national night out and we do an annual riboff competition I have to point to the mayor you lost that um it's probably like the third time I've mentioned it this year you get a shot in every week I'm going to say it again you lost chief didn't he win the year before though he did you did win the year before, but that was the year before and I'm the current champion. So, I think there was a lot more entries when I was when I won it. So,

uh so we do the downtown Halloween event, uh the Citrus Fair parade, uh we do a booth at the Citrus Fair, the FFA barbecue event in Santa Rosa. We did that. Um the Winterfest, uh we had Meet the Grinch. We will be doing that this year again. Um, and I think we're going to re um my my plan this year is to reach out to um um a children's center is to go um have the Greek Grinch meet the the children there, you know, in um not in need, but uh they're getting medical treatment like a burn center or something. I would love to do something with a school with autism um special needs kids as well for for this year. Uh we did the Hillsburg parade. We assisted them with their parade with the FFA parade that is coming up next month. Uh we will be helping them out again. We did the long table which they're no longer doing. Um the Fourth of July parade, the Latino Heritage event, Red C read across America, which when we go out to the high schools, we read uh Dr. Shu's books to the kids. Um uh last year we I did a talk with the uh the entire Washington school about the safety of ebikes and e- scooters and the legality of those and then I challenged you know the whichever grade had the I call it the most or the least of merits. Um I would buy them a pizza party. So I bought them pizza bought the seventh grade uh pizza and they had pizza with the officers. Um, we did a high school law enforcement career presentation where people were interested in going to law enforcement. We kind of talked about the upcoming changes with that at the high school. Uh, the Cloverdale car show. Uh, I did a brass badge event last year for all the retired police

chiefs in Sonoma County. Uh, which was a lunchon that, um, Sluck, our Sonoma County Law Enforcement Chiefs Association, uh, sponsored. Um, I chaired it and uh um we we bought lunch for those folks, had some donations for them from the National Sports Distributor. Um, and it was it was fun to recognize those folks and get them back together. We had a really a lot of police chiefs that showed up. Uh, we part we had a mixer at our police department. Love to do it again. I don't know. She she took off. Um and then the ebike scooter unit detective cases. Uh so we do have one detective uh which is Katie Venoni. Um she is one of the hardest working employees that that I've come to know. Um she's very tenacious. Um and does a great job with her position as a detective. Um she never says no and she's always go go go. Uh she she completed 106 cases last year. Uh actively managed 28 assigned investigations spanning from violent property crime violent crime, property crimes, narcotics investigations, weapons weapon offenses, and crimes against person. Um she uh investigated 11 violent cases including assault uh assault with a deadly weapon, um criminal threats, robbery, domestic violence, child abuse, and homicide related investigation. She prepared 17 search warrants um and executed those. Um she did work on the Sierra Gear case um where we went out and arrested uh James Munich. She was instrumental writing the search warrant in that with his his uh residents uh was on the team that took him into custody.

Uh she is uh she participates in the Snow County Retail Theft Task Force. Um, if you notice the the band of folks that go in uh to a retail establishment, clean out an aisle and take off. Um, they have a task force that deals with that in Sonoma County. They're doing a great job. She's a part of that. Uh, it's a really good group and they they've helped helped us out on a couple of cases with CVS. Um and she also uh participates in the regional gang intelligence meetings. Overall, Detective Vonoi uh 2025 case load reflects the balance and strategic focus focus on both the serious uh violent offenses and crime affecting the day-to-day quality of life in our community. dispatch. Um, dispatch uh handled a total of 17,222 phone calls, including uh 1553 emergency 911 calls and 1569 669 business line um response and day-to-day assistance. And they people call for the strangest things, but you know, they're there to sometimes they'll just call the lights just to talk, you know, because people are get lonely. They'll call dispatch. Um, you know, but they're they're happy to do it. You know, they're just a great group of people. Um, like I said before, I I couldn't do their job. It's just um and so and they also handle the front desk. Someone comes up to the police department. Um they handle those folks that come up uh to the police department. They'll get them to where they need to go. The department me excuse me I have more stats for you. I'm not going

to bore you with those. So, uh, last year we made a push for emergency preparedness, um, and response training, which, uh, Kevin participated, some of you folks participated in. Um, we do have an u uh scenario coming up uh to test those skills again and just to keep us sharp. I think it's May 12th um where we get we operate the EOC over at the fire department um order resources and um you know just practice our emergency response and coordination with all the city staff, the clerk um the department heads uh a lot of the city staff participates and we're we're going to look to continue that over the next year as well. Also, we participate in active shooter training with the CHP. Um, and it's always we always try to keep up to date with that uh in hopes that we never use it, but uh we are prepared if it does occur. Um, and that's that's it. I just want to thank our, you know, our community and uh you folks for our support. We couldn't uh we couldn't do this without the the support of the community. Um, we all understand that and um, I love doing my job. The guys behind me love doing their job. Um, you I wouldn't go into any I'm glad I went into this profession years ago. Uh, you know, you get into for different reasons, right? Um, um, you know, the young guys, they're going to think they saved the world. Not going to happen. You got to take it case by case. Uh, but you make a difference. Um, and people let you know that they do. You do make a difference from the people you arrest. You see them down the road. Hey man, you arrested me for that dope. I appreciate it. Uh, it changed

changed my life, you know, and uh, you always appreciate those those outcomes. Um, that's it. That's all I got. Chief, thank you very much. Council member, you okay, Mayor? Yeah, he's having a tough time right now. Chief, thank you guys and thank your team for everything that you guys do. Uh it's pretty amazing seeing the numbers. That's a lot of calls for such a small agency. Yeah.

With great results. Um I know anytime I've had any issues or anyone I know that has had any issues, it's been very uh prompt and um very professional and respectful. So, thank you to all of your amazing staff. Thank you for the great hires that you've been do doing. We'll save the sappy crap for after your retirement, but uh thank you. Thank you, Chief, and congratulations on your retirement. Thank you to all the officers, dispatchers, and detective as well. Um it was a good presentation. It's good to see all the numbers here. So, um you know, there's been some big cases that have come down. Sarah gear case, uh

you know, assistance with uh I think some of the search warrants that have happened recently. So, keeping our community safe. Appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah. And we've uh, you know, we've made an effort to be able not to have to outsource that, you know, special the specialty needs. Um, so we can pretty much handle anything in house that we come across. And I appreciate um just your presence in the community and the welcoming feeling that you know certainly my wife and I have and just want to share that with you. Thank you. Thank you. Um, I wanted to thank you and all your officers. And one reason I really like living in Cloverdale is I feel safe here. And I think that's due to you and all your officers. Thank you.

Thank you. Go ahead. I know you're going to say something. Thank you, Chief. Thanks for I like uh like the council, I just want to echo these guys. Thanks for you guys being around. I mean, we go down there, there's somebody you're always running into somebody, you know, you guys do a great job. Um maybe you you upon retirement you can maybe put on a cooking class and teach some of those other guys how to cook. Yeah. No, cuz I compete against them. So you know it wouldn't hurt him. But anyway, thank you uh for everything that you do. It's awesome. Congrats on retirement. Yeah. Thank you. Any comment from the public on this? I

seeing none. He's getting water rates three water and wastewater rates study with uh Mr. Mark Hild Debrand. Good evening. Um, my name is Mark Hildebrand and I am a water and wastewater rate consultant out of Oakland and I actually did the rate study for you folks last time about four years ago. Um, and I this is the first time meeting you because that was right smack in the middle middle of COVID. So, um, nice to see everybody in person.

Welcome. Um, so I have a presentation. These are preliminary findings for our water and sewer rate study. Um, and I'll go ahead and do I click here or does somebody else have you want to change?

Okay, great. Next slide. Thank you. Uh, so the agenda here will be to cover rate studies in general, the general process that we follow and the legal requirements that we have to follow and then we'll look specifically at the water utility and the wastewater utility and then talk about next steps. Next slide. So the general process for rate studies uh is that we do the three steps that are shown up here. We first we cover the revenue requirements which is also called a financial plan. We're looking at what are the costs right now? What are the revenues coming into the utilities right now? What do we think those costs are going to do over the next 10 years? Um how is our capital spending program looking over the next 10 years? and really just trying to develop an understanding of how much additional rate revenue we're going to need in order to be able to cover the c the cost that we're anticipating over the next 10 years. And that might come with a debt strategy as well. Once we understand how much rate revenue we need from our customers, then we do what's called a cost allocation or sorry a cost of service analysis which is required by law and it's also just a best practice where we look at your different types of customers, your residential customers, your commercial u customers, your irrigators to understand how big their meters are, how much water they're using, that type of thing, just to allocate cost to them fairly based on how they're driving costs in the system. And then the final step, the rate design is taking those once we understand how much we're going to allocate say to single family homes. Then the rate design is decisions on how their bill is going to look, how much we're going to recover through their fixed charge, how much of it's going to be through variable charge, if there's going to be tiered rates, that type of thing. Next slide. So, in terms of legal requirements, it's actually pretty simple. Um there's something that's called Proposition 218. It's part of the constitution. There are two major components. There's what we call the substantives requirements and there's the procedural requirements. The substantive requirements basically just

