City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay. We're gonna go ahead and reconvene from our closed session. Any final announcement final action to announce?

Yes. Thank you, mister mayor. On item number one, the council voted unanimously to authorize legal counsel to defend the matter listed on the agenda as item one, and there's nothing to report out on item two.

Thank you so much. And with that, we will adjourn the closed session, and we'll go ahead and call to order the regular meeting for Tuesday, April 28. Please call the roll.

Council members Kozlowski?

Here.

Leary? Here. Rohrbach? Here. Aquino? Here. And Rethel?

Here. If you'll please stand with me for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. And do we have any updates for the agenda this evening?

Yes, mister mayor. We have additional information or additional material for agenda item number 19. I believe a copy was provided to the council, and there are extra copies in the back table for members of the public.

Thank you so much. And that takes us to business from the floor. If anyone is here to address the council on unagendized items this evening, go ahead and fill out a blue card in the back, and you can bring it right up here, and we'll happily get you in. And do we have anyone scheduled to speak this evening?

No request under business from the floor.

Going once? Going twice? Alright. That will move us to scheduled presentations.

Okay. Your first scheduled presentation item this evening is number one. This is an introductory presentation of the Folsom Public Library programs and services.

It's not often the scheduled presentations get applause before they even get started.

It's not often that the library does a scheduled presentation. Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor, City Council, Tom Grenoisen, your library director, here with you this evening with, library supervisor Andrew Tweet, senior librarian Amanda Perez, and our youth services librarian Lindsay Melhouse to share just a little bit of the info of what we do at Folsom Public Library.

I have a disconnect between

what we see. Krista? Just advance it with the hand. I mean, it should advance.

I agree with you. No?

Hey, there we go. Alright.

As we were applause, applause. Thank you.

And I do wanna start by saying thank you. I wanna thank you individually and as a city for your support for the library. The theme of last week's National Library Week was find your joy. And in a time of increasing misinformation and polarization and decreasing literacy, it gives me tremendous joy to be part of the team whose job it is to help stem that tide, to support learning critical thinking, to, draw our community together, and ultimately to bring our prosperity into the future. And, I think that that joy resonates with our residents when they visit the library. It's not unusual for a community to love its library. It is unusual for a community to engage library services with a kind of voracious appetite that we see here in Folsom. We

okay. Okay.

We love books. We've always been about books. And our residents, being a community of readers, they also love books. And that's part of why last year we checked out more books in Folsom than any other library location in the county. If you include our digital books, it was over a half million items.

Similarly, because of our tremendously hardworking staff, because of our governance model, because of our nimbleness, we're able to deliver more programs than any other library location in the county. And because those programs are laser focused on the immediate needs of Folsom residents, those programs were attended many times over, in attendance when compared to other libraries inside the county. We do all of this with a staff of only 11 full time employees, a small dedicated crew of on call employees, some amazing volunteers, and of course the help of the friends of the library. So to give you a little more information about those amazing programs, I'm going to call up Youth Services Librarian Lindsay Melhus.

Thank you. Good evening. My name is Lindsey Melhus, and I am the Youth Services Librarian at the Folsom Public Library. Support for our community starts with our youngest residents. Baby Storytime regularly serves over 50 infants a week in supporting early literacy and language development.

This year, increasing popularity of this program led to us doubling our Baby Storytime offerings, and we look forward to our second annual baby prom, the cutest way to kick off summer. We continue to support literacy skills as children get older. In addition to baby storytime, our staff hosts five very popular toddler and preschool storytimes a week, which is more than any other neighboring library. Every child is invited to complete our 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten challenge, with finishers earning a special book and a certificate to celebrate this achievement. And in one of our most successful and far reaching programs, our staff visit every Folsom Cordova, kindergarten class in the city to give students their very own library cards.

And just this year, we've given out over seven seventy five cards to Folsom kindergarten students. The library also serves as a place for young residents to build, craft, and try new hobbies. We want to ensure that every child in Folsom feels like there is a place for them at the library, so our program offerings reflect a wide range of interests. Folsom kids get together to build LEGOs at the library every Saturday, meet up to play chess with other kids, and try their hand at building challenges in our engineers' club. We even host a kids' book club to talk about the latest popular titles.

All of these programs are part of our regularly our regular youth services schedule. Our library and our staff are very busy meeting the needs of our youngest patrons. My colleague Amanda will tell you more about our summer teen and special offerings.

All right. Hello, city council, city manager. There we go. We strive to continue to be that third space in our community for teens as well, offering teen programs like teen create space, teen writers workshop, teen talks with local experts, and even teen game nights throughout the year. However, our most popular service for local teens are our teen volunteer opportunities.

Folsom has a high achieving and very busy teen population that are always looking for volunteer opportunities here. And at the library, we offer two different programs. The Teen Library Council is a volunteer program that runs during the school year, focuses on leadership skills, and puts them to practice by running teen events and special projects. During the summer, we have a dedicated teen volunteer group that helps with our summer reading program and is focused on gaining experience with customer service and job training. Between these two programs, we work very closely with about 80 teen volunteers who end up serving over a thousand volunteer hours in the year.

All right. Well, you can't talk about the library without talking about the Summer Reading Program. At its core, the Summer Reading Program is an effort to combat the summer slide that often occurs while children are out of school by encouraging and celebrating their reading. In its entirety, though, the summer reading program is really a collection of programs and events that makes the best use of the busiest time of the year for the library. To give you an example of the visitor count during summer, last year in June and July, we had over 4,000 people at our story time alone.

Our summer reading program events include those weekly story times, dance parties, crafternoons, a movie matinee showing, as well as large scale events like baby prom, dinosaur day, and things like a Minecraft party. It is important to note that the summer reading program is financially supported by our friends of the Folsom Library Group. In addition to all of those recurring events that Lindsay and I have talked about, the library also hosts special events throughout the year. Highlights include the very popular LEGO contest in winter, a games day celebration featuring a life size Candyland game in the fall, and a new program we recently started hosting a few times a year, a puzzle contest. We also strive to partner with local organizations for unique programming, which my colleague Andrew will go into detail about.

Thank you.

Good evening, council members. I'm gonna talk primarily about the adult program. So in addition to the staff led programs that repeat every month, like our book discussion groups, we partner with local authors and outside organizations to bring in specialized expertise and information for adults. I'll call out a few of these organizations to show the breadth of our partnership in the community. We provide free tax assistance each year from February to April with the AARP tax aid program.

California State Parks interpreters have come multiple times to provide informational programs on local flora, fauna, and history to help us promote State Parks Library Pass, program. University of California Master Gardeners frequently provide speakers to teach about water wise gardening, composting, and other gardening topics. The library has over 200,000 visitors each year and with the growth of remote working and mobile devices in recent years, the library has become a popular coworking location for individuals and groups who need space to work and fast WiFi. Our group study rooms provide space for student groups working on projects, small nonprofits that need meeting space, and individuals who need distraction free space for job interviews on Zoom. Whether people are studying as a group or grinding out work emails, the library provides a pleasant space where they can work outside the home or office.

Lifelong learning has become increasingly important to our careers, and at today's pace, the skills that got you a job will likely be out of date in five years, and they won't be the skills you need to get your next promotion. To support residents' careers, we have 27 computers which log over 17,000 sessions per year and fast, reliable Wi Fi, which provides an average of 10,000 device connections every month. To assist with economic development, the best business, legal, and technology put book collection among our peers, we've developed that, and the collection is designed to, help people start a side hustle or get that next promotion. Starting in August, we'll also offer free online access to the career development video platform Skillshare, which is used by Fortune 500 companies and universities to upscale their workers. The library is working to help Folsom residents keep progressing in their careers and their businesses.

In addition to over 90,000 books and DVDs, the library checks out a variety of kits that include everything residents need to try out a new hobby. Most are geared towards helping people make the most of living in our beautiful town, like disc golf, bocce ball, birding, local history, hiking, gold panning, pickleball, and the previously mentioned state parks passes. Additionally, we have telescopes and three d printing kits, which have everything you need to learn additive manufacturing or explore the universe. These kits build on library's historic role of taking an expensive or rare object and making it available to the widest possible audience. In that same vein, we have book club in a bag kits that have five to 10 copies of a particular book and a discussion guide to help you host your own book club and build community connections.

Last thing we wanna acknowledge about library service is that Folsom's library is a beautiful centerpiece for the community. The building itself and the location in the parks is attractive, and with the continued investments that the city has made in HVAC replacement, new roofing, lighting improvements, fresh wallpaper, and carpet, we hear from residents and out of town visitors alike that Folsom is the best looking and most welcoming library to visit.

Okay, counsel. I appreciate you, allowing us to bring this item forward. Do you have any questions for your library?

Questions?

Questions? Thank you. Really appreciate seeing

Did your you say 10,000 connections to the high speed Wi Fi

every Yeah, and that's each unique device each day. It's not doubling up.

That's not minor.

No, it's not. Tom,

Lindsay, Andrew, Amanda, appreciate all you guys do. Appreciate all the staff at the library and all the volunteers we have. You guys are providing a very important service for our community. So

thank you.

Thank you, mister mayor. We

do have one request to speak, on this item. My library commissioner, Solomon, Keese.

Good evening, mister mayor, vice mayor, and councilman. I'm Solomon Kees. I'm a Folsom resident as well I'm a business order owner here in Folsom, and I'm a commissioner in library. A couple of years ago, my daughter was in high school. We got the library card. But I wasn't aware of how much and how many programs the library has till I joined the commissions. And when I said the first day and I said, you're doing this and this and this, and Tom said, yes, we're doing that. Yes, Solomon, we're doing that. I was so amazed of how many opportunities the Folsom Library they're doing here in Folsom. So I know the Folsom City budget, it's not as great as we want it to, but I urge the City Council.

I sit on the City Commission and we hear all the times like we need more money. We need they're doing so many things with so little with a budget. So I'm here to advocate in behalf of Folsom Library. Please look at the budget. Please find some money somewhere and let's help this work. Let's help these programs and let's keep those programs from Folsom. And as well with all the Friends of Library and all the other donations that they're doing, they are doing an amazing job for Folsom Library. Thank you so much.

Thanks, Solomon. Appreciate it. Please call item number two.

Okay. That takes you to item number two, which will be a presentation from California State Parks representatives regarding the Parks Mural Project.

I'm I'm sorry we let the library go first. They they set the bar pretty high.

We'll do our best.

I have faith in you.

Counsel, thanks for having us. We began this process quite a long time ago. As most of you are aware, in 2020, we were asked to look at the name of Black Miters Bar. Then, knowing

Steve, tell everybody who you are.

I'm sorry. Steve Hilton. I'm the district superintendent Goldfield's district superintendent for state parks. So we started looking at the name change in twenty twenty, twenty twenty one with Sarah and some other folks from the council. Looking at the name and trying to figure out a new name for that day use area prompted us to do a lot more research about the history of the area and the day use area around Black Miners Bar.

It's led us to an abundance of information, not only about the African American history there, but also the Chinese history in the area and also, most robustly the Native American history in the area. Through that research we identified a couple of high profile Native American members that were in the area around the period of the gold rush. Among them was a woman by the name of Jane Lewis, who later became known as Coto Jane. Through our research, identified some relatives of Coto Jane of the Weldon Rancheria that brought more stories to us, some oral history about the area and stuff like that. Our understanding definitely went up and we noticed that the entire area from about the powerhouse all the way down to the Orangevale Bluffs was known as one village site, the village of Yodok.

That village had basically prominence over the entire area. The 20 or so families that lived in the area would follow a lead person, whether it was acorn, salmon, or whatever gathering was happening in the area. They identified Coto Jane as one of these people right around the time of contact with the Gold Rush. So we started looking into the way Coto Jane used the area and what that meant as far as the first acorn, first salmon ceremony, talking with the informants at Wilton Rancheria, we were told that Coto Jane took private or like ownership of some of the bedrock mortars, the grinding holes in the area, and would celebrate that every year with the larger tribal members. Some of those happened to just be adjacent and underneath the bridge over Lake Natoma.

So we started in discussions with those groups. We talked about the best way to honor, Coto Jane and the presence and perseverance of the Native Americans. And we together came up with this idea. Let's put some murals on the branch pillars. And so we've been developing and looking at this idea for the last four four or five years now. And I think we're finally at a point where we have a rendering that we want to show you guys. We handed out some some individual self representations. And now it's really up to us to start really finalizing this design and make sure that the city and the city council are for the project. Right? So Devin's going come up, interpreter two at the district.

