City Council - Regular Meeting

to open up the waiting room one second perfect you're always looking out for me recording in progress okay good evening late afternoon whatever you like to call it um i call to order the regular meeting of the city council of the city of hidden hills for monday september 14th 2026 for members of the public participating via zoom if you experience any technical difficulties please contact city hall at 818 Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. City Clerk Gonzales, may we please have the roll call?

Yes. Council Member Weber?

Present.

Council Member McCorkindale is absent tonight. Council Member Gold?

Here.

Mayor Pro Tem Siegel?

Here.

And Mayor Loja?

Here. Before we continue, do we need to have a vote to excuse Council Member McCorkindale?

Go ahead and take one so that it's clear from the record.

Okay. Dina, will you call for it? Yes, of course councilmember Weber yes councilmember gold yes mayor Patam Siegel and mayor Loja, yes Okay before we move on into the agenda if there's no objections from the council I'd like to move a portion of item 10 under staff comments to up now Rather than wait till the end of the evening No Okay. With that, I'd like to introduce Sunny Sultani from Alshire-Whitener, our special counsel, who as part of the staff comments will be providing a personnel update. Sunny.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor, members of the council, members of the public. I am reporting that former city manager, Gloria Muleta, is no longer with the city and there has been a voluntary separation as of Friday 28, 2026. And because this is a personnel matter, that is all I can say about it.

Okay. Thank you very much. Now, if the council is fine with it, I'm going to return to the regular order of the agenda.

Do we need to take a public comment on staff comments?

We're going to do staff comments, public comment at the end. We just wanted that inserted so that it would be announced and done. Okay. You're okay with that, right, Lauren? Okay. Also present this evening are the following members of city staff, assistant city manager, the acting city manager, Amber Servin, city attorney, Lauren Langer, city clerk, Dina Gonzalez, city engineer, Michael Ackerman, Administrative Assistant Sarah Porter, Emergency Services Coordinator Nick Salvadar. You all already got to hear from Sunny Soltani from All Star Widener. And we have an extended team from Transtech today, and I'm going to wait and let them all introduce themselves. We have a long agenda, and we want to keep moving things through. We will begin tonight with item 3A, the Los Angeles County Fire Department report for July and August. Assistant Chief Drew Smith is here.

Boy, thank you. That's why we love Hidden Hills. So we're proud to be your fire department, so thank you for all the support. And it really reflects on when we're interacting in the community with the public, and it's just wonderful. So your jurisdictional fire station, everybody that comes through, really appreciate the support from your city. So I didn't see anything out of the ordinary for July and August. Actually, what was out of the ordinary was July is the responses were actually down to seven, which is meaning it was either way too hot or people were out of town. So we only had seven responses that I saw and four of them which were medical responses and the good intent non-emergency calls, which I like having those higher responses. And the reason I say that on those non-emergency calls is we like to go out and evaluate what the need is. So that's why I really like those calls that come in. Not being an emergency, but that means people are out paying attention if they see something they call. For August, a total of 16 responses, so that's right in the timeframe. What we look at monthly is somewhere between nine and 15-ish, just depends on what Mother Nature throws our way, whether it be heat or whether it be rain or how it is, so I didn't see anything. But the one thing that was glaring, which was unique, was zero snake calls for July and August, and that was unique to me. We started out, With everybody having them earlier in the spring and early summer, but zero as we went into July and August. So, which they'll, hopefully those will continue to decline, because usually May through August is our highest month, so we start tapering down as we get into September and October, as we get into fall. So I'll give an update on where we're at as far as the organization. As you know that we're into our last couple weeks of summer, we're going to be headed into fall, which we know there is a prime wildfire season and it's a wind-dependent fire regime out here. So we know that Mother Nature does focus those Santa Ana winds on us. On average in a year we'll get anywhere between five and eight red flag events which happen usually between October 1st and my first measuring stick is Halloween. Second one is Thanksgiving and then the third one is Christmas. As we see within that window routinely is when we get our significant east wind events. And with that being said, you can have the same outcome on a hot, dry, windy, or just dry, windy, as we know that there's a big focus on the PDS, particularly dangerous situation. You can have the same fire effects on a red flag day as you can a PDS day. So just because you have a PDS does not mean that the fire is going to be more rapid, more growth, or more intense, you could have those same effects on a red flag day. So what I don't want is people to be sensitized to the point to where, well, it's not a PDS, it's just a red flag and it's not that bad. When it's a red flag, that means that we have vulnerabilities. and that is when our live fuel moistures are at its lowest, they're the driest, and the wind is at its strongest, and the relative humidities really drive a lot of what happens in the absence of precipitation. And yes, we did get on average an inch of rain over this last monsoonal flow that we had. But truthfully, that doesn't really suppress or damper what we have going into in the fall. I'll put it this way. It took the dust off all the plants that are out there. The vegetation is very responsive to change and that change happens daily. But on a forecast where we look and identify With the area, I don't think anybody is unaware that we're going into a red flag or we're gonna have high winds. So we need to have that preparedness. And so I appreciate all of our cities out here and the collaboration we have and the communication we have. And just remember, any of that information that's gonna go out, it's gonna come from your favorite, Megan Currier, who's gonna give us the messaging of what happens. The coordination with your agencies for your city of Hidden Hills is with Los Angeles County Fire Department, which has a direct protection agreement for Hidden Hills. Also with Ventura County Fire and also Los Angeles City Fire Department. Anytime that there is a fire that is reported, you get our three agencies on an automatic response to the area, so that goes all the way from here to the 118 freeway. It goes from here on the other side of the freeway through Calabasas along Mulholm into Panga Canyon. You get all the agencies there on initial attack response. We don't wait to call and ask for help. That's an immediate initial response that you get, which is an excess of about 51 pieces of equipment with a total of six aircraft, so nowhere else does that happen anywhere. Just want to give you a highlight on what this fall is looking like, and that is that we're on average to have that potential for those red flag events. Until Mother Nature gives us two inches or more of rain, that doesn't make that fire season over. What it does is it actually moistens those fuels, and when we start to see that we have green up in those new grasses, That helps with the receptive fuel bed if a fire starts. So the effects can be less than but still challenging if there was no rain. So that's the first thing we look at is when have we got two measurable inches of rain and that we really look at that when it happens between October and December. So with that, is there any questions from my wonderful city council?

Any council? Go ahead. Yeah. Cool hydrants. Cool hydrants. It's not a requirement of the fire department? What's their position on that stuff?

Depends on pool, not every pool hydrant is treated the same. So meaning just because there's a hydrant, it depends on how that water is supplied. So meaning our domestic water that we have through here on their fire hydrants are under pressure. And in this area, they'll deliver anywhere between 70 and 140 pounds of pressure. And we can hook up those and it comes with volume. And a pool, depending on its size, depending on its location, it is gravity fed or we have to, what it is, draft from it. So we use special hoses that are what we call hard suction. So you can't use a regular hose because it'll collapse. So we have to hook up to that and pull that water from the pool. So when we do have people that put in pools and have a fire department connection, it has to be of the right size and type. because we use the national standard host threat. So we have other appliances that we could get into that. So we do support that. We think it is of great value if it's identified, if we have people that are doing any modifications or pool, they can allow us to have Fire department access is in a place that we can get our fire truck and use that within a 20-foot reach. So that's why hydrants are placed where they are. And also the fire department connection for a pool system or draft hydrant is favorable that it's within a 20-foot piece because we have a lot of regular hose. We get a lot of length out of that. Our engines, but on those hard suctions, they're only in 20-foot pieces. That's why they need to be 20 feet within the street so we can access them. But we do favor hydrants that are hooked up to pools.

Okay, thank you.

That was it? I have a question. Yes, sir.

So if I'm correctly reading the weather projections, there's a potential for a significant amount of rain between now and the end of the year. Anything we should be doing different in terms of emergency preparation and any coordination we should be doing with you given the fact that rain events can cause as much damage sometimes as anything else?

So that's also going to come out for Megan on any preparedness. So if we know that we have a storm, a storm could be, an east wind event, we have that preparedness so we know that we may transition into a red flag day, but if we also have measurable precipitation that is gonna put us in a certain phase of a mud and debris flow, the good thing is the Woolsey Fire of 2018 has a watershed now that is different than it was in 2019, 2020, and so on, because as those fuels mature, The soil disturbance from the rain is actually collected different because of the vegetation that's out there. However, we still do identify with our public works partners on what the forecast is with our National Weather Service partners. So yes, there's always the potential, regardless if you have a burn scar or not, that we have to have that preparedness. So what can our homeowners do? If you have your, just like we clean out our rain gutters for debris because of fires, we need the same thing so your water can flow through those gutter systems because it can't compromise the house. You could have flooding issues. Also looking at any of the, to prevent any flooding that you have. So the landscaping, make sure that that water flows the way it's supposed to flow. The preparedness we have, and we have that readiness that we look at that intelligence every day on what we do. And if there's any significance of that, we get that communique out to all of our cities out here.

Okay, just sort of switch back to the fire side of this. Typically, we do brush clearance around the city, within the city, you know, once a year. That kind of May to July, June timeframe. This year as a council, we decided to allocate enough funds to be able to do it multiple times. When should we be looking at an assessment to see if we need to actually do brush clearance again?

That's a great question. So just know that, and we talked about this before, it's a timing on that and how we want that brush clearance workflow, that defensible space requirements to look. The number one contributor to fire to start and spread is grass. The grass has to be dry and receptive. If we get into our January, February, March, April with average rainfall and we have all this green grass, we go and it's whether it's weed whipped, whether it's mowed, whether it's used goats, it could come back again because mother nature doesn't turn off the sprinkler system usually till mid April. So you could have a robust, grass cutting endeavor, and then you could be back doing it again in another month because the annual rain that we get, which is about 14 inches for the area, So we have to time it to answer your question. I am a big fan of we look at going into while we do our defensible space inspections in May because, as we know, in April is when we usually don't get precip. Mother Nature starts putting us into a seasonal drought, which is normal because we don't get much rainfall after April 15th-ish. as we look into May, June, July, August, September is the targeted timeframe where we have to be most prudent with any of the grasses that need to be modified or thinned or cut.

Thank you. Anybody in the audience have any questions for Chief Smith? And anybody on Zoom?

No hands raised, Mayor.

Thank you for everything you guys do. We are greatly appreciative of it.

All right. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Okay, we will now move on to item 3B, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department reports for July and August. Deputy Brian Knott will provide the report.

I wanted to stand in ovation. That's fine. I'll just continue. Deputy Knott, I've been at the station 19 years. I'm leaving in January. I've served Hidden Hills throughout all that time. It's been great. I love this community. Deputy Baldy is fantastic, and he's on vacation, and I'm filling in for him, and he's back tomorrow, and then you can give him all your complaints. Okay? He wrote me a nice little script, and I'm going to put on my glasses. It says... For July, there was no noteworthy crimes. And for August 6th, in the 24800 block of Long Valley, there was a person who was found squatting at a residence and using the caretaker's vehicle. He was arrested for burglary and taking the vehicle without the owner's consent. And as of September 3rd, the suspect was still in custody and his next hearing date was on the 16th. And we know about the situation with the e-bikes, I think, from yesterday. And I think Deputy Baldy is going to address that with council when he gets back. I believe he's back here tomorrow. But he got calls in Hawaii, so he's working from there. And that is it. I'd like to say hi to my buddies over here. They're a great bunch of people. They really helped us out also from our station level. So it's good to see you. And it's good to see all the fun faces, even Drew. I haven't seen Drew.

Even Drew?

Yeah, I haven't seen Drew. Drew and I used to do this all the time. So any questions?

Larry? No, no questions.

Okay. It's great to see everybody again. Matthew, do you have a question? I'm not aware of one. I could find out. I could let you know. But that would be Calabasas, Moreau? Right around that. Right around that. I could find out. Okay. Last night? Okay, I'll find out.

