City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay thank you for that. Okay before we get started with our regular agenda we're gonna go right into a special order of the day Public Works Week proclamation. Tonight it's my pleasure to recognize and celebrate National Public Works Week observed May 17 through 05/23/2026. Public works professionals are people who help keep our city running every single day. From maintaining our streets and public buildings to ensuring reliable water, wastewater and solid waste services.

Their work is essential to health, safety and quality of life in our community. This year marks the 60 sponsored by the American Public Works Association, and it is an opportunity for us to acknowledge the dedication, professionalism, and hard work of the individuals who serve our community behind the scenes. On behalf of the city council and the residents of Hollister, I want to thank our public works staff and all public works professionals for their continued commitment to serving our community. So do we have anybody here from public works? Okay.

So do you guys oh, we have lots of you. Is any is does somebody wanna come up and and actually get the proclamation? Does somebody wanna be a representative for the group that's here? Who wants to be the person? Okay.

I'm gonna ask you to go to the podium first. Okay. And then can you just please state your name quickly?

My name is Frank Garcia.

Frank. Okay. So thank you for representing this very important group. And I just want to read a couple of the items that are on the actual proclamation, and then I'm gonna go down and present this Okay, to so public works professionals that focus on the infrastructure, facilities and services that are vital to the importance of sustainable and res resiz resiz resilient, sorry, communities and to public health, high quality of life, and the well-being of this of the people of the city of Hollister. So like clearly you guys have a lot on your plate and we expect a lot from you guys live up to it every day.

Thank you so much for for that. So now with that, I, Mayor Roxanne Stevens, Mayor of Hollister, do hereby declare this week as National Public Works Week, I urge all the citizens to join with representatives of Public Works Association and government agencies in activities, events, and ceremonies designated to pay tribute to these very important professionals, engineers, managers and employees. So thank you all so much for your hard work and I'm gonna come down and present this. And a round of applause would be great.

Thank you, Mayor. We appreciate it. Yes. Would be great. Come on. Come on,

guys. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We can get all this out.

There we go. And the council members too. That was very convenient.

I love seeing all those hands go up when I ask who's here for public works. That was really cute. Okay, well thank you all so much again for your hard work and we will look forward more success in public works as we know you guys are doing a great job. Okay, so we're gonna move on with our next part of our agenda and this is our public input part of the agenda. This is a time for anyone in the audience to speak on any item not on the agenda and within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council.

Speaker cards are available in the lobby and are to be completed and given to the city clerk before speaking. When the city clerk calls your name, please come to the podium, state your name and city for the record and speak to the council. If you're joining us by Zoom, please click at the to the bottom of your screen to raise your hand. If you're joining us via Zoom on your cell phone press the asterisk 9. Each speaker will be limited to three minutes with a maximum of thirty minutes per subject matter. Please note that the state law prohibits the city council from discussing or taking action on any item not on the agenda. Okay. So do we have any speakers for this one?

Mayor, if we may, we need to get the post session report out from the May 4 meeting.

We do that first or would you It's

it's first on the agenda. We could do that and then we could jump right. Oh, I apologize.

I did skip right over that. I'm sorry. Yeah. Go ahead and do that. I'm sorry.

At the closed session, the council took a unanimous vote to not accept the settlement.

Okay.

You. And with that, our first speaker is, Caitlin Felix, followed by Judy Ganson.

Good evening. I'm Caitlin Felix, and I'm here from Hollister. Good evening, mayor and members of city council. My name is Caitlin Felix. I am representing Cat Crew, California. First, I wanna sincerely thank you for your time and for the work that you do for the residents and animals of Hollister. I'm here tonight to ask you to continue the funding for this NIP program, the spay neuter improvised project, because it is tremendous difference in our community. One of our biggest missions is TNR, trap neuter return for feral cats. Funding the feral SNP clinic is where we see the biggest impact on the population of cats. These clinics directly help stop the cycle of endless litters and suffering before it begins.