He's going to talk a little bit about the process of doing this. And then we have Stan Padilla, a local artist that helped us to develop this design. So I'm going turn it over to those guys real quick.

Hello, everyone. So I've talked about this project many times with all of you. It's become very near and dear to my heart. As Steve mentioned, we've moved this process along through talking to these different stakeholder groups early on and engaging with the different tribal groups about the interest and the significance of this project. The site was very significant to everyone, but there was kind of this desire to bring back some of the native aesthetics to it and how can we move forward with art and how can we do that.

So I've met Stan here behind me. Stan retired, he informed me today, but he used to work for UAIC. He's a legacy mural artist. He can tell you more about his many accolades. But we decided to move forward with these different stakeholder groups and see how we could move this project along.

We went up to Shingle Springs several times, talked with some of the folks up there, their art department, and came up with what we wanted to pull from the landscape, what we wanted to pull from the various tribal communities. And this is kind of a start of where this project is going to move forward to. But if you look at the drawings that we presented to you there, you'll see that there's a lot of natural landscape that we're trying to put into the mural. And that's intentional because it is a natural landscape. That's one of the things that Folsom is famous for.

And I think the bridge kind of takes away a little bit from that. So the desire is to really bring the natural landscape back and then also the tribal culture that is so relevant here. And so we've worked together with different artists. We have some other artists that are working with us on the project, Frankie and Sean, a couple artists from the tribal groups. And we're moving this design further forward to get more of a rendition.

As you can see, it's sketched out as of right now. And Stan and I can talk more about the process, but the art itself will be painted mainly in a warehouse on what's called Polytab. Again, Stan can explain it a little better. And then adhered to the pillars for the final rendition, and this is common practice for lots of murals now. So it's really brought a lot of people together. We have different tribal groups working together. We've gotten support from the local chamber, and now we're here today seeking your support and your grace to move forward. So, Stan, your turn.

Good evening, everyone. As Devin said, I'm an artist of a standing 45 experience working with all levels of muralism. I joined the group about a year ago and as lead artist and as art director. What does that mean? That means at all levels of development, I'm here to add my expertise and professionalism so that we develop an appropriate work of art.

Muralism basically is storytelling. It's community storytelling. It tells a story of the environment and the history and so forth. If you focus in on the drawing, this is really a riverscape, a historical riverscape. If you look on the left, moving downstream, we have the traditional ecological knowledge and indigenous way of life that flows with the natural flow of history.

And if you look on the right hand side, you'll see a modern angler and kayaker going upstream. And it's kind of like these where this world these worlds can come together. The river brings us all together. And that's kind of the story. What is the traditional way of life, the natural ecological harmony and balance of nature, and at the same time, what are the contemporary uses so that we're all included in this river vision?

So that's basic. I don't want to get too geeky or too arty here, you know. But again, I'm here to ensure that there's a professionalism that will hopefully outlast all of us. And technically, using space age technology, this we call it parachute cloth and permanent paints, it's kind of old fashioned anymore to paint on walls and on concrete. It's been gone on and it causes blight in the long run.

This new idea is space age technology. It actually comes from the covering of the space shuttle. So it's durable, fireproof, waterproof, rip proof. And so if you have any questions, you know, I'm happy to address them. I wanted to say a little bit about my professionalism.

I am now working on, I'm the lead artist for the new airport terminal at Sacramento Airport as the lead artist building the legacy project for the next century at the Sacramento Metropolitan Airport. I was recognized by the California Arts Council last year as a master legacy artist, which means an artist that has worked continuously for fifty years for the good of the community, Not for themselves, but more altruistic work. And I am an indigenous educator of fifty two years. So I know what I'm talking about and we can do this. And with your approval, with your agreement, we would take this rendering then and develop a drawing that's more proportional, it's clearer, we know where everything fits.

It's almost like a jigsaw puzzle then. We have it all laid out and we would bring that to you next. And then from there, just do it. That's the art part. So thank you.

Thank you. Council Member Kozlowski, I

actually have several questions because I'm geek for art. Are you is the fabric that you're painting onto, is it does it end up being fully adhered to the concrete? Or is it fully It

adheres like a decal. Okay, got you.

So it's a wrap.

If you look at in Sacramento, all the high rise buildings and underpasses, they're not painting on the walls. They're painting on this material and it bonds. It's like a decal or popular, it's called a tattoo. It bonds to the wall and it's permanent.

And then your story of sort of, for lack of a better description, sort of snapshots in time, Is there some specific cadence to them, like five hundred years ago, two hundred years ago, for

each of the columns? Wouldn't say so literal. It's more evolutionary. If you look at it at the bottom, we would see underwater and then what's up on top. But if you go left to right, you're probably going

Oldest one hundred years. Most recent.

Yeah. Know, kind of in our era. You know, what we know the last of the traditional way of life and the angler Gotcha. Moving up there.

Is the idea to be a sort of realistic depiction of those things or more impressionistic? I know that word means Kind a lot

of, yeah. I understand. I would say a marriage of both. Okay. You know? Not a snapshot or not a photograph. Something that's interpretive but at the same time is real. As was mentioned earlier, this is a very particular spot.

Okay.

And very special. So on the bike trail, you can sit and see the story of the river.

And then is the intention to have the artwork wrap around and meet back up so that's actually a continuous scene without a seam being visible?

At this point, no.

Okay.

It would be in the front, but then the rest of it will be enhanced like one color, you know, complimentary or a sage green or something that would fill the environment. I don't know if you know the exact spot down there, but it's blighted.

Mean

it's not very pretty.

The columns, my recollection is that they're on either side of the hike bike trail. So is the intention here that these are all visible if you're heading west or east or to the bike trail from the inside?

Yes. To work on all of them simultaneously with this being the first model Mhmm. And then we would move on to the to the others, which would almost be simultaneously. Just tonight, we don't have renderings for those yet.

Gotcha.

But it's all been addressed. We've looked at it. We've talked about it and everything. I just think a little at a time.

Sure.

And then additive.

This wonderful work. Thank you. I do have one other question for Superintendent Hilton or maybe a couple questions.

Sure.

But you and I did talk about this a good long time ago. This I thought it was a great idea then.

Right.

I still think it's a great idea now. So is the intention of having the artwork sort of face into the trail still to not draw people off the trail?

That's exactly the intention.

Okay. All right. And we want to do we still need to do a sort of native plant refurbishment in that area.

And we started that. I don't know the last time we went down to the powerhouse. Or, This July 11, we'll have the second intertribal Tulipo races at Rock Beach. And we've worked with the Native American tribes. We now have a working group that's doing restoration, riparian zone restoration, along the entire area. We've started removing a lot of the blackberry, limiting the poison oak to non trail areas. And then with full fan, we've developed the nursery over at the cottage at Blackmatter's Bar. And that's going to become our, basically, our nursery for native plants.

Oh, fantastic.

And so the plan is to keep going. We started, like I said, at Rock Beach, which is right across from the Powerhouse because that's where we do the Chuli boat races. And then we'll we'll be moving down all the way down the the lake to the Bluffs. My plan really is we as you guys know, with we're the paddling capital of the West now, We get a lot of people. We go to closure at the park around, you know, midday on a hot summer weekend. I'd like to disperse that crowd as much as possible, and that starts with some of that restoration. Yeah. And I think that this will be a good thing for that. The idea to keep everybody on the trail is we really don't want a lot a large population going down and messing with the rocks further. But it's something that we're gonna be looking at and developing a a further plan as we go forward.

That's fantastic. And just one suggestion, Stan, you should hide a little geometric red rabbit in the artwork someplace since you're working on the airport.

We'll make something iconic. This is going to be a landmark. This is going to be an epic growth on the river there. It is going to identify us.

Very good.

You can just feel it intuitively. Vice things

Mayor, questions?

I did have one, but Mike asked it. So I just want to say thank you. I think this, like you just said, this is going to be iconic, epic, another thing that people want to come to Folsom for. So thank you for all you're doing, however we Our can

hope is to have this up by next summer. So we're giving ourselves a year. I hope we can get it done in that time.

Councilor O'Gilleri, any questions?

I don't have any questions, but, Superintendent Hilton, I remember getting your email a year ago, and then I would, kind of ping Right. Our city manager. When are we having this presentation? Really looking forward to this presentation. And I love this project.

Excellent.

And I think it'll be iconic. It'll be something that, you know, people identify with this area. Just to back up a little, when I moved here thirty years ago, there was very little evidence that native people actually lived here. You know, most of the historic information was about the Gold Rush. There was one resource to find out more about the peoples who lived here, and that was Herb Puffer, who used to run a Native American store just off of Sutter Street.

I'm really glad to see all of this coming forward and the involvement of all of the local tribes. And I wanted to add one other thing and that is the kind of advertise that people catch up with, I guess, subscribing to your newsletter, which is fantastic, every month, and getting engaged with Full Fam because there are a lot of great opportunities for families to go out and plant a lot of these native materials and remove things that are non native. So I'm just excited to see this coming forward. We have one park in town that is a tribute to the Native American people that I actually put the name on back in the '90s in on park. But more education is great, and I think, you know, having this whole series across the centuries is going to be an excellent presentation for all.

Thank you.

Thank you. Councilwoman Burkino, any questions?

Yeah. Comments? I don't know if you mentioned this. This is the columns of the Lake Natoma Crossing, Yes. Sorry about that. Okay. I also think it's a fantastic idea, I do think it dovetails nicely with the paddling capital of the West announcement that's going be coming out in the next couple of weeks. And then also, the city recently launched a historic walking tour. I'm wondering, I mean, could there be a QR code or an app or something? It's for people who are on the water and paddling that there's something that they could press and they listen to a history about the Nissan.

Wonderful idea. Wonderful idea. And I think we're developing that. It really the partnership just continues to grow and grow.

Okay.

And so I really do foresee that in the near future.

Okay, good. I do have one question about I think

you called it the poly tab

wrap that's going to happen. If somebody were to tag this with graffiti, does that just wipe off then? And is that the responsibility of state parks? Would the city of Folsom be responsible for maintaining? Who's going to be in charge of maintaining this?

I believe that we'll take responsibility. I'm going to have to check with my maintenance chief about that. And if it becomes too much of a problem, we'll have to figure out what we do about that. But yeah, I'm all for taking responsibility for that. But Stan can

talk about But this also has an anti graffiti coat on it which makes it much easier. But that's a question we're all going to have to address because the possibility is always there. In the past by re landscaping, it changes the mood. People don't tag as much. If there are lights or there are signs, then it changes. That's where we all as a community have to work together

Right. And on I think the place now, one thing we find, I go over there a lot just looking at the project, empty pillars. But I think one thing is it's not really a place to visit necessarily. Places under bridges are not fun typically. And now this is going to be a place that people want to go. They'll want to see it. You'll have more foot traffic there, less desire for people to graffiti. So I think that it will become a place.

Well, if it works out, then we could do something on the Rainbow Bridge.

Right. And there are several other columns, right?

Yeah.

I just have one really important question. Was that Yes,

that's it.

So I'm confused by this kayak. If we're going for modern, I don't see many kayaks out on Lake Natoma these days. I see a lot of paddle boarders.

John Lane would disagree with you. You need to be out there earlier in the morning Who

goes at 5AM? Only John Lane. Yes. They might all be out there when I'm not there. That would work. But yeah, you're bringing modern and old together. I'm just putting a plug in there for the paddle boarder.

You are aware of it. There was a tule boat race there last July,

which

is I think it's an annual or possibly annual, which is just an incredible opportunity for tourism and for all of us to see these traditional boats come out and families and education and cultural celebration. You know, for the whole community, not just one aspect of our society.

I think an important thing to think about when you think about what time frame are we looking at for this mural, I spoke to an elder once who told me, I asked him, what do you say when people ask you how long have indigenous people been here? And he said, ever since the sun first rose over those mountains and first set over those mountains, pointing to the mountains on the East and the West. So essentially, since the beginning of time. And I know sometimes we have trouble, sitting with that, but that's what we're looking at.