Anybody else in the audience have questions for Deputy Knott? How about anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Thank you very much, sir. Thanks for your service. Yeah, thank you, everybody.

Good to see all of you. I'm going to go watch the Emmys.

Okay, we will now move on to Item 3C, the Public Safety and Emergency Services Report for July and August. Emergency Services Coordinator Nick Saldivar is going to make the presentation.

All right, we'll start with July. We had 57 citations issued in the month of July. The top cite was for failure to stop at a stop sign. Yes, that one's been a heavy one. 40 sites were issued for that one alone. The other ones were texting while driving and using your cell phone while driving. For cert news, we had no, well, back up, we had no crimes that were noticeable during that month. However, we did say goodbye to Mike Grant. We had a nice send-off for him for cert, and thank you guys for coming out for that. the month of august we had 35 citations issued again 2644 failure to stop the stop sign we talked about the burglary that occurred that's being handled by l.a county sheriff's department he just talked about and then we did have a cert meeting that month we were talking about how we can get more community community engagement from cert and have more people in the community join us so we're talking about maybe putting on some training within the city And the last notable thing was the city is now part of LA Ricks, and we're using their radio services to help communicate with fire and police during emergency situations.

Okay, thank you. And council, any questions for Nick? Anybody in the audience have questions for Nick? Yes. I'm sorry, I can't see you.

I was just wondering there's always been a very good relationship and I believe that and I just wanted to see if there's been conversations with the school and making sure that that I think they have radios that connect with us here to make sure that that is active now the school year has started

so i did talk to the hoa and i did talk to when i first started here with the school district about that we are actively working on a situation or excuse me a plan that we can have certain exits and entrances shut down so that we could have the kids come in and be in a safe area while we're transporting them from the school to the hoa so we're working on that actively

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

When can we expect you to have that evacuation plan finalized?

So we started talking to the school district about it, and we're working with L.A. County Sheriff's Department about that, hopefully by end of October.

So maybe a presentation in November?

Sure, absolutely.

Thank you.

Mayor? I'm sorry. I'm sorry to interrupt. There is a black Chevy Tahoe license plate ending in 773 that's on the inside parking lot that is blocking cars, and people are unable to get out. Thank you. Okay.

We will now move on to item 3D. An update on the Round Meadow-Moreau Roads Landscaping Project. City Engineer Michael Ackerman will make the presentation.

Thank you, Council, staff, and residents for attendance tonight. We are lucky enough to have Camille with Studio MA here to make the presentation for the Round Meadow Landscaping Update.

Thank you all. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. I appreciate being here. We thought we'd just give you a little history, which I know many of you already know, because you've been engaged in the process, but we have a little slideshow for you here. I think Dina's gonna put that up for us. And this is the first image. I'm not sure if we can get a full screen on that.

It might be good, because it's a little small.

but hopefully the viewers from home can see it too. So this is just the original condition out at Murrow Road when everything first started. Some of you long time hidden house people will recognize the old gazebo and all of that. All of that is gone now, but we want to just give you an update on where we are. So you can go to the second slide. It is a PDF, so you can just roll out some if you want to.

Love this technology, don't we?

Technology. If we did it today, we'd have it automated in AI so you could walk through, but you know, this is from a couple years ago, or from a little while ago. Probably what's most important about shows is just that, you know, they're just, the plant material was tired and it needed to be updated.

Can somebody go help to see if, if it's in PowerPoint, you can just do a slideshow. Send Brett in. You think they know we can see them?

It's like they made stickers out of them. You know how when you do little stickers when you're, okay, there we go. Okay, so this is the plant material plan. We just wanted to show you how that was going. This is what you saw the last time I was here. What is slightly different about it is the bottom band. We did get approval from the city to incorporate the county portion, so it'll integrate beautifully by the time it finishes. Do you need me to go to the next slide? This was the rendering. This is what we're working to achieve. Some minor plant material changes, but basically, overall, this is what is being built today. So the build is underway. This is an overview of that same corner. You can go to the next one, too. And then this is just wanted to give you kind of an overview of what's happening out there. And so the top row is showing the condition when we kicked off build, and that was once the bid was accepted from the general contractor. This is just showing some of the difficult conditions that were up there. The fence was needing repair, so that is getting done. The path was needing repair, and it is going to be replaced. It's already been demoed. You can see the old retaining wall back there has already been replaced now, and a small garden wall has been put in front of that, and that's been taken out. If you go to the next image, you'll see them starting to lay that path. Oops, I'm sorry. Can you go back to that one? Yeah, we'll just stay on this one. So in row two... Image one, you'll see the establishment of recreating that path. It will now be with pavers to give it a longer duration of use and better durability. In image two, you just start to see some of the guys moving dirt and a really good team out there moving dirt around and it's coming together. You can see the final layout of that path. And then on the right side, you'll see the form that's as they're putting in the low wall, and that's already just been completed. And then if you go to the first one, it's being hidden by Dina's name, but if you can picture it. And if you get time when you're driving by, I don't want anyone, it's a very precarious corner, so you can look out that way. These trees have all arrived. This is a big oak in the bottom left. You see what the oaks look like. It's a magnificent specimen. All those trees arrived. They've all been set in place. They're not all planted yet. We're just doing soil amendment work. Prepping everything. You can see that same tree actually in the second image on the third row with the guy standing next to it is them placing that. You can see it's not an easy job to do for those of you who like to work in your garden. It's a big job and they are doing that right there. And then as you go to the last two images, you'll see the fence has been replaced. It's kind of small for this audience, but hopefully that home audience can also see it. You can see the fence has been patched, completely repainted. The new plant material is going up the hill. The neighbor has taken care of her side of the... fence and or is working on her side of the fence because there's some overgrowth plants there and then the new plant material is coming in and this is just showing it in the last image is it's hitting as it is going to engage the new low wall there's a stone wall there and then dean i'm not positive there's the one last one just to talk about This might not be there. This might be done. Okay, this is just showing it done now. So you can see everything's been incorporated. This is showing the path the county has agreed, thanks to your team. You did a great job with the county to eliminate what was a really hazardous exit way on that path. For any of you who could walk there before, my worst location, and we had been waiting and waiting and hoping they would give us that, and your trans-tech team got that for us, and so that end piece that you used to see on the very first slide has been removed, so it'll just be a beautiful little turnaround. handicap turnaround where you can get to the end and explore the plant materials. There's a lot to be learned from the plant materials. They're all on the fire mitigation list. They are all wonderful specimens in terms of water. And so really worth looking at. There's a couple of feature things that are a little more special than that, but because this doesn't have structures. We were allowed to use the materials we have. And that's it. So it's going to complete on itself. I think maybe TransPet can give you a better idea of that final date. But we seem to be going on and on schedule and hitting all the deadlines. If there's questions, I'll have to answer.

Thank you very much. Council, any questions for Camille?

I'd love to hear a date.

Right. I don't know we know that. I just wanted to say I didn't know it.

Thank you for the question. The current date for completion is November of 26, but we expect it to be complete before then.

End of November or the beginning of November?

Hopefully the beginning of November.

Okay.

He's very confident.

Good.

Anybody in the audience have any questions for Camille or Michael? Go ahead, Matthew.

Ted Rosenquist, hi. Do we have any legal liability because we've designed the path so a homeless guy, for example, can sleep back there and do something? Is that our property?

Thank you for the question. That is the city's property, and I believe it's the same liability as all right-of-way within the city's property and city properties. But, yeah, if somebody was sleeping there, that would be something we would want to address.

So just no disrespect, but, Warren, would you please take the liability portion of the question?

Sure, I think that is correct. And as with any public property, you would want to properly maintain and make sure that you're watching and make sure that you handle issues as they come up. Report them to the city. If you see anything in that way, they know to take appropriate action and protect the city.

So if I remember correctly, one of the things that was a little controversial that we decided as a council was to remove the drinking fountain.

Oh, okay.

Because we felt that having anything that gave reason for groups of adults to congregate next to an elementary school was not a great idea. So we did do some of these considerations and sort of look at that, and we think we came up with the right balance of the answer. Good.

Thank you.

so i have some questions uh this corner's costing 835 000 i believe with these changes and i know some of it comes from measure r and some from measure m but i don't know if you noticed that you voted to approve alternate c and the executed contract shows a different price which was alternate a that city council city manager signed off on and at that meeting i thought stewart wisely mentioned that it would have been nice to have that opportunity if we were going to spend that much money to get a right turn lane out of that congested area have asked before about seeing a permit for that and I have not been given it was a request that I made officially in writing and I just not anything about the design or what you've done but the process of this the there's no sign up there that has like the City of Hidden Hills has asked residents and all construction to have which has the contact information and has information about AQMD contact, et cetera. So I've asked several times, I've never gotten a response, I've not gotten a copy of the permit for that, and from my understanding and from requests for public documents, there was no CEQA done for that, and that is required for something of that scope. environmental review no coordination with the school which was quite alarmed and concerned that that was going on and there have been multiple times I've gone by there and trucks are standing out into the street or you come around the corner and there's a truck out there so you know fender a bumper I have great concerns about this that remain unanswered thank you

Maybe I have a question for Michael. Is this project a landscaping project, not like a construction construction, like building a house?

Right, thank you for the question. It is a landscaping project.

Okay, so we don't need to post those signs for a landscaping project, do we?

We typically do post signs. The signs are being posted as we speak.

Okay, fantastic.

Okay, so we have a list of questions that have come up, and so we will take them and we will respond.

And just one more thing, that there was coordination between the school district and the city.

And I have one final for Lauren. Is this exempt from CEQA?

Typically, there are exemptions for landscaping projects and minor alterations to land, so I would imagine that that's how this project was looked at. Okay.

Okay, Barbara, go ahead.

Hi. I have a question. With The fact that it is in the city of Hidden Hills, but it is outside the gates. What procedure is planned to make sure that nobody does end up on the property and create an issue, especially across the street from the school? I'm sure everyone gets watch duty. Every day I probably get 10 texts of fires everywhere. And that to me is an opportunity for someone, even if the plant materials are fire resistant, to start something so is there any plan that somebody's going to be driving by the cover six every day stopping walking through the property making sure that nobody's there that shouldn't be there well my my only comment would be that we had a gazebo with a fire height with a drinking fountain there for 20 years

I don't recall there ever being an issue. This is less of a attractive instance than we had before. I can't conclude on that.

The direct answer to your question is we do not contract with Coverage 6 for services. The Coverage 6 contract is covered with the HOA. This is outside the HOA. I don't think we made any special provisions. We rely, public safety, we rely on the Sheriff's Department. You know, we do contract for a sheriff's patrol car through the city. Joe. Joe.

Do we still have the homeless outreach? Okay, so we have a homeless outreach guy that comes around and checks for homeless people. And he's partly paid for from Hidden Hills and partly from- He's paid by the COG, so it's a regional service that the city receives. And he has found in the past, homeless guy that was sleeping in the gazebo so Much as I loved that gazebo It made sense firewise to because it was dilapidated wood So what we've have done on that corner is a lot more fire safe than it Than it was in the past It'll be well maintained And hopefully with the homeless outreach, we'll make sure that no homeless person decides to camp out there.

Yeah, he'll be or she'll be helped by the homeless outreach coordinator who can provide them with services and referrals and all that good stuff. So the other thing I would say is that I encourage everyone to reach out to us if you see something say something so please reach out if you use that entry then let us know if you see something that you don't like thank you my question is is if this is just a landscaping project how does it qualify for measure our funds that's my question Yeah, maybe we should just write it down, yeah.

Great question, and we will get back to you. All right, is there anyone else in the audience that would like to comment? Anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Emile, Michael, thank you. And we will do our follow-ups. We will now move to item 3E, an update on the proposed cemetery at the former Bodling Tree Land property. City Attorney Langer will present.