say you can't charge more than the cost of providing service. So that means two things. You can't make a profit. So you can't take your water rates and charge a little extra so that you can transfer to the general fund and pay for parts parks and wrecks or that type of thing. Changing light bulbs. So all the money that you make with water rates has to stay in the water utility. So there's that part. And then it also means that you can't charge one group of customers more in the interest of trying to keep the rates down for another group of customers. So you can't do cross subsidizations of your customers. So those are the that's the substantive requirements of Prop 218. And then the procedural um part of Prop 218 is that you have the authority, the city council has the authority to raise rates without going to voter approval, but you have to go through a public hearing process and you have to give your rateayers an opportunity to protest against the rates. And if they come out voluntarily and protest 50% of your rateayers come out and protest voluntarily against the rates, then you can't raise the rates. So, you do have to go through that public hearing process, which involves sending out a a letter 45 days before the the public hearing. Next slide. So before we jump into it, here's a quick survey of rates around the region. Um it's important to note that we don't set rates based on how much other people are charging. That's wouldn't comply with the law and it doesn't make any sense. But it is an interesting data point just to sort of get a sense of where Cloverdale is relative to some of your neighbors. So you can see that the combined water and wastewater bill uh for Cloverdale when you look up and down the 101 corridor is towards the bottom of this list. And so that's obviously a good place to be. Um it's not um you don't necessarily want to be the lowest rates in the region. And sometimes folks who are all the way at the bottom, the reason that they're all at the bottom is because they're deferring capital spending. That's the one part of spending that you can keep your rates down. You can kick the can down the road. You can let your system age and not replace things as it as it starts to

fail. and you can keep your rates down for a little bit, but eventually it's going to come back and bite you and then you'll end up at the top because you have to do a bunch of emergency repairs. So, um it's it's nice that you guys are keeping cost under control, but it's also important to understand that being at the bottom list isn't always the goal. Next, next slide. So, we'll jump into waste to the water enterprise here. Next slide. Um so first a cross-section just a a quick uh look at what your revenue where your revenues come from. So this is your actuals for last year. You can see that almost 90% of your revenue comes from rates. Uh that's the bill that folks pay on a monthly basis. There's some other additional revenue. Um there's an adalorum tax revenue that gets transferred in um from the general fund and there are interest earnings on your on your reserves. Next slide. On the other side of the coin, uh this is your operating and debt service. So what this slide doesn't include, if you're looking at the $5 million from the previous slide and the 3.9 here, you say, "Oh, we're doing great." This doesn't include capital spending. So this is just your operating cost and your debt service. So this gives you a a pie chart here, a um an idea of how your money is being spent. You can see about 40% salaries and benefits and about 20% debt service and then some other miscellaneous costs. Next slide. So now let's let's talk about capital infrastructure. Um you'll recall that from the last time we did a rate study um we actually came to council once proposed some rates and there was enough public uh feedback that we actually went back to the drawing board and um met with a stakeholder committee and talked about the capital spending program. And so these because those were the large that was the large driver for the rates then and it continues to be the the

drivers for the rates that we're going to be proposing now. So I'll go through a list here of of um projects next slide that um the city's currently trying to deliver. So there's a um capac capacity studies. SCADA is the system that controls it's the electronic system that controls the the uh instrumentation and whatnot um at your facilities. Uh there's a series of water treatment and distribution tanks and reservoirs that need to be uh replaced or rehabilitated. There's pump station rehabilitation. Uh there's a project to getting water allocation from uh Lake Moscino. And then there's a program for leak detection and pipe repair. So if you go to the next slide, you'll see what those numbers look like. So this is what that spending for those different types of projects looks like over the next um five years, six years. Um and I'm not going to spend too much time on all these numbers because to be honest, I'm not an engineer. I'm not familiar with these projects. Um staff is here available to answer any questions that you might have on the spec specifics of these projects. But what's of of interest to me as a rate consultant is how does this look compared to the capital spending that was proposed four or five years ago when we were here last time. So if you go to the next slide, uh this gives a comparison. Oh, this isn't quite it. So this is just the graph that shows what's been spent over the last uh six seven years. And you can see that there really wasn't a whole lot of capital spending activity four years ago. Um last year there was a big um project that was pushed through that was debt funded. um that was a a series of projects including the solar project um that got um funded last year. And then you can see the projected spending is going to steadily increase over the next several years and it's going to level

off in the um 20 after 2031. Um it's the the prompt is blocking my number a little bit, but you can see that the average historical uh spending has been thank you 130,000 and the forecasted average is 3.5. So that's a huge jump in capital spending. And it was the same story as um four years ago. And I I do believe some of the capital spending has been delayed um compared to what was hoped for. But um the next slide will show you exactly how much was delivered and how much we plan on delivering. So this is an interesting graph. So this shows um the black shows what we projected would be spent back in 2020 when we did the study in 2020. And the blue is the current plan. So if it's a past year, then that's what was actually if it's in blue and it's a past year that's what was actually spent. And if it's blue um and for future years, that's what's being projected. So you can see that the spending in 23 24 and um 22 23 23 wasn't as high as anticipated. 2025 far exceeded what was anticipated. Um and then going forward um it kind of goes back and forth, but the the bottom line is the numbers in the bottom right corner show you that in 2020 the spending through 2032 was anticipated to be about 22 million and now we're expecting it to be 25.5 million. So, the amount of spending um is going to be more than what we had previously planned. And so, that's why the rate increases that we're talking about here tonight are a little bit higher than what we had forecasted they would be back in 2020.

Now, is that just an inflationary jump right there? I'm sorry. Is that a jump for inflation to 21 to 25? Um, no. I I' I'd say we had accounted for inflation at the time. Uh I think that the projects just were um hadn't you hadn't received bids on some of the projects and they've been better defined since then. Uh I mean granted we assumed 3% inflation back in 2020 so I think inflation's been a bit ahead of that and so that might some of it might be explained by unanticipated inflation. Thank you. Next slide. So Mark I have your slide here. I think we'll we'll take

that 100k in 2022. Rob, we'll give you your time when it's Rob. We'll give you your chance when it's time, please. Okay. Is incorrect when we presented four years ago. Then I would we'll ask you to do that up here, please. Sorry to jump on that. No, I don't. Next slide, please.

Um, so, uh, just in terms of reserves, how much cash we try to keep, uh, in reserve, we do have some policies in place. uh a contingency reserve of a million dollars which is about 25% of your annual operating costs and debt service and then a replacement reserve of $3 million which is equal to your average capital spending annual capital spending. So these are just rainy day funds just in case unexpected expenses or catastrophic failure of assets that type of thing. Next slide. So this graph is a culmination of all the information that I just provided to you. um and it puts it into a 10-year forecast. So the the top graph is an area graph in the background shows revenues and the columns in the foreground show expenses and they compare each other. So anytime that the columns are higher than the background green, that's a a year when there's a deficit where your expenses are higher than your revenues. And vice versa, when the columns are below the background, that's a surplus year where you're building your reserves. Um, so the the background, the light the the sort of darker green at the very bottom, that's your miscellaneous revenue. The light green in the middle is your existing rate revenue and the dark green at the top that's increasing and that's the additional revenue you'll get from the proposed rate increases. Um, in terms of the columns, the dark blue is your operating expense, the hashed blue is your debt service, and then the light blue is your capital spending. So you can see that for the next four or five years we're going to see a we're going to see deficits and that can be seen in the line graph in the middle there. You can see that green line is the forecast of how the reserves are going to go. So you're currently at about $8 million in reserves and we're going to be drawing down on those reserves pretty aggressively over the next four or five years until it drops below the target target reserve line, the black line in around 2031. um will dip down not quite close to the minimum reserve level which is the Dash red line uh and it will start recovering

in about 2033. So if all the forecasts that we have um based on inflation and whatnot hold true then we expect the reserves to get drawn down until about 2033 and then they'll start to recover and get back up to the reserve target level. Um all this will happen if we increase rates by 7% per year for the next 5 years and then we forecast that we'll have to do additional 6% increases from 2032 to 2036. Just to put that into context, what had been forecasted back in 2020 because we had exactly the same type of graph before in 2020 where we had proposed 5 years and then we had forecasted our forecasted rates back in 2020 were 7% 7% 333. So you can see that the first two 7%s we got right uh but the next three years of 3% unfortunately are not coming um are not no longer the proposed increases uh based on inflation based on increases in capital spending. Next slide. Um so what changed since the 2020 study? Why why these differences? So there has been a 19% decrease in water usage which does affect the finances for water utilities. You sell less water and so you get less revenue and unfortunately your costs don't drop um in a at the same level that your revenues drop and so that ends up being a revenue shortfall of about 234 273,000 per year. uh operating costs are about 2% higher than what we had forecasted back. We did account for inflation, but we're off by about 2%. Um that 2% is largely driven by an increase in overhead allocation to the general fund. Uh which can be tied back to increase in insurance costs. Um and then there was an additional um employee that was added to the weight water treatment plant that hadn't been anticipated back in 2020. And then

finally, we already talked about how capital spending is going to be $3.6 6 million higher than what we had projected during the next the coming time period. Next slide. Okay. So in terms of the rates, next slide. These are for year one with the 7% increase. Um when we do these rate studies, there's also a u cost of service analysis that I mentioned. And so in year one, there's some shifts in how the costs are allocated. So you can see that the usage rates are actually proposed to go up by 8.8%. And then the fixed base charges are um proposed to go up by between 2 1.8 and 2.1%. And so the net impact of those rate increases will result in a 7% increase in revenue across all your customers. But certain customers will see different results depending on how much water they use, the size of their bill, that type of thing. So overall, it's a 7% increase for the city, but for individual customers, they might see a slightly different percentage increase to their bills. Next slide. And here is a table to show you how that will play out. So you can see in year one, a single if we look at the top row, a single family account with low water usage, we we can expect them to see a 5% increase to their bill in year one. Um, and in year two, everybody had gets exactly the same, exact same 7% increase because the rate structure changes have already been applied. And so year two, everybody gets exactly the same rate increase. It's just in year one, you can see there in the middle that different folks receive slightly different percent increases to their bill. Next slide. So this is just a table that shows what the rates will look like over the next five years. not particularly