Awesome. Well, hearing a lot of support for my colleagues up here. Thank you guys for coming out tonight, and we look forward to seeing you again soon. We'll see you soon. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay. Your next item this evening is number three. This is a presentation from HEART, the homeless assistance resource team regarding the twenty twenty six winter shelter.

Thank you. Thank you, Krista. I'm glad to be up here again, and thank you city council, mayor, vice mayor, city manager, all the wonderful folks who work for the city of Folsom and the folks in the audience here. We're it's it was a great season, and so, thank you for the time to, apprise you of of what it was about. Heart of Folsom is who I am with.

I am Bev Seas. I'm the director of the winter shelter. This is the fifth year for me in that role and, it's been wonderful to, to be part of that and to follow it along. We ran the shelter this year from January 2 to March 1, trying to catch those winter months where there's wind, rain, and cold. The things that we do, we provide shelter, food, safety, and compassion.

That's kind of the most basic piece of what we do for folks who find themselves unhoused in Folsom. That's sort of the base level thing that we work from and provide. We the shelter itself helps build trust in community as folks come inside and they spend the night within the structure that we have together both with volunteers and with the other guests and it's a powerful part of the community within our community during those months. We also connect guests with local services. We don't have a lot of county services out here but we do have some really key local services.

One is Dignity Health, the hospital here. This year for the first time we had each week the substance use resource person and the nursing director of the hospital each came both came once a week, which was super helpful for guests with various issues to be able to again build trust with them and get help from them. Jake's Journey Home is always there and we refer folks to them a lot. They're involved. Powerhouse Ministry as well.

They were there weekly and are just always there. We have their cards and people talk with them and work with them. Many of our guests work with them during the week. And then Hart Transitional Housing has a case manager for the transitional housing clients and that person came two or three times each week to work with folks. So I'd say we had more resources there than we've had ever before so it was really, really good.

People in Folsom are the winter shelter. We provide kind of structure and the process by which it happens but it's really people sort of far and wide in the city that are the shelter. We start with about 110 volunteers, heart volunteers we call them because we work for the entire season, including 22 leaders who begin work in August, meet probably five times or so and put things together, Then folks sign up for weekly shifts doing different jobs for once or twice a week. We have night captains each night of the week. There's a different person ultimately in charge.

It's really important that we have that one person who's the lead there. Intake and interviewers, we store people's stuff overnight in a storage pods. We've got someone there for that. Drivers, driving them to the shelter and back. Welcome team at the shelter who's there each night. Delivery from restaurants, I'll talk a little bit more about those. Morning team, there's three people each morning who come and help get things rolling in the morning. A moving team that once a week moves the whole shelter to the next location. Sleeping bags and cots team works with those cleaning, repairing, all that kind of stuff. Supplies, we have a manager who makes sure that we have plates and cups and forks and things like that.

And then more behind the scenes kinds of people. We do this kind of structure I guess you'd say so that it's spread widely both for safety, to make the load light, to make it happen so that nobody burns out and people are fresh and ready to help these folks. So shelter, sites, hosts. We spend the night, usually a week at a time, at a location with a group of people hosting. So this year, we had the Church of Jesus Christ Latter day Saints, Trinity Episcopal Church, Oak Hills Church, Reflection, MCC, the Muslim community of Folsom, Lakeside, Bridge Community Church, and Folsom Bible Church there, and then the three rotary groups.

So we had 10 groups all together hosting the shelter overnight this year. So they provide dinner, help with showers, laundry. There's a team of two to four people who spend the night there overnight as well. So we are super, super grateful for all the folks involved with that. And we do have restaurants.

We have restaurants that we all go to and they wanted to help and provide a dinner once a week the guests at the shelter. So Chicago Fire, Lazy Dog, Mas Taco, Bacca's House all provided that for us. Anna Pourna, which is also on this slide, is not a restaurant, but it's an outreach group of the Indian community of Sacramento who provides things like meals. So they we're really grateful for all of them. We link with other with folks to serve Folsom.

So the first one I want to talk about is the police department and fire department, especially the HOT team, which is HOT at the police department with Brian Mendenhall. So helpful, such a great resource and support for us as we exchange information and, you know, see who's who and what we know and how to help things to go smoothly. And then the fire department, we have some guests who have fragile health sometimes so we call them sometimes. And they're both super professional and compassionate. We're really, really thankful for them.

And then the city as a whole, especially I would say the library, Tom Grenoisen, and as well as Parks and Recreation with Kelly Gonzales. We're there. The intake is there at Upper Rodeo. Chris O'Keefe and his team help us get in there and get out of there at the end of the season and it's really a cooperative thing to provide for these folks and make it work all around. Hope Presbyterian Church in Folsom provides toiletries, combs, razors, all that kinds of stuff that people need as we try and help them be part of a community that's got more structure than they might be used to and more support, but also in a way more expectation for both behavior and just how we operate.

So we appreciate them a lot. And District Church, which is actually in El Dorado Hills, they provide us a shower trailer every year, which we all know the value of a shower. And so they donate that every year so we can provide showers every night. Wilkinson Portables provided our both a bathroom and a washing station at intake this year. They were that's new for us with them and they were wonderful.

New Joy Arts is a ministry. Angela Hauke runs it and she came once a week to provide art therapy for folks to just shelter really becomes a place where people in lives that are often somewhat chaotic and the things they see is kind of chaotic to a place of calm and that kind of thing and so the art has been really super. And then we have individual donors as well who help provide money so that we can buy supplies and all that kind of stuff for the shelter. So some numbers from this year. We were open for fifty nine nights.

We served 47 guests. A total guest nights was six ninety three. Average guest per night was 12. When I look at the season this year, I would say and compare it to kind of the last nine, I say I probably have data for about the last five, we're becoming more focused I would say. 47 guests is a low number for us as far as the number of different people we saw but they stayed the same number of nights as last year.

So we have fewer people but they're staying longer with us which I think is really good. It's people who really, really value the shelter and being in that environment and having the opportunity to be able to look forward and get help and talk with people who are encouraging them to think out higher. And we had 64% men, 36% women, which we're also on trajectory kind of with that with more women as the years go on, higher percentage percent of women, which I think is good. Not that all women are as vulnerable and men aren't vulnerable, but they are vulnerable out there. So good to see them coming in more.

Our oldest guest was 72 and our youngest guest was 22. They have to be 18 to come. We can't take children And they have to be ambulatory with at the most a cane because we take them in vans. They've got to get up and down and that kind of thing. So that's typical age for us.

It doesn't vary very much over the years. Eleven percent were veterans, which again is somewhat typical, and seventy three percent of them had been in fulsome prior to the season, which is the highest that we've had of them. So again, I feel like we're sort of honing in. I don't know how exactly whether it's them self filtering or we do our you know, there's some people who we don't allow in and we try and catch that as early as we can. Anyway, all of those looked really good to me.

So the guests are there. That's kind of who they are and we look, we don't do an exit interview as each person leaves a shelter or anything but these are the things that we know of. Three guests out of that 47 were working during the shelter and that means sometimes we allow them to arrange with us to come late or leave early than usual and if they can do that and work with us in that, it works great and the three were wonderful with that. Four guests were actively seeking work, interviews, things like that. One of the four actually got a job right near the end of the shelter but I kept him in that category for now.

We had two guests go to programs, recovery programs. We had two guests go to full time shelters down in Sacramento. It's not easy to get a spot there and the case manager was really helpful with that where they can be there three sixty five all day, live there. Ours is just an overnight shelter. Two guests went through transitional housing programs and three guests had plans with other housing with family.

So out of the 47, like a third of them, I call it moving forward or trying to move forward. So that was encouraging to me to see that happen for them. So that's it for me. Do we have time for questions? And do we have any questions?

We have time for questions. Thank you, Bev. Thank you to all the HEART volunteers. We really appreciate the work you guys do here in our community. Questions? Councilor Mower? Councilor Mowerberry?

Yeah, I just have one question. And that is when the shelter's closing down, you know, like, I can't remember the date in March. March 1. Yeah. You know, example, this year we've had a lot of difficult weather after March 1. And just as a general rule, when that March 1 date rolls around, how are people directed to other shelters or are there other places for them that are identified to go once the shelter is closed?

There where to go? There are other shelters and most of them know of them. My understanding just from talking with them is it's I mean there are other ones. There are down in the cities kind of different. There are reasons that folks kind of like us, you know, come out farther. It's quieter but they're definitely there. Powerhouse, many of them are really tied into powerhouse ministries with the day center. You guys know it just moved across the street. And so they're always, you know, year round working with folks to help them move ahead. And Jake's journey as well, you know, working with continuing to work with them after the season ends.

Yeah. So basically some people are probably going back to camping out?

Yeah. Some are. Some are. That's why the ones as I showed, the ones that have found either programs or housing of some sort is wonderful because there's not that many here but folks, some of the folks from the place. Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. I appreciate your service and other services that are working with you.

Thank you. Yeah, it takes a village for sure. So thank you. We really appreciate the city's support so very much. Thank you. Thanks for your time.

Thanks Bev. Thank you. We have one request to speak tonight on this item, Miranda Pond. If you want to come on down.

Thank you. My name is Marina Pond, and I am a resident at City of Folsom, And I'm also unhoused. This past winter, I was a participant in the Folsom Winter Shelter with Heart. And I wanted to bring to the attention of the community because there's been a lot of issues over the last few years. I went back and reviewed the presentations from multiple years and targeted questioning about kind of the more transient population and also, like, exit interviews and linkages to services.

And by context, I have a background in social work, so I bring that perspective to the table. But I think it's important that and, again, I don't know if you guys are funding HEART or not, but two issues. One is they alleged they have a partnership with community First Steps community through a case manager. And it is misrepresented on their website that she provides case management, comprehensive case management, all these services. The way it's portrayed to the community, you would think that everybody that goes into shelter receives case management and that is not the case.

She's only given one hour, three nights a week and that's not enough to meet with everybody. They don't do service plans and there are no formal referral services. And then, two, HART also has been building a transitional they have a transitional housing program as well, and that's often discussed in shelter if they have openings. And this year they did have openings. And I think it's important that the city, which regulates shelter operators in our town, is aware that their transitional housing application contains the majority of unlawful questions that are prohibited by state law, such as immigration status, disability, your medications, among other things.

In addition, they've been recruiting, including through the shelter. It was discussed more than once about their alleged partnership with Folsom Lake College. And I was a student. I became suddenly unhoused for other factors. And that is how I wound up at heart was through their, for lack of a better word, outreach from the college.

I did receive confirmation from the vice president of Folsom Lake College this evening that they indeed do not have a partnership with Heart of Folsom, and that's been misrepresented, including at the ribbon cutting groundbreaking the mayor was at. They were using their logo and alleging a partnership with the college for student housing to recruit specifically girls to put them in the and there's more behind that that has to do with the intersectionality with the church. And I have concerns. I'll wrap it up with the separation of church and state. So thank you.

Thank you.

You have no further request to speak on this item.

All right. That will conclude our scheduled presentations this evening. And we do have we got a late request from business from the floor. But before we move to the consent calendar, I'm gonna invite that person down. Just one request. So, Paran, if you're still here.

Thank you. Good evening, esteemed mayor, vice mayor, and council members. Namaste. My name is Prahran Mathiral, and I'm a volunteer with a Hindu Swayam Sevaksong, known as HSS. Today, I am here before you to invite you to an event.

HSS USA would like to explore the opportunity to introduce our initiative, the Hindu Education Foundation, HEF, to collaborate with educators and schools. I am here today to seek all of the respected council members' presence with your family for the heartfelt celebration of the Guru Vandana program on the occasion of the Teachers Appreciation Day. We are well aware of the profound impact that teachers have on the lives of their students and their dedication, hard work, and passion for teaching our students. This event is our way of expressing gratitude to educators for their invaluable role in shaping future generations. In Hindu tradition, Guru Vandana, meaning salutations to the teacher, honors the deep respect and reverence for teachers.

HEF has been conducting the Guru Vandana Teachers Appreciation Day program to honor students in the local area for over a year. In 2025 alone, over 2,000 teachers and many civic officials attended Guru Vandana across 150 programs held throughout The USA. Our local Guru Vandana event will be hosted at Folsom Middle School in the multipurpose room on Saturday, May 9 from 4PM to 6PM. The program features cultural performances by students, a short presentation on Hindu traditions, and a special teacher feliciation ceremony. It's a wonderful opportunity to engage with the local Hindu community and ex experience this beautiful tradition.