With the SNP feral clinics, around 500 feral cats were fixed last year. That means 500 feral stray cats that could have continued reproducing if they had not been spayed or neutered. The impact of fixing even one single cat is enormous. One unspayed female cat can produce enough offsprings and leave to hundreds and potentially thousands of cats over the next few years. With the intervention of overpopulation, grows rapidly and becomes much harder and more expensive to manage.

With these feral clinics, feral cats are not only fixed, but they are vaccinated, dewormed, and treated for fleas, improving both animal welfare and public health. These efforts help reduce disease, prevent suffering and stabilize outdoor cat populations in our community. However, that's simply not enough slots available in our clinics. Multiple resources have to split those slots and because of storage, many of us have to take the remaining cats, the veterinarians, at much higher cost. Cat crew alone, TNN'ed a total of three eighty nine cats in 2025 and has already TNN'ed 127 cats so far in 2026.

That shows both the need and the demand in our community. When you compare San Bernardino County SNP numbers to the surrounding cities, in numbers were significantly lower than unfortunately the locals around us. There is no other options for low cost spay and neuter services or feral cat clinics. We understand the budgets and funding decisions can be difficult, and we understand that the City has many important priorities. However, continuing to fund these clinics ultimately saves the City money in the long run.

Reducing overpopulation helps decrease stray animal complaints, shelter overcrowding, disease spread, and community issues that become far more expensive if left unaddressed. We have compassionate, hardworking people in this community who generally want to do the right thing and help these community cats, but we need your support to make that happen. Continued funding for the SNP clinic allows programs to remain accessible and help effectively control the cat population. With this program, it's not just about the animals. It's about preventative public health responsible spending and building a healthier and safer community for everyone. We respectfully ask you to continue the funding for this program and continue investing in a solution that is already making a measurable impact in San Benito County. Thank you again for your time, your compassion, and your consideration.

Thank you, Ms. Felix. Okay. Okay. So I'm going to ask I'm going to ask the audience to refrain from applause. I know that this is really important. I agree. However, I'm going to ask that you not do that so that we can just keep moving along with our speakers and allow time for the other speaker to speak. So, I'm assuming you're our next speaker, Judy Ganzen,

and I live in the 400 Building facing San Benito Street, and I was out walking Tuesday and I went by the garden box right by where you enter San Benito Street and it was pretty shabby looking. So, my neighbor told me that she thought that the Flower Mart was taking care of it. So, I contacted them and she said that their contract with the city ended about a year and a half ago. So I sent an email to Anna and said I would volunteer to adopt that box and take care of it. Well, then the city guys came out and they trimmed a little bit and then a couple days later they came out and they planted one little plant that has red flowers on it.

But the one on the right, as you're entering South, there's no flowers. The one on the other side of the street has some geraniums and stuff, but am quite willing to take it over and work on it and do it myself. Anyhow, then you guys just have to water it. Anyhow, thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Gantz. Next speaker, please.

Lisa Sears, followed by Natalie Day.

Hello, mayor and city council. My name is Lisa Sears, and I'm proud to be born and raised in Hollister. Since 2018, I've been advocating for spay neuter services in your city, driven by a belief that an ounce of prevention is worth the pound of cure. In fact, my family and I took a significant step by sponsoring the very first Snip Bus feral cat clinic here in Hollister back in December 2018. Thanks to the city's support along with contributions from local donors and rescue groups, we have successfully fixed over 4,000 feral cats on Snip Bus.

Imagine the impact if the city hadn't invested in these clinics. If half of those cats were females, each having three litters a year over the last seven and a half years, the number of community cats in Hollister would be staggering. This investment in Snip Bus Clinics has been crucial in controlling Hollister's feral cat population. Today, I urge you to continue funding this vital service. It is essential for the cats, for the dedicated rescuers and trappers who volunteer in Hollister, for animal lovers who wish to prevent suffering and neglect, and even for those who prefer not to have cats living in their neighborhoods.

I'm also here to share as a member of the Animal Advisory Board for Seaside. I'm thrilled to announce their success in addressing animal overpopulation. Seaside has implemented a three pronged approach that Hollister could easily adopt. Number one, in December 2024, Seaside passed a required spay neuter ordinance requiring cats to be fixed by five months and dogs by six months with a breeding licensing fee of $1,000 per animal. Number two, they have a full time animal control officer that enforces the ordinance using a fix it ticket system, and he also runs a feral cat trapping program where he fixes approximately 200 cats annually within the city limits.