interesting. Just uh put it up there for documentation. Next slide. And then here is the survey of what the rates water rates specifically will look like um from currently to next year and where you stand within the region. So that first survey that I showed you was combined water and sewer. And this is just the the water bill. So you can see you're kind of middle of the pack and you'll stay in the middle of the pack relative to your um neighboring agencies. Next slide. I believe we're switching over to wastewater. So these will be similar slides. So um I won't provide as much background. Uh next slide. So here's the revenues. very similar uh close to 90% uh rate revenue for the wastewater side and they also receive a transfer in from the general fund from advorum taxes. Next slide. And the operating expenses um a bit less debt service um on a percent basis uh and pretty similar salaries and benefits about 45% here. Next slide. Reserve policies are the same, but the amounts are different just because they're different u size utilities, but about 700,000 for contingency and 770,000 for replacement reserve. Next slide. Then here's a list of the capital projects. Uh there's a slip line project. um wastewater treatment plant upgrades, CCTV of sewer mains to look for um condition, try to identify areas of problem areas. Um SM SSM lining, bios removal, sewer lining replacement, covered building, and wastewater

generator replacement. Again, these are all projects that I'm not particularly familiar with, but you can ask staff for details if you're interested. Next slide. And here's what those dollars look like. So the sewer utility is a smaller dollar, smaller system, um, and smaller capital budget. Next slide. And here's what the spending looks like. So there was a bit more on a relative basis more activity over the last 6 years uh more consistently and the spending jump uh going from 300,000 to 900,000 isn't as dramatic at water but it is still an increase in capital spending. Next slide. So here's that same graph kind of comparing plan versus current. So almost exactly the same numbers on the sewer side. Uh $6.4 $4 million was projected back in 2020 and that continues to be the same plan. So um in this case it looks like the the projects have turned out to be very similar to what had been forecasted. The timing is a little bit different but the overall spending is the same. Next slide. And then here is the same graph um that shows the revenues versus expenses up above and the reserve levels going forward and the proposed rate increases. So in this case uh what had previously been forecasted was 3% increases and we are proposing 4% increases at this time. Um the reason for the slight increase if you go to the next slide is explained by again that decrease in water usage affects sewer as well because there's a volumetric rate or there's a s a usage

rate on the sewer side that resulted in a revenue shortfall ofund uh $11,000 per year and operating costs are 1.5% higher than forecasted again driven by the same things the overhead allocation due to insurance as well as they also hired a new FTE at the wastewater treatment plant. So that explains the additional 1% uh in the rate proposed rates. Next slide. Uh here are the here's the specific rate changes after the cost of service analysis and rate design study. Um and you can see that single family homes will um get a a only a 2% increase instead of 4%. Uh multif family will actually see a 9% decrease in year 1. uh that was due to the fact that there was a um uh a decrease in water usage by multif family homes. We we do an analysis of how much water they use on a per dwelling basis and they're using less indoor water than the previous study had found and so they're getting a smaller allocation of costs. Um the one outlier here unfortunately are the public schools which get charged on an ADA basis. So that's average daily attendance. Um there's two things at play here. Um there was a significant um I'm sorry there there's a typo on the thing that the the footnote should say there's a um there has been a decrease in student attendance. That's probably something that you guys are very familiar with uh being sitting where you do. Um but the wire usage didn't change and so we're we're charging them on a per student basis basically. And when you have the same amount of, you know, water usage but a fewer number of students, we have to charge more per student. And so that's why the percent increase is a 27% uh increase. Next slide.

Uh and then for sewer rates, as you could have imagined based on the previous two surveys, your sewer rates are lowest in the region and you'll continue to be the lowest in the region. Um it's a small efficient system um that doesn't have particularly large capital needs and it seems like it's just a it's doing pretty well. Financially stable, minimal rate increases. What's not to love? Next slide. Uh here's the rate survey or rates over the next 5 years. We'll just skip over this one. It's just a bunch of numbers. And here is that combined survey once again that um shows that you'll be jumping from second to bottom to third third from the bottom. So really not a big change in in where you stand in the region with these proposed rate increases. Next slide. And so here's the last slide. Uh we are here giving you a pre preliminary recommendations. We'd happy to take any feedback, questions from the public, questions from council so that we can come back on May 27th with our final recommendations. Um after that, we will um with council's approval, we'll send out the 218 notices, the public hearing notices. Uh there is an extra step. You'll see it says deadline for objections. Um there's a new step in the rate setting process whereby um it's called AB2257 and we solicit any objections from wouldbe lawsuits from your rateayers and it's on the same 218 notice. Um it's it's actually it's a very useful new step that they're going through. It's calling it's called the exhaustion of administrative remedies. The the problem was that previously what would happen is that if someone took exception to your rates and thought they were illegal for for some reason, the way that you'd find out is a letter from a lawyer. You'd be you'd be getting sued over your rates.

There was no real administrative step for them to come in and complain about your rates um formally. So what this does is that this gives them an opportunity, a platform to object before we adopt the rates, which gives you in turn an opportunity to backtrack. If you feel like they have a good point and you think you might lose in court or your rate consultant screwed up and didn't carry, you know, a decimal point or something, you can make the adjustment before you go so far as to start charging people the wrong rates. Um the other good thing about the process is that if somebody doesn't submit an objection at that time, they forfeit their right to be able to sue the city in the future. So they have to basically, you know, make it known that they object to the rates during that time period. And if they don't do that, then they no longer have the ability to sue the rate, sue the city over the rates until the next rate study. So, it's a very useful process that's going to make things less expensive for everyone. And that's my presentation. Happy to take any questions.

We'll bring it to council. Council member Marquez, questions. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I think one of my questions to start out was uh the what we're seeing here and uh this this trajectory was really set in place in 2020 by the by the 2020 council. Yeah. Okay. So, um you know, any recommend recommendations? You know, I'm kind of wondering how much room that we have regarding that um room in in terms of um just kind of what's in place as far as uh you know the the future spending or any of the plans that are um projected,

right? Um so the the rates that were adopted in 2020 are coming to an end. um this year the last rate increase happened last year and so the decisions going forward the the decisions that were made back in 2020 basically are expiring at this time and so everything put in front of you now is is up for you to decide.

Okay. And that's um you know I guess with the recommendations you know looking out to uh 2036 um I just wonder if if if those rates the increase rates are needed for what is needed to be improved. You know we have uh you know our new hires and um so I'm just kind of wondering how much room this might be a question for our city manager city attorney too but um you know how much room do we really have to adjust any of these things? you know, is if there's needed improvements, we have needed improvements, right?

I I could take a stab at it and um the projects that we've listed here is staff's attempt to see what we're what we're going to need in the next 5 years. I think we still need to do some adjusting on that list and we'd like to have your input on that list as well. That would potentially affect the rate increases. Is that correct, Mark?

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Um, and in terms of your ability to make changes to the decisions that you make now over the next 5 years, um, you always have the authority to, um, lower rates. You don't have to go back to your rate payers or go through a process. If, if we say 7% and it turns out that you're not spending the capital or your costs go down, you can always vote on having lower rates as long as they don't exceed what we put on the the public not what we talk about during the public notice. So if conditions change to your favor, you can always lower the rates and you don't have to go through a lengthy process. If on the other hand, you run into higher costs, then you might have to come back and hire a rate consultant or or do the work in house um to update the rates at that time. You have to kind of go through the whole process again.

Okay. So yeah, I think there's probably some some meeting with our city manager that we'll do and uh and what I'll do is defer to the rest of the council and maybe have any questions. You can circle back. Thank you. No questions. Go ahead. You know, I was on the council in 21 is when I came in. It was when all the all the havoc started with this and the uh the signs and everything else that went on and we actually did forfeit. I think it was a portion of or a whole one of our um percentages for a year that we did at one point. Mhm. But what I do see here, and it really bothers me, is a list of projects that should have been done already.

These are things that were promised years ago. These are things that our our community has been promised and we haven't fulfilled or executed. And I'm I'm I'm just disappointed to see things like SCADA on here to see, you know, the talk of the solar panels that we put in aren't hooked up. That's money that we're losing. That's things that we're doing. We're looking at inflation on things and raising rates from what they're marked at. It's because of projects that we did haven't done at the prices that we got in 2019 and 2020. Pump Station Rehabilitation on School Street. I've heard about that from the first day I was on this dis. You know, it's the only thing that's new is the water allocation from Lake Menescino and that's because I started it with the Potter Valley project. This is it's unacceptable to me to look at my constituents in the eyes and say I'm going to take another 7% and over that 5 years it adds up to 50% jump in their rates for their base rate for water. I don't know how I do it. How do how do I look at someone and say, "Hey, you're paying 40 bucks rate, but now I'm going to make it 60 and we haven't we haven't executed on any projects."

Uh pay with the pay as you go style. Do these engineering reports and things run out of time before we get these projects done and do we have to re-up some of these pro these engineering reports and things? Um yeah, I'm not familiar with how long the shelf life is for the engineering reports. I didn't know if that was one for you. We'll bring that up another time. And it's okay, Derek. I'm gonna have a future agenda item I think that this is going to have to come on to with the questions I have. It doesn't really fit what you're doing. I'm just want to make sure that people know my concern here, right? Um I want to read through my list real quick to make sure I hit everything for you and then I'll just leave you alone.

