Council Economic Development Committee - Regular Meeting

Okay. Good afternoon, everybody. Today is, Monday, 04/07/2025. It is 05:05 zero 1PM. This is the council economic development committee. I'd to call meeting order. And, mister Castro, if you please take the role.

Alright. Council member Eponia. Council member Andrews. Andrews. And mayor Sleens. Present. Thank you.

Moving on to public comment. This is reserved for anybody in The audience that would like to make public comment are we on Zoom too? Yes. Oh, okay. So anybody in person or online that would like to make a public comment, feel free to do so now. I don't think anyone is online, and there is nobody in the room that, like, made public comment. So, like, close public comment, then I'll move on to approval of minutes.

Say aye.

Moved by council member Andrews, seconded by council member Mamilla, and if there are no objectives, it will move in the past. Thank you. Moving on to item number two. This is the oral report. This is the downtown Hayward Association, also referred to as DHIA, and, I believe our economic development officer, Paul Leedon, moves.

Thank you. Thank you, mayor. Good evening. Council members, tonight, we are fortunate to have Dominic and the queue district managers for the DHIA to speak to you and provide an update on all the great work that they're doing. This item is a direct referral from this body, asking the DHA to come and provide an update about the current initiatives and to discuss some of their achievements over this last year and then segue into a broader discussion on their upcoming program and how the cities might be able to partner to move some of these initiatives forward. That, I'll turn it over to Dominic.

Thank you. And we have a slideshow that I prepared and Perfect. Next slide real quick. Okay. Perfect. Well, thank you all for the opportunity to speak to you today. I have had the pleasure to work with many of you before, and it's nice to meet some of our new council members as well. My name is Dominic Lamanja. I'm the district manager for the Downton Ability Improvement Association. What the DHIA is is that it's a community benefit district formed in 2018 for a ten year term.

And what a community benefit district is, it is a special assessment district that is formed to provide supplemental services above and beyond that we see if they would currently provide. This is quite large. We have over 250 property owners, over, I think, about 275 business owners as well. And our boundary extends from the BART station all the way to the Hazel, where the world gas is next to leaving wind. So it's a pretty, large swap. And as I mentioned, the district was originally formed in '28.

Perfect.

Yeah. Thanks, Matt. So, just, I wanted to provide some brief, history just to kinda set the tone. As I mentioned, it was formed in 2018 for a ten year term. And the first few months of the the when Dish was formed, we're really just really getting the length under the organization, choosing the office space, getting our insurance in owner, choosing the logo, and then also getting our insurance policies under our belt so that we can commence our services.

As soon after forming, we commenced services in July 2019. We all we I personally hired the meeting staff, five time employees, and we commenced services for a brief five months before essentially the world shut down during COVID. And I was at the time managing the district living in Alameda when COVID hit the Bay Area. And so, you know, when COVID happened, it was a very unprecedented times. A lot of services pulled back from downtown.

Our service our main employees were actually being essential workers during that time, so we were out there still providing daily services. From the very beginning when we were wiping down crosswalks and benches, we didn't really understand what COVID was to, you know, all the way to September later that year when we were working with city staff as well as the downtown streets team to reintegrate services in downtown. And since then, we've been continually providing services to the downtown district as well as the property owners. In 2022, we actually transitioned our in house maintenance operation to a third party vendor that was at the time next street. And then the year after that, we brought in another maintenance manager works, and we had them until just recently last month where we transitioned back to in house.

And as I mentioned, we just transitioned back to in house, and the reason for doing that was both for vegetarian reasons, but also because we want to get much more active in place making and aggregation in downtown. New City Of America, we manage about seven districts statewide. We've created 99 of these special assessment districts nationwide. And what we wanted to do is bring some of those best practices that we can other districts and bring them to down on Hayward to help reenergize the downtown street traffic and also hopefully encourage some more tenants tenant occupancy on the street and district wide. Next slide, please.

So overview of our organizational structure, we have 12 board members. Two of those board seats are placed by the city. Sarah and Daniel Mouser are representing the city. Our fiscal year budget, our most recent year budget was $870,000. Our actual annual budget is about $653,000 in assessments, but we've also had a carry forward that we had some savings during COVID non sponsoring events.

I'm doing a lot of those other activities in downtown, so we are able to serve that money. And, really, we've been kind of holding on to that money for a lot of big purchases and infrastructure purchases in downtown, many of those that we've made in the past year. That two thirty nine parcels, that was from originally when the DISH was formed, but, I believe that that's expanded now since some properties have been split up. But, some of those property owners have also consolidated in terms of their ownership. But the property owner consistency also includes some county agencies as well as the city of Hayward.

City of Hayward owns about 25% of the dish parcels within our district, and we also have BART, USPS, United States Postal Service, and then I think there's one more AT AT and and That we may have to manually bill. And then as I mentioned, our services are designed to provide, above services above and beyond what the city of Fort Worth provides, and that's according to prop two eighteen. The services that are afforded by these special assessment districts are not meant to replace general benefit services. So that's why we look to work with our maintenance services department as well as our public works department to say how can we enhance what they're already doing. And a lot of times we work with the downtown streets team to go into areas that we, by mandate, can go into, namely the city parking lots.

And then as I mentioned, the majority of our district business business is actually conducted through three committees, advisory committees, cyber operations, state of identity, and then a land use committee that doesn't have to operate budget, but still operates to, look at, projects downtown as well as infrastructure needs. Next slide, please. Perfect. So this is a brief, summary of what each, committee which each advisory committee, covers, and kinda kinda gets recommendations to the board on how programs and projects should be furthered. So we have our sidewalk operations.

We call SOHO for short that oversees our maintenance operations as well as any hired security personnel or an expansion of the nascent camera pilot program that we we tried a couple of years ago in downtown. We also have a district identity and streetscape improvement project or a committee rather. We call it Dizzy for short that oversees all the marketing and sponsorship for special events, any place making activities in terms of tables and chairs that we intend to put out, that'll be run through that committee as well as the new banners that we're putting up around the district. And then finally, our latest and project review committee, as I mentioned. This committee doesn't have an operating budget.

It's mainly just, there for review of new projects coming into the district as well as advocacy for land use specific items like fiber in downtown or, you know, the effects of the loop in downtown. Next slide, please. So this is some brief highlights of what each committee handles. With Sobo, it's really, it's Sobo accounts for about 69% of our overall budget in downtown. It's really the services, the meat and potatoes of our district.

So that's where we oversee our maintenance operations. Since transitioning from our third party vendor, there's been a a somewhat of a lag, about a month lag in terms of us restarting our pressure washing services in downtown. That is because we had to wait for our pressure washing service vendor to come out and assess our machine that happened last Friday, and they're able to, perform some on-site repairs. Our machine is now ready to use, and now we're gonna be training our staff this week on how to use it. And, if you really wanna get into the details in terms of how pressure washing works, there's a service cleaner, and then there's a wand. With the wand, you're not gonna get the gum that you're you see a lot of, let's say, dirty bird. There's a bunch of gum right in front of it. Nick and I just walked by it. That's gonna be our first test case scenario where we go out there with service cleaner. The service cleaner acts as a big buffer.

It takes up that gum, and so that's gonna be one of the first sites that we hit just to kind of give a good impression our services are commencing. When we started back in 2019, if anybody remembers, it was the old billet hall chalk it up on Foothill Boulevard. It also had tons of gum in front in front of it. We wanted to make a statement in terms of our service in the back. So this time around, it's gonna be dirty bird, but what we're hoping to do is commence those services as soon as possible because although downtown is pretty free of litter and graffiti, Nick and I did a walk through earlier today, the sidewalks will look pretty rough.

And so that's something that we wanna overlay our fresh washing services back onto it. And, ideally, we can get back into our original rhythm, which is about the entire B Street corridor from second to walk ins per month. And so that's the ideal that's what we're striving for, and that's what we're originally doing before we transitioned to the third party, but we know we can do it, done it before. We had the machine to do it, so that's what we're going with that. I mentioned that we're providing regular steam cleaning, so we're gonna commence that very soon.

We installed 20 hanging basket flower baskets on B Street. A lot of those were planted last fall, and so they've actually run their horse and plants. So we're gonna be taking those down and replanting them for spring. We've also installed over 20 decorative corner planters around downtown. Some of those are doing very well. Some of them have been completely excavated by people wanting to bring home some plants. So all of the stuff is But

it's free. We Yeah. Exactly.

It's it's our own dream thumb program globally. But the idea is that, you know, this is housekeeping. You know, when people, you know, graffiti or trash can be with flow or they spilled coffee on the sidewalk, that's why the DHI is here to clean it up, to return it back to baseline. So that's what we're looking to get back into. So if there's plan is missing, we're gonna replace them.

If there's something that's graffiti, we're gonna take care of it. If there's sidewalks that need to be pressure washed because of high use, that's why we are here. And then the last point, the we always saw the installation of string lights, although this is kind of a cooperative program between Sobo and Dizzy because it's designed and public safety. It is a it was a pretty expensive project to do all of Foothill this past year, and so that came out of our Sobo budget because it is, as I mentioned, where the majority of our budget come from. And so we installed a string lights that are permanent on Foothill from C all the way to about City Center Way, And so we're gonna be looking to do all the other adjacent corridors incrementally year after year and spend down that current board that I mentioned over there.