Sure. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. In addition to information that the city has been updating on its website, we wanted to provide a brief update tonight to the community just to provide additional information as we learn it. First and foremost, I think it's important to remind everyone that the property is located entirely within the city of Los Angeles, not Hidden Hills. So Los Angeles is the entity responsible for reviewing the project, determining applicable zoning and environmental requirements, and issuing permits. Hidden Hills did not and cannot approve the project and cannot approve or deny it. The city has been actively monitoring. Beginning last year, Hidden Hills has had access through my firm to attorneys with experience in cemetery and land use matters, investigated the applicable Los Angeles requirements, submitted written letters to Los Angeles planning, mail the detailed application information packet to every resident in the city we've submitted public records requests and continuously monitored and posted permanent activity as we learn it to the city's website it was quiet for many many months there has been some activity in recent months We understand that various applications have been submitted to the City of Los Angeles for a cemetery covering the approximately 32 acres, approximately 14,000 square foot mortuary, maintenance building with grading and related lighting and infrastructure. Some demolition and utility permits have been issued by the City of Los Angeles, but the major grading, mortuary, maintenance building, lightning, and cemetery permits remain in various stages of review. This is not a standard linear application where one package is submitted and we can get the package and review it. It is a variety of different permits and requests, and it's just not a typical review process. So it can be hard and complicated to gather all the information and put it together. We recently heard reports that Los Angeles may have issued an administrative public benefit determination in June. That's related to a portion of the Los Angeles Municipal Code that could permit a cemetery on a certain use if they meet on a certain land if they meet certain public benefit requirements. They haven't posted such determination on their website. Again, it's not so easily defined, and so we don't yet have any complete approval or supporting record to review, but we're piecing together all that information. We are submitting another public records request this week, requesting more information because there is limited information on the city's permit portal. We've also reviewed recent communications circulated in the community. As I mentioned, because it's hard to get information on this project, there are outstanding questions and outstanding legal questions. For example, is the cemetery even allowed on this site? We know that certain letters have been submitted to the city of Los Angeles, making arguments one way or the other, and we're waiting to see what Los Angeles says about it. These determinations will impact what level of public hearing and if any environmental review is required. If any sort of discretionary approval is required, a CEQA review would generally be required, the California Environmental Quality Act. And then there's the question with the proposed mortuary building. One piece of recent information that I learned just recently is that I understand that the one demolition permit that has been issued has been appealed. through the city of Los Angeles. And so there is an appeal pending. And through that appeal, we expect that the city of Los Angeles will issue a written determination on all the arguments. And that will probably be the first time that we can see Los Angeles' position on the cemetery, on the arguments that have been made. And so I understand in the coming weeks that there should be some response to that appeal. And we eagerly await reviewing it, as do the individuals that have filed that appeal. That decision could be further appealed throughout the City of Los Angeles process, but we don't know what it will say until it's issued. So we're eagerly awaiting that. And once we see it, we can assess further and provide more public updates to the public. There have not been recent communications between the City of Hidden Hills and the developer. I think last year around this time it was reported that any communications about any easements related to the various properties had been stalled, and there have not, to my knowledge, have not been any communications since that time. So there are not current negotiations going on with the cemetery developer. It has been quiet since that was last reported publicly, and to my knowledge, nothing has changed. IN THAT MATTER. SO WE WILL KEEP THE PUBLIC UPDATED AS WE KNOW MORE. WE WILL TRY AND KEEP THE WEBSITE UPDATED AS WE KNOW MORE. AS I MENTIONED, WE FILED ANOTHER PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST TO TRY AND GET AS MUCH INFORMATION AS POSSIBLE BECAUSE IT'S NOT ALWAYS SO EASY TO NAVIGATE THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES' RECORDS AND THEIR PERMIT PORTALS. BUT WE'RE EVALUATING, AND WE WILL REPORT BACK TO THE COUNCIL AND THE COMMUNITY AS WE HAVE MORE INFORMATION. THAT CONCLUDES MY REPORT.

THANK YOU, MS. LANGER. ANY QUESTIONS FROM COUNCIL?

I have just a comment. I would, I've asked our city attorney to reach out to the attorney for the homeowners that have filed some of these actions to make sure, sort of pants and belts and suspenders type of thing, although we're following up and we're doing our due diligence, there may be more to be learned and I've asked city attorney Langer to reach out to that attorney And to the extent that he can communicate without having a negative effect on his attorney-client privilege, we'll try and work together on that.

Okay. Council Member Gold? Is there anybody in the audience who has nothing to add?

hello good evening yes so it's my understanding that the attorney for the West Valley group that has been working very hard in opposition and working to get request information, public records that are well ahead. I did have a conversation with you, I think, just this afternoon. So the city of L.A. secretly approved the cemetery project back in June. There's a case number that was approved by city planning official Daniel Coronado. and the approval was never listed on zmas which i believe is what you're referring to the city planning website but this group of homeowners who did not want to take the cities it's not our our thing and we shouldn't oppose it and moved ahead with some support from with a lot of support from within the community and some support from woodland hills as well so no public notice was issued to the adjacent property owners no appeal rights were disclosed to the community the approval was only discovered through a cpra which is california public records act request the covenant runs permanently with the land binding all future owners and the 90-day challenge closes september 16th two days from now and so there has been zero environmental review um they're talking about 121 000 cubic yards for grading uh this is an earthquake liquid liquefaction zone um and that was confirmed in the ledbs parcel report and i know if you were here for the earthquake in 94 there was a lot of damage along long valley we had a lot of red tagged homes along long valley this is adjacent to that it's an earthquake landslide zone also confirmed in that report very high hazard fire hazard severity zone also confirmed in that point there's a blue line stream known as the calabasas creek running through the property la county flood control debris basin on site the metropolitan water district pipeline easements across the property there's i should have brought my water up sorry the size of the water does not reflect the comments um maybe um there's 14 455 square foot mortuary that you mentioned with embalming chemicals near that waterway california law requires full environmental review for projects of this scale and sensitivity but there has nothing has been obtained for the blue line stream You mentioned that a notice was sent out to the homeowners. There was a multi-page letter sent out when it was first discovered. I think it was last September, August, September. and I'm sorry but it was very much coordinated with the developer and it was using a lot of their euphemistic phrases we're not planning this at this time things like that we already know that based on having the mortuary they're legally allowed to move from there to a crematorium we are very opposed to that And LEDBS admitted demolition permits were issued without secret clearance, that it is required, and they called it a department error. so there's a lot going on here and i'm glad that the city's catching up to what a private group of citizens have put a lot of money behind and we need more money because we're going to need to file a lawsuit if people are interested i will provide the information but There was also, I said this a year ago, September 17th at this meeting and before, in our engineering reports and in information, there is talk about phase two for Hidden Hills for the Long Valley Gate. Excuse me, Matthew, your time is up. Yes.

Can I get my time?

No. No.

Really, I can't take, she's offering me to take her time and I can't have her three minutes.

It's up to the council whether you allow people to cede their time, but the other member of the public can speak.

I say no. All right, how long is longer do you need?

A minute.

I'll give you a minute.

There was a year ago this month, There was conversation about the need for Phase 2 at the Long Valley Gate, and it is a great need, but the fact that there's any interconnection between that and agreements that were sent to Dignity, whether that's paused or not, is in the background of a lot of this information and our concerns as citizens that there were quotes that you would look into it and dig into it and make sure, we're not feeling like that's happening we're feeling like we as residents are doing it independently and that if the phase two is a quid pro quo to have an easement and to be playing nicer with dignity we just are very opposed to that so thank you i think this is one of the largest issues facing our city right now anybody else in the audience would like to speak

Is there anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Okay. I have a question. Go ahead, Ted.

So no environmental impact report was filed mitigating any damage to the stream?

None has been prepared or submitted to the City of Los Angeles, and the City of Los Angeles needs to respond to the public and say whether that's required or not.

What's the timetable for filing a CEQA lawsuit? Is that the 16th?

Well, we haven't seen any determination that was made in order to be able to make that determination. But as I mentioned, I understand that there already is an appeal filed with the City of Los Angeles that should be preserving those arguments for those that have made them and making the City of Los Angeles put their positions out in writing so that you can go through the process.

Okay. So all the gratings are going to have water trucks there to keep... the valley fever out of the air. Because that's what you get when you graze without water trucks. I guess we don't know.

Okay. All right. Thank you, Ted. Anybody else?

Judy Fisher, I'm here with my husband Ron. We are residents of Woodland Hills, and we are very involved with the program that you are actually involved with as well. And I speak for my neighbors. We live on Cansonette and Boda Street backs up to the Treeland property. There are many things that were not mentioned that are important for everyone to know. We are extremely opposed to this project for a host of reasons, not the least of which is dignity has made promises to other cemetery properties throughout the country and have reneged on those promises. They have in fact been sued by a number of these properties, including Eden's Memorial just in the northeast corner of the valley. The property is actually several parcels. It is not just a single parcel. And if dignity comes in, they will be able to sell off, build on, change all of those various parcels. They have already. chopped up some of the property in order to make their application to the City of Los Angeles. They have deceived the City of Los Angeles, they have lied on their application, and they have misled the people that want some of this project to go forward. I really believe that there needs to be a great awareness of what dignity and SCI, the parent, is doing in order to procure this property. It is an endangerment to our neighborhood. They say it'll only have a few cars in and out every day. We all know better when we've been to a funeral what that means. when the cars march in. We also know that this is a highly toxic piece of property and the toxicity has never been mitigated in the 70 plus years that Treeland has owned the property. There's water runoff that has gone into the water system that is also toxic. I don't know if you're aware that there was a cemetery up in the northeast part of the valley that in heavy rains, because of the high water table up there, the caskets actually arose from the ground. So there are a lot of things that have not been brought to light that I think is really important for your consideration. And we urge your support. Go to the website, nocemetery.org. We need your help. We need your support. Thank you so much for the opportunity to talk with you.

Thank you. And welcome. Always glad to meet our neighbors. Anybody else in the audience?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Okay. Thank you, Ms. Langer. We do have some follow-up here, right? And we will be following up. Okay. We will now move to Item 3F, the Building Safety Card update. Tonight we have Melissa DeMerti of Transfect. She is here at CBO.

Good evening honor roll mayor mayor Pro Tem and City Council members on behalf of trans tech We're so happy to be here to give a fun update of your building and safety department. I know we have a very short presentation It's only three slides and I'm gonna kind of talk you through what that is. I think maybe our city clerks getting that up as we're Uploading it. My name is Melissa Demirci. I am the CEO of trans tech with me this evening I have your building official Dennis Turango One of our directors at TransTech, Raffaella Diaz. And on the engineering side, of course, we have our city engineers, Mike Ackerman and Ahmad Ansari. I just want to say that since we've started servicing the city in January, it's truly been an amazing experience for us to work with your community, with the applicants, and we just thank you for your support and leadership. We did prepare that presentation, and should I go ahead and begin as it's being uploaded, or... You can just give me a moment. Yeah.

Thanks Amber.