Uh water tanks are a necessity. They're still on this list after 5 years. They're falling apart. a generator to run our water system. It's It's just This stuff is kind of unacceptable to me. Um I will stop. Well, let me Yeah, I'll stop right there. Good.

Uh kind of the same thing. I appreciate uh great presentation. kind of brought a lot of stuff to light and I've kind of got the uh I know all the council is kind of sitting back and we do need to have a couple more meetings about this internally here but I'm kind of on the same track as as the vice mayor here is I know the generator is a big one and it uh it should have been down there should have been running this last winter you know so I'm going to have a question about that and I think uh I don't want to tag team future agenda items, but I think that's going to be on there. We need to see one why some of these things that already have the money allocated are not there and not done. And that's uh very frustrating to me and I think everybody on the council kind of shares the same thing as the vice mayor here is is how can we look at people in the eye, walk down the street and say, "Hey, guess what? Your rates are going up and we've got nothing for them." So, that's my uh that's where I'm at right now. And I think that'll be a future agenda item. I'll stop that one right there, too. But thank you very much for your uh for your presentation, and I would like to bring it to the public.

Okay.

Sorry for the outburst earlier, but uh I couldn't stay almost couldn't stay seated in my seat. Uh the one chart showing um slide 13 you said right Rob? Yeah slide 13 for Mike

if you went back originally I think his slide shows roughly $100,000 spent in 2022 we were supposed to spend $1.4 million on things like the Cherry Creek reservoir whatnot one of the tanks that was in Mark's report that's what the previous city manager and others promised us. Uh on that other chart, there was $1 million supposedly uh spent. We were supposed to spend $3.4 million, which was things like water main replacement, the new well, and the sludge drying bed. I mean, on and on. If you look at what was said by Mark and the city at the time, different council, we are not doing what we said we were doing. Now, um Oh, I'm Rob Kazowski, by the way. Um so, I feel there's been a lack of transparency. That was 5 years ago. There's another set of lack of transparency now. Um, and it appears that uh the city of Cloverdale with their promises um we ended up increasing doubledigit rate increases and I don't know where that money has been going. Um, no major capital improvements were completed during 2021 and 2022 and almost nothing was spent on capital projects during 23 and 24. And that was outlined in Mark Hildebrand's presentation back when. Meanwhile, the city took on debt financing using these protested rate increases for nonwater sewer projects such as HVAC systems and nonoperating solar systems. All of this activity occurred during a spade of yearly double double-digit rate increases, I've said, which has gone on for 5 years until now. This foisting of high rates on residents appears to have been a bait and switch scheme to use water sewer payments to justify financing other projects. Unacceptable. This also meant the abandonment of fiscally responsible pay as you go financing in favor of debt financing. Again, the rate increases

were to deliver on these projects and I can't see any of that have been done. Uh, and by the way, don't say the water meters because those were snuck in there and that used money that I really believe was um wasted on meters that were basically brand new, especially where I live. Um, the annual interest rate payment of this incurred debt, and Mark showed it, is to the tune of $800,000. That's $800,000 a year. You could pay for half a tank with that kind of money. that there boy, you know, so some of these critical projects the city said were needed after Mark's last rate study needed to be started to preserve our water and sewer systems. And again, that included both new and replacement wells, a mandated Cherry Creek reservoir replacement, a Ritter reservoir, and a bioolids removal, not to mention both significant water line and sewer line replacements. That work has not been done unless there's, excuse me, an emergency. To add insult to injury, another quarter of a million dollar study is to be performed to look at the overall well situation where that new well should have already been built. If you look at today's chart, where are we spending a4 million to study it? Again, makes no sense. And last but not least, where are all those impact fees going? They've been historically used for City of Cloverdale's water and sewer projects. bottom line and I will stop enough double-digit rate increases, enough studies that enrich consultants and continue to kick down the kick the can down the road. Enough delays. Let's see some promised deliverables. Let's have some transparency. Thank you. That's it. Michelle Winterbottom, I just have one question. Does the council, the city of Cloverdale have a capital improvement program?

Yes. So, are these capital improvements? Yes. In that program and it's been updated.

So, then you knew that these were scheduled to complete and they just weren't. Just for a little clarification, we did know absolutely everything you said is true. Um, some of these things have been done like but they're not complete. Like when you talk about lining sewer pipes and and things like that. That's ongoing because you can't do them all. So some there is a lot of it, but it's not everything that we had expected and and shouldn't be done at this point. individual items should be scheduled on that capital improvement program year after year after year and it should be updated every year.

They they are with our budget and that is why you see our frustration. You said that you didn't know about them but yet and they're on. That's what you just said. What I said is I didn't know that they weren't completed and it's frustrating. Jennifer, I will bring you a microphone. I apologize.

Um, there were two pie charts and I think that I saw on repairs and maintenance the water was like 2.5% of that pie chart. 2.5% was spent on repairs and maintenance and then the wastewater I think was 4%. I'm curious like that that to me sounds like a really low like a small amount of money spent on repairs and maintenance and I'm curious like if cities should budget like like how does that compare to other cities that you see? Yeah. It's it's a it's a bit hard. It's it's very hard to compare how that number compares to other folks because it a lot of it has to do with just how you label things in your budget and obviously the salaries and benefits for your operators will be going towards repair and repayment their time spent on um so that those those expenses the 2.5% 4% were probably just specifically for supplies um and equipment used for repairs and replacement. for minor for minor capital,

right?

Yeah. I mean, it's I I'm not I can't remember exactly which line items were labeled as um repair and replacement in that operating budget, but I believe it's just for supplies for small minor minor capital expenses. So it doesn't include any of the capital spending. So repair and replacement. Yeah. Repair and maintenance. So that's going to be just minor equipment, um you know, small pipes, that type of thing. It's not major capital. So the repair and replacement is there's the minor capital and then there's the major capital and they're um combined. But what that doesn't include is all the salaries and benefits is also lots of that's being spent on maintenance as well. So

Sure. Yeah. Can you hear me? Should I come back up? I can hear you. I can repeat it too. Um, so when I own a business for example, like there were targets. Uh, so like 30% of my revenue should be for rent. Jennifer, there's a mic for you.

Thank you. So when I had a business, there were like targets um that you would try to hit. Like so when you were looking for a place to rent or lease for your business, 30% ideally should go towards rent. like if you were spending 50% of your revenue. So, I'm just curious like do do you guys have like salaries and benefit targets? Like you can't succeed when you're at this like at this percent if that makes sense. Does that make sense?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely does make sense. Um a and by that metric um the the suggestion that you're making it's actually counterintuitive but it's it's um it's a good thing that the repairs and maintenance number is low here because if that was a big part of your operating cost that would mean that you're running around fixing pipes all the time that are failing right when you where you want to repair your pipes and and your infrastructures through your capital program before it fails. So, if it shows up in here, it's because you're running around putting band-aids on your system. You're spending all your time trying to catch up with leaks and whatnot. So, it's actually a good sign that this is a relatively small number. Um, in terms of targeted numbers for benefits and and that sort of thing, it's um I used to I used to uh wear a hat where we do surveys um trying to look at how to compare different utilities. And what we found is that it's really each utility is so unique and so different because of how it interacts with the rest of the government that it's within and the the size of the system and the age of the system and the topography and the water source that it's really hard to find valuable metrics for having sort of a normal um performance number um for water water and wastewater utilities. So it's it's it's it's elusive. Just one last quick, but like it's like fine dining. Like fine dining has really high food cost compared to like a pub.

So like that that but there's still targets like there's still more. There's nothing like that in your world. Can you repeat question? He's asking you to repeat the question in the mic. Okay. So in the world of fine dining, for example, food costs are way ex way high. They're higher than like your average food cost for like a McDonald's or for like a average restaurant, but they're still like, you know, these norms when you go into these businesses and you research like where should I be just to give you some structure. Um, yeah. So, you know, like, okay, this is just insane what I'm spending, right? And if I can do something better here, then

yeah, I mean the the bottom line is really the survey, right, that shows that obviously Cloverdale is not um running hog wild with their costs and that they're not, you know, bloated or anything. They they've got very controlled costs and the survey is showing um that the costs are under control. So we look at the big picture, it seems like Ldale is doing fine in terms of the the the minutia and the and the details. That's that's beyond what I'm capable of answering at this time, but great question.

Thank you. I have one last comment and that I'd like to make and it is Rob. Um, as far as the subcommittees coming on, we went to the system of as needed. Obviously, we're at as needed and I agree there's some good information that comes out. We're going to kick those back off and get some infrastructure subcommittees down there. I totally welcome your comments. I can't say I don't I don't disagree with you on some of this. It's a frustration for for some of us that have been up here for a while. Those conversations were had with some uh previous folks and uh you know, you put the trust in them and say, "Hey, deploy this. It's paid for." And you're expecting that to be done and it didn't get done. So, we will be having some conversations at infrastructure. And coming back to council, uh one of my goals is to get this thing tightened up. I agree with you. I have the same frustrations as you. Thank you for your comments. We'll make sure you know when those infrastructure subcommittees come out. All right. Any other comment from up here? None for the public. Okay. Let's move on to the consent calendar.