Next slide, please. And then district identity, this is the fun stuff, the stuff that's really flashy. And so since May March 2022, we've been actually contracting with a PR social media firm who promotes the good things that are happening in downtown. Mainly why we have a PR firm is because when DISH was formed back in 2018, a survey of property owners determined that a a lack of a positive profile, good reputation in downtown was one of the overarching or general themes or shortcomings of downtown that property owners identified. So understanding that, we wanted to help control that narrative.

And how do you do that? It's with the PR firm and social media. And so if there are bad stories coming out about your destination or your locality or district, then the district is there to inject good stories, a positive association. So we had a pretty good success, right off the bat and as well as, I 2023 when Nate had us on, face on the San Francisco Chronicle talking about Downtown Hayward. But the idea is that, you know, it's not just one article that's gonna change hearts and minds. It's really kind of a a progressive strategy of getting those stories in and really changing people's perception from the ground. And so it's with social media. It's with PR. We've been building our social media for the last couple years from scratch. We had a we originally had a PR firm during COVID.

That PR, we transitioned to all of us, I mentioned in March 2022, and at that time, we had to essentially create all of our or recreate our social media from scratch. So today, we're going very strong, and downtown events definitely help us boost up because get a lot of visibility via that. And that's why we also are very active in sponsoring and supporting a lot of our downtown events because in the absence of a lot of that foot traffic and customer traffic that COVID did away with, the downtown events are really capable and centrally bringing back people to downtown because people come to downtown, they have a good time, they see a business that's vacant. Potentially, that could be a a new tenant that could pull that business in the elderly and death on Hayward. And then we also designed a new downtown mural banner, something that we've been working a long time on.

First, we had to really audit how many polls were eligible in downtown. And from that audit, we found out there were about a 117 street poles that we could install brackets on. And with that, well, there's there's more than a 117 poles. We just didn't wanna have a a ban on every single pole because then we looked like little it'd be too much. So we did every other and so, we printed a 117 banners. We have nine designs, 13 versions of each banner. And so, those banners are currently going up right now. We had some issue with our installer in terms of them to giving us one price then giving us another price midway through the entire price. So we're shopping other options now, but the banners are in our office. They're just waiting till we confirm that vendor to get those up.

But those will should be completed within the next month and a half once we secure that next vendor. And then, each holiday season as well, and what we wanna do is definitely, you know, establish a sense of routine in downtown. And so we did this before COVID. We're looking to bring it back with our in house maintenance operation, but to decorate downtown around the holidays. So around springtime, do spring flowers in our in our barrels in downtown, do some stuff that's really just going to reflect the season.

In summer, do something that's conducive for summer. In the fall, we did this one time, and I'll I'll reference it is that we did hay bales, scarecrows, and pumpkins. I think it was during COVID that we did it, so people tend to grab those pumpkins and go home with them. But it it was a way just to kind of give people a little bit of a whimsical flair as they come to downtown, do the downtown shopping. So we do that already for the holiday season. You can see in the picture I provided for the around the holiday season. We do we decorate B Street as well as the surrounding area, but we wanna get more active in doing this for each season. So when people come to Downtown Hayward throughout the year, they can see a downtown that changes with the season. And next slide, I believe. And these are just some events that we supported.

All these pictures are from events that we supported this past year, everything from the May Day festival to Latin Jazz Festival, the Mariachi Festival. I don't believe that we gave a financial sponsorship for light of the season, but where we don't get financial sponsorship, we also look to promote via social media and just throw around that bait and to promote downtown happenings. Next slide, please. And then these are some projects that we're looking forward to working on in 2025. One thing I I forgot to mention is that we just launched a new website that promote our district as well as our downtown happenings.

And so one thing that we launched last year that didn't get a lot of traction that we're looking to relaunch this spring is our downtown big belly artist call for artists. Essentially, have all these units in downtown, 35 of these dual stations in downtown. The DHI worked with maintenance services staff to place them strategically in downtown. And the idea is that with these 35 stations, there was an opportunity for us to to decorate them or adorn them with local art. And so this was actually a program that I had familiarity worth, familiarity with, excuse me, when I was working in San Francisco.

These big bells are very common in San Francisco with some of the issues, around trash that they have. And so they gravitated towards these big bellies back in, 2019 to 2021. And a great project that they were able to spearhead in San Francisco is the adorning of these cans of public art. And so they did a public art competition, providing the stipend to the artists that were chosen, and then adoring these trash cans Blessings. With art for over a year.

And so it's a way for the community to actively kinda curate the experience, as you, traverse these districts. And then, some of the other pictures that I included were, you know, tables and chairs from a local event on B Street. This is something I mentioned that we wanna get more active in doing with our in house maintenance operations. B Street is built for having that kind of bistro atmosphere. And so what we wanna do is roll out tables and chairs on B Street, have them maintained by our staff. Why we've been so reluctant to do so up until now is because, one, our maintenance operations through our maintenance vendor ended at around four point two. So but these tables and chairs out, we can't guarantee they're gonna be there. Get back there the next morning. And,

also,

I think everyone understands that our foot traffic isn't quite to where it was pre COVID on the street, and that's what we're hoping to engender this year is more foot traffic returning to downtown. And while DHI is hoping to complement, what the city is already doing is really just set the board, set a welcoming atmosphere for people to return to downtown and do the shopping to go out for a bite to eat or just to do the retail shopping. And then the picture on the far right is Memorial Park. We wanna do is get more very involved in trying to drive programming activation on Memorial Park. We understand the libraries always storage. Heritage Park. Sorry. Heritage Park. Excuse me. That's another another park.

Heritage Park.

Heritage. Heritage.

Thank you, Sam. Mhmm.

Heritage Park. This is a fantastic asset that is a really invaluable to our downtown screen space. And what we wanna do is definitely activate it, and we know that the library's already doing a great job activating it. We wanna help promote what they're doing and then also potentially drive more operators there. You know, I know that the library is kinda wearing multiple hats right now, and doing these events in other districts, I can tell you it's a full time job unless you do this as, you know, as this is your job.

So what we wanna do is see if the city's open to finding somebody that we can tap to bring their network, to bring their resources to this park to activate it because we think that with this park being activated, it's gonna send all those customers back to the downtown. And hopefully, like I said, patriots the businesses and maybe one of those people will go and see an empty business front and wanna be able to wanna invest their game in in that business front. And then the bottom two images, public safety, or public camera system in downtown. I mentioned earlier is that the DHI actually launched a public camera system, a pilot program back in 2020. Not too much too much success.

What we found out in installing LPRs and HDR cameras on five locations in downtown that the locations we installed actually had a a big impediment in terms of providing upload speed adequate upload speeds for those cameras. So we're trying to leverage private fiber optic or private connections at those buildings to support these cameras. What we found is that those businesses couldn't support the upload speeds required for the LPRs. So the system the pilot program wasn't really able to expand beyond those five locations because, one, we just couldn't find people that could in a key intersections that could support these cameras. And two, it was this kind of this hodgepodge pilot where we provided the hard work, they provided the connections, but it's just there was just too many things, too many variable factors to make it scalable and make it successful.

So, that's not to say that we're not interested in still partnering with the city, and this has been has been an ongoing conversation with HPD for some time. We still have carry forward funds for this purpose, But we I think just recently, we heard back from HPD that if we were going to move forward with this, it'd be something that we would have to essentially move forward with ourselves, but then patch in whatever footage we have to HPD's network. We're not interested. The h the DHI is not interested in having a siloed storage of camera feeds. That's just expensive.

It doesn't normally any any good. What we wanna do is if we set the system up, essentially give HPD full access so that they can access the footage when they can. And then final bottom right, diffuse events. This is a company that that New City America company that I work for work within four of the districts to do what we call a taste of dish type of event. And I work in literally in San Diego, Chula Vista, East Village in Downtown San Diego.

In each one of those districts, we do a taste of East Village, taste of Chula Vista, taste of La Ole, and what it essentially is the ticket event in which all the participating businesses or restaurateurs within an area sign up to provide a taste, a sample of what they, serve at the restaurant, and then the ticket goer, they go in, check-in, get their ticket, and the ticket access the passport. They go to each of the businesses, get a taste. Not only is it great way to introduce people to downtown businesses, but to get them accustomed to walking over downtown and actually patronize local businesses. So that's what we want. We want people to create a connection with the sense of place and with the operators in that sense of place.

And so that's why you find that taste events are very successful and kinda hitting two birds, one stone, showing people a new side of downtown, but also filling their bellies with the food. So this is something that we're gonna be taking up this year from the DHA side of things. We're gonna partner with the chamber actually to do a dual program in downtown and actually had a a great talk earlier today about know, because the chamber is a partner here, incorporating more restaurants that are outside downtown so they can set up a table and serve so that this can truly be a taste of Hayward, not just Downtown Hayward.

Yeah. All

all in the all, what we're really looking to do is drive more traffic to downtown when people are here. You know, show them that downtown, you know, if they've had a bad experience in the past, give downtown another try, demand another chance because, hopefully, they'll be pleasant best of luck to me. And then I think that's the last slide, but just oh, I think district challenges. So this is some of the challenges that we've experienced over the course of the district's tenure thus far since we've been in operation in late twenty eighteen. Obviously, you know, first and foremost, long term property vacancies or undercapitalized businesses.