For more details, visit www.fus.org. We are hoping that you can take some time out of your busy schedule and be part of this wonderful initiative to honor our teachers. Thank you. Namaste. Thank you. And have

a nice evening. Appreciate you. Alright. That takes us to our consent calendar.

I'm gonna pull item number nine, please. But I if nobody else wants to point

And number 11.

Oh, nine and eleven. Okay. I'll move the rest of the consent calendar except nine and eleven.

Second.

Please call the roll.

Council member Kozlowski? Yes. Leary? Yes. Rorba? Yes. Aquino? Yes. And Rethal?

Yes.

Okay. Item number nine is resolution number one one five nine seven, authorizing staff to submit grant applications for funding for the Folsom Boulevard pedestrian over crossing project. This would be through the Safe Streets for All grant program administered by the US Department of Statewide Active Transportation Program.

So I don't need a presentation on this. I just this question has come up before and was asked of me on Facebook in the last couple of days. And I had this conversation with city staff, and I thought it was helpful. And so I just wanted to have it publicly. One of the questions that we get is when we do have very limited resources, especially in Parks and Rec and a lot of deferred maintenance needs, why would we commit some local funding for a grant to build something that we can't afford to build on our own?

Obviously, we're going to have apply for additional grant funding to do the construction. So Brian and I think Rebecca was helpful too in my agenda review. But if you guys could just maybe kind of explain how we are being mindful about how much local money we're using to leverage and to get grants and how we need to have some things kind of shovel ready in our queue when opportunities arise and that sort of thing.

Sure. Yeah, thank you very much. So it is something that we have to be very cognizant of. And as we move forward with our budget process too, we will have to be kind of judicious on what more we take on. Part of this is this has been a project that has been on the books for quite some time and this is an opportunity that we've had input over the years.

We have the location. We have the situation that we hope to do someday. The goal would be to leverage funds to get it on a biddable document like plans so they can be on the shelf that if other grant funds come up. But in essence that's what we would try to do. Not just for this but other projects, street projects, we want to proactively design projects so that we can be ready so that when regional funds become available that we can be ready to jump on those opportunities. Rebecca, do you have anything to add to that?

No, you

did a great job. Thank you very much.

Okay. Thank you. Can go ahead and move

on No, I was going

to pull this as well.

This came on consent agenda item two years ago, and I got the information I needed after it passed off the consent agenda. But I do have an issue with this. One of the things that we talked about during our strategic workshop, I guess, a couple months ago, one of the highest priorities in Folsom is solving our traffic and congestion issue. Later in the agenda on item 11, there's nine priorities that the staff has set out. This I don't believe has actually come to counsel as a priority item.

I believe this was staff driven. I think that Kelly gave me a lot of answers when I sent about 11 questions, I think. And I really appreciated that. But it failed a couple different times in different aspects. And I understand what you're saying about having it be design ready.

I just think that the funding that we would need to match these funds are coming from Measure A funds, other buckets of money that we want for other higher priorities that will solve some of our congestion and traffic issues, like Empire Ranch over interchange. The Riley Street, East Bedwell, there's a lot of different projects that I think take priority over this. So I see this as not a priority from the council and not a priority from our public. So I'm not in favor of going forward with this. I wasn't in favor two years ago either.

And I don't think our public is really behind this. And I think this is setting us up for, in several years, to have it on our shelf is one thing. But how do we fund the matching for this? Right now, it'd be $2,000,000 just over $2,000,000 In three, four, five years, it's going to be a lot more than that. And that means we're sacrificing other opportunities unless we go out for other revenue. So I can't support this at this time. I think I'd rather have the staff putting time towards other priorities and other grant applications. So that's kind of where I stand on this. But I do appreciate the staff working together. When I did get the answers, it sounded like there was a lot of collaboration.

And I appreciate that with the staff and Kelly's work. But at this time, I just don't think this is a priority that we want to go forward with.

I appreciate the discussion. Think this is a good discussion for us to be having. I am a big supporter of split grade crossings. I'm a big supporter of a walkable and and bikeable community. I have a really hard time with a with a $20,000,000 gross price tag. I get it. You know, a $20,000,000 investment in our city where we pay 2,000,000, that's pretty awesome. Right? But if it's 2,000,000 that's being pulled from other mission critical projects. So I think it's a good discussion.

I think it's tough to say we're not going to spend $2,000,000 to go after a really cool $20,000,000 thing that would definitely be used by our community and definitely be an advantage to our community. But I think the question is, do we have the 2,000,000 right now? And is it something that's going to pull staff time away from other things? So I'm of two minds about this. There are other split grade crossings that we're looking at, like East Bidwell, across a major arterial.

And it's much more cost effective just because we're not dealing with light rail there. And I also kind of look at the traffic. And I think this is where my question is, is like, from the active transportation plan, is this like our highest priority in the active transportation plan? Do we have any sort of traffic counts where this would be how many people would we have using this on a regular basis?

Yeah. We'll have Ryan Neves come up and talk a little bit about that. I think it's important to note, Ryan, if you wouldn't mind talking a little bit about the ATP, how that is kind of developed. Because in some sense this is not something that's totally new. Maybe initially it was staff driven, but it's been on the board for a while. But I think this is a really healthy conversation because I think that's the right question is where do we want to spend our money? Is this the highest and best priority? So can you talk a little bit about the ATP, some of the projects that are on that, and then maybe share where this stands in that priority?

Ryan, can you also articulate what we're discussing? I'm not sure we ever said that to the public. Cool. That is

Yeah. For sure. Good evening, mayor, members of council. I'm Ryan Neves, capital projects manager in the Parks and Recreation Department. And so the item is to authorization to submit grant applications for the Folsom Boulevard Pedestrian Overcrossing Project.

The project is identified as a high priority in our Active Transportation Program, or ATP, that we update every five years. And so we do robust public outreach as we identify the projects and priorities in the ATP. And so this has been identified as a priority. And we had done some extensive public outreach. We've used some ARPA funds in the past to, conduct feasibility studies.

So, you know, we have you know, and as part of that, we did, you know, did reach out to the community. And so I would say the timing for these grants so the two grants that we identified in the staff report, one's a Safe Streets for All grant and one's the statewide ATP cycle eight. Those grants are both one's due in May and one's due in June. And so we do meet collaboratively all the different departments and talk about these grant opportunities. I think given the timing of those and specific to like the East Bidwell pedestrian over crossing project, another great grade separation project that we do currently have design funding for, and we've just executed that contract and just kind of kicking off that project, we're not to a place where we feel as staff that we're ready to submit additional grants.

We want to get through the feasibility and environmental clearance portions of that or get a little bit farther down the road before we are ready to put that one forward for funding for the next element, which would be construction. And so, yeah, this project was identified internally as our highest priority for these two grant sources. And I would say, again, we we did submit for grant applications in the past. And as you noted, council member Rorabad, we were unsuccessful. We took advantage of SACOG's offer to do some technical assistance on our applications.

And so we feel like we're at a place where we're at the best opportunity to be successful in and grant to complete at least the next phase of design environmental clearance and with the goal of getting a project that's shovel ready. And if it's not a priority, certainly there are other projects timing wise for our trails team. Even if we were to obtain grant funding, we will be wrapping up design of the Highway 50 under crossing project, construction of the Mangini Ranch Trails project. So we have thought about what know, how that will impact staff resources, but, you know, we think timing of this will work out well. And if we don't pursue these grant opportunities now, if we wait for the next cycle, I think essentially this project will, you know, kind of become stale and, you know, and so that, like, is our best opportunity.

So if it's obviously the direction is not to proceed with it then Mr. Mayor. This is the forum to

bring it up. Have a question also.

Councilwoman Kozlowski.

So would it be fair to say that Folsom Auburn Road or Folsom Boulevard in that area is one of the most heavily trafficked roads in our fine city? I think that's fair to say, yes. And for those of you that aren't aware of the project specifics, it's more or less a connection from the hike bike trail that runs parallel to Folsom Boulevard and connects to the light rail station that's at Glen across Folsom Auburn Road to generally in the vicinity of Mel's Diner, Okay? Just so you have some landmarks to think of. And there is a fairly tremendous population of people that live in that quadrant that is North Of Blue Ravine and East Of Folsom Boulevard.

And then there is a very large employment center on the opposite side of that road, which happens to contain my office just as a coincidence. So the ability to take both recreational users off our trail system and get them into the Lake Natoma Recreation Area by way of getting across the road and then also regular pedestrian access from the light rail to those business centers is a pretty righteous goal. And this has actually been under development almost as long as these columns have. And we talked about it quite a lot. I was a skeptic at first, but I think it could be a terrific project.

And taking the next steps towards design with anticipation of future funding from others to get it built, think is worthwhile for whatever that's worth.

Thank you. Councilor O'Leary.

Yeah. I agree with what Councilmember Kozlowski was just saying. This project has been down on the books for quite a while and some progress has been made on it. I think that, there is an increasing amount of traffic along Folsom Boulevard, with people on bikes that are that are using Folsom Boulevard instead of their trails around Lake Natoma to get to the historic district or to get off at Iron Point Road or at Blue Ravine, that would be serviced by this. And so I I still think it's a worthwhile project.

I know it's been a long time in coming, and there, you know, could potentially be an expense for the city. I will bring up that we have someone here in the audience, Will Kempton, who was working on this early on as I recall. I don't know if he wants to comment on it, but the other question I have is that how many other projects that we have on the books for Folsom would qualify for this same funding because this funding is directed for a specific type of project. So projects for over crossings at Highway 50 or in other areas may or may not qualify for the same. But do you have any idea what those other projects might be?

I know when we I mean, some of the project that we discussed I mean, one is the Riley Street project. I mean, pedestrian and cycle bicyclist safety improvements are obviously the focus of these. And so as you know, there's another agenda item with additional requests for grant submissions. And so when we looked at our list of projects and the various grants, we had identified the Folsom Boulevard pedestrian over crossing as the best candidate at this time for these two grants.

So to be clear, you really have to match the project to the requirements of the grant.

Absolutely. That's grant funding that you

can't throw at another project. I think that's something that's not great. Always clear to the

really want to

If I could chime in just briefly. So yeah, so the types of funding and programs that are available, they do have certain characteristics and markers that have to be met. In this particular instance, active transportation really does just focus on that. And specifically, this is a very, very competitive program. We've been unsuccessful at getting some similar grants like this for Riley Street in the past, hence why it's back on the list for our item 11.

But this particular project has a couple of multifaceted community benefits in that not only does it connect state parks over to our trail system and it also has a connection over to the light rail. It's also located near an identified affordable housing site that's helpful in terms of kind of moving folks from place to place in terms of work when they maybe don't have the necessary resources for it. But this project in particular has been a good candidate because of its collaboration not only with state parks but also with SACRT as well. But they do have markers like that. To your point, they do have markers at what type of projects can be proposed for particular funding types.

Worst case, we can always abandon the grant even if they offer it to us.

Thanks for pointing out the commuter benefits. I do appreciate that. The business park is there. There's a significant amount of jobs. It is meaningful to me for sure to get those folks give them a better option to commute and to work on a bike.

I have a Oh, have a question after you. Go ahead.

I already went once, so go ahead.

So the ATP grant does not require a minimum local match, but the SS4A grant does. So would our 20% does that come from the Parks and Rec budget? Or what is that coming from?

Yeah. I would say the potential local match funding sources that we identified were Measure A Fund two seventy six or the TDA Fund two forty eight. So they're funds that we use for parks and recreation projects and trail projects specifically. But obviously, we coordinate with public works because obviously Measure A funds are used for other projects. And so I think it would depend on what the dollar amount is, what the specific local match source would be.

And because there is kind of a mutual benefit to RT or state, probably even Sacramento County, have we explored? Can you submit an application like this jointly with other agencies and maybe share the cost of that?

I think, Ryan, if you could talk a little about this is the ask for a grant to complete the design. What's the anticipated cost of the design?

So yeah, right now our total design cost for the preferred alternative, the north alternative, is $2,600,000 So it's roughly $400,000 for preliminary engineering, another $400,000 for environmental clearance, and then the remainder for final design. But $2,600,000 is our estimate

for So that would that. And so for this particular grant, there would be a match?