Well, kind of while we're waiting, I can give you a little bit of background. So we wanted to give you an overview. What does the building and safety department do for your city? And so TransTech is an extension of the city staff. And in the next slide is kind of what I was going to go after is our building and safety department provides plan check services, building official services, building inspection services, as well as permit technician services on behalf of the city to applicants. We've included a screenshot of what that landing page looks like on your website. And we've really integrated an easy approach for applicants or developers, not developers, contractors to easily at any time, 24 hours a day, upload their plans into the system for our plan checkers to process them in a timely manner. Customer service has been the forefront of everything that we do in the city, especially when making sure that the plan checks are coordinated in just under two weeks for that first submittal, oftentimes within one week. We really see ourselves as an extension of city staff, and we're really proud to work alongside each of you, the community, and the city staff. And with that, I'm going to go to the next slide, which is the more exciting stuff. So in this next slide, we have a breakdown. We wanted to give you a snapshot of what your building and safety division looks like in numbers. We started in the beginning of January, and we kind of put together data from January 1, 2026, through August 31st, just 14 days ago, 2026. So here we go. The city has issued a total of 106 new permits. In addition, we have finaled 82 permits that were in review when we began our services in January. Our team has conducted 511 building inspections and our turnaround times is one to two weeks for that first plan check. We've reviewed and plan checked a total of 208 individual projects. which included over 800 pages of documents and reports. And collectively, all of these represent approximately $11.7 million of project valuation in building permits. And so what does that mean? What does project evaluation mean? So in order to calculate the appropriate permit fees, the building code requires applicants to input an estimated construction cost and this is more for the building side of it not your you know heater or some of those more simple things and so that total value of construction for each project includes their estimated materials work labor electrical gas plumbing etc so you can see that for the eighth month eight month period approximately 11.7 evaluation of building permits were conducted in your city and it really it reflects an active year and it's really a testament to i think the quick turnaround times kind of that update and a lot of customer service and customer support that we've been integrating with the city and with that on behalf of our our team thank you so much and dennis and i are here to answer any questions that you might have you know it's so relative so in you know you have cities that are a hundred thousand populations you have cities that are ten thousand population and so you can't really say what the trends are in terms of is it a high number or it's a low number because Are people wanting to do construction? Are people wanting to remodel their homes? Maybe last year there was a higher number of remodels happening, so they're at the tail end of completing those constructions. So it's difficult to say necessarily for a city like Hidden Hills since it is all residential if it's a higher load number because there isn't a business community in terms of development and restaurants and other types of activities. So we feel that it is a reasonable number considering the number of homes that you have and the activities that have been happening. I think that now that the city and the applicants have had a feel for the building and safety department, there might be more remodels and construction going on in the future. But it's, I think, very relative to the community.

Council Member Siegel.

wanted to make a statement and or two one for the people watching on TV and out here they see some of these numbers hundreds of permits and they say oh my god we're over building the city where people forget that a generator requires a permit solar panels require permits Your Tesla charger at home requires a permit. How about hot water heaters? They still require permits. So the vast majority of these permits being issued are not new homes or major remodels. Correct. You're dealing with a little tiny piece. The other thing I wanted to say was we had an unusually long and wonderful relationship with our former engineering firm. which was really the face of that was really Steve-O and Dirk. And I was very nervous when they decided to basically both retire. And we kept them around as long as we could. But I'm happy to say that the normal attitude of people towards their building inspector and their plan checker from my perspective has been zero complaints and it was very good in the past and uh... i tried my very best when i first got on the council because i had a long period of dealing with the city of l.a. and getting building permits to try and foster a sense that a professional client relationship, not an adversarial relationship, although it can be. People don't like being told no, particularly in affluent communities like this. But I haven't had anybody call me. I had one inquiry about, which had really nothing to do with you, having to do with these draft tigrants, that's why I asked about it.

Other than that,

I heard the sound of silence, so thank you for that, and hopefully I don't discover something between now and then, but thank you.

We appreciate that, Mayor Pro Tem.

Council Member Gold?

No, I just wanted to say welcome, nice to see you again, and thank you so much. We appreciate you and your company. Thank you.

I know you guys service a lot of cities. Tell us what we should be doing differently that will make this better for our community.

You know, I mean this with all of my heart. This is an incredible community, and we have had a lot of fun getting to work with the applicants, with the HOA, with the city, and really streamlining a lot of the processes and just continuously trying to make it a better experience for applicants and homeowners and contractors that are coming here to help beautify or fix your homes. And no comments, really. We love it.

Okay, then tell me a little bit about how we balance keeping the contractors, keeping the homeowner who's actually doing the project, keeping the city and the HOA happy is really one bucket. Then you have the bucket of the rest of the community that is nothing but inconvenience. Do we need to do anything differently there?

You know, I think we see ourselves as building and safety professionals as educators. And I think the biggest thing for us is that we handhold residents that might have. I don't want to say complaints, but might see some construction as nuisance to advise them on. working with the contractor of noticing communicating making sure that everyone is working within the appropriate hours of working making sure that they're cleaning up their properties and so we're working hard with the city staff to really hold all individuals accountable and to make sure that the residents are also feeling heard during that process okay anybody in the audience have any questions for melissa how about anybody on zoom

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

So one, thank you for coming out tonight. Great to see you. Two, thanks to you and your team. It is, Stuart and I, when we kind of went through this process, were very concerned about this. But I can say we think we chose, we think the council chose very well. We're very pleased, and we're especially pleased with the fact of the depth of the resources that you are able to provide. You know, not everything is exactly how we always want it, but you guys always respond, and we are appreciative. Thank you. we appreciate it so much thank you thank you okay last under presentations is item 3g an update on the library project acting city manager serving you make the presentation yes mayor thank you if we can have just a moment to upload that presentation

Terrific. Thank you, Dina. Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. Tonight I want to give you an update on where the AI Library stands. Next slide, please. The AI Library is the first digital community-centered platform. It brings together trusted resources, learning tools, and AI-powered support in one easy-to-use hub. Three things make this platform different from a collection of links and databases and subscriptions. The digital access where residents can reach books, research tools, databases, e-learning resources anytime and anywhere. Personalization, the AI-powered recommendations and smart tools will be built around each individual user so the experience feels relevant rather than generic. and the community connection. Even though it is digital, it is still local. Resources, events, and programs are designed to connect residents, students, and neighbors here in Hidden Hills. Next slide, please. The platform itself is built in live. That is the hardest part and the most technical part of this project, and it is complete. What remains is what we are calling the pieces in production. I want to walk through each of those briefly. The membership system, which will allow residents to sign up and be verified as members. Onboarding automation, so new members get a smooth, guided introduction to library instead of needing hands-on staff support. Content pieces, this is the educational and informational content, including the AI avatar videos and written guides for our content partner are currently being produced. The final graphics, the visual assets, residents will actually see when they utilize the platform. And finally, the integrations, which connect the library to the outside systems it depends on, including our registration and content partner platforms. Next slide, please. Moving forward and remaining pieces. This slide outlines the remaining pieces that we are focusing on. The membership system, we are building and preparing the actual membership experience residents will use to sign up. The onboard automation, we are developing and testing the onboarding flow so it works correctly before residents see it. The content pieces are being produced and initiated into the library and the videos and guides residents will use once they log in. The final graphics, we were completing the visual assets and will hopefully be approving very shortly all of the visual concepts and graphics for our content developer. And the integrations, we are completing registration and integration and testing our outside platforms. Next slide please. Right now we are past the platform build. We are in the remaining pieces of production stage. From here the path to launch runs through five easy steps. Produce, we finish building out the remaining pieces. Integrate, connect those pieces to the platform. Testing, where we verify everything works as intended. and finalizing where we address anything that comes up through the testing phase before we complete the final review. And then finally, our launch and open to the public. Next slide. I'm happy to take any questions, Mayor.

OK. Thank you, Amber. Any questions from the council? I don't have any. Me neither. Council Member Weber? No. I have several. If and when we are successful, there will be several, there should be a place where our young residents and school district students can come and utilize this library to perform what they would do a little more than you could do in a physical library. What kind of projections are you guys putting in to make sure that this is an appropriate place for young students?

Yes, thank you for the question, Mayor. The LVUSD school district will have its own separate login. From there, we are able to really drill down on the different types of permissions that the students are being granted access to, and it'll also be based on age appropriation. so our k through second graders will not have access to the same information that our high school students will so all of that is being done on the back end what about our underage residents who don't go to australia they will have a area which is for youth under hidden hills and the city of calabasas so they will have the same type of guard rails within the platform

And then, correct me if I'm wrong, but one of the things that I think gets, when I talk to people about the library, there are a few things that people seem to get caught up in. It's not a, we keep calling this an AI library, but it's really a digital library that utilizes AI to power some increased functionality. It's not an AI library. Isn't that a better description?

Yes, sir.

So when we do this, when we built this, everything we've done, I want to make sure that I have this clear. There are three buckets of customers that we are targeting. One, we want to build something that's very functional for our residents. Two, we have incorporated philosophers in a school district to weigh in on what they would actually like to see us build and the access and the digital assets that we have. And three, it's also being built for the city of Calabasas residents. because we entered into an agreement with the city of Calabasas that they were going, their residents would have equal access to ours, and what we traded off for that was that our residents still have all of the same access to the city of Calabasas library system that they had before. Do I have this correct?

Yes, sir.

Awesome, thank you. Anybody in the audience have any questions for Amber? No, sir.

Yes, my questions is what you've brought up in the past is, is there any validation about usage that if we build this, that anyone actually uses it, that we're going to report back to the city on usage, that it's actually, we're spending money on something that's benefiting the people that are actually getting used?

So we haven't finalized them, but we have developed a set of metrics of how we're going to measure usage and the city will get those reports and how they decide to distribute them will be the next council.

I was part of one of the groups, the focus groups, before it started. And my opinion is still remaining the same. I personally think it's a total waste of time. And it's been confirmed now because Las Virgen schools, as well as LA City, have found that there's too much internet for the kids and they are going back to the basics of teachers teaching. To provide this kind and take these funds and use it for something that I think is not going to benefit. MY SECOND POINT IS, ISN'T THIS ALSO A PUBLIC LIBRARY, THAT ANYBODY ANYWHERE HAS THE RIGHT TO BECOME A MEMBER, OR IS IT RESTRICTED TO HIDDEN HILLS AND CALABASAS AND LAS VIRGINS STUDENTS? THAT'S THE SECOND. THE THIRD IS THE QUESTION ABOUT THE AMOUNT OF MONEY, THE $57,000, $52,000 THAT WAS PAID TOWARD THE ASSISTANT CITY MANAGER'S SALARY FROM FUNDS THAT ARE FROM THE LIBRARY.

So I normally wouldn't answer, but I think they're pretty easy answers to give you. One, the Las Vergas School District has been an active participant and an advocate of us completing the project. I apologize. Okay, so the Las Vergas School District has been an active participant in the design and what it is that we're building. And they see, so far, everything they've communicated to us has been they are an advocate of the project.

Even though they've changed this year for the school year?

This is recent. This is an ongoing project that we are continuing to build. Your second question was? So our analysis is that we are perfectly within our rights and entitled to limit it to Hidden Hills, Calabasas residents and the Lost Virgin School District. We've done the research and we believe that is and we have structured it to do that. And your third question? So we get library funds and we can allocate them to spending on the library. We took a portion of the assistant city's manager's salary that we thought was reflective of their time. AND ALLOCATED THAT COST TO COME OUT OF THAT FUND RATHER THAN PAY IT OUT OF THE GENERAL FUND. WE BELIEVE IT'S A LIBRARY EXPENSE. WE BELIEVE THAT'S HOW IT SHOULD BE ACCOUNTED FOR. AND TO DO SO DIFFERENTLY WOULD BE IMPROPER. SO WE BELIEVE THAT WE ACTUALLY THINK THAT IS THE APPROPRIATE WAY TO ACCOUNT FOR IT. AND SO FAR OUR AUDITORS AGREE. ANYBODY ELSE?

sorry I don't mean to thank you for answering I don't there's no restriction on you answering items on the agenda I don't believe I think usually I like to do a lot of research first okay so if people submitted letters or emails to the City Council are those being read into the minutes

Pardon me, we're on the library right now.

I understand, because I have an email from somebody, and I was asked to read it if her email is not being read into the minutes. I just thought, in general, is that happening on items?