I mean, we all know the name Ken Mitchell here. I think we all know the name Ken Mitchell here. He's out of a fantastic property on B Street that's been empty for for my time working in Hayward. Nick and I were just talking about this. Mick and I was talking about this notice of application that we received for a enterprise rental car on C Street behind the the fire department. That was empty when this district started too because we looked at that space for an office space. So some of these long term vacancies are finally turning over. Some of them are not. Well, enterprise credit card, don't know how much you wanna call that an actually turnover, but its activity been a lot. And so that I think that is promising.

But we still have some key properties on that in downtown, whether they be empty buildings or empty lots that are really kind of serving as an impediment for downtown really getting bounce back from COVID. And that's just the to my second point that under underdeveloped and utilized parcels in district, there's no commercial capture. So when you have empty lots in downtown, they're not giving back anything to downtown. A lot of times, they're creating a blight in downtown. They're creating either an opportunity for graffiti artists or they're probably doing dumping or just vacancy listed activities.

And so not having, these lots activated and and and kind of providing some type of economic incentive or commercial incentive to downtown, that is, you know, kind of way on downtown's bounce back, and I mentioned the downtown loop. This has been a long standing issue, a long standing deterrent to walkability in downtown. And I think new projects like the Vilarie, Lincoln Landing, these are great opportunities for people to walk into downtown, and we're starting to see a lot of that cross traffic, but it is hard to get people to walk in downtown when you have, you know, a five, five lanes of traffic circling downtown. And there's a lot of nice places to walk to downtown. You guys have white sidewalks, you know, public green spaces.

What we wanna do is encourage people to patronize the space and act in those spaces, but just the high speed of traffic makes it very hard to both, you know, get home from work, walk your dogs. I I passed a a young family on the way to City Hall here today walking the stroller and, you know, outside of the construction, just crossing the street on, you know, d or crossing the street at a, it creates that barrier that disincentivizes people to walk into downtown from the surrounding neighborhood. I mean, we have single family residential surrounding downtown. What we wanna do is create an environment before those dollars to walk into downtown and spend their money. Surplus of free parking.

So there's 10 plus city owned parking lots in downtown, and all of them are free. And so, you know, an avail a high availability of parking is good if we have constant turnover. But we because there's so much parking, we have people that are parking in these parking lots for long term. We have people that are camping in these parking lots because they're not regularly monitored. And so part of, you know, downtown's bounce back is really the city.

You know, one, I think they've already quantified how many parking spaces are in downtown. But one thing I've always been an advocate for at our DHI meetings is a parking district a lot of times is the kind of the mechanism that you need to both monitor and maintain the assets that the city has. City has plenty of parking in downtown. It's just a question that is that parking maintained well. Do people feel safe parking in Union Lot 2 and walking to Costa del Toro? I hear constantly from Alejandro, who's the owner of Costa del Toro, that his patrons are getting their cars broken into. There's nothing that GHI can do. Something that anybody in this room can do about that. In terms of environmentally, we have to environmentally design those parking lots to deter that type

of traffic.

And how you do that is a lot of times is through investing in adverting, arms that go up and down as people come in and out, parking attendants that can monitor those lots. I'm not you know? And we live in the twenty twenty twenty five. Money is just gonna fall from trees. How is the city supposed to pay for these things?

By monetizing the assets it currently has by creating a parking district. Now these 10 parking lots could be generating revenue that then goes back into meter maids, goes back to lighting in these lots, goes back to security in these lots. So it's a way for the city to really help monetize these lots because when, you know, when, people park in those lots and then they're essentially using the public asset for private monetization. But when people come and wanna have a party in those lots and those parties become unruly, that has collateral damage on the business community or on the residential community or when someone wants to come and break into car cars and, you know, steal things. Because it's not active monitoring those lots, that all that stuff, has an impact on the perception of downtown as well as the economic.

And then I'll end on the code enforcement with a lot of times happening in parking lots or in the the dirt lots, especially the c and main dirt lot, which is city owned. And then the acute property crime that's happening in these lots, you know, we have heard stories of vehicle break ins constantly. Yeah. I understand there was an unfortunate shooting at the Lutz parking lot. Again, there's not nothing that can be done in real time to prevent these crimes, but it's really about environmentally designing these lots so people feel they can't get away with these things when they come to Hayward.

And then the broken storefront windows, this was actually something brought up recently at our last board meeting. There is a high instance of businesses, especially in Foothill, having the windows broken. And a lot of times, it doesn't get reported because if a business owner reports it, their insurance takes that into account, and it's a high reporting, then they will drop that business owner from their insurance. And so these are kind of the inside economics that business owners have to deal with. You know, you might not see the same reciprocal increase in calls for service for broken, you know, car windows in downtown because it goes goes back to something that we I'm sure we've all heard and just people feel demoralized in terms of reporting these things because they don't feel something's gonna happen.

I'm not saying that it's happening at a higher instinct than what our stats are showing us. It's just that this is kind of the the perception that takes hold when people feel like there's an impotency of addressing these issues. Of course. So I'm not saying that I'm not pointing the finger at anybody. I'm just saying that this is and I can tell you working in districts all over California, these are all common problems right now, not just in Hayward's problem that's really felt acutely across all downtown urban districts.

So in terms of Hayward, from our experience, Nick and I's, and as well as those concerns that invoice the board, these are kind of the predominant the predominant challenges that have been plaguing our dish since its onset in 2018. And I think that's the last slide. Yes. I'm happy to answer any questions.

You oh. So if if, customer Bonilla wants to go first, I'll let him go. Sure.

Thank you. I just wanted to kind of understand a little bit more about do you guys have, like, some kind of plan for how these improvements are gonna be made that we can track? Because I love kind of everything that you were saying, but it's almost like, how do we actually fill some of these changes? Because even when you were kind of, you know, mentioning the good news stories that you're promoting and things like that, like, where are those going? Because, like, I mean, I'm not really seeing them, and the people I'm hanging out with aren't really seeing them.

So, I mean, where like, I guess, how are we doing that? And then when you were talking about, like, these great different events that you were considering hosting, like, you know, these restaurant tours and things like that, like, there a calendar of, like, commitments that we can, like, look at so that we can kind of put pen to paper and start seeing these things happen? Because, like, I mean, I love everything that was said. It just feels so far like, it feels more, like, you know Abstract. Yeah. Abstract than, you know, concrete.

Absolutely. So, this is something we actually from our PR firm, we get a roundup of all of our PR efforts and our, accomplishments per month, and that's something we're gonna start posting to our website, something that we'd have functionality posting regularly to our website before. So just like we used to get regular maintenance reports from our third party vendor, we're gonna start posting our PR reports and social media reports. Those are also included within our board packets. So if you go on our website, you can see our board packets list all of our kind of our month to month PR accomplishments, social media accomplishments, and it tracks top stories as well as top social media achievements month to month. But we also have, you know, kind of

stand alone reports that we're also being hosting. So there there are posts on their social media channels, so on Facebook, on Instagram, etcetera. And then they've secured news stories with San Francisco Business Times and and other publications, like, for us at beer week. We did other ones prior to that. So there there are, like so they're helping us with making sure we're getting the story out. So that's where you can find some of those updates in addition to the password words that's not being mentioned.

I'm wondering

how how we because, I mean, if if we're a council and we're, you know, supposed to be promoting this, but we don't even see it because, I mean, I don't see it. So, I mean, I can go and look for all these things. But, I guess, how do we surface it so it's easier for folks to kind of see and engage with so that there is this feeling of revitalization and new energy and

things like that?

So one thing we're actually so the second point of your question was when is this taste event gonna happen right now? We have a preliminary date of October 2 that we're gonna be bringing to our committee, and we're gonna be sending out a survey to downtown business owners that the proposed date works for them because we wanna have participant buy in from the restaurants before we begin promoting that date and also from the chamber before we promote that date. But regarding in terms of promoting now or how do we tell people the good word, we're gonna be looking to launch a different vendor in the very near future that ties into our website that kind of is a roundup of all the things that are happening downtown, new business openings, new social media highlights, all that stuff, kinda just to kinda get the ball rolling and get people regularly informed about what's going on in downtown. Because we do social media, but if you don't follow our social media, then you don't hear about So the newsletter is a way for us to get out the word to the general public, especially to the kind of the the older generation that may not be so kind of social media friendly.

Newsletters are much easier, much more approachable for them, and we'll also probably be doing something like we're always looking for ways to get the word out, especially for older operators. So, we're not opposed to even doing kind of a direct mailer to some of our businesses and having they just drop off, say, a QR code or website link so people can view that, that content on them.

That makes sense. Thank you for that.

But we're also open to any suggestions that you think how we can better get the word out.

Yep. Yeah. And then is there, like, a strategic plan that you can share that kind of talks about all of these activities that are gonna be happening throughout the year that you guys have organized?

Don't have a strategic plan on an annual basis. Our board does have an annual meeting in which we set kind of strategic priorities for the following fiscal year that we follow. And that meeting typically happens in the fall, but we haven't really set down, like, a five year strategic plan because, really, when we're getting just getting go to going in 2019, COVID hit, it kind of threw everything kinda up in here. So at the time, we've essentially been operating according to what our I guess, the the most the most straightforward strategic plan that we have is what our management district these districts are formed. The management district plan is drafted.

Essentially, it says what the services will be, what the allocation of funding will be, and then what, you know, the district is intended to do. So we've been operating off that management plan since this was started, but there hasn't been a board kind of strategic vision set out on a five to ten year plan before because of COVID. So that's not something that the boys not opposed to doing. It just hasn't happened thus far.

And then how is engagement from the 250 property owners and stuff with your assets work?