So there's two grants that we're requesting approval. One has a 20% local match requirement. The other, the statewide ATP doesn't have a local match. Obviously, if you include a local match potentially that could increase your competitiveness. But there is no required local match for that.

Gotcha. So the one that does have a requirement, it would be the proportion of the total cost. So is that the 11.47?

It would be 20% for that grant.

So $520,000

Yeah. So if we requested and received the full $2,600,000 to complete design and environmental, yeah, then it would be 500. Right.

Councilmember Aquino, we would not use the park recreation budget for it. We would use some designated funds outside of the general fund for this effort.

Okay.

So I have a couple more points. This is something that I really appreciate that you being put on the spot. Thank you for being there. But just having a good conversation about our priorities in the situation. So whatever the majority of the council decides to do, I'll fully get behind.

But one of my insights coming into this was we're already dealing with a lot of deferred maintenance of our facilities in our city. And this is decisions that were made ten, twenty, thirty years ago. And so I want to be mindful of what we're setting up for the next ten, twenty, thirty years. While there might not be very much maintenance initially, but we're kicking the can down what would we have to take out of RCIP in twenty years to maintain or fix a bridge like this? So I want to be very mindful of the priorities there.

And item number 11, which we're going to get to next, there are a lot of priorities there that are very well established and our public is very well aware of. So if we get a competitive bid advantage and we get two of these grants, I would rather see all of Measure A funds going towards Empire Ranch. Not that I don't think this pedestrian overpass is viable or will serve a purpose in Folsom that is very positive. My priority is to reduce the traffic and congestion in our city right now. And so that's where I'm at as far as this and obviously the deferred maintenance and making sure that we are sustainable as far as our financial situation. So that's where I'm coming from as well. Thank you, Brian.

It's a good worthwhile question to ask the sort of maintenance responsibility. What would you estimate, Madam Public Works Director, that we have to budget or expect to expend on, say, the bridge that crosses East Bidwell.

We will refer

to that as the Jack In The Box Bridge.

Which is not

the bridge we're talking about.

No, it's similar in

scope. It's been pretty minimal as far as I'm aware of anyway. I haven't had a chance to look through the historic records of that. That's been do you have any comment on that?

I mean, spoke with our facilities maintenance manager.

Is that one core 10 or is it painted?

It is painted. I mean, yes. It's painted. And so we do need to so we haven't really spent much maintenance dollars.

I'm not talking about over its life.

What are

we expecting to

I mean, so in the last ten years, I think we spent basically about $10,000 But we do have, to your point, now that it's getting to be More than Yeah. Thirty years. We do have a need to repaint the bridge. And so that's an upcoming project in a future fiscal year that we will advertise.

All

right, well in order to facilitate or move this forward I'll move resolution number 11597.

I'll second.

Any further comment or discussion? Please call the

roll.

Council member Kozlowski?

Yes.

Leary? Yes. Rohrabaugh? No. Aquino? Yes. And Rethal? Yes. The motion passes.

Please call the next item.

Okay. Item 11, which was pulled from consent, is resolution number one one six hundred. This is authorizing, again, applications for grant funding from SACOG twenty twenty six federal funding programs.

So I pulled this, and I think, Zach, you had some heads up from some of the questions that I asked. I appreciate all the answer. And, again, this sound like a very collaborative discussion with the whole city, all the city departments. I don't really have any issues with any of these priorities. There's three for three different grants, three each for three different grants, so nine opportunities.

I just want to make sure that the same intent that as we're this was kind of staff driven, and I believe that was taken from comments you've heard and throughout the years. But I think anything like this that's prioritizing major projects should the the council should all kind of buy in on it in public rather than a consent item, which kind of gets a lot of public don't listen to it or hear it. So that's really my intent. I mean, can do a brief it looks like you did something here.

This is proactive, right? I set up a couple slides just for informational purposes. Perfect. If you have specific questions, I can address those really quickly. Or you can give me about five minutes, and I can go through the whole program.

I would appreciate that. I think our public would appreciate that.

Yeah, absolutely. And I'm happy to do so. This is a really great program, and we're excited about the opportunities that this presents to the city. Zach Bosch, senior civil engineer in the Public Works Department, here to present city staff's recommendation for some applications for three different grant programs in the SACOG 2026 federal funding program. So a little bit of background and context.

Our Sacramento Area Council of Governance is the region's designated MPO, and it's responsible for administrating the congestion mitigation and air quality and the surface transportation block grant funds on a region wide basis. So over the past two years, SACOG has been working with a multi agency working group to complete the transition from a four county funding program to a six county funding program. And that it also establishes performance based competitive funding framework to distribute those funds. Since the program guidelines have adopted and the funding assumptions for the fiscal years 2028 and 2030 are in place, And the proposed evaluation criteria and the project budgets are finalized. We are at a staff level working on different applications for these different funding cycles.

So for this program, there's approximately $230,000,000 available, again, from the federal fiscal year 2028 to the 2030 fiscal year. Sacramento County is anticipated to receive about $116,500,000 on that. So there's still estimates at this point because they're dependent on federal authorization for that money. The programs are split into three different groups the Next Generation Solutions and Air Quality program, the System Performance, and the System Preservation. So each of those has their allocated amount.

So we took the two pots of money, the CMEC money and the STBG funds, and we broke them into three different programs. And within those programs are the criteria for each of those that we are submitting applications for. So upon publication of materials earlier this month, city staff evaluated all of the possible projects that we could submit for each program. So we evaluated the deliverability and the readiness of these programs based on the expenditures of the funds, on the timelines established within the grant programs, the cost effectiveness and the matching requirements and the availability, and the consistency and the alignment with the city council adopted plans and priorities. We took these projects and compared them to the project specific evaluation criteria to develop the recommended project list before you tonight.

Each federal program has performance outcomes that the projects are required to be aligned with in order to be competitive, with each project needing to show how to respond to documented challenges and community needs. At a high level, projects will be evaluated based on their deliverability, their readiness, their financial capacity, and the cost effectiveness in alignment with the performance of local and regional priorities by a selected group of subject matter experts within the area. Presented before you tonight are the three programs the system preservation, the next gen solutions, and the system performance. Each agency is allowed to submit up to nine applications, three per category. Additionally, city staff is required to submit a project priority ranking list for each of the programs where one point is allocated to the highest project within each of those programs.

So you get one additional point for the highest project priority, and the other two within that program do not receive that additional point. Staff is happy to answer any questions the council may have about the project list or the order of priorities.

Before you go back because that's really what I wanted to highlight is what we're trying to do, what the city staff is trying to do to alleviate a lot of the issues that our public really cares about. And so those are major things. The Riley Street, obviously Empire Ranch is something we've talked about, East Bidwell, all of these things. And that's what I really wanted to highlight as far as priorities, that we're on it, we're doing it well. I think we could adjust some of these priorities.

Obviously, I just voted against the Folsom Boulevard pedestrian over crossing, put that third, but it's not an issue. So I'm pretty happy with this like I started off, but I'm not opposed to any of this. I just wanted to make sure that we were all kind of got buy in and with public oversight of what we're actually trying to do to solve some of these issues. So you don't have to keep going on if you don't want to unless we

want I've hear this

is really what I was looking for. That's it.

And if I may, Zach, first off, thank you for your preparation on short notice for this and to the entire council for the conversation. I think it's important for us to and I guess I'll say, you know, in hindsight, we probably should just put this not on the consent agenda, more on a public presentation. But anyway, appreciate that.

Thank you.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's fascinating how these things go through the sort of stages of development, kind of like turning into a butterfly because there could be years in between the times when we talk about them, when they're sort of trying to get funding for design, different stages of design. Then they're designed and then they're trying to gather up from multiple sources the funding that's necessary. So they gestate over a really long period. And there is a gap in time that actually makes these things sort of fall out of memory a little bit. So it's great to have this conversation.

Yeah. And I think that it's hard for our public to understand. I mean, they understand it. But it's hard to articulate how long these things take. So where Folsom Ranch was planned years ago, we're finally getting to the stage where we actually can go out for these grant opportunities to actually solve some of the issues that we're facing. So again, thank you so much.

Any other questions for Zach?

I'll move resolution 11,600. Second.

Please call the roll.

Council Member Kozlowski.

Yes.

Leary.

Yes.

Rohrbach. Yes. Aquino. Yes. And Rathal.

Yes. And that takes us to our public hearing section. Please call the next item.

Okay. Your first public hearing item this evening is number 14. This is the Natoma Station Maintenance Assessment District 2502. This will be the protest hearing and ballot proceedings followed by direction to staff to tally the ballots and return with results at the next city council meeting.

This is the time and place fixed for the public hearing related to the proposed formation of the Natoma Station Maintenance Assessment District Number 2025 Dash 2 to fund ongoing maintenance, operation, and servicing of the landscaping, street lighting, public art, and other improvements within the district. Quick announcement before we go on. Anyone needing a replacement ballot may see Amanda with NBS in the hallway near the entrance. Amanda, raise your hand. Give us a wave.

She's out in the hallway.

She's out in the hallway. Yeah. Can you

hear us?

There she is. She's waving right now. She can hear us. I was like, there's speakers out there. I would now ask the municipal landscape services manager to provide the staff report. I'm not normally given a script, so I'm really enjoying the script.

Just one minute.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the council. I'm Derek Perez, municipal landscape services manager for the Parks and Recreation Department. I'll be presenting a brief presentation on the public hearing for Natoma Station's Landscaping Lighting District's current Prop two eighteen status. Quick background. Folsom has 30 L and L districts that maintain assets that provide a benefit to the residents in each district.

These assets include landscaping, street lights, monument signage, artwork, mini parks, as well as other assets. All L and L districts are formed pursuant to the Landscaping Lighting Act of 1972 in the California constitution. Folsom has districts that range in size from 10 to 2,370 units. Most districts within the city, including Natoma Station, were formed prior to their Prop 02/18 and 1996. The map here shows the boundaries of the Natoma Station LML District, as well as the location of the public art pieces.

There are many other assets maintained by the district that are not pictured here. This list includes the major assets in Natoma Station L And L District. A few of the assets include 21 piece of public artwork, seven large entry monument signs, and 16 irrigation controllers that are 36 years old. Here's a brief explanation of the L and L Act of 1972. Essentially, the act allows local governments to form L and L District to fund specified services such as landscape maintenance, street lighting, and maintenance of other items as identified in the resolution formation.

The Prop two eighteen process is a three step process, and the first step was initiated 06/24/2025 with resolution number 11403. The second step was initiated on 02/10/2026 with resolution number 11548, approving the preliminary engineers report declaring the intention to order the formation of a landscaping lighting assessment district to levy and collect assessments to provide notice of public hearing and direct the mailing of assessment ballots within the proposed district in the city of Folsom. We're currently in step three, the public hearing. This is legally required to allow property owners public review comment and protest opportunities related to the proposed assessment. There's a required forty five day period required between steps two and three, which met which was met between 02/10/2026 and 04/28/2026.

This slide here shows the timeline complete to date for the Natoma Station reassessment. This slide here shows where we are currently at with the remaining schedule for the Natoma Station reassessment. Tonight, we are currently at the public hearing, and any remaining ballots will be collected in person by close of the public hearing. Ballots will be tabulated on 04/29/2026 tomorrow, starting at 9AM in the large Public Works Conference Room located at City Hall, 15 Natoma Street, Folsom. Once the city clerk certifies the results, the results will be posted on the City of Folsom website under Landscaping and Lighting Natoma Station district page.

Staff will be presenting the ballot tabulation results to City Council at the 05/12/2026 meeting. I would also like to note that staff held an additional community outreach meeting on 03/05/2026, answering any questions related to the ballots received in the mail by the parcel owners. With that, staff recommends that the city council conduct a public hearing to receive testimony and to allow for the submittal of ballots before the close of the public hearing. Staff recommends following the close of the public hearing, the item be continued to the next city council meeting scheduled for 05/12/2026 so the city clerk can tabulate the ballots on Wednesday, 04/29/2026 at 9AM in the large Public Works Conference Room at City Hall 15 Natoma Street, Folsom. This ballot tabulation is open to the public.

Results from the tabulation will be presented at the May. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Any questions for Derek this evening?

No, sir.

I don't have any questions, but this has been a long time coming. I appreciate all your presentations on it. And I just wanted to reiterate, and this is information I had in mind but, should be shared with the public is that the ballot count will be completed tomorrow, but it won't be certified until our next meeting. But people can get a, report on the results of the ballot count after tomorrow?