Public comment is not being read into the record.

okay so i'm reading this on behalf of brett aronson who writes i am writing to request clarification regarding the city's use of the profit property tax revenues designated for library services california ed coat 19116 requires a city that withdraws from the la county free library system to assume responsibility for providing library services and provides that the associated property tax revenues be used to maintain those services. According to the city's audited financial statements, Hinhills received $589,423 in library-designated property tax revenue for the year 2023-2024, and an additional $636,612 uh dollars for 20242025 yet the city reported zero in library fund expenditures in both fiscal years in addition the library fund reached 1.6 1.7 million as of june 30th 2025. the city also transferred 36 973 from the library fund in 2324 and 2848 in 2425 described as transfers for allowable expenditures. I respectfully request the city identify precisely what those expenditures were and the authority under which they were determined to be allowable library expenditures. Given these figures, I am asking the city council to clarify What library services were provided to Hidden Hills during the years 2023 and 2024, as well as 2024 and 2025? I just noticed white fuzz on my . What specifically did the library fund transfers that I mentioned pay for? How does the city believe its use and accumulation of these restricted funds complies with Ed Code 19116? And what is the city's current plan for the approximate $1.7 million accumulated in the library fund? She says, I'm not alleging wrongdoing. However, these financial figures raise serious questions of potential noncompliance with the statutory requirement that these revenues be used to maintain library services. She further says, I believe Hidden Hills residents deserve a clear accounting of these funds and an explanation of how the city is fulfilling its legal responsibility

to provide library services she says thank you for your attention to this matter thank you so this is going to require a much more detailed response so we will take up we will take bells and we will craft our response and we will communicate it out anybody else in the audience ted by the way long time no see how you been i've been good thank you joe mayor loja

Yeah, it's been a long time since I've been in front of hearings. I just have a question. My name, if I had minor children, et cetera, will be on this onboarding list. How do we protect that list from being searched by illegal AI? and using it to hack or get into our computers. I'm a CPA, you know, I can't, but yeah, it has address, name, phone number, anything else? Age, I guess.

Go ahead.

Thank you for your question, sir. So the registration software that we're developing is going to be managed internally. So all of that will be housed in-house. So it won't be open to the public or searchable unless through staff.

OK, well, if it's searchable by staff, it can be searchable by somebody else, I think.

Anybody else? Anybody on Zoom?

We have one hand raised, Mayor.

Okay.

Hello, can you hear me? We can hear you. We can't see you, Joe. Hi, yeah, Joe Bellissimo. I live on Lupin Hill Road. I don't know too much about this project. I understand these funds come from tax... revenues um but forgive me for asking such a simpleton question but everything that was described in this package that you're developing what is there in it that i can't just simply get off the phone i'm holding right now on this zoom meeting or my laptop why are all these funds being used to it seems create something that's just readily available to anybody with an internet access and um Is any of this going, any of these $1.7 million, if that's correct as a figure, going towards infrastructure to facilitate like fiber optics, better internet, anything like that for the community? So I'll take the last part of it, and then I'll give you the first part of it.

The library funds are to be used for the library. They're not to be used for anything else, and we are very careful in how we actually allocate funds. So they are not going for any infrastructure projects.

Right, but just as you allocated some funds that are proportionate to the city manager's time that she would spend on this project, Wouldn't there be some sort of infrastructural need to be able to house this kind of bandwidth that we're having? And again, to that point, all this money, it seems to me like we're building something that just basically has a community registration aspect, but offers everything that you can still get from any internet connection.

You want to take that?

Yes, sir. Thank you for your question. The library project itself does allow for subscription bases to be free and open to both the elementary school students, all LVSD school district students, the city of Hidden Hills, as well as the city of Calabasas. So programs that are typically on a monthly basis or registration software will now be free and available to the community and to the users through this process.

Got it. But if you search on Google, let's say, AI will still give you a very thorough, detailed answer with follow-up questions and options. And that doesn't cost anything.

The AI library will also offer courses. So it will allow people to start a program or a course that they're interested in learning in, be able to step away, come back, and then re-engage in the program at a later date. It'll also be set up to set reminders. So in case you haven't logged in in a couple of weeks, we'll check in, make sure everything's OK, and be able to really see if you're still interested in this program or this core concept that you were researching. and also be able to make recommendations for future lessons.

Okay.

Thank you. Thanks for your questions. Anybody else on Zoom?

No, Mayor.

Okay. Thank you, Amber. We will now move to the consent calendar. All items on the consent calendar are considered routine and may be approved by a single motion unless a council member requests an item be removed for separate discussion. Council members, are there any items you would like to see removed from the consent calendar? There you go.

Siri? Come back to me one second. I want to make sure.

You were last.

Oh, I was?

Yeah. So I'll delay as long as I can.

Sorry, Larry. It's like you're not there. No, I do not need to pull anything off.

Okay. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to comment on the consent calendar?

Okay. Consent calendar. There are minutes being presented for March. Thank you for presenting the minutes. There are meetings minutes being presented for March 2nd that just say amended and I think it is worthwhile to mention why they're being amended since they weren't redlined. In addition, on demands and disbursements. And maybe it's because we've had zero snakes in Hinn Hills for July and August. But I have asked before what some spending was for. I think in July when I was here, I asked about some spending that was not answered and then subsequently voted to be approved. And so in this case, I'd like to ask if the city council has looked at the individual items on the register of disbursements, and if they would like to identify what snake boots for $1,523 was, snake boot replacement for another thousand dollars a press release from sisson for public information it was 2300 i looked i couldn't find a press release from around that time as well as i i I just, if you have looked at and approve all these things, there's two times the same amount of water for the goats water, the exact same amount. I know that runs on a meter, so it surprises me that it's the exact same amount. Again, we have paid CERT training where we used to have free CERT training. And then Council Member Gold has put in for travel miles, and I presume that's for between 72 and 76 cents per mile, and that comes out to about 945 miles. So it doesn't say the time frame for that, but I would really like to know about snake boots. and I'd like to know if you're aware of what snake boots are I think there's a history of some odd things in the thing and in July I asked about spending for someone to do grants and I never got an answer on that but that night even though you could provide an answer you went ahead and voted for it so I'd like to know that you're comfortable with spending over $500 on snake boots.

Thank you so much for your questions. I'd just like to address the question about the mileage that I submitted. I gave a list of events and conferences and meetings I attended on behalf of the city, and it's just a testament to how much I work for the city. This is how many miles I drove. I go and represent the city in all kinds of meetings, all kinds of conferences. I take this job really seriously. It takes a lot of my time, and maybe it's shocking how much time I spend, but it's the truth. And I have everything documented, so this is how much I work for the city, yes. Yeah, it's, Steph has all the details.

Okay, I'm sure the most anticipated answer of the evening is going to be, because I literally asked the same question, what are snake boots? So I know what they are, but Amber, we just answered the question of what are snake boots and why we needed them.

Yes, sir. They're PPE equipment, so personal protective equipment for our staff when they go out into the field. Most importantly, staff was going out to check on the goats and being in the canyon, it is a area where snakes are prevalent. So snake boots were purchased for their protection. And after having the fire chief be able to describe the rattlesnake concerns here in our community, it was felt it best to protect the staff in that sense.

Okay, any other comments on the consent calendar? Is there anybody on Zoom that wants to make a?

No hands raised, Mayor.

Okay, can I have a motion to approve the consent calendar?

I move to approve the consent calendar.

Second. Dina, can we have a roll call?

Of course. Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Siegel?

Yes.

And Mayor Loja?

Yes. Okay, motion carries. Thank you.

Now, I have to recuse myself from 6A.

And you too. Me too. Yes.

So, I can make a quick announcement. I understand that two council members have conflicts on 6A because of the location of their property to the site. And with the absence of Council Member McCorkindale tonight, we don't have a quorum. So this item will have to be continued to the next meeting.

That's a bad deal.

Okay, we now will move on to item.

Aren't we under a time crunch on this item?

Thank you for the question. And yes, it will be important to take it to the next meeting.

OK, we will now move on to item 6B under old business, the award of professional services agreement to Tripepe Smith for AI digital design standards and launch marketing services. Acting city manager Servin, please present the report.

GOOD EVENING, MAYOR AND MEMBERS OF THE CITY COUNCIL. ITEM 6B RECOMMENDS THAT THE CITY COUNCIL AUTHORIZE THE CITY MANAGER TO EXECUTE A PROFESSIONAL SERVICES AGREEMENT WITH TRIPEPE SMITH FOR THE AI DIGITAL LIBRARY DESIGN STANDARDS AND LAUNCH MARKETING SERVICES. AS BACKGROUND, THIS SCOPE WAS ORIGINALLY PART OF A LARGER DESIGN SERVICES PROPOSAL THAT THE CITY COUNCIL PREVIOUSLY CONSIDERED. THE COUNCIL DIRECTED STAFF TO RETURN TO THE CONSULTANT TO NARROW THE PROJECT SCOPE TO JUST THE AI DIGITAL LIBRARY PIECE WITH THAT OPTION TO ADD THE REMAINING PIECES BACK IN LATER IF REQUIRED. DRAPEPI SMITH RETURNED WITH A REVISED PROPOSAL LIMITED TO AI DIGITAL LIBRARY WORK. SINCE THIS IS NOW A STAND-ALONE PROJECT, THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT COSTS REFLECT $1,587 INCREASE, BRINGING THE TOTAL PROJECT TO $14,290. There is no general fund impact. The library fund will absorb the full cost, including the 5% contingency that staff recommends, a total contract amount not to exceed $15,004.50. Staff recommends that the city council authorize the city manager to execute this agreement with Trepepe Smith in that amount. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Any questions from council?

Not for me.

No. No. Any questions from anybody in the audience? Any questions on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Okay. Do we have a motion?

I'll make a motion that we award the contract to Treppie Smith for AI digital design standards for the contract. Second.

City Clerk Gonzalez, can we have a roll call?

Yes. Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Councilmember Gold? Yes. Mayor Patem-Segal?

Yes.

And Mayor Loja?

Yes.

Okay. Motion passes. We will now move to Item 7A under New Business Adoption of Administrative Policies Regarding City Council Agendas, Governance, Records, and Personnel Matters. City Attorney Langer, please present the report.

Yes, hi, good evening. I'll give the report on item 7A this evening, which is proposed to adopt resolution number 1065. Over the past several years, the City has updated its personnel rules and administrative practices. And as the City prepares for a transition to a new City Council, this is an appropriate time to memorialize additional best practices to promote accountability, communication, continuity, and the proper stewardship of public resources. The policies are forward-looking and they supplement existing law, the city's municipal code, the city's personnel rules, and other adopted policies. They do not make changes to the fundamental allocation of responsibilities. The city council always establishes policy and provides oversight, while in a city manager form of government, the city manager remains responsible for administering day-to-day city operations and these policies set forth best practices and expectations for how to best do that work especially in a unique city like Hidden Hills the proposed policies really fall into three categories first there are agenda protocols intended to improve planning and transparency there have been some discussions recently about the best way to use the consent calendar what should go on regular agenda items what shouldn't so these Policies are intended to promote the best practices and to make sure that the council and the community understand where things will be placed on the agenda so staff can appropriately put forth city council agendas. They require timely and legally compliant agenda packets, provide opportunity for the mayor to review draft agendas before posting, and make sure that certain items have received appropriate city attorney approval. legal review and that certain items receive review by city council subcommittees who may have purview over a specific topic and we want to make sure that the council is informed before those items end up on an agenda. There's procedures to properly report vendor selection practices and expenditures. Um, to establish an annual priority setting process. Earlier council review of the draft draft budget is recommended annual confirmation of city council subcommittees and monthly updates on council goals at the public city council meetings. There are some policies on governance and records to strengthen internal controls requiring. to ensure that there's legal review of contracts again consultation with subcommittees and quarterly reporting of staff level decisions and expenditures and contracts that are approved and monthly reporting of city manager authorized expenditures they also require city business to be conducted through city controlled devices accounts applications and vendor accounts whenever reasonably available that helps ensure that all the records are maintained in the appropriate places and that they can be easily accessed when needed. And in today's digital world, things aren't maintained in a variety of different accounts in a variety of different places. It's a best practice to make sure that city business is done on city accounts. There's some personnel provisions that reflect the operational needs of a very small city. Expectations for the city manager being involved in the day-to-day work and operations of the city. Really a focus on staff being present at city hall so that they can serve the city council and serve the residents and really be available to the community. Notice when the city manager is not going to be available. Designation of an acting city manager. And clarify communication protocols, the best way to communicate between council members, city managers, staff, the community, and other organizations that the city does a lot of work with. It's important that those relationships are maintained. how the city council should interact with staff versus how they should interact with the city manager are addressed and establishing regular council member meetings and agenda briefings, project tracking requirements, weekly reports to council of emerging issues so they know what's happening with the residents and what residents are concerned about is being reported timely to the city council. So it's really about continuing existing practices, memorializing them and implementing best practices for continuity and to make sure that forward looking the city is implementing the best practices and policies that it can. So it's really a positive document that's being proposed to memorialize how the city's been functioning and make sure that that can continue as you move into a moment of transition over the next few months. That concludes my report.