A lot of times from my experience, the property owners don't reach out to you until they have an issue. For the most part, I've I've been able to, over time, meet or interact with majority of the property owners in downtown just through direct mailing and stops no. Door door check ins when we first started the business. But for the most part, people know how to get in touch with DHIA, and it it it was out to us. You know, we try to provide as much, you know, helpful solutions as possible.

I mean, one particular business owner say I forget his name, but he was the owner of the driving school right here on on P Street? P Street. A and Maple, I think it was. And we were going back and forth for two years during COVID, and for the most part, he just wanted to make sure that his algo was. And stuff like that, small stuff. For the most part, owners are pretty independent until they wanna figure out what the assessment is that they're paying the property the final property tax bill or if they need some assistance usually moving out, say, the homeless individual on their own.

It's crime and homelessness. I mean, not not the two are a couple, but kinda just thinking about the two individually. Is that interesting that comes up a lot? Because I didn't necessarily see that on your last slide as kind of some of the target wording.

So Prime, we in the past, we have employed two separate security firms to the amount of around $70,000. We didn't see too many results from that, and the security guards weren't being as proactive in the community as we were hoping for. But the reality is that HPD is really the only body in downtown that can address that crime. But in terms of homelessness, I mean, for the most part, Downtown Hayward doesn't have an epidemic of homeless that you see in other communities like in Oakland or San Francisco. A lot of the homeless that we have here are kind of long standing homeless that have been in the community for some time or people that are kinda passing through the area.

They usually take BART or they take the the Union Pacific Rail lines to and from. When I worked in San Leandro for about five years, it was very similar situation where we had people passing through on the way to their final destination. But outside of, you know, some of the hotspots we had in downtown that we're pretty close to with HPD on, And unless Nate has any other people I don't know about, we don't have any there are too many pressing problems with homeless. We have people that are, you know, encamping on hard spots and stuff like that. And when we when we're called out, we ask them to move along. For the most part, they move along. If they don't, that's why we call HPD to, you know, move along as best.

Got it. And then as it relates to the parking lots, because it sounds like, you know, there's kind of two sides to that. One side is they're kind of a hindrance to an ability to really kind of activate downtown in the way that you described? But then on the other hand, it also seems like there's kind of a missed opportunity in terms of, like, a parking district or finding a way to potentially monetize these lots. So I guess how is DHIA in the city working together to address that concern?

I think that's something that is needs to happen. I don't know that we're there or had conversations about that yet. So there's not really a lot I can share other than I know the city and public works did a study several years ago looking at trying to see if there should be, if we should institute a a paper parking sort of system, and I don't think that it went very far at all. But lots changed since then. So and Citi's situation has changed quite a bit since then. So there's always time for additional conversations. But we're not there yet, and we haven't really had any active conversations between the DHIA and

the Citi yet related to that.

Because that's where I was thinking, like, this kind of maybe not like a just like maybe a multiyear, I guess, is a way of looking at it. Plan to say, you know, on year one, let's tackle these issues. On year two, let's get a parking plan in place. Right? In year three, let's do whatever. This way, we can kinda get behind it and then start to figure out how we prioritize things within our own strategic plan and economic development and our own resources, but doing so in a way that's kind of making commitments and getting to pay for what the next two or three years would look like because these transformations don't generally happen in a single year anyway. So just kind of looking at that more longitudinal view, I think, would be really helpful for us, at least me.

No. I I I I I hear that, and I understand that. I think that's great feedback. I think that the challenge, and while we've not had a significant amount of turnover of board members, most board members hold a two year position. And so while some have stayed on for multiple years, we've also had some changes. And so you don't end up with a lot of consistency, and so doing a plan for too long, you know, could be challenging, but it's not impossible. And I think it's great feedback, and I think, you know, that's good information for us to take back to to the full board in in ongoing conversations we'd have with the city manager and and in their office to figure out what the best path

is forward. Excellent. Thank you so much.

And great report. Thank you for what you're doing. Yeah.

Of course. My pleasure. Yes. Thank

you. Thank you for the presentation. I've been looking forward to this all year. What's an okay council members be board members? I'm joking.

I joke.

Wanted to know about a little bit more about the opportunities you're talking about, especially with parking. When you see paid parking downtown, are there anchors that people are interested in going to? Because right now, I think that is what's missing from our downtown. We have lots of great restaurants. We have a great library, but we don't have an Apple Store. We don't have a Sephora. We don't have those things that are things that people pay to go to. So what do you suggest when you don't have that type of anchor in

your downtown? Well, that's a great question. You know, the way I look at it is a little differently. The way I look at it, people come in to downtown right now. They're coming into their shop, and they come to get their services.

They come in to, you know, you know, go out for a bite to eat. So people are coming in that time. It's just a question of, are people willing to pay, you know, the dollar, dollar 25 to pay, to stop, and then to do their shopping as well? For the most part, you know, we might say people that, you know, the common the common kind of way of thinking is that, you know, a cost for coming to downtown is gonna be an impediment for people. What we find is that if people are coming to downtown and they have are having a pleasant experience, and that pleasant experience is supported by the the resources they're contributing to the district, like a parking district if it's coming or like the DHIA in terms of keeping the sidewalks clean, they have a pleasant experience, then they're gonna come back and do VP business.

If someone comes to downtown for a bite to eat and their car gets broken into, they're not coming back to downtown. And so where people experience downtown a lot of times is in these municipal lots or on the public street because that's their first impression of downtown. They pull up, they park, they get out of the car, and they walk to the place of destination. They get out of the car, and there's no lights above them or they'll, you know, there's glass on the ground or, you know, they just they get the general sense of disorder or that nobody's taking care of things. That informs their perception.

And as I mentioned, a lot of people come to downtown, they park in municipal lots, and when they walk from the municipal lot to B Street, they walk them over the parking lot, they're walking past graffiti, and a lot of areas that the DHI can't control. This is within the city's realm of service. And so rather than the city digging into their pockets and asking, you know, maintenance services or public works to come up with funds and resources they don't have, this is where a parking district can be beneficial to help bring more resources to the table so that you can do more with it. Just like the DHI, community Benefit District here, you know, if you would have said back in 2016 that you create this district, it's gonna drive out private investment. I don't think necessarily that's the case.

What this does is create stability in downtown. When you have things like COVID happen, which again, it's not I don't think it's gonna happen like that again. But when you have crazy stuff happen within the real world, these districts provide a sense of stability. When COVID hit in our literally district and everyone had to eat outside, and when I say literally, literally San Diego, we have over I think we have over 76 restaurants. We don't lose one restaurant during COVID.

It's because the district was able to move forward, create a standard for outdoor dining, give it to the city. The city of San Diego then created that standard for citywide, and then all the restaurant tours within a weekend were able to be in operating outside. All that was spearheaded by the district because it's a hyper local administration for the area. Just like a park just like the community benefit district in Downtown Hayward, is keeping sidewalks clean, removing graffiti, pressure washing sidewalks soon, so the city doesn't have to. The parking district is able to collect funds to clean sidewalks, to remove graffiti, to upgrade lights, to provide some late night security so people have that vote of confidence when they choose to spend their money in downtown.

So can we I know you said that the security didn't work out downtown. Can we kind of combine efforts of having ambassadors to look out after our parking lots at hourly parking, but not necessarily charged for parking. I just got a phone call today from a resident upset about rates that keep going up. So I did I do think it could we could receive some backlash from this. So just wonder if we could ease into using some of that those ambassador funds instead of security for everything because people feel uncomfortable.

I think that's one of the reasons why your security hours probably didn't work out. They felt uncomfortable calling PD on on folks, but they can at least look after the cars that are there. Is that something that So our ambassadors absolutely

serve a observable report status. That's something that's just part of their mandate. Having them provide that service within the parking lots, it's not something that we can do. But, typically, these districts are supposed to provide curb to property front, services. If we're going into the parking lots, then we're we're essentially exceeding that mandate of what we're supposed to be distributing services.

Now if we were contracted with the city to provide that service exclusive in parking lots, and that's just something that I was in talks with maintenance services staff last year to provide our maintenance ambassador cleaning services into city parking lots. That's a different discussion because that's a separate contract that the district could apply for to to provide that service. But just as it is right now, we are not supposed to go into parking lots. Okay. We can still provide that observed report status though.

Okay. Well, I would encourage staff to kind of help find a hybrid solution for the parking lots if if there's anything we can do. Because I do hear that as a a big deterrent of people coming downtown. And then you said AT and T is one of your larger clients here. Is is there a notification system that you all use as since you're DHAID, do you let them know, hey. You have graffiti on your boxes? Because that's something that we can't address as a city if they own boxes. Like, around

They're usually public. Away? Yeah. So if we see it on their maybe to their boxes, we just take care of them. Okay. Yeah. Take care. Yeah. So if anybody sees that stuff, like, if it's on, like, one of the painted cities boxes Yeah. We will contact the city because our graffiti stuff takes off everything. Okay. So what we don't wanna do is, like, punch a hole in the city's mural. So what we do is make sure that, you know, we if there's a mural on it, we touch base with whoever put the mural there. If it's a private property owner, we have them sign a graffiti essentially, abatement form

Yeah.

Allowing us to move that from their property.

Okay. The next thing I was gonna ask about was consistent hours. I know your competition's in the room, in the back wall, that has really one of the reasons why the wall has succeeded is because they have consistent hours. When I come downtown, I don't see consistent hours door to door. Have you talked to your property owners about having consistent hours so then people who visit know that there's some regularity of this restaurant's gonna be open on Monday, this restaurant's gonna also be open on Monday, or we all know the restaurants are not gonna open on Monday.