Yeah. Just to check with the city manager, mayor. The item does say waterway study and council direction. We didn't receive any council direction to for the record. The direction is we're going to conduct some subcommittees and we're going to fine-tune comb the project list and see where we land in terms of the rate increases. Yep. Perfect. We just like to reiterate it. Thank you. All right. I'm going to need we do have one uh recusal for item F3 from the vice mayor. So, um, do I have a motion for F1, F2, F4, and F? I got to like to make a motion for, just to clarify, F1, F4, and F5. F2, F2 is called

F2 has been pulled. F2. I'm sorry. Thank you for the correction. F2. I'll second F1. Okay. F4 and F5. Okay. Let's put it to a vote. All right. A motion for the consent counter for items F1, F4, and F5. All in favor say I. I. I. All oppose say nay. Motion passes four to zero with one council member Laskkey abstaining. I mean being absent. Yep. Three to Yeah. four to zero. Yep. Okay. And F3. All right. Now I need a uh another motion for item F3. I'd like to make a motion to move F3 forward. Okay.

Second. Okay. Bring it to vote. Item F3. All in favor say I. I. All oppose say nay. Motion c motion passes three to zero with one abstension, one absence.

Come back. Vice mayor. All right. Let's move into new business. Uh but mayor through through the mayor, I want to just make sure everyone knows why I recuseed. Uh precision excavation has given a donation towards my campaign for county supervisor. So I'm recusing myself from that item and I removed myself from the dis during that.

Thank you. All right, let's move into new business. Recycled water feasibility study presentation. Mayor and council members. Um we have Rodora zooming in. She's a representative of WestJS. They performed the recycle water feasibility study. Um she's going to give you the presentation. I think Mike has the slides and then uh we'll be available for questions after.

Thank you. I just promoted you to panelists. If you can just say the next slide when you're ready. Let me pull up that presentation. It'll be one moment. All right, Rodor, we are ready when you are.

Good morning or good evening. All right. Good evening, Mayor Wheeler, Vice Mayor Lans, and city council members. Tonight I'll be presenting the city's recycle water feasibility study and the alternatives available to the city. Um checking to see if the slides are up. All right. So next slide, please. The recycle water feasibility study is about identifying potential recycle water users, defining total recycle water demands, identifying recycled water market, and identifying a project that is uh that would provide a new alternative water supply source for the city that would help its water supply reliability. Um its goal is to find an economically feasible project for the city. This project is 100% funded by combination of funds from the state water board recycle water planning grant the US bureau of reclamation water smart recycling and desalination planning study planning funding program and this study is to be completed by May 29 2026. Next slide please. Um in this presentation I'll be providing an overview um of the drivers for the recycle water potential recycle water uses recycle water system alternatives

alternatives comparison and staff request and the next steps. First the drivers for recycled water. Next slide please. The drivers for recycled water include include providing water supply benefits. It would help preserve um or it would help improve water supply resilience and it's included in several specific plans in the city's um planning projects and it could potentially offset demands from existing and or future customers. It could address uncertainties associated with city's wastewater treatment permit requirements, particularly with increasingly stringent regulatory requirements. It could help with supply uncertainty associated with the Potter Valley project decommissioning and climate change. And right now this project um state and federal funding is available to support the city the city's efforts in advancing recycled water. Next slide, please. The city relies um solely on the Russian River connected water supply and has pre914 senior water rights. But climate change has presented increasingly increasing frequency and severity of droughts. The city experienced a multi a multi-year drought

2014 to 2016 and then again in 2021-22. In 2021, the state water board issued a curtailment order and the city was required to seize the versions except for minimum for human health and safety. The state water board extended curtailments in the summer of 2022 and the city had to implement stage 4 water conservation and associated drought rates. These experiences illustrate a need for greater supply resilience. Even with those senior water rights, the city is vulnerable during drought. Regulatory risks and supply uncertainty are increasing and the Potter Valley project may impact available water supply um from the Russian River. Diversifying supplies improves reliability and local control. Next slide, please. Our assessment shows that recycle water could augment water supply and reduce water conservation by customers. This graph shows available water supply during the worst dry year based on the 2021 curtailment shown in the blue and purple bar and the green line shows normal water with no conservation action. The required conservation is between 21 to 23% once recycled water is implemented. Um right now it's projected at 2035 or later. And compared to if there was no recycled water uh customers would have to save um more than 27%

in some years. Next slide. So potential recycle water uses. Um for the feasibility study, we evaluated recycle water for non-drinking water uses. This would mean that water recycle water would be delivered for non-drinking users. meaning more water available for drinking water purposes. Next slide. So potential water users include current irrigation customers, planned active development areas, agricultural and industrial users, Kpine geysers facilities. Um, it's important to note that recycle water for irrigation could address city safety and so it's an important part of your water supply during the dry season. Dry or dead landscaping around structures could present fuel for fire events and so maintaining landscaping is one of the ways to mitigate fire danger. So, um, from our evaluations, the city could potentially, um, deliver an average day demand of 87,200 gallons per day to 660,000 gallons per day, depending on the alternative. Next slide, please. All options would provide recycle would provide wastewater benefits, but water supply benefits can vary depending on

the user. Existing irrigation customers could potentially offset um existing demands. Planned development could reduce ultimate future potable water demand. egg and industrial users could potentially um present the city an opportunity opportunity to trade water supply for additional regional Russian river diversions for your drinking water supply and Calpine geysers could potentially increase revenue to purchase additional water supply or participate in regional supply projects. Note that sending water supply to users such as the ad users or Calpine could require legal services because they are outside the city service area. Next slide please. So let's look at the recycle water system alternatives. Next slide. Alternative one is to serve existing irrigation customers. This alternative could offset um up to 87,200 gallons per day of water supply seasonally during the dry years. It would require construction of pipeline, pump station, and storage tank. Next slide. Alternative two would be to serve future planned development with some agricultural use. Um when recycled water distribution system is adjacent to

agricultural users. This could potentially offset 145,000 gallons per day seasonal um water use. It requires city construction of pipeline, pump station, and storage tank. We assume that the developers would construct on-site piping to use recycle water within their development. Alternative three, next slide. would be to serve um agricultural users outside the city limits. The city could serve up to 188,000 gallons per day of seasonal water use uh to a users. um this amount of recycled water um could serve 255 acres of agricultural land. This would require that the city construct pipeline and pump station and the agricultural users would construct local pipelines and storage facilities. Alternative four, next slide, is to serve um to sell water to Calpine Geysers. This could um potentially use up all of the city's recycled water, your wastewater effluent up to 660 gallons per day year round. This would require construction of pipeline and pump station by Kalpine um up to the city's wastewater treatment facilities. Next slide, please.

In addition to the installation of a distribution system, a wastewater treatment plant improvements would be required for alternatives one, two, and three. Um the treatment would require the production of tertiary treated recycle water using common filtration method. The sizing and the layout of the facilities vary depending on the alternative. Alternative four does not require treatment plant upgrades because um Calpine could use secondary treated wastewater effluent which is what the city's current wastewater treatment plant produces. Next slide please. and um there's a no project alternative for the city. The benefits of this project is that there's no treatment plant upgrades required and it avoids upfront capital cost and future operational costs. The challenges are that um you would have limited options to address water supply deficits. Um so in the future there would be increased conservation in dry years, increased surface water use under existing water right which could be curtailed. Um increased reliance on purchased water supply. It doesn't address ongoing supply vulnerability and it does not address wastewater regulatory uncertainty. Next slide please. So let's compare the alternatives. Next slide. As part of the study, a quantitative

comparison was conducted. Alternatives are listed in the first column of this table and cost and water supply are provided in subsequent columns. Alternatives 1 through three. Capital costs could range from 2 27.4 million for alternative 2 to 36.6 million for alternative one. Um that would be the capital cost and then there would be an annual O andM cost that would range from 245,000 to 311,000 in cost. Alternative one could deliver the least recycled water and provide the highest annual cost of 5.4 cents per gallon. Alternative two would deliver a little bit more recycled water with an annual cost of 2.7 cents per gallon. Alternative three would deliver the most recycled water in the area with no capital or operational or with annual cost of 2.1 cents per gallon. And then alternative four would be the alternative that would provide the most recycled water for beneficial use uh at no capital or operational cost to the city assuming that Calpine would um pay for bringing its pipeline to city's treatment facilities. Then the last alternative um provided is the no project option which means no recycled water and no cost to the city. Next slide. A qualitative analysis was also

conducted. Alternatives one and two would provide potable water offset, provide regional water sustainability, and provide future flexibility. Alternative three may be able to provide potable water offset and the opportunity to exchange wastewater effluent in in exchange for drinking water supply from the Russian River. the city would need to negotiate with the a user. So we do have a question mark about that potable water offset. Alternative four um and the no project option have no or low upfront cost. Calpine could potentially provide the city additional revenue so that it may purchase additional water supply from a regional provider. The no project option would provide the city future flexibility and the city could reassess the potential beneficial use of its wastewater effluent in the future. Next slide, please. The city's the study is almost complete but requires city council input on the selection of a preferred alternative. All alternatives would address wastewater uncertainty that the city is facing. So the question is how should these alternatives be prioritized? What are the city's criteria for a successful project and how would should the criteria be ranked for your consideration?

The proposed the preferred project or no project will be reflected in the feasibility study. Up to 400,000 in USBR funding is available for next steps towards implementation. Um and that would be for detailed planning and preliminary design for that effort. Work must start in July and com be completed by December 2027. It requires um equivalent city funding match. Um by completing the preliminary design, the city could show project readiness and increase its eligibility and competitiveness for future external funding. So next slide, please. And one more. Um, as a reminder for city council, this slide shows a summary of the alternatives and the costs and benefits associated with them. I'm going to turn the presentation over to city staff to discuss their request and recommendation and for city council discussion. So, I'll go back to you Derek and Kevin.