Thank you. Any questions from council?

No, I think it sounds like a real good idea. It's always nice to fine-tune, which is what this sounds like, and, you know, to get things into best practices.

Council Member Gold?

I love that we are memorializing all these things. I know that some of it might sound, of course, yeah, everybody knows, but it's nice to have it together in one place since we are going to get three new council members, and I think this is going to help them to be successful.

Yeah, as reading documents go, it was one of the better ones I've had to read. Thank you.

Okay. Any questions from the audience?

well this is a glorious document addressing a lot of things that I've been at this podium about over the last couple of years I just have a question in that there's a certain specificity to it that I'm concerned that if you have said this this this and this but it may be a broader scope are you creating a a trap where a more general statement would be appropriate. An example would be where you talk about the various vendor accounts, I think, Costco Staples, uber eats or and similar vendors i didn't know if that was general enough of a thing i mean we saw in the reports a lot of like lunches and things like that ordered it just it seemed i know like with my own personal business stuff i have like an errors and emissions thing that is broader than this is in some in some of those instances And then it's great to have a city manager goal to have them in the city office, which would be great. But point five, if an early city meeting is scheduled such as an 8.30 COG, the expectation is the city manager will either report to city hall before the meeting, when reasonably practical, or report afterwards. That's kind of in conflict with nine to five hours. And then the only other thing I would suggest is that the city manager is familiar with the roads the facilities the ingress and egress points the trail points of the community and that while being here within the city you say i believe present at city hall but i think there are times when it's actually would be really valuable to have the city manager out and seeing things so i don't know if that's too narrow of a thing of a restriction where if the city manager were in the city and having familiarity with access that it would be a good use and a valuable use of someone's time but these are great and positive way to move forward and a gift to the new city council members anybody else in the audience

Anybody on Zoom?

No hands raised, Mayor.

Great. Can we have a vote? Motion. I'm sorry, I need a motion. Steward?

Yes. I recommend that the City Council adopt Resolution Number 1065, which I don't need to read, do I?

No.

No.

I second. Second. Tina, can we have a roll call?

Yes. Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Patel-Segal?

Yes.

And Mayor Loja?

Yes.

Okay. We will now move on to Item 7B under new business consideration of approval of professional services agreement with Pico Party Rents for the Hidden Hills Fiesta Rentals. Acting City Manager Servin, please present the report.

Good evening, mayor and members of the city council. Item 7B recommends that the city council authorize the city manager to negotiate and execute an agreement with Pico Party Rents for the event rental equipment and related services for the city's annual fiesta. As background, the fiesta requires tenting, flooring, seating, lighting, power, restroom facilities, and related site infrastructure to support the main tented areas, south tennis courts, and the main arena. Because of the total contract amount exceeds the city manager's informal bidding threshold, formal city council authorization is required. Staff solicited proposals from three qualified vendors and evaluated each for scope, qualifications, and price. Staff selected Pico Party Rents to furnish the full event rental package, including tenting, flooring, tables, chairs, linens, lighting, generator, and power distribution, as well as restroom trailers, along with delivery, installation, and removal of all equipment. There is no additional general fund impact. Funding is available in the adopted fiscal year 26-27 special events Fiesta appropriation, and staff recommends a contract amount not to exceed $66,327.76. Staff recommends that the city council authorize the city manager to negotiate and execute this agreement with PICO party rents in that amount. And that concludes my presentation.

Okay. Any questions from council?

Yes. I would like to see, and I know that sometimes it's there and sometimes it isn't, but for this amount of money, it would be nice to see a little spreadsheet showing the three top bidders. And the prices and maybe sometimes there's an obvious reason why you pick one over the other, even if it wasn't the low bidder. But I think I'd like to see a little more detail. And I know that it does exist sometimes in some of these.

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Council Member Gold? Council Member Weber? No questions.

No questions.

Anybody in the audience have any questions? Anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

I just have one quick one before we ask for a motion. Have these contracts been reviewed by legal?

Yes.

And we've covered the liability clauses?

Yes. It was reviewed by the city attorney's office.

Okay, thank you. Do I have a motion to approve?

Yes. I'll make a motion that we consider and approve a professional service agreement with Pico Party Rents for the Hidden Hills Fiesta. And do I need to put the amount in or just ask the contractor?

Do we have a second? Second. Dina, can we have a roll call vote?

Council Member Webber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold. Yes. Mayor Patel-Segal.

Yes.

And Mayor Loja.

Yes. Okay, motion passes. We will now move on to item 7C under new business consideration of approval of a professional services agreement with Cat's Craft Barbecue for the Hidden Hills Fiesta. Acting city manager Servin, please present the report.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. Item 7C recommends that the Council authorize the City Manager to negotiate and execute an agreement with Cat's Craft Barbecue for the catering services for the City's Fiesta. As background, catering has historically been the centerpiece of the Fiesta, and staff solicited proposals from three catering companies in accordance with the City's bidding requirements. Cat's Craft Barbecue was selected based on its proposed menu, which best fit the desired theme for the event, along with its ability to provide on-site cooking, additional amenities such as a french fry cart and corn dog cart, and a drink station cart, as well as a well-developed vegan menu. Cat's Craft Barbecue will furnish the catering services on October 17th, including menu preparation, cooking equipment, and fully staffed food and beverage service throughout the timeframe of the event. There is no additional general fund impact. Funding is available in the adopted 26-27 fiscal year, special events fiesta appropriation, and staff recommends a total contract amount not to exceed $76,825. Staff recommends that the city council authorize the city manager to negotiate and execute this agreement with Cat's Craft Barbecue in that amount. That concludes my presentation.

Okay, any questions from council?

No relation.

Sorry there is or sorry there's not. Special discount.

Any questions?

So, John, I have just two. One, you didn't ask for a contingency on here and almost everything else we always ask for a contingency. Why not?

This item was highly negotiated and we stayed within our budget and we've also made it very clear to the caterer that we need to stay within our budget.

Then my second question would be more important. How do we know these people?

They were found online along with many other caterers, and then we met with them on site, met in person. They presented their items. We called and reviewed various recommendations that came in and also other services that they provided in the surrounding area.

So when you say they presented their items, did you taste them?

No, there was not a tasting, sir.

Should we have tasted it? I mean, it doesn't make any sense. I'm sorry to throw a wrench into this, but it literally makes absolutely no sense to me that we're throwing a party and a $75,000 dinner, and we have no idea how they cook. we i'm happy to reach out to the caterer and this has to be something that they're that that is really something that they're quite used to yes they are used to doing tastings okay so anybody in the audience have any questions go ahead barbara i mean haven't done weddings and black christmas before

There are two things. I noticed that the caterers in the residential street in Calabasas and Park Hacienda, they obviously don't have a facility like a restaurant. And do we have any referrals that people have ever used them? Because the worst way to have a party is to have horrible food or horrible food and horrible service. So are we sure that this is a reliable company based on referrals? Tasting obviously goes with the show, but has anyone ever used them? And they're out of the home, not out of a restaurant that we know.

Anybody else? Go ahead.

Okay, mayor, members of the city council, has this catering vendor serviced a previous Hidden Hills Fiesta or have they serviced any other Hidden Hills City events such as the annual summer barbecues?

Well, I asked the question and we apparently don't know.

Okay, assuming they're still in business, I'd say bring JVs back. They did barbecues in Hidden Hills all the way back in the late 2000s, early 2010s, but no idea if they still exist.

Okay. Anybody else in the audience? Anybody on Zoom?

How much of the cost is offset by ticket purchases?

The entire cost.

So the cost of the dinner is equal to the cost of what we spend?

Yes, that was the direction.

Okay. Okay.

How much is the dinner? It's $35. Okay. Okay. Is the in and out truck still coming? I know, but I might need to order two.

Okay. Joe? Yes, sir. I think the question is, do we have time now to put this off? No. And to investigate it any further, or are we down to the wire now? Yes.

No, we do not have time to put this off and to engage another catering company. I am happy to schedule a tasting prior to executing the agreement and then making adjustments to the menu until the committee is satisfied.

You know...

Joe, when you and I are out there greeting people, we may have to run afterwards.

Well, no, we greet people before they eat, so we're long. We're a trip on the way in. Okay. Do we have a motion to approve this? Sorry, anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Okay, do we have a motion to approve this?

Yeah, I think we have to. Okay. Subject to a tasting.

Yeah, subject to a tasting. Okay.

Otherwise, we're going to go to the Brett Katz Department.

All right. So is it you? Are you making the motion?

Yes. And I'll second it. You'll second it? Subject to the.

Tina, can we have a roll call vote?

Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Patem-Segal?

Yes.

And Mayor Loja?

I abstain.

Chicken. Very strong.

Benefits of going last.

I spent too many years in the event business to hire a caterer.

That's right. I forgot where you came from.

Didn't you listen to the presentation? They're serving six hour chicken. Let me get to it. 14 hour smoked brisket and six hour slow smoked chicken. And it's being cooked out there, obviously, on site. All right, go for it.

You already voted. We will now move to Item 7D under new business consideration of a first reading of a proposed ordinance in Chapter 8. I vote for it. Is that my phone? Somebody's cell phone.

Let's see.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. Item 70 recommends that the Council introduce an ordinance amending Chapters 8 and 13 of Title III of the Municipal Code to update the City's construction, site control, and noise standards. As background, construction in Hidden Hills frequently occurs close to homes, roadways, and equestrian areas. The proposed ordinance consolidates construction site regulation into Chapter 13, while Chapter 8 continues to cover general non-construction noise. The ordinance strengthens site maintenance, fencing, and active site requirements, addresses noise, idling, and dust, clarifies red flag warning restrictions, and adds a draft hydrant requirement for larger pools and water features. It also preserves enhanced notice for major projects. Staff recommends that the City Council waive the full reading and introduce the ordinance by title only. An ordinance of the City Council of the City of Hidden Hills, California, amending chapter eight and chapter 13 of title three of the Hidden Hills Municipal Code to establish updated construction site control, noise, notification, dust, fire safety, and enforcement standards. The second reading and adoption would return to the City Council on October 13th. I'm happy to answer any questions along with our building official, Dennis, who is also here to assist with any questions as well.

Any questions from council?

No, I had sort of anticipated this. That's why I brought up the draft hydrant question with Drew in the fire department. So, no, I'm good with this.

Council Member Vogt?

No question.

Anybody in the audience? Anybody on?

Just like I said, it'd be nice to get some sort of red line, just so you understand what's changing. If you don't take the existing document to know what it's changing to, I don't have the ability, I read it, but it's hard to understand what actually changed. It wasn't clear to me.

Okay. Do you have a summary of what changed?

Yes, Dennis does.