Like, I know Old Town, Oakland, a lot of restaurants don't open on But sometimes even goods, like, I wanna go to a certain store. I don't know if it's gonna be open or not. Yeah. And so I think that's one of the reasons why residents don't come downtown either because they drive all the way down here, and then it's closed. Yeah.

Yeah. And what you're pretty much explaining is a negative feedback where people don't come downtown because they think things are closed. Or if they do come down and it looks closed, then it just continues to reinforce, or disincentivize them from coming downtown. We have a couple, and I mentioned this as part of district challenges, a couple of what we call underutilized businesses that are operating businesses. They're, you know, caught up on their business license. They're paying their rent, but they are only open to by appointment only. Yeah. And that's an issue that we have in downtown in addition to places that aren't even occupied at all.

So have you talked as a group, like, You're part of this Oh. Open district. Why don't we think about ways we can work together?

We do have we absolutely we have a good dialogue with those owners, but, you know, perfect example would be like Alfredo's Vintage Vintage Alley. You start to see he him reducing hours because I think it's a testament to lack of foot traffic. You know, business owners, if they see if business owners think there's gonna be foot traffic, then they'll stay open because they wanna capture that foot traffic. If they're choosing to close down on certain days, and I hear this, with my other dishes in Southern California for restaurant tours, they close on Mondays because it is a slow time for them. And so they choose to stay closed that day because it's too expensive for them to remain open.

If if people are keeping odd hours, it's a testament to the lack of foot traffic in downtown. And trying to convince them to maintain those hours when there isn't an a sustainable foot traffic on the ground, essentially, we're we're fighting an uphill battle with that. Okay. What we're really focused on in DHI is really trying to create an inviting and welcoming environment when people do come downtown, but that's not to say that we're not open to trying in terms of convincing people to, you know, to reassess their operating hours and see if they would be open to opening up at more kind of conventional hours because there are people that are open at hours that I agree with you. Don't really make sense.

Yeah. Another challenge I know you talked about is the loop, and I think downtown has more than a loop as a challenge. It's it's just a lot of hard barriers. You have mission, you have loop, and one way streets. The one way streets are helpful in circulating traffic. But like you talked about earlier, crossing the streets and all that is is a challenge. And I know we wanna activate Heritage Plaza, but are there other locations where you could see activation? Because I feel like Neumann Park is an opportunity, but it's also close to addition. Yeah. So do we want activity there? We don't want activity there is a question. Yes.

Okay. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to No. No. No. Was thinking before you finish, asking the question. But, yeah, absolutely.

I'm asking all of

Newman Park Newman Park was part of our original plan when we launched the district to put table beach tables and chairs out there. At the time when the district was launched, Dirty Bird was actually doing beach tables and chairs right outside of the place. Dirty Bird? It's what it Okay.

Before he did his outdoor patio. Exactly. Oh, had his outdoor dining out in Newman Park.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, originally, I know, Dirty Bird wanted to expand a deck onto Newman Park when we found out that was it was controlled by the rotary. So that was something at the time that the rotary was more interested in preserving the aesthetic of the park and not, you know, allowing that deck. But it's always been our intention, just as well as B Street to put tables and chairs in being in

park

because right now, it's just a blank space. If we can put tables and chairs and we can get people a viable place to go and have their lunch or to take a phone call or something like that, grab coffee and have a coffee meeting, then they will go to those spaces versus just sit inside Pete's. And so if these spaces are well maintained, if they're properly activated and programmed

Yeah.

We think that they're very viable to support the type of traffic that you're immune to.

So I was just in Union Square, and they have a lot of activation there. A lot of challenges. I did see the challenges there, but there were people there. So they did have games, free books Mhmm. Dry erase boards, chalkboards, all that. Would that be something that can potentially be done at Newman but managed by DHA to start activation instead of just tables and chairs?

Absolutely. Yeah. It could be it could be programmable games. It could be kind of more, kind of micro activities because it was a smaller space. In my mind, we wanna create a big splash by doing something at Heritage Park. Okay. Seeing if we can kinda create some momentum and expand into other green spaces with the district as well.

Yeah. Heritage Park Plaza, we have talked about. I know it's something that you all need to discuss with the library, but I am interested in activation. I know there's also the argument of not having so much activation and being in a place of just calm. Yeah. But I do think there needs to be activation there. We have been saying that. Like, partnership, I'll let you all manage that. And then I just have a couple more questions. The FUSE events.

So our economic development department did a great restaurant month. How does that work with DHIA restaurant month chamber? Is January and October are the are those, like, the slow months of four restaurants? And it's something that you all possibly can work together or transition? I don't know if you guys can manage both. Yeah. Okay.

No. We're I'm totally open to partnering with I read you guys minutes before this meeting. Okay. Totally open to seeing how we can partner and and kinda just driving more traffic to local Hayward businesses as well as elevating up those businesses. This is gonna be our first time ever doing this type of taste of it in downtown, so we don't know if it's gonna be a complete blender or if it's gonna be a smashing success. Why we chose October is originally we're looking June, July. A lot of people in the Bay Area, especially in Hayward, are out on vacation. And in the summer months, people you know, kids get out of school. They go in they go to Tahoe. They go around.

So the idea is that rather than do something in the months where it could cause us to take an event, it's not just people show up. We need to get people to, you know, put some money in the game. So that's why it was suggested more September, October, very viable in the in Hayward, beautiful weather. So the idea is that we want this to be good weather, no chance of rain. October is a great season in downtown, and the weather is nice.

Summer breeze or somewhat of summer breeze. So India is doing in October. Restaurants would be open to it. That's why we're be doing a survey to see that they're a 100% with that date. But right now, we're looking at that October date as the most viable because it also gives us ample time to really promote it, get the word out about a brand new program.

And then if it is a success, then we can look at possibly folding in additional businesses, keeping that date. If it's not, then we can look at reassessing and maybe moving into another date. I will say that typically with these events, we we avoid the winter months. Because winter months, it's cold, dark, people are usually not so open to going out, especially for a ticket event. All the other events that we do or all the other districts we do based events in, it's March, May, August, and then June.

Okay. Alright. I was gonna say I do like the banners and then also, like, your social media. I think your social media has come a long way, and you're you have a really good PR firm, a really good PR firm. I also encourage you all to work with the city, hashtag payroll program. They have a lot of impressions, and I don't know what they do with their SEO, but it is generating a lot of traffic. And then also the the library, if you all wanna park the library, they get millions of views.

So That's exactly yeah. And they're doing that great trunk or treat program that they did. That's the stuff that we wanna promote and elevate up because it doesn't have to be from Downtown Hayward. It can be, you know, other organizations within downtown that are doing a great job promoting downtown, and it just takes the DHI throwing some additional promotion their way to really set them up higher than they've been before.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks. Just a couple of reminders. What's the governance structure? I know there's a board. So how have board members picked and, you know, I know they're two two year terms, and how do they rotate? Yeah. Can you explain it

to me? Yeah. So there's a nominations period around the fall. It's around forty five days. We send out nomination forms to all the parcel owners within the district. They can submit nominations if they're interested. It goes to a nominations task force. The nominations ask which you use all the nominations received, then make a recommendation to the board of who they would like to recommend adding to the board. And typically, we look at for eligibility is that they have to own a a property or a business within the district. They have to support the, you know, goals of the district.

We don't want somebody know, wanna have an an arsonist be a firefighter. Right? And then also that they've paid their assessments. We wanna make sure that people are caught up with their assessments and, you know, aren't deliberating and making decisions on how this money is spent without having paid their own assessments. So it's a very, very entry level eligibility requirements, so pretty much anybody in the industry can serve. And how many nomination cycles have we had? So this has been in operations since 2018 with the interim board. Its first actual election was in 2019. So we've done annual elections since 2019, 1924. We'll introduce our future. Six. And then there'll be six this year.

Oh, okay. And then, and what's the enthusiasm? I mean, are people nominating? Are they submitting nominations? I mean

A lot of times, we'll get people that reach out and say, I got this nomination. What is this? And I explain what it is. It's like, okay. No. Never mind. But other times, we do get new business owners and new property owners that move into the district that wanna participate because they see that they're paying assessments. You wanna make sure that the money is being used responsibly. So we have some long standing property owners on the district that own property in the district for a long time, still on the board. We've had the same type of long standing property owners that have been on the board for some time and then have second off.

New property owners come to the floor. What we try to do is create a from staff's perspective, create a good kinda composition on board of old and new so that we have people that have some history on where Hayward came from, you know, it's it's relationship with the city, and then we also have new people that are coming to the floor that may be new to Hayward that just opened up their business, but wanna be part of kinda pushing Hayward into the next So how many

board members are there? 12. And then and what what is their you know, I guess I'm trying to ascertain, like, their mood. Like, what's their mood about downtown? How do they feel about downtown? How do they feel about the city? I mean, what's you know? And and the reason why I asked that is because, I mean, I have spoken to some, you know, property owners and, you know, they can, you know, they can really care less about us. But I'm just curious. What is the mood amongst the board? And, you know, I know we have two members that are from the city. But but, you know, what is sort of the general mood of property owners?