Number three, the city sponsors one SNP clinic a month to meet the demand for the Fix It tickets. This approach has resulted in a dramatic 30% decrease in shelter intake in the first twelve months of having the ordinance. The most effective solution to our animal shelter problem is source control. By reducing the number of unaltered and unwanted pets, we alleviate the burden on Hollister Animal Shelter and its dedicated staff, ultimately saving the city cost in the long run. We need stronger protection for animals, including a required spay neuter ordinance and higher breeding licensing fees to protect dogs from the exploitation by irresponsible backyard breeders that is happening here in Hollister.

Please join Seaside in leading the way to solve animal overpopulation and saving the taxpayer money in the long run. Thank you for your attention and your support.

Thank you, Ms. Sears. Next speaker?

Natalie Day followed by Liam McLaughlin.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and other council members. As many of you know, I am the volunteer liaison for the SNP Farrell clinics in Hollister and the founder of For Farrell's Sake, a small TNR focused rescue. For those of you who do not know what that is, it's trap neuter return, the only humane way to address the feral and community cat overpopulation. I have been involved in over 100 feral cat clinics and have seen firsthand what happens when we can't provide the services. The local rescues here have fixed over 5,000 cats since 2018, and we're extremely proud of those numbers.

But what is now imperative is the implementation of a spayneuter ordinance and continued funding for SNP, Also low cost clinics for certain high risk and lower socioeconomic areas here in town. California used to have the best live outcome numbers. Only about 30% of the shelters report, but right now California is one of the worst euthanasia rates in the country, second only to Texas. Texas euthanizes $125,000 or 125,000 animals, and we euthanize over 100,000 every year just because there's no place for them to go. I wrote this all crazy, you guys, so please bear with me.

If not addressed, the problem doesn't go away, it gets worse. Last night, a feral cat scheduled for surgery today gave birth in a trap. Six more kittens. At another location, we trapped a mom with kittens somewhere. Hopefully they make it through the night without mom, but we have no choice. We have to fix the moms. These are the situations we face almost daily, and our decisions impact lives, the lives of animals with no voice and no way to stand up for themselves. Cutting funding, closing the shelter, all of these choices being made are going to be the reason cats and kittens are dying in our streets, backyards, bushes, in driveways. I can't live with that, And knowing what y'all know now, I hope you can't either.

Thank you, Ms. Day. Next speaker?

Leanne McLaughlin, followed by Carolyn.

Good evening. My name is Liam McLaughlin. I'm the political and community organizer. I I work on staff with SKA five to one. I don't actually just be, just to be straightforward, I actually live in Santa Cruz, but I represent city and county workers in San Bernardino County, Monterey County, and, Santa Cruz County.

And just wanted to, ask. I sent an email on the seventh. I know you guys gonna get a lot of emails, but we're the frontline workers really like to to set up some time to meet with the council members individually just to kinda share their, you know, what they're dealing with at work, share their, you know, their concerns, and kinda just have that that time to meet with you individually and and hear your perspectives as well. So, just just a reminder to to please look at I'm gonna follow-up those emails today so you guys have them on top of your inbox. Would love to find some time the next couple weeks to meet with each of you as well as as well as Roland. I hope he he sees this as well. I'll follow-up with him as well. So, yeah, that's all I wanted to say. And, again, city workers just wanna have a chance to, you know, have an honest conversation and and hear your perspectives as well. So thank you for your time.

You, mister McGoughlin. Next speaker, please.

Carolyn, followed by Olivia Martinez.

Hi, mayor and city council members. My name is Carolyn, and I am a resident of Hollister and the work site organizer for the city workers. These workers are calling me every day due to the stress and fear that the city manager is causing. The workers have always been understanding and worked in partnership with the city until now. But today they come to you asking for you to stop this ongoing behavior from the city manager that is causing workers to go on workers' comp. Financial uncertainty is not new to them. They have helped the city before taking a 0% wage increase last year, as you all know. We ask your thoughtful city leadership to make decisions to support the city workers. Thank you.