Go ahead. Good evening, Council. I do have a summary of the changes. There are many small nuances, more clarifications than changes. What we try to do is take the noise provisions within Chapter 8, specifically for construction, and move them to Chapter 13. So it's more of a reorganization. There are some updates which strengthens our ability to enforce some of these noise ordinance, dust ordinances as well, but mostly it's just small changes that clarify definitions of who a responsible party is, who the builder is, and then organizes them in Chapter 13. Thank you.

Joe? Yes, sir. I was going to say that I agree with Brett. I think it's probably, for this type of a thing, it's probably a great idea, as long as it already exists somewhere, a red line copy at the backs of those of us who want to or members of the audience want to see what changed. You know, we have sort of a generalized over, you know, statement of different things, but if we could do that in the future, it would be great, as long as it already exists.

Okay.

Go ahead, Natalie.

So my question is about enforcement. I have a picture today of the street cleaner who I contact the city and the HOA about on a regular basis I don't know if you can see it's a huge cloud of dust behind it and this is the intersection of this guy barely ever putting the brushes down lack of water to clean it but also he happened to just go by a construction site that has loose dust poured out all over in front and into the street but weekly he is as bad as any of the blowers in the community and so i and i feel like this is something stewart frequently says it's no good having policies if you don't have a mechanism for enforcing it so what happens with enforcement on this i think i've probably sent at least three things about the street cleaner but i have also you know there there was a while where there was a guy driving around at the at the construction sites in the morning I think he was in a city vehicle or something. Anyway, he was looking and watching some of the construction sites for that. But you call the AQMD and nothing happens. So I know there's an attention to dust blowing around and trying to prevent soil contaminants from getting into the air, and I would like that to be enforced.

So, Amber, do you want to talk a little bit about what we are implementing to try to increase our compliance initiatives. The enforcement officer.

yes thank you mayor um the city is currently working closely with um will dam to bring in a code enforcement officer this will be somebody hopefully after the final reading and the 30-day notification afterwards before the code amendment is put into place, that we'll have somebody on board that will do exactly as was described, to really be out on the sites in the morning, especially on red flag days, be able to do the leaf blowers. Also, our current building inspector is going through AQMD fugitive dust training starting on Wednesday. So that will be a two-day course that he will be attending. to be able to be more versed in AQMD terminology so that when we do call in and report a site, we are using the correct terminology to really flag a problem and catch the attention of AQMD.

Thank you. I believe the other comment was about street sweeping.

I believe the street sweeping is handled by the HOA, sir.

So maybe we can make a call to them tomorrow to say, I would hope that we're not going to turn our HOE in for any violation, but maybe you can directly talk to them.

I will discuss it with Aaron. Thank you for bringing that to my attention.

Okay. Any other questions in the audience? Anybody on Zoom?

No hands raised, Mayor.

Okay. Do I have a motion? Yeah. Yeah. Do I have a second?

Yes.

Okay. Dina, can we have a roll call?

Yes. Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Patem Siegel?

Yes.

And Mayor Locha?

Yes. All right. The motion passes. We will now move on. TO ITEM 7E UNDER NEW BUSINESS CONSIDERATION FOR AUTHORIZATION TO REJECT ALL BIDS RECEIVED ON JUNE 9, 2026 AND AUTHORIZATION TO READVERTISE REQUESTS FOR PROPOSALS FOR ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN SERVICES FOR THE CITY HALL LANDSCAPE AND HARDSCAPE IMPROVEMENT PROJECT. CITY ENGINEER MICHAEL ACKERMAN, PLEASE PRESENT THE REPORT.

THANK YOU. Item number 7E is regarding City Hall landscape and hardscape improvements. On July 15th, 2024, City Council received a presentation regarding City Hall building renovation and City Hall exterior landscaping and hardscape improvements. On May 12, 2026, staff advertised a request for proposals for architectural design services to prepare plans, specifications, and estimates, and a construction bid package for City Hall landscape and hardscape improvements. On June 9, 2026, staff received one proposal in response to the request for proposals. After staff's careful review of proposals and since the city did not receive enough competitive bids, staff is recommending to reject all bids received on June 9th, 2026, and to re-advertise the request for proposals to establish a fair selection process and obtain competitive bids. Staff recommends the City Council authorize staff to reject all bids received on June 9th, 2026, and to re-advertise the City Hall landscape and hardscape improvements projects. Request for proposals for architectural design services. Thank you.

That concludes your report.

That concludes my report. Thank you.

I just wanted to make sure I didn't cut you off. Any council questions for Michael? None for me. Nope. Why are we going to get more bids this time?

That's an excellent question. Thank you. We are going to do additional outreach. We are going to post it on PlanetBids, as we always do. We'll post it on the city's website, and we will reach out and do more outreach efforts to receive additional bids.

Why did this not happen last time?

I do a lot of CIP projects, and sometimes you get one bid, and sometimes you get ten bids, and it's uncertain why. If other contractors are busier or less busy, and it also depends on the time of the year. If there is a bunch of holidays going on, or it could have been the summer and summer vacations, there's many reasons why bids may increase or decrease, but we're hoping for a better response with this advertisement.

Okay.

Thank you.

Anybody in the audience wish to comment? Anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Do we have a motion to reject all bids received on June 9, 2026 and authorize the re-advertisement?

Yes, so moved.

Second. Dina, can we have a roll call?

Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Patem-Segal?

Yes.

And Mayor Loja?

Yes. Okay, we will now move to public comment. This is the opportunity for members of the public to address the City Council on items that are not on tonight's agenda. Speakers are limited to three minutes. I would also like to remind everyone that under the Brown Act, the City Council cannot discuss or take action on items not on the agenda unless the matter qualifies as an emergency. Is there anyone in the audience who wishes to speak?

Good evening, Mayor, members of the City Council. Thank you for allowing me to speak again about the City's use of FLOC safety automated license plate readers. Since my previous comments, several new developments in California deserve the Council's attention. Perhaps the most relevant is Santa Barbara. Last month, its FLOC contract ended. The police departments initially recommended replacing FLOC with another ALPR company, but after public concerns about privacy surveillance and data sharing the city council chose not to immediately enter another contract instead it decided to review the city's entire alpr policy before considering a replacement santa barbara didn't simply ask which company should we use instead it stepped back and asked should we have this type of surveillance system at all el cerrito also voted not to renew its flock contract its cameras are shut down and the city is removing them And Ventura and Oxnard provide an important lesson about safeguards. Ventura discovered that a flock configuration error allowed two out-of-state agencies to query its system despite California-only restrictions. Ventura called this a violation of its agreement with flock. Oxnard discovered a similar problem. Despite configuring its system for California-only access, a flock-enabled nationwide search function allowed out-of-state agencies to include Oxnard data in searches, resulting in over 5 million inquiries in that city alone. Oxnard subsequently suspended its 19 flock cameras. These examples directly address the argument that safeguards make these systems safe. California does have safeguards, but safeguards on paper don't necessarily guarantee that the technology will operate according to those safeguards. And this isn't limited to smaller communities. In July, the LAPD allowed its FLOC contract to expire, citing serious concerns involving civil liberties, privacy, and the collection and sharing of data. LAPD is one of the largest law enforcement agencies in the country and our closest major law enforcement agency. I've also heard the argument, our cell phones already track us. But the Supreme Court has addressed that argument. In Carpenter v. United States, the court held that obtaining historical cell site location information was a Fourth Amendment search, even though the information was held by a third party. And this year, in Chattree v. United States, the court held that obtaining cell phone location information through a geofence warrant is also a Fourth Amendment search. Neither case says that every ALPR system is unconstitutional. but both demonstrate that the government's ability to obtain information about our movements is not automatically unlimited simply because technology makes that information available. California's constitution separately recognizes privacy as an inalienable right under Article 1, Section 1. So the question before this council is not whether ALPRs can help solve crimes. The question is whether creating a searchable record of where people's vehicles travel is worth the privacy, security, and oversight risks that accompany it. JUST IN TODAY'S MEETING, A RESIDENT EXPRESSED CONCERNS ABOUT THE AI LIBRARY AND THE SAFEGUARDS OF OUR PERSONAL INFORMATION. JUST IMAGINE SENSITIVE PERSONAL INFORMATION ACCESSIBLE THROUGH FLOCK. I RESPECTFULLY ASKED THE CITY COUNCIL TO TERMINATE HIDDEN HILLS FLOCK CONTRACT, REMOVE THE EXISTING CAMERAS, AND DECLINE TO REPLACE THEM WITH ANOTHER ALPR SYSTEM. THANK YOU.

I apologize. I brought this up before, but I never heard any response. I'm just going to bring it up again about the possible conflict of interest that went on with some of the bidding these contracts with an employee, a city employee with an outside third party agency that he worked at both companies at the same time. And that is when Mike was working as a city staff. as a public safety manager and we spent money on different types of things like cameras and stuff and contracts are awarded and to have someone who's an employee and work for that company, is a conflict of interest. Nothing ever got done about it, never heard anything about it. And there's a number of other things that have been approved by the city council. And I question, do we have a conflict of interest? I was reading about government code 1090, which makes it a felony for a public officer uh... cannot have financial interest in contracts made in their official capacity every contract with covered six during that period is potentially void as far as i in my understanding and the city may be entitled to recover all the funds paid out and when i brought it up to CITY MANAGER, SHE ACKNOWLEDGES THAT THEY KNEW ABOUT THIS AND I JUST THINK IT'S A PROBLEM NOT TO DEAL WITH THESE ISSUES OF CONFLICT OF INTEREST AND I BROUGHT IT UP BEFORE AND EVEN YOU PULLED IT OFF THE AGENDA FOR THE SECURITY AND ALSO I FORGOT ALSO THE DRONES ALSO. I MEAN, THERE'S A BUNCH OF STUFF AND I DON'T WANT TO TAKE EVERYONE'S TIME. I JUST THINK IT'S A PROBLEM WHEN WE DON'T TAKE CONFLICT OF INTEREST SERIOUSLY. And to this date, I've heard nothing about this. Thank you.

Okay.

We talked about a lot of things tonight, and I hope going forward things are redlined. That was one of my issues, that we have things that are changed, the minutes that were amended, and there was no, that was a pretty significant shift in those documents, and I'm i have a question i you said that um glare melita there was a separation agreement for a city manager i it was said very quickly i heard the 28th but i didn't know if we were talking about the 28th of last month or the 28th of this month and if there's a separation agreement that's typically public records will that be coming forward as public documents i just Clearly, you can tell I've been spending a lot of time in our minutes and our budgets and our agendas. Our legal services in 2020 were $81,000. They're currently over $400,000 a year. Something is wrong. and i hope that the new incoming city council members help to put a stop to that general budget bleed we've been paying for a city manager who hasn't been here for several months i'm not quite sure what the game plan is. Nothing was said about what's the game plan. While Amber is acting city manager, are funds still coming out of the library funds to pay her base salary? It's just not clear. I know there's an additional $1,000 payment for when she acts as acting city manager. I feel like this is information that needs to be clear. we have i just i feel like this is a great opportunity to see some controls and um attention put on things like office expenses that used to be 40 000 were well over 70 000 this year i'm talking about 2020 to 2026. uh data processing from 18 000 to also over 50 000 there was uh something even in the things for a payment to council member mccorkindale or data something i i don't have it in front of me at this moment but i just feel like you know even this beautiful eighty thousand dollar desk um the spending out at the corner. The bottom line is these are our tax dollars, and I know that sometimes we have opportunities for grant money. We're apparently getting 2,000 buckets for mulching, food mulching, whatever. I just would really like there to be some attention to the spending that's going on. These are our tax dollars, and I would like to see some control over them. Thank you.

Ted.