Yeah. I'm curious. Well, the I could speak to the property owner on board. Generally, they're

they have

a pretty constructive mindset, but there is some long standing concerns that they have no qualms in calling out and bringing up at each meeting. A lot of the concerns are not necessarily with the department itself, but just, you know, not having the responsiveness from the police department that they would like. And that's not something, again, that's specific to Haywood PD. It's just the nature of policing nowadays. There's just departments across the country, across California are short staffed, and so they can't be as responsive.

And so a lot of these property crimes, that, kinda happen on cyclical basis, That's something that it really irks a lot of smaller property owners, small small business owners because, you know, a lot of them are undercapitalized. They don't have deep pockets to dig into to do these out of pockets repairs like the broken windows or stuff like that. And then dealing with, you know, the we don't have as many big retailers in downtown. We have the grocery stores. We have cycle path that's now closing, but that has oftentimes been a cause of concern and complaint.

It's just the kind of retail theft that a property owner see, business owner see, and that's not again an issue that only HPPD can really deal with. The loop has always been an issue. Again, this is just things that sometimes and Sarah contested this. Our meetings kind of are just a

You can say anything about the loop here. You're you're in a safe place.

But sometimes, you know, the first thirty thirty to forty five minutes of our meetings can be just people airing their grievances for the city. And it's not There's a good energy. There's a good energy.

I think there is a good energy and some good synergy with the property owners. I think they care very passionately about downtown, and they want to see it do well. I I think there's a lot of heart there, and there's obviously a lot of history there. But I think that, you know, I think they all mean well, and they wanna see Hayward thrive. I think they're unsure sometimes how to get there.

Yeah. And I so I I think, you know, one of the things that the city manager and myself talked briefly, very briefly about, and I know we'll have ongoing conversations about, but it's just, you know, how do we, as a city, maybe take a little more active role through this? How can we help better partner to make sure that the DHIA is a success and that downtown is a success? And how do how do we work towards that understanding we're all in this sort of limited resource sort of situation? But how can we be creative?

How can we partner together? And how can we help each other achieve the goals we're looking for? So I think it's just about having a lot of you know, continue to have the conversation. But I think we've got we really do have a good mix of property owners and business owners that really do care and have seen a lot of changes and have seen the good. They've seen not so good things, but they've also seen a lot of good.

I mean, you know, I would say, I think even in our last meeting, you know, Alfredo Rodriguez specifically was like, he very specifically said, you know, how much he's seen improvements and things change over time in downtown since he's been part of the board. And he's been so there is a good energy. I I think though that what we have been trying to actively do is to really start making some physical transformation changes in downtown, like with the lights, with the banners, with the planners, with the whatever we could do to show physical changes in investment so that the property owners could see, oh, okay. They're not just this board I pay money to and nothing's happening. I'm seeing that I'm getting something for that investment.

Yeah. And so that's what we've been really trying to focus on post COVID is how we put, you know, that money to good use where they can physically see the transformational changes. And so, like, with the with the newsletter and those other things that we're trying to get to that point, really helping to tell that story and get back to businesses and the property owners that are being assessed to say, no. No. It it is worth it, and it's been good things, and let's show you all of the good things that we are doing.

And, mister Murray, I would add just add to that that the last year, the DHI has invested about a $100,000 in physical improvements in downtown to service point. The lights on Foothill, the planters, the banners, I think that's reflective of the fact that the DHI wants to meet the city halfway in terms of showing up, putting money money where its mouth is, and, you know, walking the walk. And we also have money that we are putting aside for expanding the downtown camera system. And, again, that's something that's been a long standing commitment of the DHA board to meet the city halfway and to be at the other half of that point. We the the board, though, is filled with business owners, and they are they can be shrewd. And so what they wanted to make sure is that the city is ready to meet them halfway when they do expend those investment.

I I should've I should've led off with this, but I I wanna say I mean, I and and I don't wanna give it a negative tone, but I what you guys have done in downtown over the last several years has been exponentially great. I mean I mean, I think it's gotten better every year. The fact that you have lights now all the way down to Montgomery Street, because, you know, for I don't know if it's just all the trees and stuff, but it's a pretty dark space between BART Station and and and right here. And but the lights, it adds this little, like, boutique ish kinda ding. You know?

It's great. Foothill, the same thing. I think the it just when you're driving through Foothill, you know, I I think it's great. So I think a lot of the you know, today, the planners, I, as I was driving you know, the the planners are now sort of filling up now, and you got these big so, yeah, I mean, I think it it it really has enhanced it. I so okay.

The other you know, I think, council member Andrews, you know, touched upon some of these, you know, the safety. You know, I think however way we can just deploy just different measures around safety, you know, we get we get the emails. You know? And, you know, not to I don't wanna sound like an alarmist, but every time something happens, right, we we get the emails and we get the calls. And so, you know, safety is is is a

big

issue. You know, the it sounds like you, in terms of cleaning, it sounds like you're steam cleaning with hot water or cold water.

Oh, we intend to steam clean with hot water once we get our machine and our operations back up and running. Yeah. Okay. Good. Yeah.

Just curious about, you know, the movie theater. You know, the the I was the, you know, dare I ask, but, you know, has the has the property the property owners in the district opined about the city purchasing the movie theater and sort of what's their mood about that? And do they see it as, like, an opportunity? And and do they see our role in in purchasing the building sort of an asset creator and a positive thing? I'm just curious.

I will say that from what I've one of the members I've spoken to, they do see that as a positive because they understand that with the theater not been bouncing back from COVID, a lot of them were seeing that of the tenfold flight for downtown. It's much better and much safer in the hands of the city versus just going to receivership or going to whoever, whatever. Yeah. It's just a lot of them are waiting to see what the city intends to do with it. Yep. Because that is council member Andrews, to your point, that is the engine. That can be an engine to our downtown in terms of bringing people. The movie theater would bring in families before COVID. Families would then go out by you know, and, go out for a bite to eat. They go to Charlotte, skip some ice cream.

We've lost that. How do we restart this, or how do we place an engine downtown? In my opinion, it is that movie theater. I have my own personal opinions and would like to see there, but the board itself hasn't made any any any statements of what they'd like to see there. I just think if we can replicate the sense of people coming down there to go to a show, to go to a movie, and then go and flood and and go shop in the area.

I look to a a neighborhood in San Diego that is actually very prominent in North Park. It has an old single theater single screen theater that was converted into a live music venue, and it's programmed by Live Nation. They bring all their cast, all their, you know, performers that they have with Live Nation, and they regularly have shows there. People then leave those shows, go to the local bars and the eateries. It just creates that engine of bringing people downtown.

We have Cal State East Bay, one mile away, creating a cool venue to get those kids down here and to, you know, take the shuttle to downtown, take the shuttle back up. In my mind, again, the the DHI board hasn't as come out in position on this, but in my mind, that could potentially be the new idea. I

asked that because some there's days I wake up with a great deal of anxiety. Like, what are we gonna do? What are we gonna do? And I feel like sometimes I feel the the responsibility of being the idea being the idea guy is falls on us. We're always, like, you know, coming up.

So that's why I asked, you know, you know, if the board, you know, if if the d the the DHIA board can also you know, if if there was some you know, whether it's a formal plan or or what, I mean, we would certainly be interested in that. You know, one of the I was having in fact, this afternoon, I was having, a discussion with one of our school board trustees, and I had told them, like, you know, I said the there's the the the DH the DHIA, you know, we're sort of throwing around this idea of, you know, buying, you know, buying tickets, movie tickets for high school students or or even Chabot and Cal State students. But we're thinking, you know, if we were to buy buy out the theater for on a Friday night or, like, maybe one Friday night a month or whatever, what the Saturday night. But, you know, give all the tickets to the, you know, to the students, the parents, you know, the parents either they would come take them to the movies, but then the parents would all go to the restaurants and hang out. Mhmm.

You know? I don't know. And and but how do we sort of you know, how do we measure that and, you know, it would that be a successful model? I don't know. I don't know what the what the what the impact would be.

But I can tell you, you get the kids down there, the parents will fall in tow, and people like to eat. So the idea is that if you create a a center of mass in downtown and it can regularly draw people there from good associations, then people won't have money to spend. It's just about Downtown Hayward created the best case for them to spend their money here versus Alameda, Castro Valley, San Leandro.

Yeah. And and or sometimes it's gonna take us to sort of create that energy, that synergy, and then and then we just sort of back off and let it sort of.

Well, that's where we would step in and and maybe you guys create this energy and then hand it off to DHA and then plug it into our PR and social media strategy and just, you know, go to town on it. That's exactly what we do in in other localities that we work very closely with the city on joint programs. Yep. We I'll just say that we worked with the city of Chula Vista two years ago to do a parade and tree lighting event. 65,000 people. And it's so much so that the fire marshal almost shut us down.

Well, you know, the other the other thing, I was, a year ago or so, I was, I was at an I was at the airport in, in Boston and just I was sitting at one of the restaurants, and I happened to be sitting next to a guy who was on his laptop. And he I forget the name of the company. We're friends on LinkedIn. But he was essentially reprogramming with I guess it was, like, no December, I guess, mid December. And he was programming light shows

Mhmm.

In downtowns Mhmm. Through his laptop while he was sitting there at the bar. Mhmm. And I'll and I it caught my attention because I was watching me, and he had all it's like he had this whole dashboard in front of him, And he was calibrating, and then he had flipped to, like, a real time screen, and he would see the lights go

boop. Yeah.

It completely changed. It's really cool. I mean, so I I really enjoy that.

So I you know?