Thank you, Carolyn. Next speaker.

Olivia Martinez, followed by Frank Garcia.

I'm Olivia Martinez, and thank you for listening to us city manager. I see that you're not even paying attention. But that's her behavior lately since we've been meeting with her and with the workers. She disregards the workers. But let me start with my speech. The City of Hollister employees are the backbone of this community. Many were born and raised here. They are not new to a budget deficit, right? They helped balance the budget last year by not taking an increase. They are not afraid of change.

And so if she tries to tell you or inoculate you to tell you that they're afraid of change, that is not what they're afraid of. They are tired of being disrespected by her as she came in here. She has not been transparent with them. She has created lies and uncertainty for them, telling them, We're going to outsource the water department. We're going to get rid of animal services.

We're going to reorganize this. Tons of things constantly that she is doing that isn't unfair to your city workers. They are the city of Hollister. They were born and raised here. You hired a city manager that has a long history of reputation. We met with the Teamsters where she came from. We heard from them, and we heard what she did in Washington. And then you hire her here. They are asking you to step up and talk to them and meet with them and see what's really going on in the city. They are here today because they are tired.

They are afraid. It is not fair to them. The city is one of our smallest bargaining unit. We have 26 in our region. We are 50,000 strong. That's how strong SEIU is. And they are here today because they will not tolerate having somebody that came from Washington come and change their city. They have been committed to you. And every single bargaining that we have with you, they come and say, no, we cannot ask for money because they are trying to balance their budget. We need to help the city. Now you need to step up and hear them. They will tell you the truth about how this city manager is disrespecting them.

Thank you, Ms. Martinez. Next speaker. Okay. No, I'm gonna ask you again. I'm gonna ask again. I'm gonna ask again respectfully that you hold your applause, please, because we're we need to get through this, and we want to give everybody an opportunity to have their time to speak. Okay. Go ahead, sir.

Good evening, mayor, city council. My name is Frank Garcia. I am a public works employee. For the last forty five days, I've carried this quietly, thinking about timelines, meetings, credibility, documentation, and whether I was handling this right way. People see the emails. They see the documents. They don't see the mental exhaustion behind them. They don't see the nights second guessing myself, wondering, am I overreacting? Did I miss something? Am I the only one seeing this?

Why do I feel like I'm carrying this by myself? How do I protect the bargaining unit while protecting my own credibility? For forty five days, I've tried to stay composed while watching timelines continue to shift, explanations continue to change, and concerns continue to grow. I understood how important credibility was. I knew that if I became too emotional, people might focus on my tone instead of the actual issues. So instead, I documented. I questioned. I compared notes. I stayed up thinking about timelines. I carried meetings in my head long after they ended.

And the truth is, it takes a toll on a person mentally. The hardest part is realizing that eventually, your mind never really shuts off. Even when you're home, your thoughts are still there, replaying conversations, wondering, did I miss something important? There were moments where I questioned myself more than anyone did, not because concerns disappeared, but because carrying something this heavy for this long starts wearing on you mentally. I'm not asking for sympathy.

I'm asking for people to understand there's a human side behind all of this. There is pressure that comes with feeling like you have to catch every detail, protect your coworkers, remember every conversation, and still remain calm and professional through it all. I've done my best to handle this responsibly. And regardless of how difficult this process has been mentally, I will continue protecting the bargaining unit the best way I can. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Garcia. Next speaker.

Christina Tamarillo, followed by Timothy Pearson.

Hello, counsel. Thank you for your time. So, I'm speaking on behalf of what I feel that I've seen within the budget and the deficit. I keep hearing that we're $21,000,000 in the hole. But yeah, I don't feel that the city has done their due diligence to protect city the way it should. I pulled a number. I requested a public documentation. We're 4 and a half, 4 and a half million dollars behind on our collections for water. That's a lot of money. When you look at that and I can forward you these documents, when you when we're asking for to cut jobs or to make sacrifices, we have to do our part for these workers that are here every day.