I'm Ted Rosenquist, Mayor, council members. lived in Hidden Hills since 1999. Before that, I was a member of the Calabasas Cityhood Committee, the General Plan Committee, I was the founder of Stop Amundsen Ranch. I was one of the nine litigants in Los Angeles County versus Ventura County. I was the author of the Amundsen-Kilroy referendum. I quit all that when I came here, but what I want to say is And to our citizens, you can win on fighting corruption. Ventura County, the county supervisor took an illegal contribution. I addressed it to Ventura County. district attorney, and he penalized her. This was presented before, but there seems to be a conflict of interest between Covered Six and some of our contracts. And if someone wanted to, like me, take this to court, who's the district attorney or who would I address it to here in our city?

I'm not sure I understand the question.

Well, if there's a state law being broken where it was broken on a contract between covered six and the city, you can file a complaint. Citizens can file complaints. I was wondering, you know, this is a small city.

We don't have a district attorney here. I know we're not supposed to say anything, but we don't have a contract with Covered 6. The HOA has it.

I will respond to all of this.

Oh, is Covered 6 solely... The HOA has the contract.

Yeah, we have no contracts with Covered 6. Oh. So I don't know where this is coming from, and I understand that there's... A lot and I'm so in forward meeting a bunch of things that are floating around out there and I will address them in my council comments. Okay. They're pretty harsh accusations.

MR. Not from you, Ted.

MR. They are. And I just want to clear it up because I would like to sort of circumvent innuendo and rumor with facts.

MR. Okay. And – MR.

When you use the word corruption when you're addressing us. MR. Oh. MR. You used the word corruption.

MR. I'm sorry.

MR. You should be.

MR. Well, I am. I want to thank you for all your service. I know it's thankless to be a council member. And I didn't mean that you were corrupt.

Who are you talking, referring to then?

What?

Who are you referring to when you?

Coverage Six.

Coverage Six is corrupt.

Yes.

They're corrupt, but we're not corrupt.

Yeah, I never said, I specifically talked about Coverage Six. Go back and look at the minutes. Okay, thank you.

Okay, Barbara.

And I don't know if I pronounced this correctly, but a law firm named Alisher and Winder has been hired. They are employment lawyers. The city already has a city attorney. This firm was brought in specifically for employment related claims without authorization, without a contract, with a direct conflict of interest. $3,941.70 of our money, no vote, no contract, no explanation. I'd like to have an answer about that.

Okay. Anybody else? Anybody on Zoom?

There are no hands raised, Mayor.

Okay, great. Public comment is now closed, and we will move on to city council comments. I'll go last. I've got nothing.

I have no comments.

So just on the lighter side, I would like to wish happy birthday to a former city council videographer, my son Connor. His birthday is today, and sorry I'm late for your birthday dinner.

Okay, I have a couple of comments, and I've asked Sunny Soltani from Alshire Widener to join us. She is our special counsel. You're the managing partner there.

I am, yes.

And City Attorney Langer will also be participating. And I'm going to go through some of the things that got mentioned today here in our meeting and some questions that people have. have forwarded, including some of the financial questions. So the first question is that we had not made any public announcement regarding the prior city manager. Sonny, can you actually explain why this happened and how it happened and why it was proper the way we did it?

absolutely uh thank you mr mayor the city did not make an earlier announcement because personal matters are subject to very important legal and privacy protections and the city was required to allow the pro the process including all applicable statutory review and revocation periods to be completed before making a public statement And the government code sections that deal with this are government code section 54957 and government code section 54957.1. Those government code sections in compliance with the Brown Act and employment rules and privacy rights had to be followed, including other contractual obligations the city had.

Thank you. There have also been some inquiries regarding some FPPC violations with prior city manager. Can you address that?

Absolutely. Those are not within the city's jurisdiction, and the city should not really be commenting on that. Those are private matters between your former city manager and FPPC, and that's the appropriate agency for any member of the public that has concerns to contact.

There's also been some questions regarding that acting city manager Servin has a lawsuit with a, is involved in a lawsuit. Please address that.

The city cannot discriminate and not hire employees because they've exercised their First Amendment rights to seek legal remedies from former employers. That is a private dispute that she has with a former employer under the US Constitution. She's entitled to pursue her rights. And the city was absolutely in the right not to make that a consideration in making employment decisions.

Thank you.

You would have violated the Constitution otherwise.

There's also been some questions about whether or not we, how we fulfill the role of treasurer, and that we have no official position of treasurer. Can you address that, please?

Absolutely. It is true that there is a government code section that requires cities to have council members, city treasurer, city clerk, and a fire chief, and a fire, sorry, and a police chief. However, there is a code section that, and I wanna find it, let me find that code section. Government Code Section 34856 provides that the city council can appoint, make that position an appointment and they can give that authority to any of their staff. So what the city did here was absolutely within the bounds of its discretion and in complete compliance with state law.

Okay, thank you. There's also been some questions about giving the city manager authority for

over all of the staff uh that's an interesting one um the city of um hidden hills uh operates in a city council city manager form of government and uh in a city manager city council form of government, it is the city manager that's in charge of hiring and firing staff, and the council body sits as a policy decision maker. And I have to add, I would wager to say 90-plus percent of the cities within California operate that way, and that's for good reason. It's like having a board of directors. If you own a company, you would be very familiar with this structure. The board of directors are there to be policymakers, to provide broad direction to the CEO or the executive officers, and it is the CEO and the executive officers that deal with hiring and firing. Can you imagine if you had a situation where the board always said, We want to interview everybody you're hiring, CEO. Anyone you want to fire, we want to interview. So what the city has now done by formally adopting its city manager, city council form of government in its personnel rules is what should have been done a long time ago, and it is consistent with state law and how other cities operate around the state. Thank you.

We've also, this year, well, 2025, we changed our structure a little bit. We now have a city manager and an assistant city manager position. Is this consistent or inconsistent the way most cities operate?

I cannot think of a city I know that doesn't have an assistant city manager position. It's absolutely consistent with the broad practice in the state.

All right, we also changed our city manager's purchasing authority from $5,000 to $10,000, which is effectively doubling it. When I talk to cities across the county, I come up with completely different numbers. So my research says that most city managers have the authority to spend between $25,000 and $75,000, which is significantly higher than 10,000. Is my research wrong?

Absolutely not. Many of the cities I see are closer to 50,000, 75,000 given inflation, and most cities have adopted their rules recently.

Okay, and it's still fairly consistent that the city clerk and the assistant city manager and the finance staff report directly to the city manager and not the council?

Yes.

Okay, tonight we adopted Resolution 1065, which is our new governing policies. From our perspective, what we were trying to do was introduced best practices and instilled good governance and be more transparent. Do you see anything within that resolution that is contrary to these goals?

I don't. I think it's very good that you've done that. All the reporting requirements you're asking the city manager to put on agendas are exactly what the public should be looking for. It's transparency.

There's been some questions about how we hired you. Could you let us know how we did it?

Absolutely. I'm happy to... I was retained by the former city manager under her $10,000 signing authority in October 6, 2025, to answer some questions regarding personnel matters that I cannot disclose. That contract was officially extended in closed session by the city council on November 24th. pursuant to the Brown Act under potential litigation, and it was done as part of litigation strategy. Even though it was not a requirement, there was a report out of closed session, which clearly on that date said that There was a retention of special counsel being undertaken for litigation related matters based on a claim that was submitted against the city. And again, all of these are public documents and anyone can go watch the minutes from November 24th when that announcement was made out of closed session. And there has been minutes of the city approving our fees, so nothing has been hidden. It's been on the public agenda.

I know you're not a finance expert, but we rely on you for law, but there's been some questions about us utilizing library funds to pay for things. I know either you or City Attorney Langer is somewhat familiar with how we're going about this process. Any issues?

I don't see anything, but really your city attorney should respond on that. She's more familiar with those issues.

Yes, I think a lot of work has been done to look at the types of library services that are permitted to be funded with those funds. You've been looking at it for quite a few years and making sure that you're following the law and the expenditures of the library funds are proper.

So there's also been some questions about the role of Mike Grant in Coverage 6. whether or not there's a there is a conflict of interest my memory is that we when it first came up and someone brought it up we opted as a council to delay the actual vote and asked you to look into it so that we could double check to make sure that all of this was above board what what am i missing that's exactly correct to be 100 certain that there was no problem before the contract was approved

The item was continued in order for my office to do the analysis. And what we had determined was that he was not involved at all in the agreement that was before the council that evening. It hasn't been brought back yet for formal approval, but that analysis was done in the interim and determined that there was no legal defect under Government Code Section 1090. OF CONSIDERING THAT CONTRACT, AND I BELIEVE IT WILL BE BROUGHT FORWARD AT FUTURE COUNCIL MEETINGS. HE'S ALSO NO LONGER AN EMPLOYEE OF THE CITY. SO I BELIEVE HE HAD ALSO SCALED BACK HIS WORK OVER THE PAST YEAR OR TWO TO A REALLY MINIMUM NUMBER OF HOURS, AND HE HAS SINCE STOPPED WORKING FOR THE CITY. SO WHEN THAT CONTRACT COMES BACK, THERE WON'T BE A PROBLEM, BUT MY OFFICE HAS LOOKED AT THE LEGAL ISSUES AND DETERMINED that for that contract he was not involved in any way in the consideration or drafting or discussions of those agreements. There was a separation, and so it was proper.

There's also been some questions that we've converted the CERT team into a paid coverage six contract. Do we have a paid coverage six contract to cover CERT?

No, sir, we do not.

Do we have any contracts with coverage six?

No, sir, we do not.

Zero? Zero.

No, sir.

Okay. Because I don't know of any either. There's also been some questions about our financial position, whether or not that the people saying that we should have an audit Well, of course we should have an audit. We have one every year. That's literally what we do. We get audited. The audit firm comes in. They're independent. They have their own set of testing procedures. They go through all of our stuff, and they issue an opinion on our financial statements. This happens on an annual basis. This gets presented to the community as part of the package that we send out there. And I don't really know what else to say about that. We don't have an option of whether or not we should have an audit or not. It's the law. Our audits are probably a lot more intense now than they have been because I used to do audits. So if you ask our audit firm, they'll tell you I am a freaking nightmare because I know what questions to ask and what questions not to ask. There's also been some things out there about our financial stability. And we do know that some of our surrounding communities are having some financial pressure and some financial issues. That is not the case for us. As of June 30th, 2026, now this is pre-audit, but we know that we're going to be relatively close. We have $14,485,524 in reserve. That's our reserve. Our annual operating, our annual revenues are about $4.5 million. Our annual expenditures come somewhere close to that. So this amount has been building over years. So our financial position is actually very good. We are very sound. We pay a lot of attention to what we're spending money on and what we're not spending money on. There are times where we spend more money as we have tried to professionalize and spend more time. We get a lot of questions from the community. I welcome the questions, but every time you guys ask questions, we go do the research. You don't like it when I don't answer you, but what we do is we go do this research. We're not trying to be not transparent. We're trying to be thorough. We're trying to be accurate. We're trying to be correct. So I don't really know what else I can tell you about that. We have a series of add-out committees. We have a budget committee. We have a hiring committee. We have an investment committee. And we spend a lot of time safeguarding the assets of the community. We view that as our number one job. And every day we ask ourselves, what are we doing to make Hidden Hills a better place to live? There's no strange ulterior motive. All of us have lived here for a very long time. I mean, I'm probably the new guy. I've only lived here 30 years. So if you have, we encourage you to ask questions. We encourage you to follow up on it. This shouldn't be an adversarial relationship. We don't try to make it that way. And I hope that you take this in the spirit of which I meant it. The questions are out there, so I tried to answer them. So with that, I will move on to staff comments.

There are no additional comments for this evening.

Okay. There being no further business, can I have a motion to adjourn?

I move to adjourn.

Second. Tina, could I have a vote?

Council Member Weber?

Yes.

Council Member Gold? Yes. Mayor Patel-Segal?

Absolutely, yes.

And Mayor Loja?

Yes, we are adjourned.