It'll be certified tomorrow morning by the city clerk, and then we will be posting the results tomorrow afternoon online.

Okay. Yeah. Great. So people can look those up and They can look that up. Yeah. The community. Great. Thank you.

Alright. The city council will now open the public hearing and hear from any interested person who desires to address the city council on this matter. Do we have anyone signed up to speak this evening?

You currently have no request to speak on this item.

Seeing no one else who wishes to be heard, do any members of the city council have any further questions for staff or consultants as a result of the thrilling public testimony? Sorry. I ad libbed the thrilling part of the public testimony. Sorry. They gave me a script.

Alright. I'd like to remind everyone that all assessment ballots must be received by the city clerk before this public hearing is closed. Ballots received after the close of this public hearing will not be tabulated. Are there any remaining ballots to be submitted? No one? No one? Alright. This is the final call to submit your assessment ballots. The public hearing is now closed. Assessment ballots received by the city clerk after this time shall not be tabulated.

Thank you, mayor and council members. The next step will be the ballot tabulation, which will take place tomorrow, Wednesday, 04/29/2026 at 9AM in the Large Public Works Conference Room at City Hall, 15 Natoma Street, Folsom. This tabulation is open to the public. Once the tabulation is certified, results will be posted on the city website the afternoon of 04/29/2026 in the landscaping lighting website section. Results from the tabulation will also be presented at the 05/12/2026 city council meeting. Thank you.

Alright. Please call the next item.

Okay. Your next item this evening is, public hearing item number 15, resolution number one one five three nine. This is a resolution declaring results of the majority protest proceedings and modifying the assessment rate of the Folsom Tourism Business Improvement District. This was continued from the February 24 council meeting.

Thank you, Mayor and members of the council. The item before you is related to the new TBID assessment of 4%. We've had a few meetings about this and city staff along with the Chu's Folsom staff had opportunities to meet with the hotel owners and as a result of those meetings, governance structure was developed and we have received notifications from, I believe, all the hotel owners that had submitted a protest before. They have rescinded those protests and on the condition of the approval of the governance structure. And I know we have members from TED Corp here with us that can speak to this as well if they so choose.

But in essence, it appears that there's not enough protest to impede this from going forward.

All right. Any questions for the city manager? Alright. Any comments from Ted Corp? You guys are welcome to make comments if you'd like.

Mayor, members of the council, just, wanna express our appreciation to both you, Justin, and the city manager for helping us with this. Just to clarify, you know, we started working with the management of the hoteliers, then it got elevated up to the owners. We were able to convene them and come to this resolution. So we're excited to get started, hopefully we can complete it tonight.

And so if I could just remind the council what the action is, is that staff is recommending, staff recommends that the city council hold a final public hearing to declare the results of the majority protest proceedings and if no majority protest exists, adopt resolution number 11,539, a resolution of the City Council of the City of Folsom declaring results of a majority protest proceeding and modifying the assessment rate of the Folsom Tourism Business Improvement District.

Thank you. And we do have one request to speak tonight from the public. Eileen Reynolds. We're going go ahead and officially open the public hearings. He didn't give me a script for this one.

Good evening, everybody. Thank you very much. My name is Eileen Reynolds. I am here as a member of the public. As you know, I was chair of TED Corp for two years, and I am no longer on the TED Corp board, but I must say that it is very gratifying to have seen how this unfolded. And thank you very much to all of you. I know the process got a little messy for a little while because there were still a lot of negotiations that needed to be had but we couldn't be happier that this is a good outcome and we think this will be a good tool for the city for the future as far as being able to expend some tourism dollars to get more money in our coffers. So thank you very much to all of you. Appreciate it.

Thank you. Bye bye.

All right. Any other members of the public who want to address the council on this item this evening?

All right.

Hearing none, we're going to go ahead and close the public hearing. And I'll move resolution number eleven five hundred thirty nine.

Second.

Any discussion?

Yeah I just want to make a comment. I appreciate the way the governance body was created. I'm not sure who was a part of that. But having three city representatives on there I think is very helpful and more palpable to our public as well. And I think it's just a good balance, even though it's 11 people, which is a lot of people. But I think this is an important. And what they'll do is decide where the money is spent and how it's spent and if it's meeting its purposes. So I appreciate that how this happened.

That brings up a question for me.

Sure.

And that is we have reps two city council members that are already representing the city on the TEDCOR board. So there's two that will be sitting on the TBID committee, and I'm wondering if the intent is to have those be the same people or have some more diversity to manage all of this.

Councilmember Larry, we're going to be bringing that back at a future agenda.

Okay.

Thank you.

I think I think it would be helpful tonight if we just knew which council members were interested, and potentially serving. We're not going to make any decisions tonight, but, is that all

right?

Just to see who's interested.

Sure. And I would just since I'm talking, would also request that we ask the city clerk to officially read the protest, or lack thereof into the record.

Thank you.

So a majority protest officially does not exist because the protests that have been submitted were withdrawn.

Thank you. Any interest in serving? I'll just pull all of us. Are any your interest in serving on the committee?

I'm happy to but I'm also happy to defer to others.

Okay. Councilmember Leary?

I'm interested.

Okay. Councilmember O'Leary? You're Okay. Either way, you're fine. Right. I'm open to the side. And you're currently our TED Corp.

I am. I would be happy to serve, but also I could go either way as well. I do have to say, I was on a city council before outside of Folsom, and this is a board that I was on. It was actually really fun. So it was a really fun process. So if anyone else wants to

do it, otherwise, I'd be happy to do it too.

Yeah. I love being on the board that gets to choose where the money goes. But at the same time, could If we have two folks that are really interested, I could part, but we can discuss that at the next meeting. All right we have a resolution and a second. We've recorded everything into the record we need. We've closed the public hearing. Please call the roll.

Council members Kozlowski?

Yes.

Leary?

Yes.

Rohrba? Yes. Aquino?

Yes.

And Rathal?

Yes. Please call the next item.

Okay, item 16. Can

I just make a comment? First of all, thank you for your support. Secondly, just for clarification purposes, the way the governance structure is written is if, for instance, Anna is the representative, that she's the one for the city council not because there's two TED Corp there's two city council, one that identify who she's representing, whether you're asking us to have her be the TED Corp rep or the city council rep so that we can count it all correctly. We'll just need to have that clarified when you do take that action.

Sounds good. Thanks. Understood.

Okay. Item number 16 is resolution one one six zero one. This is a resolution replacing a prior resolution and approving the updated city impact and connection fee schedule for law enforcement, fire suppression, general facilities, vehicles and equipment, park improvement, Humbug Willow Creek Housing Trust. Sorry I got into this. Water, sanitary sewer, solid waste, transportation improvement, drainage, and light rail impact fees. Sorry. Thanks, Krista. I was in too deep to back out.

All right. Mayor council members, I am Elizabeth Hannah, revenue services manager. And if it's okay, I'll be reading for item sixteen and seventeen on the agenda. Do you need

to read 17 as well? Resolution number one one six zero four, replacing a prior resolution and enacting the annual inflationary adjustment for city user fees.

Thank you. Alright. For item 16 resolution one one six zero one, we have applied the annual inflationary adjustment to impact fees for area for the area north of Highway 50. The increase is based on the approved cost construction cost index, CCI, which is 2.43%. And then for item 17, resolution one one six zero four, we have applied the annual inflationary adjustment based on the approved consumer price index, also known as CPI, to city user fees, which is 3.04%. So with that, staff recommends to adopt resolution one one six zero one and one one six zero four.

Thank you. Any questions for staff this evening? Alright. With that, I'll go ahead and open the public hearing for item number 16. And we have no request to speak. Oh, we have a request to speak. Come on up.

Yeah.

Not sure of the appropriateness, but it did mention water. I just wanted to ask if we could vote on having water at this session. Some of us have forgotten to bring water. I feel like it would cost around $30 I've done an informal poll of looking around, and nobody has well, few people have brought water, but I feel like not all of us Do

you need a cup,

or do you need a water fountain?

Yeah. Well, I didn't wanna

interrupt the session. I yeah. I feel like if we just have maybe $20 worth of water, that's, like, not too much. Feel like we could fit that in the budget.

Water water fountain or cup?

No. Like a water bottle. Oh, k. I I'm willing to negotiate with this.

Any other comments this evening?

I'm willing to answer any questions.

Thank you. You'll have a water bottle here shortly. Okay.

Alright. Appreciate your time.

Absolutely. There we go. Ask ask and you shall receive. Any other comments on item number 16? And we'll go ahead and close the public hearing.

I'll move adoption of resolution number one one six zero one.

Second. Please call the roll.

Council Member Kozlowski. Yes. Larry.

Yes.

Gorba. Yes. Aquino. Yes. And Rethel.

Yes. And we'll go ahead and open the public hearing for item number 17. Any comments? Alright. With that, we'll go ahead and close the public hearing on item number 17.

I'll move adoption of resolution number one one six zero four.

Second. Please call the roll.

Council member Kozlowski.

Yes.

Larry. Yes. Rorba. Yes. Aquino. Yes. Rathal.

Yes. That takes us to old business. Please call the next item.

Yeah. Item number 18 is resolution number one one five nine six, approving the Park and Rec Commission's recommendation to approve the Benevento Family Park Master Development Plan.

Good evening, mister mayor and council members. I'm Brad Nelson, park planning manager. Just give me a minute here

to load this up. Okay. Sorry. This isn't working. Sorry.

Do we let Zach go home too early?

I was trying to get the Here we go.

Sorry about that.

No worries.

Tonight I'm presenting the Benavento Family Park Master Development Plan, which reflects several months of community outreach, public meetings, and a survey conducted in March with over 500 responses. We've had a high, huge level of interest and passion from the community throughout this process, and we appreciate that engagement. Our goal is meant to take that input and translate it into a plan that is both responsive to the community priorities and feasible to construct within the available budget. The plan being presented tonight incorporates key elements that are consistently identified through outreach, including active recreation amenities, neighborhoods serving features like playgrounds and picnicking areas, and necessary infrastructure such as restrooms and parking. We understand there have been some questions about process, cost estimates, survey results.

All of that information is being presented publicly tonight so the city council and the community can review it together as part of this decision. So this slide really speaks to our vision and goals for this evening and how we got from the 2022 plan to the plan that's being presented tonight. After the original approval in 2022 by the Parks and Recreation Commission, we received significant community feedback at a community workshop in 2025 indicating the plan was not meeting expectations, particularly around the balance of active recreation and overall usability. In response, we went back out to the community, corrected or conducted additional outreach, and ultimately revised the plan to better reflect those priorities. The updated design places a stronger emphasis on active amenities while still working within the site's physical constraints, including the terraces and existing pond, and addressing neighborhood concerns related to access and compatibility.

In terms of cost, what you're seeing reflects not just design refinement, but also some real world factors. There's construction cost escalation over time, which we've taken into account and will be taken into account and a better understanding of some site specific conditions, which I'll go over in a bit. Overall, the plan presented tonight presents a balanced approach and responds to the community input. It's feasible to build and remains fiscally responsible as we move forward into the next phase. So a bit about the project site.

It's a 19 acre site. This is Broadstone Parkway here. Carpenter Hill Road is up here. The Vista del Lago High School is right here. We're going to be developing approximately eight acres of the total 19 acre site. There are three terraces. The lower terrace is the terrace that's generally flat, and it's closest to Vista del Lago High School. There's a pond that's in the center. And then we call this the middle terrace, and then there's the upper terrace, which is adjacent to Carpenter Hill Road. So the master plan, which I'm going to show in just a minute, was originally approved in 2022 by the Parks and Recreation Commission.

And since that time, there has been ongoing design refinement and community engagement. So we took that plan out to the community in September, and the initial update was the feedback required some revisions to that plan. So we went back in October with a revised plan. That also did not receive very positive feedback, so we came back in December with a revised plan. And at that meeting in December, we did receive positive feedback.

Since that time, we've had ongoing commission updates January, February, and March of this year, and we also conducted an online survey, as I mentioned. This is that 2022 master plan. I'm going to go over it very briefly because there is an updated plan I'll spend a little more time on. So parking lot this was eight sand volleyball courts, soccer field here, pond in the middle. We had pickleball here, two group picnic structures, a hillside play area, and a parking lot up at the top.