Okay. Thank you, Rodora. Yes, we're asking for direction on this for these uh future wastewater studies with the Could you go back to back one slide? Um another slide. So, wi with the available $400,000, um, City Engineering is anticipating the next step um being a an $857,000 endeavor, which would put the city's match in in the $430,000 range to com to complete the next steps. Um the the city engineer um does recommend uh that the the the council look closely at the proposed development um u alternative. Um uh I I'm recommending the no project. Um I think this is a great study. Uh I think maybe this is uh a little bit soon for what we need and um with the rate study and things coming up uh the wastewater is is um operating good and we definitely need to um look at where we're spending these monies. So that is my recommendation is the city engineer's recommendation. Like I said, um she she would like the council to look at the proposed development alternative. So, any other questions? I'm sure there's lots.

Uh just a question. Uh when you refer to no project, would that we really just kind of tableabling this to a later date? It's it's not just like so the no project would result in them finalizing the study and then the council accepting the study and then that then it would this study would for all intents and purposes be shelled. Then you guys could bring it back and reassess it at a later date if you would like. Um but the uh USBR match funding would no longer be on the table. Okay. And that's um I mean that that funding would not be available. There's always a possibility of some other future match match.

It is to be noted that in engineering department the $430,000 match that we would be on that's if we did not uh get any any additional um funding and they're they're trying really hard to get a an additional $150,000 in funding but they haven't currently secured it. So I'm working off of what is what we have right now. Okay. So uh just to clarify our presentation is finished and we can kind of go into general questions and comments at this point.

Okay. Um I I think you know the idea of recycled water is a great idea. Um you know evaluating our options here it's kind of feel that you know tableabling might be a good option. Some of the factors around um you know possible developers are uncertain. Uh I think even with u the proposed formation of Alexander Valley Water District that um some of those options might uh change in the future um pending their approval. Uh you know I think and what you know just the general cost you know if we were to run it back to our city I mean if we had all the money in the world that's a great idea but um I think the the cost of that is also a concern. Uh so I think for for we maybe circle back I'd like to hear what the council has to say but I think uh you know maybe tableabling this for now um might be the best thing.

Um I have questions like um regarding the cowpoint um option. Uh are there certain reasons why you don't like that option? Um, so I had met with them uh a couple of times and and um I I'm still trying to get a formal letter of commitment. Um, I think with the um change in their uh ownership and senior staff there, I think their their long-term future um I'm not sure if this pipeline is is is in it. I'm hoping it is. Um but we haven't got a 100% letter of commitment formal from them. Um, so that that would be kind of a uh if that alternative was chosen, we we would then pursue um that

we there's we could still pursue it regardless of what happens tonight. If that kel if the Kalpine option becomes a reality, we can still Yeah. If it become if they present it to us, we will definitely talk to them about it. Yes. Yeah. Okay. So, just for entertainment purposes really at this point on this one for me, uh plant upgrades, who pays for that? Does that come out of the grant funding as well? Uh so the the grant funding, the $400,000 available is just

No, I mean like that would be a cap. There's no nothing queued up for that. This is all nothing queued up for that. Yearly operational costs I they are about a 300,000 average. nothing queued up for that. Mhm. How many steps in this process are there? If we're starting on a 400,000, then we go to an 837,000. What's next?

So the so the 8 857 would be the total next step and then the 400 would be grant money. So the remaining the next step just gets us to um the detailed planning and pre preliminary design and that's it. Then next step would be final design implementation. So there's a lot of steps. A lot of steps still left after the 857. Yes.

So then let's talk about since we were at our last agenda item, we've lost or we're using 19% less water right now. So people's rates have to go up because you still have to pay your bills. So now we're going to cut out another 27% of our water. So, if I'm a constituent, I love helping the environment, but this isn't good for me because it makes my rates skyrocket. Yeah, we we would be I mean, we would be charging for the recycled water, but not nearly at the rate as what we're charging for treated water, but they're not using they're not using the water. So, then they would get charged on that for more. Exactly. I

I'll just stop right there because I can see where I want to go with this and I think everyone else does as well. I guess my question here is um one, how long is this study good for? I mean, it's I don't see an expiration date on it. I mean, the numbers may may not be feasible. Um but re recalculation, you know, including inflation and and supply cost.

I just and and I keep hearing, you know, and and I think for the four years I've been up here, absolutely every conversation we've had with previous city manager and everything is we've got to do a study. We do a study. We've done so many studies. I sat and stared at binders full of studies. They had a sunset to them. Oh, we need to do a new study. What's wrong with the old one? Oh, it's out of date. And we continue to pay 70 or $80,000 leaning towards where we're at in a so much deferred maintenance right now that now we're going to be playing catch-up. So, um I'm I'm not going to this is a lot of information here. I'd like to, you know, punt this to uh I think this needs to go to another subcommittee and we talk about this and bring some more stuff back to council here and so we can digest this. But I think tableabling is a great option run it to a subcommittee.

There's one uh consideration is that this needs to be completed by May 29th. So the consultant needs to wrap up the project and submit it in order to complete the grant. Um so that's one thing we we could do is if there's any interest we could come back at the next council meeting with some alternatives um in terms of what that money would pay for maybe a little more detail on that. If that's not the direction, that's fine. As also the numbers won't I mean they won't change from this council meeting to next. It's still going to be the same projected numbers. And I I see we have till May 29th, but this needs to go to a subcommittee, I think, and and get hashed out a little bit more where we can sit and talk about it and then bring it back to council with

I think I think with with passing the grant because it's currently USBR grant funded. And so wrapping up that grant, that's what gives us the timeline. And so, um, if council chooses to push it to subcommittee and then bring it back up to council or or prolong the process, whether we wrap it up here or continue to move on, um, that could jeopardize the the grant money that's paying for this portion. We just have to hit the 29th by the 29th of May. Correct.

Uh, Rodor, you're still on the line. Could you give us a a projection of those exact dates? Yeah. So, um, yeah, we need, we're a little bit behind already the USBR and we were able to request an extension. Um, but we're supposed to move forward with the next phase, which is a pre-esign um, starting July 1. So, uh, should we want to push this schedule further out, we would need to have a conversation with our USVR project manager and see if we can make some changes to the schedule. where I'm at.

So, mayor, um, if I may, so it seems as though, and Reador could correct me, but it seems as though what we're really asking here or what staff is asking is direction from the council as to whether one of those projects um, alternatives, you've heard from your uh, public works director regarding his recommendation, also from your city engineer. believe she had a recommendation as well, but the May 29th date seems to be the the sticking point here where it seems as though the um staff is really looking for direction as far as how to move. Now, they can go back and ask whether we could extend it again. Yeah.

Um, but it sounds like at this point from the conversation, I don't know if there's an appetite to go try to get an extension, come back, or it's really going with a no project at this point, finalize this, and then pop up potentially keep working through it through your subcommittees or whatnot. But I think that that's kind of what I'm hearing as far as the potential two options. If I can add a one kind of go circling back the Calpine option uh because that possibly could be something that might bring some revenue to us. Yeah, we're I'm continually testing those waters continuously all the time

cuz when you know when I look at you know with the other alternatives you know it's like you know we don't have a development in the books right now that's planned. Uh you know running the pipe to the rest of the city is going to be very very expensive. I love that option. And it just the cost is really what gets me. And I kind of look at um you know Ukaya that they uh just kind of sacrificed the water to their a community a plugs in and uh that seemed like you know for them they didn't want to spend the money to run it to the municipality. So I think you know their access to a is different than ours that you know they're surrounded we have to cross a river. Um I think one of the other questions in in that that if we were to take the a option and there was some infrastructure that was put in place to um cross the river would maybe there's some other benefits that um that infrastructure can you know

uh also provide us in the future. Um but there there is a little more difficulty with that. So the the option of Calpine um that if that can bring us some revenue and maybe even bring our rates down possibly. Um

that certainly sounds interesting. I would say any project any any alternative any alternative other than no project alternative is is going to constitute a commitment of the city match to finalize um the preliminary planning. And so that's that's that's the second stage of this uh project that was in the original grant agreement um from the previous administration. The the the the even if I'm not mistaken, Rudor, even choosing four would would trigger that um um additional

actually because alternative four would not require additional facilities. um you wouldn't have to do any pre-esign, right? But you would have to have negotiations and discussions with Calpine, right? And we're not we're and that you could do that at any time. Yeah. So if you went with options one, two, or three, Yep. that comes with the commitment of the city's match for the rest of the on the table grant money

to finalize because what you're doing is you're choosing a pathway to do a pre-esign I'm definitely hesitant on that one. I think you know for option four if that kind of becomes a time constraint that we we just can't have those negotiations before that deadline date um I guess that's just the way it goes. Uh but certainly I think that's an option that does sound interesting that that really requires less commitment from us and maybe can provide a benefit. Yeah. Um and then and then the this the city engineer did to send an email with her details on um her background or reasoning why.

Yeah. and and I I would like to state that for for um alternative for the Calpine option, you don't need to have negotiations with Calpine at this point. I mean I I think you know if if you want to pursue that option along with it or maybe a no project option that could be documented um in the report and then you would take your time in whatever work you need to do with with Cal Pine to implement that option.

Thanks Ror. Um, certainly that's something I'd like to bounce off the council. I'm really interested in the Calpine option and I just think it would be an excellent option if it's possible rather than spending money.