We flipped at it. We flipped into that.

Yeah.

We did. Because we thought that would be you know, that would help with some place making in downtown if you could install some lights that were really cool and had LEDs and you could change the colors. And that way you could install the lights once, and then you could really change the lights and the coloring depending on the mood. Right? You have the warriors and, you know, the the finals, and you can make them all blue and yellow. Or you had, you know, you know, Cal State Hayward was in something, and you changed the colors or or whatever it is. Right? Like, you could really pulse set the tone, and then we found out the cost, and we went, well, that blows our budget for this year and the next five years, in order to do the spikes. And I'm not sure if that's the best use of our resources right now, but they are cool. So I hear you. It's it's a pretty neat feature.

You know, I just wanna just also wanna repeat the the the, you know, the support around parking. You know, I I have been I have been sort of the guard for I don't wanna charge for parking because we do. I mean, we we do hear it. And, you know, but parking also but this is the other thing about parking. I mean, we we get it when there's not enough parking. You know? And we get it when there's too much parking Yeah. Or or when we charge for parking. You know? And and sometimes, you know, I remember I responded to somebody who said, you know, I can't park in downtown on a Friday night. I was like, well, it's it's a great thing perhaps. Well Because that means it's full.

And from my experience and the parking district is really meant to to address utilization. If people are parking for six hours in a parking space, and that prevents the business owner downtown from getting a turnover in customers. And so not having a parking district prevents you from being able to regularly monitor those that turnover and incentivize people to move their car. And sometimes the incentive is in the form of a ticket. Give me the form of a simple notice saying that if someone's going out there saying, you've been in for two hours, you had to move your car, or I don't know what would happen. But right now, it's just the issue is that without a parking district or without any type of monitoring of the parking inventory downtown Yeah. I don't know. Yourself out to me.

I know. And and, I mean, it it goes back to the issue around safety, and I totally agree. If people have a bad experience, not gonna come back. And and and so you're absolutely right. And one one one last thing, I just you know, you don't have to go to it, but just the challenges. I, you know, I don't disagree with any of the challenges. I see them all the all the time. And I you know, the the the loop I mean, you know, I wasn't around when the loop was voted on. But, you know, I you know, I'm I'm it's it's interesting fifteen years later. Right?

Fifteen years later to see how, you know, we're having this discussion. And objectively speaking, the loop is a big problem.

And It's doing exactly what it was intended to do. Well, yeah. Which was to move traffic out of town. So So it it then it's objective. It's just also having those detrimental inside the loop. Right? I don't disagree.

Yeah. Yeah. And so but, anyways

I just

have to represent Alex. I'm sorry. I have to represent Alex for the meeting. It's doing exactly what it was intended to do, but maybe not what we want.

Or even we're on. Right.

Or a

little we're on. Yes. Yes.

Business owner perspective that was there before and after, the loop hurt us more than COVID.

So

that's why we were prepared to handle COVID when it happened because if we can handle the loop, we we we can figure it out. And so you know? But, unfortunately, during that because I was there when when that boat was happening and just everybody was against it in the downtown corridor, but our voice was not even. So we were all, you know, same as the name change at Cal State East Bay. When it was all there, we all voted against it, but it wasn't enough. It just passed because it did what it was designed to do.

Yeah. So Okay. That's all I have. Do have yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. So

one of my council members and colleagues, George, he was saying that, I guess, you know, maybe using the parking lots for the businesses to have their staff parked there because, I guess, sometimes, like, the businesses will have theirs not not they will have, but their staff will park, like, know, in the front on B Street and then take up those parking all day. So, I mean, have you kind of thought about I mean, maybe not you, but as we think about, you know, this parking district or how we better use our parking lots, maybe that could be something to consider too. It's how they leverage those parking lots for their staff to keep those front parking lots open for customers.

That's a fantastic suggestion.

And that was George's. I just wanna give him credit just in case he's watching because, you know, he's someone who can troubleshoot.

And I'll I'll bring up a a recent solution that we're able to devise with the city of Chula Vista. The city of Chula Vista district that I manage is they only have one parking district in the entire city, a city of 280,000 in in our downtown. And the parking district is set up to pay for wayfinding improvements, parking inventory management, Ace parking manages the district for them, and so they no one that does the meters and whatnot. But the the district or the parking district is set up so that it can provide also solutions for public safety, for landscaping maintenance. And when it sorry. You mentioned the council member that mentioned

George Sarra.

George. And his original And what about employees? Employees of

the businesses parking in the One sorry. Thank you, Sarra.

So one thing that we have in our district in Chula Vista is that we have a parking garage, rarely used, been around for about forty years. No one parks on the 3rd Story because they get their cars get baked in the sun. So a a easy solution that we're able to devise is saying, hey. Have the top story be all employee parking. They can park it all day. They don't have to move their cars. The other bottom two stories are free for the people that are coming and going and people that

are going to thinking. And maybe you have been on, like, on one of those, like, 3rd Floors.

Well, the city's doing that with the walk in garage right now. So the city has already created precedence for their own garage. To be able to do that in the garage behind the movie theater, I think, would be a no brainer solution. Right.

I mean, maybe something to consider, and then just talk to him about it because this

is I think yeah. If if if boys aren't gonna move their car for eight hours Yeah. And they wanted to be safe, that would be a perfect location to put it.

Yeah. Excellent. Yeah. I'll let him know.

And get him a window shade.

There you go. Yeah. That that's that's the thing. I'll switch right on.

Okay. You got it? Yes. Okay. Next is public comment. Is there any public comment from anybody online or in the room public comment on the DHIA. No one and there's no

one online. No one with their hands.

And no one okay. Perfect. Seeing that, I will close public comment. And, mister Duiz, anything I'll any last words on this? Or do you have what you need? Or Okay. Thank you. And do you have what you need? I

think so. And I know myself and the city manager will be continuing to have discussions about improving upon the partnership between the city and the.

Great. And I know council member Andrews has been asking for this item for, I believe, the last, I don't know, thirteen years. At

least thirteen.

Since COVID. And

Since COVID. Okay.

Thank you very much, and thank you for Anytime you

guys want me to come back, have a good Thank you.

Thank you. Okay. Next is, future agenda items.

Movie theater. Yeah. We make it a standing item. I think it's probably part of the road map as well, but they should just be a standing item. And then an update on the downtown action plan.

I know in the minutes, I mentioned, tour of Southland, and it's been a while. I mean, not since I've been there. But Very good. We'll see. Okay. That's all

for me. Thank you.

Okay. Sounds good. Okay. Perfect. So I will close future agenda items. There are no oh, do you have We have announcements after. Committee committee announcements, staff announcements, and or referrals.

Go ahead. So just back on the future meeting topics. We are scheduled to staff a diligent working to schedule a tour of Tennyson as a pilot for some of these off-site CDC tours. We'll see how that goes, but it is our intent. I don't wanna program at all and promise at all. Make this kind of a long list, but it's our pro it's our intent to start doing more of these after doing one on Tennyson, getting some feedback from council and staff to see how much because it's pretty intensive to schedule Yeah. The the whole tour and kinda plan it out. Yeah. And Javier Castro here is leading it for my team. But but after that pilot one, we intend to start doing more of them.

So, you know, another trip to Southland or to Hesperian, some a street, Jackson, some of other commercial corridors that are outside the downtown to do, but I won't program all here until we get the Tennyson one in Orville. K.

And and when we do the Tennyson one, can we Stuff to eat?

No. Just What? Just like so just to get anything So so

so the the so take Bart, though. I'm wondering if he maybe we could, you know, take Bart and and have the whole Tennyson experience where we take Bart, get off of Bart.

It's a long corridor? Take BART, like, you wanna lag the whole Tennyson.

Well, by the time

we get to Cecil's burgers, by

time we get to Cecil's burgers,

we'll be hungry. I was

gonna say then you're behind. Yeah. So we road survey didn't do it, but I think just give it the the length of the corridor and then make the next

I'll wait.

Yeah. But I'm not Maybe we don't Okay. Alright. We'll see how it's gonna go. But I'll I'll take one.

But there

will there will be somewhere that four doors are lockable. Like, if we go to this offline and and talk the general manager gives us two hour walk around. I think some of the quarter ones that are, you know, one or one between three miles, 3.5 miles long, I think it's they're more likely driving tours or tours that have a lot less stops. Like, we just need that one spot. Do we have a do we have, like, a

shuttle vehicle?

We have a the city does. We're looking into getting a passenger van, like a Sprinter van that can hold up to, like, ten, fifteen people. Okay. So, yeah, that's

because, you know, Glad Tidings has a So just para Forget it.

You can always use paratransit. Therapist, we've used it before or AC trim.

Anyway Yeah. Well,

It's just there's a lot of so all of that

just arguing.

Yeah. Just the the big peak tour and then the narrative tour, the economic development related content tour. There's a whole another engine behind the logistics, the stock Yeah. Okay. The parties, the maps. It's a lot it's it's pretty intensive. There's you know, we did one two years ago, did was it last year? We did it. Yeah. We did it. Did it last year. Long?

And Oh,

it's worth every minute.

Yes. But but we also did one remember when we did when we did did a development tour back in, like

We did one a long Yeah. We we rented

we just did, like, a a Hertz

Yeah.

Rental car, like, run a van and did it that way way back when. Yeah. Hertz Enterprise when you're

here. But

Enterprise. Enterprise sounds to me indoors.

But that's But that but that

was a long time ago.