They're they're doing the job or not doing the job in the front end. We have to collect the money. We cannot charge less to deliver a product to the public that it's not enough to afford the expenses that we have in the city. We're charging $13 a little over $17 now base rate for water. When other districts, district I live in, I have to pay $37 a base rate.

What makes my district different than any other district? If we get called, if I have to call out an emergency worker in my district, I have to pay an extra fee. If they get called out in any of the other districts, they don't charge. How can we math doesn't math. If you are not going to step up and do the job to charge the public what needs to be charged so that these people do not have to worry about their jobs. So that this is an enterprise fund. We're going to be in this situation every single year and there is not going to be no change. So as a city council, we voted. I voted for Priscilla. She's my district.

I've spoke to all four of you up there. Roland was the only one that didn't return my call. But at the end of the day, we don't need to beautify our city if we can't even afford to provide water to it, or sewer or streets or anything else in this department in this city needs. You have a duty to the public to do the job correctly and make sure that you are charging the right rates for the things that need to be charged so that you can afford to run a city. That is my position because every one of these people that are standing here today, they work really hard to do the job.

And it's not their fault or anybody's fault except who is responsible is the top. So I appreciate your time. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Hotamere. Next speaker.

Good evening, council. Max Payers. I'm gonna keep it real short and sweet. I was here a few weeks ago, discussed about a a sad situation that my family has been thrust into regarding, killing our family dogs over an incident. What I did bring today was all the sworn statements in the record that seemed to be ignored by the hearing officer as well as Commissioner Galloway that I would just like to leave with y'all to read through.

Mister Pearson, I'm gonna ask if you speak into the mic so that we can okay. Yeah. Thank you.

Sorry, mayor.

That better?

That's Okay.

Usually, have too much with booming tone, but my wife says. So, anyways, those are here to be matter of public record once and for all, but I'm running out of time. In two weeks, the city the city manager has has authorized the city attorney attorneys to issue a order for us to turn our family pets over for destruction over a limited one time offense. They got out. They mixed it up with some cats who are also roaming, which we feel super sorry about.

And I've actually we've made restitution to the to the owners. But yet the hammer was put down on just killing these dogs and making an example out of us where we're upstanding members of of this community. I coach. I volunteer coach for the high school. My kids are both on ASB, four point o students, Girl Scouts. Heck, I I pill pick up trees on after Christmas with a Boy Scout, and I have two girls. So we give back, and this is what we're getting in return. So the TNR groups are here. Thank you very much for what you do.

It it

it makes it makes a huge impact. Imagine how much more of an impact you could have with another 10 or $15,000 of city money that went to killing our dogs instead of your program. That's all I have to say. And the overreach of, you know, the the city attorney and uniformed officers in the in the courtroom at Superior Court to make sure our dogs die. The day after Christmas, a surprise kennel inspection.

Because we had a huge windstorm at on Christmas. Remember? Well, let's show up at the Pearson's house at 01:30 in the afternoon and pound on the door to see if if they're adhering to the commissioner's instructions when all the the posts from half and the animal shelters say, bring your pets in when it's cold. Fireworks, you know, bring your pets in when the for the fireworks. Our dogs had to sit out in the on the back patio while all that stuff was going on. But more to come. Thank you for your time.

Thank you, mister Pearson. Other speakers?

There are no more speakers.

Okay. Okay. Thank you everyone for your comments. We appreciate every comment that we get and we'll be following up with some of you. So thank you for that. We're gonna move on to the consent agenda. So, do any members of council have any brief questions or comments on any items on the consent agenda? Don't know, have a

knack of not being super brief.

Okay, wait, hold on a second council member. Can we just, do you have any, no, okay. Okay, go ahead, go ahead council member. Yeah. Okay. Go ahead, councilman.

Can you hear me? I feel like I'm yelling and it's saying, you know, when I hear about annexation, my ears perk up and my spidey senses start to tingle. And I read the documentation, but can somebody in the know city manager possibly just kind of help me wrap my mind around seven point five and seven point six. Maybe I should probably know at this point of year end, year end sixteen months or where we're at, but what are we annexing? What's going on here? What is the community facilities district number five specifically and Number 4?

I will ask Mr. Hernandez to respond to that public works director.

So should I pull it?