I don't want to spend another dime on this. I'm back of the napkin. You're at $480,000 a year. If Calpine worked perfect and they they paid for everything. If we pay for a pipe from our sewer plant to the bridge, we're out for 20 years and you know it's not going to work right. So I I just I unless they're going to come in here with a contract that you can show would override everything we're talking about here, it doesn't pencil out for our customers and I'm against it. Sorry. Um May 29th is is like the the city attorney said is kind of the sticking point here. So what I understand here is if we were to even do the the no option here that still moves this project forward on their timeline. Correct. Correct. With without any

the city owes nothing. No no further fund commitments or anything that they would finalize and then we meet we meet their 29th deadline and they can continue on. Yep. Okay. For what? No project would be no additional funding commitment.

Yeah. Okay. That's the one I'm going I know. I know my thoughts on this is previous previous agenda items. We've got to really dig deep and shore up what we've got going on at the water plant right now. We've got a lot of big uh you know capital improvement projects that need to be taken care of. I just can't see spending spending anything on this future. Yes. Absolutely. Great idea. Hiltsburg's done it. Other other people have done it and it's worked out for them. But we're not Hilsburg. We don't have the money that Hildsburg does. So until we can get everything short up and get our plant operational taking care of Cloverdale residents and no breakdowns or or very few and these guys have everything we need, I I just don't think this is a great option to move forward. I I I vote for no project on this one.

Um is there public comment? Do you want to? Yes. Public comment. You want to open that? Yes.

Yeah. Rob Kazowski here again. Um I just feel this is a a boondoggle. Um they're talking about construction of pipeline and pump stations for recycled water. Uh, I say let's do this work for residents drinking water instead right here in Cloverdale. Besides, if you start doing this kind of project, you start using up our own resources to keep track of what's going on. Uh, one of the justifications though of the young lady's presentation at Yoast was that um there's increasing frequency and severity of droughts, which is why we're doing it. This premise is all wrong currently because there's been no shortage of rain, at least around here, for over 5 years. In fact, it should be noted that quote, "After experiencing one of the wetest holiday seasons on record, still soggy, California hit a major milestone this week, having zero areas of abnormal dryness for the first time in 25 years." That quote came from the LA Times in an article called Drenched California has no dry areas after 25 years. And that came out January 10th, 2026. So, I'm an advocate that for instead of diverting resources, time, and money to produce another study that is not implemented, please focus on current water and sewage projects that benefit Cloverdale residents. Paying for a study on recycled water is not in the public interest. Instead, as posited to the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors years ago, consider the following common sense ideas related to groundwater that cost taxpayers and rateayers almost nothing. quote, "If the goal of the whole framework, sustainability is another way to say long-term means balance, groundwater extraction using wells must be matched by replenishment, like balancing a bank account with withdrawals and deposits. Then the counties and cities across Soma, such as Cloverdale, must capture rainwater and inject it into the ground. As new development occurs, erosion control should include swailes or bioeles to

slow down rainwater runoff to enhance groundwater replenishment. Is this occurring across the county as was done in our 2018 single family home development here in Cloverdale by Blackstone Homes? We have a gorgeous swale that slows down the water flow and it sinks into the area around our roads. How about rainwater collection systems instead of studies? How about permeable paving as roadways are rehabilitated instead of studies? How about leaky sistns instead of studies? So, no more studies is my message, please. No more studies. Say no to this boondoggle or an uneconomical project. Let's implement no to lowcost solutions today. This matching $400,000 being bandied about could go a long way for higher priority water and sewer projects in Cloverdale. Thank you. A few more public comments or questions.

Public comments closed on that item. Derek, did you have anything else? No, I'm good. Kevin, did you have anything? No, I think we want to do a motion though so we can memorialize what the direction is if it's no project or one request for uh clarification. Um, sounds like uh, you know, no project is on the table as well as uh, just want to clarify with the Calpine option. Um, if there was no spending and they were to sort of cover that, would that be something that we'd be interested in in in

I think if uh, we could rely on Calpine One to come into the negotiating table and commit to something with a contract, then it's an option. But the way I see it, it's not an option now. We have too much CIP too many CIP projects to take care of around here to take on another project. I think this something this is something that needs to be looked at in the future and take care of what's going on in Cloverdale right now. Any thought? Yeah, if they're looking for direction, I I'm not for the Calpine option at this point. Not either. I have no project.

I I I I don't want to spend another dime or minute of our staff time on this at this point. Yeah, you can you can always bring the cowpine option back to a subcommittee and ask for an update or communication log update for that. We can supply that for you. Okay. So, um yeah, thank you, Derek. Thank you, Reora. Uh I'd like to make a move uh motion to proceed with no project. Do we have a second? I second that. Okay. To vote, Mike, I'm sorry. No project. We have a fir we have a motion and a second.

Our motion was made by council member Marquez, seconded by council member Morgan Stern to move forward with no project. All in favor say I. I. All oppose say nay. Motion passes four to zero with council member Laskkey being absent. Perfect. Thank you.

All right. Thank you, council. All right. Let's move into uh council member reports item I. Council member Marquez. Thank you, mayor. Um, council member report. Uh, Thursday, April 9th, I did attend along with council member Morgan Stern and council member Laski, city clerk Maloney, uh, city manager Thompson, and Chief Parker. Uh, the Sonoma County Mayors and Council Members Dinner, uh, hosted in Helsburg. Uh Friday, April 10th, attended uh State of the City. That was hosted by our Chamber of Commerce here at CPAC. Saturday, April 11th, uh I attended the Supper Club grand opening. I wasn't there for the river cutting, but uh did have a fine dinner there that evening. Uh just want to mention they are part of Sonoma County Tourism's Accredited Hospitality Professionals. Uh it's great to see a hotel in our town that also has a restaurant and that's uh I think been a while since the Dante was offering those services a while ago. Uh Tuesday, April 14th, uh I did have a meeting with Caitlyn Vegby of Legal Aid of Sonoma County. Uh we worked on uh updating a draft for the rent stabilization ordinance and creating a full draft for closure and conversion regulations ordinance and those will be um hopefully uh brought to the council at a future time. Uh Thursday, April 16th uh attended zero waste Soma. Um we were present we had a quite a long talk about u their website uh zero waste does now have a pilot program it's called sona and that's uh basically allows people 24 hours a day to go there this is uh driven by an AI uh system

that people can go there and basically get uh questions answered 24 hours a day and that will basically kind of cut down uh calls in their ecoes and uh maybe even distribution of their zero waste guide. Uh Monday, April 20th, I visited the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center. Uh Wednesday, April 22nd, today met with uh Jason uh Terramino uh with PG& uh learned a little bit about what's going on in our region. Uh just want to also announce that the Cloverdale Career Fair will be postponed until next school year. uh the Chamber of Commerce is jumping in on that and uh all the contacts that we've reached out so far this year. Again, uh a lot of uh people are in the lineup, but uh they're they will be back next year. Uh did meet with staff regarding community garden update. I think next step is to uh have a meeting with the community members that are interested in creating the uh admin for that. And uh that that meeting will likely be out on site and that will be with uh our park superintendent uh Hector Galvan and uh kind of throwing that out to the community for them to really create the uh the group themselves. Uh and then um just want to give an update. uh Cloverdale Historical Societ Society in cooperation with Soma County Museum uh will working on um Cloverdale having a piece that will be exhibited at the museum and right now I think our only mention is that we were close to the uh uh Italian Swiss colony. So, uh, this will actually, uh, working with Kate Lynette from the historical society through, um, Karen Weise down at the Sonoma County Museum, uh, in coordination to get that going. Thank you.

April 9th, I attended a mayors and council members association of Sonoma County Board of Directors meeting in Hillsburg. We received a presentation by Bert Whitaker, the Sonoma County Regional Parks Director. The topic was Measure M, Parks for All Funding for City and Regional Parks. Um, I also attended the ribbon cutting at the Supper Club on April 11th. Um, the Supper Club has a gorgeous interior. Everybody should stop by and take a look. April 21st, I attended the campaign event for supervisor for district 4. Great. I'll go over just a few things I've done the past couple weeks. So, uh, I was a guest speaker and judge for a fifth grade class for some projects they had regarding science and water. It was a great time for Mrs. Lewis. I attended the all chambers event in Roner Park. I met with the owner of the property where the proposed development from Esmeralda is going to go. He wanted to discuss uh his ownership of the property from the inception. I attended the Cloverdale FFA barbecue fundraiser Sonoma County Children's Gala in Santa Rosa. Uh last week I had a meeting with PG&E admin to discuss the Potter Valley project and that is where they agreed to uh accept a proposal and meet with the federal government and some public entities to sell the dams to them and do the negotiations. And so uh formal invitations will be going out from the White House to them. And this is where I kind of take a step back. And then I met with Sonoma Water this morning to discuss a whole bunch of projects uh for Cloverdale ways that we're working

together from all the the funding that we've been receiving whether it's the uh water storage in Lake Menescino or uh the water that we will be getting compared to what we are getting from the Nerf or two basin solution and how that would work. And they also gave me some good ideas that I will be pre presenting to our city manager for water as we continue uh to possibly develop here in Cloverdale. Some ideas to uh help us um override the funding that it would cost us. So that's it.