It's important to note that the plan at that time was being phased based on our funding. So this is what was going to be built from that plan. So it was just the parking lot off Carpenter Hill Road, the eight sand volleyball courts, access to the upper terraces, one of the group picnic areas, a play area, and the upper parking lot here. So the 2025 master plan that we ended up with in December, this is what was taken to the January 6 Park and Recreation Commission meeting. And what this plan does, and based on the feedback we received from the SeptemberOctober meetings, was provided passive amenities on the upper terrace.

So there's no parking. There's an overlook here, and then there's pathways that leave down to access the lower terraces. And then our large, unprogrammed grass areas with trees providing shade around them. On January 6, the Benaventa Family Park Master Plan was presented as an action item to the Park and Recreation Commission, and a motion was made to defer the decision in order to obtain additional cost estimates for certain amenities, specifically around the dock structure. And the Commission also wanted us to take the plan to the Planning and Development Renovations Subcommittee for further review.

So, a little bit about our outreach efforts following that January meeting. We met with Folsom Cordova Unified School District. We met with various user groups. We met with this planning development subcommittee. We also had numerous meetings actually, more than are listed here with the residents as well.

In terms of our outreach noticing, for the January, February, and March Park and Recreation Commission meeting, as well as the City Council meeting this evening, we sent out 1,600 mailers to properties within the half mile radius of the park site. That's our ten minute walk service radius for a neighborhood park. We installed four yard signs in the neighborhood, as well as city, e news, and social media postings. This is the plan that shows all the properties that we sent the mailers to. Benevento is right here in the middle.

This is Vista Del Lago. These large brown areas are open space in general. These are the locations of the yard signs. We placed four yard signs around the park site itself. A little bit in history, we did receive a petition back in July 2021, and that was to eliminate the parking lot off of Carpenter Hill Road.

We received a total of 31 signatures from that. In January, we received another petition with over 200 signatures, and that was supporting what we're calling a community prepared plan. So we've followed that with our own online survey, and the purpose was to gather community input, ensuring there was inclusive participation beyond just the public workshops and the public meetings. And it was really to allow us to understand the neighborhood priorities, preferences, and concerns. That was from March '11.

We did have a total of five forty five responses the citywide from the survey. Some of those were from Orangevale, people from Loomis. So we took a we analyzed those, and we were able to confirm that a total of two fifty residents of the responses lived within the half mile radius of the park. So I think this really shows there's a strong level of engagement and really interest in this park. So the first question on this survey was preference for the plan.

So this was that plan which I just said which basically provides more passive amenities on the upper terrace. It has a play area down here, basketball and two stand volleyball and a soccer field. So it was either voting for this or voting for this was the community prepared plan. This has a pickleball down on the lower terrace. It has sand volleyball.

It has a soccer field, a group picnic structure, basketball, a play area, and then an overlook area taking advantage of the fantastic views. So the results from that I'm going to break this down. I'll go through this kind of quickly versus option one versus option two. So there was overwhelming response for the more active elements on the upper terraces, and that was by 80% compared to 20% preferring the more passive amenities. So that was the results from the half mile radius.

These are the results citywide, basically the same, 85%, so slightly more preferred than more active amenities. The next question was to rank the options. Preference one being the most preferred, four being the least preferred. So this was the half mile radius. Sand volleyball received the most, followed by basketball or sorry, sand volleyball received the least, followed by basketball finally pickleball and the multiuse field receiving the most.

Citywide, the results were basically the same, only the pickleball had a few more votes on it. Just taking a quick deeper dive into how this voting was. So the first choice this was pickleball courts. This was the number of people that had first choice. And then sand volleyball courts this was the number of people that had sand volleyball courts as their last choice. So you can see from first to your fourth choice. That was citywide. Another question was supporting lighting on the sports courts. So that was a resounding yes within the half mile radius. Same thing for the citywide response, including lighting on the sports courts.

Supporting a fishing dock at the pond this is kind of interesting. It's basically we consider it sort of a wash. 35% said yes, 39% said no, and 26% said no preference. And they're more or less the same for the citywide response. With limited funding available for amenities, please drag and drop the options below to rank them from one, most preferred, to four, least preferred.

So again, the fishing dock received the least votes, followed by concrete pathways. Additional shade around the group picnic area received more votes. And then the most votes received was providing shade structure over the playground equipment. Same thing for the citywide response with the most votes over the shade structure at the playground area. This was that deeper dive.

Again, you can see how many people voted for their first choice as shade structure over play area versus their fourth choice as providing a fishing dock. So we recognize that compromise is going to be necessary. Not every request can be accommodated. And funding and maintenance and really our long term sustainability really needs to guide the decisions that we're making. A little bit about the funding then.

So the city council appropriated a total of $7,900,000 The plan I'm sharing with you I'm going to actually be sharing two plans. The first plan is a $6,000,000 construction cost. That includes a 10% construction contingency, which I'll explain in a minute. And then the design and engineering costs are about $800,000 permit fee is 65,000 staff administration costs, dollars 220,000. And then we have a project contingency, which I'll also explain in a minute, at $760,000 So that takes us to about $7,800,000 The funding comes from Fund four eleven and four twelve, which are impact fees, as well as $2.40, which are QMB fees.

There is no general fund reliance on this project. Understanding contingencies. So the construction contingency is that's 10%, And that's required by the Folsom Municipal Code. And that's included in the project construction cost estimate, which I just showed you, the $6,000,000 cost. So that covers unseen field conditions, things that if there's some weird thing that happens during construction, if there's quantity adjustments that need to be, made during construction, and if there's minor design modifications that come up during construction.

What the project contingency does is it protects the project from risk. It covers broader project uncertainties beyond the construction costs. And it accounts for design refinements during the design and engineering phase, permitting any sort of regulatory requirements. It also provides for flexibility for scope adjustments based on city council direction. Those are things like add alternates, which I'm just going to explain in just a minute.

It also helps manage our inflation and escalation cost, which I'll also talk about. And overall, what it does is it ensures the city can deliver the full project within our project budget. So there we have some concerns about the site. There's some challenges, and there's some risk associated with those challenges. So from our geotechnical report, there's basically three types of soil on this site.

There's undocumented fill, and what that means our geotechnical report requires over excavation of about two feet and then recompaction in 12 inches lifts or whatever it may be. There's also shallow metal volcanic bedrock, and that is just as hard as it sounds. It's very hard. And then there's large boulders, which are 24 inches in diameter. So those greatly you pull a boulder out of the ground, then you've got a big void.

You pull 20 of them out of the ground, you've got an even bigger void. So there's a lot of earthwork that's going to be involved in this project. Comparison we have about $1,000,000 associated with earthwork costs for this project. And the earthwork costs for Prospector was also $1,000,000 and that was a flat site. Some of the other potential impacts are increased construction cost and then the drainage and the grading complexity just based on the terraces associated with the site itself.

There's also some minor uncertainty around the CEQA review and some of the permitting requirements. A little bit about that construction cost escalation. So this is from Department of General Services, GGS. This is their California construction cost index from 2021 to 2025. So you can see during coming out of COVID, it was quite large, thirteen percent.

And then it's sort of we're seeing it sort of level down. So that's a 7% annual escalation rate over those five years. So if we're out to bid in six months, that could potentially increase the project by $200,000 So now what we've been waiting for, I'll walk through the master development plan. So again, to orient everybody, Vista del Lago High School is on the left side. Broadstone Parkway is at the top of the screen.

This is Carpenter Hill Road that wraps around here. We have a coming off of Broadstone Parkway, we have a 61 stall parking lot. Here, coming into the park, we have a restroom building, and we have four lighted pickleball courts there. We have a basketball court here. And then we have a multi use turf area for lacrosse or soccer.

There's a green space in between those to provide sort of a buffer. Also have a group a smaller group picnic area here. And then we have looped pathways that wrap around the lower terrace here. These are trees that provide shade around the loop pathway. And then this is part of the existing natural vegetation, which we're retaining.

These little lines that you see, each line represents a foot of elevation change. So you can see we're trying to stay out of the areas that required more grading. So this is a substantial hill. It's about 75 feet up there. Then going up to and around the pond, we have stairs.

And then intersecting the stairs is an ADA ramp here. We have a natural surface path that wraps around the pond and connects up to the class one bike trail that's up here. The concrete path then wraps around the pond, and we have that same ADA ramp and stairs taking you up to this is the middle terrace here. So we have a larger 30 by 40 foot group picnic structure here. We have a two to five play area here.

And then we have a separate five to 12 play area here. This is all unprogrammed passive grass space with a lot of trees around it. We have a pathway that also serves as a maintenance vehicle access, which takes you up to the upper parking lot there. And then we have a 26 stall parking lot on the upper terrace up here. We also have an overlook with benches and seating area that takes advantage of the view.

So also, the intent with having this group picnic area here is that would provide as an overlook area. So a little bit about the theming on the project. We're trying to create more of a cohesive vision. And with that, our Benavento Family Park is guided by the theme of nature and wellness. So that reflects some of the site's natural features, and it also features the Benavento family legacy.

So Dave Benavento is a chiropractor in town. He's been involved with Folsom Athletic Association for many, many years. He was also on the Parks and Recreation Commission for many years. So this park really pays tribute to that. So the nature theming is preserving and an experience the existing landscape and the habitat.

The pond really serves as a central feature for the views, for the habitat, and provides passive recreation. We'll be maintaining the existing landscape to the extent possible and introducing additional native drought tolerant landscaping. We'll incorporate nature themed play elements and then shaded groves, trails, and other interpretive features. The picture there is actually Willow Hill Reservoir. Some of the nature themed amenities.

On the left is some interpretive signage that might talk about what the pond is and what some of the flora and fauna is in the pond. On the right is a respite off of a walkway that's sort of softened by the native plant material. These are some nature themed play ideas, which are kind of fun. On the left, there's a shark. And on the right, climbing structure that is a bird. More nature themed play areas. There are toadstools serving as stepping stones. And then those great flower shaped sun sails in the middle picture. On the right, it's a little hard to see. That's actually sort of a forest themed play structure.

Moving on to the wellness theme. It's all about moving and connecting. So it promotes active recreation and healthy lifestyles. So we provided pickleball. We have basketball.

We have multiuse soccer field. We're providing walking loops and endless opportunities for fitness throughout the park, and also spaces for gathering, play, and really for community connection. So, there's a multiuse field here on the left, pickleball courts in the middle, and then a basketball court on the right. So that was the plan that was presented to the Park and Recreation Commission on March 31. Following that, we developed an ad alternate plan for the council consideration.

So the ad alternates, they need to be fully designed. I'll explain about what they are in a minute. And they're included in the bid documents. And then at the time of bidding, they're actually priced separately. So it allows us to establish a base bid for the project.

And then if there's additional funding available, we can plug in those add alternates based on the funding. So it as I mentioned, it provides flexibility at the time of bid. It maximizes the project value. And it's a fairly common approach in public projects, and it most importantly allows us to maintain fiscal control over the project itself. So we've developed three ad alternates, and I'll show you those on a plan.

The first one is including basketball court lighting on that lower basketball court. So that's about $68,000 The second one is providing two lighted sand volleyball courts. We're showing those on the middle terrace. That requires the relocation of that group picnic area closer to the playground. And it also would require we're showing we're including a 15 foot high fence around this volleyball courts where it's adjacent to Broadstone Parkway to keep balls from flying out into the road.

So that's about $250,000 And then our third ad alternate is a fishing dock, and that would require an accessible path. So that's quite a bit more expensive at $419,000 So along with those at alternates, there's a design cost that's associated with those. So in talking to our consultant team, they've indicated that's going to be about $74,000 So the total cost to include these add alternates would be $800,000 So just want you to keep in mind, if the project did not come in within budget and we were not able to activate those add alternates, we would not be able to recoup that design cost. So that design cost would be gone. So this is what that plan looks like with those add alternates.

So you can't see it, but there's lights here now. This is on basketball court. This is the well, I'll do this is the concrete walkway around the pond. And then this is the fishing dock here. If you've seen our fishing dock over at Willow Hill Reservoir, that's what this one is modeled after.