I mean, those

are options, honestly. I think we're trying to to be economically minded here and and really look at what our existing are and how we can Alright. I'm Brian Fine.

I do have a Okay. Announcement.

Yeah. Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead.

So economic development, in partnership with development services, super, super excited to announce that the Holiday Inn Express on Mission Boulevard is open for business. We've been open about three weeks now. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, they opened with the TCO right before the road map set. Yeah.

Future. Huge huge left heavy left shout out to Sarah's team, particularly

Thank Joel.

The building official, the Dennis Zofarikos, the senior supervising inspector. Yep. I personally went out there many times with the inspectors to walk the property to troubleshoot some of the issues. The property was entitled over ten years ago. As you may know, ten years ago, started construction right before COVID under a new ownership. Yep. Ownerships and the construction stalled out through COVID. We've been it's starting to become somewhat of a blight on on mission. So a new ownership group called the Whole Group out of Napa. Actually, they're based out of Dallas, but the the Whole Group is is most known for their the whole vineyards in Napa, a global brand in wine.

That's their side hustle. Their main business is actually real estate investments at Denver's. They own a number of properties, a lot of hospitality properties, and they this outside of mess from Hayward, purchased the property, turned it around, put in a ton of money, put a lot of staff into it. So the property is completely good to go. They're under TCO, you know, doing some last minute fitness stuff. Little little couple details here and there, but they're fully operational. They have employed about 15 to 20 staff, 82 rooms, complete with a branded fitness center, really cool indoor pool, and a small boardroom for meeting space. Happy to report that on day one, they opened they got a TCO on Thursday on Wednesday. They stopped opening on Thursday. They had two customers on Thursday. I don't know they have two, but don't say that Friday, Saturday, Sunday, sold out.

Wow. Wow.

So they are doing gangbusters. Very excited. I'm working with them pretty closely to connect them to the airport. They start advertising this stuff for the airport. I've connected to the chamber. They're also connecting to Cal City's Bay. It's not it's not the hospitality major. I think was called something like tourism. Mhmm. There's a hospitality major. And a number of our bigger businesses who have a lot of outside business, they they seem to be doing very well. Oh, yeah. Stonebrake. The the management of Stonebrake met with the holiday interest. People took the tour partnerships and things like that. So they're doing really, really well.

I'm so happy to hear that, but it still kinda looks bad when you're driving on mission. Like, was just driving there yesterday. Yeah. Yeah. And so, like, is it even open? You know? So it doesn't definitely look like this from Mission. So when is it gonna get there?

There there are some outstanding items for there's a It's Portico Share. Portico. Thank you, sir. I can never pronounce it. Portico Share, which is the that goes over the entrance that there's some outstanding permitting items and action items. Once that's all done, that's why they're under a TCO. That's why there's the fence. They had to be boarded off and for the general public. Once that is all done and they're hoping to get it done in a month, that'll come down and they'll look those pictures are exactly what it looks like. Those are professional pictures of the site taken by them before they put them. No. Before they So they're I think. Yeah. So the back will come down once. There's a lot of

getting in through a different

There's an accessible entrance at the back.

There's two accessible entrance. I think

it also makes it look like it's really not even activated because you don't see, like, anyone in the front or anything, and everyone is is going through the back. So

They're they're they are on it as much as, you know, they hear you loud and clear. That it's it's within their interest. They're working as fast as they can. They throw in a lot of resources at it. Yeah. That's great. City, particularly the DST staff and and the fire department as well have been more than accommodating to get this place out.

Perfect. And then across the street, is there also gonna be another hotel they're building?

No. Not not potentially. That side across the street in front of the Mission Crossing is what we call it. There is an entitled Residence Inn. Yeah. Residence Inn. Right? That was entitled pre COVID. The hospitality industry got wiped out, and all the financing got got taken away. That property actually sold to another private owner, and that new owner does not come from the hotel industry sector and hasn't expressed any plans with the side.

So now they're just using it as a parking lot? Because that's what's happening now. There's just those cars from the car lots that are parking all over it.

Yeah. And our peers in law enforcement have been looking into it and and trying to engage the the owners of the stores. Alright. Thank you.

Just curious. Do we know would we be able to know why people are like, what's their reason to stay for staying there? Sure. Yeah. The business, like like

The the Holiday Express, by nature, the industry segment is is business service. Oh, okay. So it's quick. It's just business days primarily. Over the first three days when it called out, I I did ask them. I like, who's you had two people staying at? Who are these people? 40 of them are construction workers from all the projects that are happening in this in the area. A lot of construction workers from the CHP building on Jackson, a lot of the residential that's going on with the contractors and. But, hopefully, after getting connected with Stonebrae and, you know, East Bay and things like that, we'll start seeing stays for families who were coming to visit their kids, go to East Bay, and then people are coming in from that time to go golf.

Okay.

The next slide here, real briefly, just want to announce that the East Bay Economic Development Alliance held their Academy Awards event to celebrate innovation of East Bay. Hayward had two finalists. The first was Veeve, a modular home manufacturer that had a of years ago. They do basically leg up to very highly 20 different patents, but the the next generation of fabricated homes. They were nominated in advanced industry advanced manufacturing category.

When they first moved to Hayward, they said within I think it was, like, sixty or ninety days, they can go vertical for the home within ninety days. The CEO informed me that they've cut that down by 90%. They can go vertical within, like, six weeks from approval. And all these built it's basically Legos or Lincoln logs, the panelized walls that have all the plumbing, all electrical, all the activity. You just bring it to the site and just go straight.

They're also I may recall the being mentioned by Daniel Mau a number of meetings ago with an update with our Howard Hayward and tuition assistance program. They are a partner in that. They've hired a tremendous amount of people, staffs forecasting that they will probably be the city's major employer, largest private sector employee in two years, given their growth. You may have recall that they they did go bankrupt as a start up, like, two years ago, just last actually, last year in '20 the 2023 into '24. They were acquired by Lennar Homes, one of the massive home building developers in the country, and that company has injected hundreds of million dollars into this company. And so we're very bullish on on their growth. So what's that

little pill thing and everything?

The second one Yeah.

The next is the Yeah.

That was the

That's the award winner. The

CEO's Tory Smith. And Ditex is a biotech medical device company that manufactured or invented what is called pillbox, a lay pill. This pill contains high resolution cameras and sensors and motorized fins that you do it's one one time use. That's actually, obviously, it's one time use. So It's all built on.

It goes down your GI tract into your intestines and, you know, your tract, and it and it records high resolution imagery from inside your body, and it's completely well controlled. And so the the innovative element of that is that it seeks to reduce overall cost for those kind of procedures. Right now, you have to go to your doctor, get a referral, you have to set a meeting or an appointment with the the GI tract guy, the technician. You go there, you have to drink the the goop, and you get scotched. And then the scotched pictures go back to the doctor, and then we had to go back to the consult. This happened all in real time in a much lower cost by just following this note. And then

You know? I'm so sorry.

Tori Tori Smith, CEO, he did an amazing speech. The mayor did record it, posted on his LinkedIn, but, you know, it reminded me why I'm in this business and why we work so hard to attract advanced industries. In his speech, what he told us he told the story about how it's a start up. So they started in Hainesville. It's his first facility.

He started it, and his janitor started you know, he started a he hired a janitor to clean the the shop space. And today, that janitor now is on production line making six. So it goes back to why what what our economic development mission is to attract these manufacturers, particularly biotech, advanced industries, advanced assembly, parts and things like that. Because these these companies that we're chasing hire in every level of education and offer a a huge amount of, social economic mobility opportunity for our residents. Right? You can go in there, the two year certificate. Some of these kids are coming out of a Chippo Weldon school, not even finishing the Weldon program. They recruited into Haiti companies because Weldon's such a demand that you don't need a certificate. They'll train you on their job. Right?

And so this is an example where a company is doing some of the most advanced stuff that they won't ever seen, and now his janitor is actually on the line producing some of these pills. If you just Google pill if you poke pill bot into YouTube, Adam Savage, famed famed mythbusters, if you ever watched that show, He came to Hayward and made a video of him taking the pill and his experience, and I think it has, like, 3,000,000 views on on YouTube. So pretty cool company.

Happens to the pill after you take it.

Yeah. You expelled this one time use, and and it is completely disposable.

Yeah. I asked that question too.

Wow. That's interesting. Yeah.

And you can you can actually like, there's a like, you can drive it through your like, you drive it through your phone. Like, like, let's go back up. I'm like, bye. Okay.

Yeah. And they're not controlled. It's all controlled. I I have Yeah. I keep it on as an Xbox controller just like US military submarines.

And they won the award?

And they won for, yeah, for product and technology.

Going for a tour ring with. Interesting.

And then they go for tour. It's like that

I was at a magic school bus. And that's all I have here. Thank you.

Okay. Well, I just wanna say that that evening was was pretty fun. And and just the it's just the whole excitement in the room in the in the auditorium with the Scottish Rite Center, and it it it was it was one of those events where, like, everybody was just excited about innovation, science, and business, and and the the whole vibe of the whole room was really fun. And by the way, was it Tony Smith? Tori. Tori. Tori. Tori. That guy is really cool. I mean, his like, his he was his whole vibe was funny.

He was having such a great time. And, I mean, he just really exudes sort of the whole spirit of the night. Yeah. It was it was it really was a fun evening. And so it was good. Thank you. If there is no other business, meeting adjourned. Thank you. Thank you very

much.