Attended the uh state of the city here uh put on by the chamber. um went down to a legislative uh Sonoma County Mayor's legislative uh meeting uh and they are back in session. There's some bills coming out. I don't have the those bills right now cuz the um Calities hasn't decided exactly which ones they are supporting. Our next meeting we will have that down. We'll decide which ones brought up. There's an interesting bill AB2624 coming out. brought that up to the to the folks down there and it is the new one. Uh it was brought forward by uh Bont, our attorney general's wife, and it's the uh stop Nick Shirley bill that's out. What that would affect is any uh independent journalists. It would put some pretty strict regulations on them. Uh haven't heard any traction, but we are talking about that at our next agenda. And I think a lot of the mayors were pretty uh interested in that. Also, uh didn't get a chance to attend the dinner. had a different meeting to be at. Um and uh coffee with the mayor was pretty interesting. Spoke with Jennifer Sullen up there. Had a couple questions with her. Some good dialogue. I always appreciate that, Jennifer. And then also uh we have we're set up and I I know the council got an email to meet with the same gentleman that the vice mayor and Kevin met with on the Esmeralda owner, the guy that owns right now and owns the property. He's requesting meetups with us. And I also have a couple meetups with community com me members that I have set up. So, appreciate it. We mentioned uh hey, if you guys want to talk to us oneonone or get a hold of us, please email us and some folks have and I'm glad they have and we're going to have some meetups. So, it's going to be successful. That's all I got. Thank you. All right. No, city manager attorney reports. You want first?

Just real quick, uh we're going to have to push back the release of the newsletter tomorrow. Um as you know, Mike is a big uh contributor to that and he's basically he's inundated with public records requests, so he's going to need to dedicate tomorrow to working on those. So, I apologize for that. But we'll be back with the newsletter very soon. And Mayor, uh I'm not Alex um Jose Sanchez. Uh, Alex is on vacation and uh, I had the pleasure of covering the meeting for him. Always a pleasure to be here in Cloverdale with uh, with all of you. The meeting.

I have something. Um, I would like to discuss um maybe if we could come up with maybe a more transparent way of handling the water issue, the um decommissioning of the dams where like we have regular reports at every meeting. Um and also um instead of just one person working on the water issue, I think it's a big issue and maybe we could discuss all five of us working on the issue. And so um that's my idea. And I also wanted to, if possible, get an ad hoc um homeless committee uh meeting put on the agenda, I mean on the calendar.

So those would be u two items, two separate items. um in support of that. I think uh first item certainly would also be open to re-evaluating uh the representation for Cloverdale regarding the water and maybe even getting a a review of uh how we came to that or how that decision was made or what it entails.

Yeah. Uh uh we do have two people that are involved in the water currently and a lot of the information has to stay confidential and can't be privy to everybody at the exact same time. So that is why you get the pieces that I can provide and that is why right now it has gone public as of yesterday and that is why I'm providing it

ad hoc that that's Well, we'll do that. Oh, looking for consensus on one item at a time. Do we Do you want to discuss the Potter Valley Project or water rights? Is there anything that we don't have consensus on the floor right now? I think it's a it's a review of um whatever agreement was made that uh there would be two people representing the city. I'd like to reevaluate that. Is there a consensus by the council? We we agreed at future meetings that we needed to

I would like to re-evaluate that and also have a discussion on how we can deal with the water issues more transparently because I as a council member don't feel like I'm getting enough information regularly or having um any say in it. So I think the public's probably wondering what's going on with the water as well. How about this option is is we for a while there at every meeting we're doing a Potter Valley update to a point where we could and like you said there's some sensitive information out there and it could blow a lot of negotiations if we were to bring it forward. I think uh we need to bring that forward and have it as an update at regular council meetings. I would agree to that as far as we can and I don't know I'm I'm unclear on what we're evaluating for

um yeah I guess I was a little unclear on the process that was undergone that chose the two representatives. I think that was never clear. I I think the decision wasn't really um made clear in that that would be good to have that decision uh made clear and re-evaluated and done in a public setting. Maybe a uh now Jose would that be a good close session item. I believe the initial choosing was done in close session for the two representative. Would that be something to bring up close session? We would talk about

if it's okay. Let me I'll I'll follow up. I wasn't involved in that close session. Um, but let me go ahead and I'll I could follow up with the city attorney as far as um kind of the proper venue of bringing something like that up. Okay. Um, but obviously if it was in close session, there's confidentiality, correct? Um, but I could definitely follow up. Again, I wasn't involved in those conversations. Now, does that fill the looking for how we came to that determination? I know that was done in close session. No, it doesn't. uh cuz you know I I don't want to give any details of the meeting but I don't believe that that decision was made and we're close session. Correct.

So let me ask what is your goal? Is it to change the people that are on that committee? Uh just trying to figure it out. I would like to re-evaluate uh that decision and make it transparent to our community and if it you know ultimately I think you know if if there was nobody on that committee or it was we worked as a city did things as a group uh I think that would be a good decision moving forward. So without discussing it too much I don't want to get into discussion during a future agenda item. So, uh, really to make it clear, I would like to re-evaluate that decision. Maybe kick that down to also. Can we run that to the subcommittees we need to start having and and we can talk about this?

I I think you're at a two to two on this one at this point. So, it it does not pass. It gets tabled or moves on to the next meeting at this point. No, I'm just asking for a discussion and I think that would be only fair and um I think we need to re evaluate what we're doing with the water and maybe some things need to remain secret but some things should be able to be um transparent for

so would an update from me on an agenda ite kind of it bring in a few people maybe? Um, no. I I think, you know, just because Brian has said at one point that he wasn't really working on the water that much. That was just you. And I just don't think that that's transparent. I think we need to re-evaluate and have discussion on the water next meeting and see who wants to re-evaluate, who doesn't, you know, how we can be more transparent about the water issue. I'd have to disagree that he's not working on it. We probably meet three times a week. I meet with the city manager every week. Um, I speak to Alex on several times a week, I'd have to say on this, uh, emails every week. There's a lot that goes on that they know that is confidential information as well.

And, and I don't think it's all I mean, I again don't want to get into a discussion during a future agenda item. I just want to make it clear. I would like to re-evaluate the decision that I believe was very unclear from the get-go. Yeah. And I and I think to and again, a great point. You know, it's not on the agenda tonight. Yep. uh to kind of keep having the discussion. Move it to infrastructure subcommittee and we can discuss is what we need to do. Bring it back at another meeting when we have three to two. Yep. When we Let's do that. Let's right now bring right now bring it up to a subcommittee. Set up a subcommittee to discuss it. I don't know if this item can go to a subcommittee, right? If it was discussed in close session.

I mean, again, whatever is discussed in closed session, there's confidentiality. I'm not saying what was discussed or what wasn't discussed. Um however uh I just just trying to get clear on the future agenda item without kind of discussing it so much. Um it does seem as though there was a recommendation to bring back to the council correct a discussion here on the D a discussion here in the dis that ended up there's no consensus at that point um there there was another future agenda item a potential of bringing uh an update every meeting at least mayor you brought that up I know I don't know if anybody supported that

I mean uh I think uh that kind of gets ahead of us of what what the first ask uh is to re-evaluate a decision that was I believe unclear just want to reevaluate it amongst the council and also in public and I think that the original decision goes against the Brown Act because it's not transparent what's ever going on with our water issue we don't know about it and the public doesn't know about it and the Brown Act is important and so I think we need to discuss following the Brown Act

so again not not to get too much into discussion again regarding the item I think that there's also the possibility of bringing that item up again at future agenda items when you have a full council. It seems as though right now you're at a 22. I think your your your governance manual um asks for a consensus, meaning three council members to kind of decide something coming up to come to a future agenda item. Um my recommendation is potentially bringing it back up when you have your full council here since you're not getting a consensus for that specific item. There was a consensus though from what I heard regarding the homeless. Yes. The ad hoc starting that back up that did get support. Yes.

Um so that that would be my recommendation. I I didn't hear support for the weekly update or I'm sorry not the weekly the meeting every so bring up we call the ad hoc which we agree on. Correct. You want to call the ad hoc? Well and I don't think we even needed to call you know ask permission to call the ad hoc. We have a ad hoc committee and I was just mentioning that we need to have a meeting. We have a lot of unsheltered people in town right now. Perfect. And I think we can help them by having a meeting.

I agree. Yep. And then bring it when we have full counsel to for the future agenda item of of uh the Potter Valley and Water uh bring it to the future agenda with full counsel which could be next meeting. Correct. There you go. Is that happy? Well, yeah. We need a consensus. So if we do not have a consensus today, that would be the process. Well, okay. I have two items for future agenda. First one is I would love to see a water and sewer projects update so that we're all updated on everything going on. Have consensus for that? Anyone against it?

Our water and sewer projects update. I would like to have one. Support it. Okay. And the second is our recology contract. I'd really like to take a look at it and bring it back to us. Uh reason being is constituents are getting fines for their lids being open and the fines show it open about yay much on a lot of them and there's nothing in the contract that I can find they're allowed to do this and so I want to I want to make sure that we have that conversation because it's unacceptable if they're asking each person for $16 every time their their can lid is open a little bit. That's not right and that's not what we're doing here. So, I want to make sure that we're doing what's right for our constituents.

So, Vice Mayor, on that one, uh, and this is going to go through our attorney as well. Um, if if this is a simple matter, as vice mayor is explaining, could that be something that could be handled directly through ruology? If I may through the mayor directly, like for example, staff going to rcology directly to discuss what's going what what's what's happening. Yeah, that's kind of the question. if you know if we if you want to take that route um you know I do have our local representative I can put you in contact with Ambrosia um I have a card here and um if if we want to try that route maybe maybe we get it sorted out and um you know or is or is that something you would like a a full presentation on

I mean I I would be totally open to you working with the city manager and making that happen I that doesn't bother me I just we just we just want to get that just really want to get resolved for our constituents yeah thank That's all I have. Mayor done the meeting at 9:31. Thank you.