And then the third one is this addition of the sand volleyball courts, which are up here. This is the group picnic area, which we moved to the other side of this walkway to make room for the sand volleyball courts. And then there's fencing, which would be on this side. And then it would wrap around for eight or 10 feet or so there. So council members, I want to thank you for the discussion tonight.

And I really want to thank the community for all the input we've heard throughout this project. It's clear there's a very strong level of interest in this park. And we recognize and appreciate the passion the community has really brought forward. At this point, approving the master development plan allows the project to move forward towards construction, which we know is an important goal for the community. So I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Brad. You're welcome. I'll start with you. Councilmember Aquino, any questions for staff? Councilmember Larry, any questions?

This has certainly been a very long, laborious project. And, you know, one of my concerns has been increased costs for staff time to continue to revise these plans. And I know there's been a lot of impediments along the way. And then, you know, with these other alternative potential add ons, if there's money available, what is the plan for making a decision about when to move forward on those or not?

When to move forward with the add alternates? Yeah. So if the council determines to include or to approve and move forward with the plan with the add alternates, we would proceed with the design of the park. We would have the base bid cost, and then we'd have basically one sheet or probably multiple sheets of each of those add alternates. So at bidding time, we'd have the base bid, which would be the main park itself.

And then the contractors would bid those separate elements out the pond or excuse me, the fishing dock, the lights for the basketball court, and then the sand volleyball courts separately. And so then we would see if it comes in under budget and if we have enough money, then we can start plugging in based on the cost of each of those ad alternates. So it would happen during bidding.

So you would make a decision about whether alternate one, two, or three were all going to be included or maybe just alternate one at that point? How would you make that decision?

So I think ultimately when we have the bids and we would identify the costs, when we bring the project for approval by the city council that's when it would be decided. We have a public discussion and it would be we accept two of the items or it's just not going to work out. We just have to go with the base bid. But the critical path now is to get a plan approved so that we can get our designer designing it so we can have biddable documents and then we go out to bid as fast as we can and then we'll get those bids back then we can have that discussion of what that ultimately looks like.

Okay. And I just have one word of caution about the fishing dock and fishing ponds. We've got one in my neighborhood that people fish in, but Willow Springs Reservoir and Willow Hills Reservoir both have had a lot of problems with long pieces of fishing line being left behind and wrapping itself around wildlife. You know, loss of some of the birds in those areas is one thing. But the other thing is is that hooks are left on the ground because people aren't really picking up their materials when they break their lines and leaving them behind.

There have been kids that have been stepping on those. So that is a consideration to take and, you know, develop some kind of a plan for if you're going to go ahead and add another spot for people to fish. There's a regular rescue group that rotates around all of the ponds in the city trying to clean all of that up. I think it's an issue that ought to be taken into consideration. At any rate,

Thank you.

Back to you, Councilwoman Barracchino.

I do have one question, Brad. At what point in the process are the contingency funds removed if they're not used? Does it go all the way through? Or when we come back from design, are we taking anything off?

It would go all the way through.

All the way through. Okay.

The project contingency, yes.

Got it.

Vice mayor, questions?

This is kind of a future question, but what are we going to do or what are the thought process behind that parking lot that's by Vista to how to protect that for the usage of the park versus the usage of students?

That's a great question. We've talked about that externally and internally and with the school district. So right now, I think the of the direction that we're headed is we would do some sort of hourly parking in that lower lot to kind of control. You know, and of course we'd have to have somebody patrolling that. So but I think it would keep the honest people honest. But that's sort of our intent right now. So it would be we've talked about with the school district, and they wouldn't want to have any sort of a permit parking on the city property. So our intent would be to preserve the parking lot for the park users.

Councilmember Kozlowski. Yeah, this one sorry to bring this up actually. This park has been a little bit of a football the entire time I've been on the council. And there was a park design that we set aside because it was going be too expensive. And then we had an alternative park design that tried to take advantage of the potential for some economic development activities.

And that is how we ended up with the park design that had the larger number of sand volleyball courts. Is there some other place that we've identified that can accommodate a larger number of sand volleyball courts? Or have we abandoned that altogether? And during the public outreach, was there any discussion about whether our parks should be used for tournament play and to be able to draw people to town for things like that? Are That the hotels restaurants and all the other activity that happens when youth sports activities happen?

Those are very good questions. We currently have four sand volleyball courts that are programmed for the parks, the community parks down in Folsom Plan area. And other than that, we don't have we still have there's three remaining parks

The specific number that was there was eight.

Yes. It

eight, and it was was specifically because that's a number that you have to have in one place And to be able to host a tournament for that

since that time, there's a private facility that opened up just a short drive up the hill. And so there is no longer the demand for that.

And one other thing to add. Mean

guess the broader question apologies. The broader question is whether or not we want to program our parks for economic development activity or not. Because had we gone forward with the plan that we had, it might have been open before this other facility came to exist.

Yeah. And for the sake of my hairline, I think that was my preferred alternative when we had this meeting in September. So we presented that alternative. Basically our park staff said, hey Brian, come to this meeting. We're going to have this discussion about this park and this will be the kickoff to get it designed. And I was just a casual observer in the back, but things spiraled downhill very quickly. Know, we probably had 30 or 40 people in attendance and they said this is a terrible plan. Right? I mean, this is horrible. How could you do this to us?

And then I tried to use the economic benefits of, oh, you're just going after the money now, And so that caused the course change. I mean, and so I mean, think it's sometimes I say I talked to my family a little bit, and I said, man, this job would be a lot easier if it weren't for the people. So, you know, and it's because of the people that actually, I mean, this was a difficult process, but I think it's some, at least from a staff perspective and a personal perspective, that through this journey, we may not have got some of the things that we thought we wanted, but I think we got a lot of things that I think resonated with the community members that have been involved intimately with this process going forward. And I think we're going to have a park that may not be a revenue generator, but it'll be something that'll be a jewel for that area for a long time.

I think if I can just follow-up on that as well. What we've done in terms of trying to build out the park system in the plan area specifically is we've developed park design principles, which have a draft has been prepared and they've been shared with the Park and Recreation Commission. And so that would eliminate these sort of special facilities, such as this eight sand volleyball complex, in neighborhood parks. So Benavento is considered a neighborhood park. So serves a half mile radius where it greatly impacts the immediate neighborhood. Things like that would be more appropriate at a community park, which we have two community parks which we're planning down in the plan area.

Listen, I don't mean to be a black cloud. I think the design is lovely. I would prefer that we not budget for the alternate for the fishing dock at all. Just put that out of our minds because I don't think it's necessary. But I just each one of us at different times or maybe I can just speak for myself.

At many times, many instances, I have committed myself to working on revenue from all sources. And one of those is economic development from tourism. And we are making choices that undermine the ability of us to do that in some instances. And I appreciate the distinction between community and neighborhood park. And this may not be the perfect place for it, but we should always be talking about whether or not we have opportunities that are economic in nature.

So that was it. I just wanted to bring that up. I think the work is excellent. I think the result is going to be terrific. But I just think that we've got to always be leaning back towards what our principles are in terms of what we can afford to do and what we can afford to take care of over the long haul. Thank you.

Thank you. Brad, I just got a couple of questions for you. And I think you started to say it. You said we have a number of undeveloped parks left.

We have three undeveloped parks in Empire Ranch.

So if money was not spent on this park, then it would be spent likely on the next undeveloped park in Empire Ranch?

It could be. And there's also there's a total of six other undeveloped parks in North Of Highway 50 that this could be spent on.

Okay. And then I have to assume I I look at the the ad alternates, and I I I support this process kind of in the idea of it. But I look at it and go, okay. Lighting for the basketball court. The pickleball courts are lighted? Yes. So right next door. So they're already gonna be designing lighting, like, right next door. So, like, to have that as, like, a design alternative, I just can't think that there is much work associated with it. It's probably, like, the bid, you could just be, like, light the basketball courts or not. Like, it almost wouldn't even be a cost for design. It's like a it's just a bid alternate, right? Am I off base there?

There is a little bit of design because it would be on the electrical end because we would be, the electrical load would be have to calculate it for all of that. Sure. And then accommodations for the footings for the light post. So it would be minor. The design costs for that would, are definitely minor compared to the other two.

Compared to the other two options. Yeah. That's what I would think. Okay. And and if if we didn't do the design costs, I couldn't help but notice the amount to actually just go ahead and install the lights at the basketball court, which seem generally publicly supported. We would actually have a little less money than spending the design costs. Like, we could just go like, can we just go forward with that option? Can we include that as part of option one?

If if that's the yes. If that's what the council would like to do.

Or I guess we could leave it as a bid alternate if we wanted to. But I'm just kind of curious, like, is there the expectation that that money would be because you're right now option two, like, hey, we can just add $74,000 to it. But where was that $74,000 kind of projected to come out of?

That would come out of the project contingency. Okay.

But if you approve the first one, we could still include the lights for the basketball courts, either one.

We would just do it out of project contingent. We'd start spending our contingency before we get anywhere close to I think the

biggest difference is the volleyball complex. That's more of a more significant amenity when you see the second master plan.

Okay. Thank you for that clarification. I'm going to go to public comment now. So thanks so much. Brad, we may have some more questions for you after public comment.

Okay. So we have about five requests to speak. So I'm gonna read, the next speaker and then the speaker who will follow them. So if you know your next, please come over to the side here and be ready to go. Our first speaker will be Andrew Silcox, who will be followed by Terry Isaacs.

I just got the air conditioning fixed.

And if you have any more requests to speak, please go ahead and turn them in now for this item. You.

Yeah. Greetings. My name is Andrew Silcox. I've lived in Empire up in that part of Empire Ranch for twenty three years. I've been a resident of Folsom for almost forty years now. So I've had three different houses, and I've been waiting for this park for twenty three years. It was promised to me when I moved in. My family's all lived there. They've grown up. They've moved away. So now it'll be for the grandchildren. I really encourage you to vote yes for this park to move it forward so we can start enjoying the land, please. Thank you.

Thank you. Appreciate you coming up.

Okay. Our next speaker is Terry Isaacs. Terry will be followed by Karen Gifford. So, Karen, you're on deck.

Thank you for letting me speak. My name is Terry Isaacs, and I live directly across the street from Vista Del Lago High School, so I'm very aware of where this park is gonna be built. I always wanted the full, volleyball courts. I don't know why we're we're turning down making money. Anyone who lives there know there's swimmies, across the street at Vista del Lago all summer long, and I'm sure that they generate a lot of money there. But moving forward, a lot of work's been done. I like the way everything looks, but I want the volleyball courts. We have kids. We have teenagers. I want them to have a place to play.

The meetings we have all been at, so many of the students from Vista del Lago have wanted these volleyball courts. I want them lighted. I don't think it's gonna cost that much more. Also, everything is going up. Why are we waiting? You know? Oh, okay. Maybe we'll get the volleyball courts five, ten years from now. It's not going to happen. To put everything in place right now, phase one is going to be the most cost effective way to go. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay. Our next speaker is Karen Gifford, who will then be followed by Stephanie Parsons.

Hi, everyone. I'm Karen Gifford. I live in Empire Ranch. Thank you for all the work that's been done on this park. I've been involved since September. I was at that meeting, and I wish so bad that I had spoken louder. I left early because I had to be somewhere, and I didn't know at the time this is just a note for staff maybe next time you do a meeting like this, let everyone know that they can speak up and change things. Because what I thought was being presented was like a final plan. I didn't know that if I spoke up, I could get what I wanted. And I didn't know that I should be speaking against the naysayers that were there because I was sitting back thinking like, well, sucks for you guys.

Like, this park's awesome. I love these eight volleyball courts. I love what this is gonna do. This is amazing. And then I left, and I was so sad later when I realized that they could change everything. So, about the dock, I think the dock's gonna be awesome. I realize it's a high cost. There are already fishhooks everywhere, just so you know. People fish there all the time, fishhooks everywhere. I don't know. I don't know what the solution to that is. I mean, I don't think a doc's gonna change about the fishhooks, but I really encourage you guys to consider the adding on what do what are we calling that? The adding thing?

Add on

the I love your idea. Add on the basketball lighting. We've been waiting for this park twenty three years. The reason that it's costing so much now is because we waited twenty three years. If we had done twenty three years ago, it would have been a lot cheaper. So, anyway, thank you for your time, and thanks again for all the stuff. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Okay. Our next speaker is Stephanie Parsons, who will be followed by Frank Mukhtar.