Let's see if he can answer quickly, and then you can make we can decide.

Okay.

Okay?

Good evening, council and mayor. These items. So the the the there's two items on on the agenda today. The CFDs and then there's also a lighting and landscape district. So, these are annexations. This one particular is the proposed boundary of I believe it's item 7.5, is that?

7.5, yep.

So this is related to the proposed boundary of the 1620 Buena Vista Multifamily Subdivision and three six one for the annexation into territory of a community Facilities District Number 5. So it's basically annexing that property to be able to be levied for the fees associated with the CFD in order to incorporate them into our landscaping district.

Okay. So this is specifically for just landscaping? And fire, is that the next one?

So, can I just make sure that that we're really clear and make sure that I understand? The annexation is into the CFD, not into the city. Is that correct?

That is correct. This has nothing to do with annexing anything to the city. This is strictly an individuals who want to join the CFD. Okay. That'll fine. If you want.

This is what should wanna be Okay. Perfectly clear on you. Thanks.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Hernandez. Appreciate it. Okay. Any other questions or comments on any items on the consent agenda? Okay. Not seeing any, let's go to public comment. Do we have anybody, any speaker cards for this item?

No, ma'am.

Okay. Thank you for that. Okay. So can I get a motion then on the consent agenda?

Motion to approve the consent agenda.

Can I get a second, please?

I'll second.

All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay, thank you then with the consent agenda has been passed. So we're gonna move on then to item eight. It's public hearing, a resolution confirming and approving the assessment boundary diagram and ordering the levy and collection of assessments of Landscape And Lighting District Number 93 Dash 1 for fiscal year 2026 through 2027. Can we have a staff report, please?

Again, Mr. Hernandez will take this, this item.

Good evening again. So on a yearly basis, we have to bring this levy over to council for authorization in order to collect the assessment for this district. This is Lighting And Landscape District. So, I mean, the staff report kind of explains it, but it's for street lighting, landscaping, maintenance of walls, and it's for reoccurring item. So we're required to bring it into public hearing.

Is that the entire report?

Correct.

Okay. Okay. Any thank you for that report. Any questions from the council? Go ahead, Vice Mayor Bjorn.

Thank you. Okay. So as you know, I have a constituent from Sunny Silk Village who reached out regarding the maintenance in Zone C. So I had a couple of questions sent over to you guys earlier for review. So I want to be transparent about that. So I will ask when were Zone C maintenance needs last formally evaluated?

Madam Mayor, members of the council. So we have fallen behind on evaluating the needs of our various projects. Where this has become more important, I guess, is in the fact that we have not been able to apply consumer price index adjustments to some of our areas. So for for 'twenty six, 'twenty seven, for the new fiscal year beginning July 1, I'll just say it that way, As of July 1, we need to look we need to assess all of our lighting districts, our CFDs. We need to engage in conversations with HOAs.

Right now, the county, for example, is examining the possibility of adopting an HOA type of business model for any new additions to the county. I am not suggesting that that's something that the city should do, but I think that the city should study it. So that is part of an overall assessment of our conditions. For all purposes, the bucket in which I'm putting that in is under beautification. It is not beautification is not something extra. It's something that deals with the services that right now we have to provide to our CFDs, to our landscaping districts, and making sure that we not only know their needs, but also know how much we spend on those needs.

You know, significant traffic. We don't have any programs.

Out NASA's, like, we have how many employees do we have in the whole city of Hollister? All of our employees? And 80. 180 employees. How many people live in Hollister? Like 45,000 people live in Hollister at the county, 47,000 now, please don't tell me that. I probably see them every day going on to California 25. So there were we're outnumbered basically. So churches, community groups, people that care about these young people can do something. We just want them to know that we see the kids and all their cool maneuvers that they can do like turning while you're doing a wheelie is pretty cool.

So your kid's super talented right off the bat, but we care about them and we care about their brains and we care about their lives. And it's super important to wear a helmet. It's totally basic. So I love the idea of the pizza party, but I also just wanna remind people that government's not always the answer. Like smaller groups, it can get together.

And if their children like matter to the people that love them the most, stop by, have a slice of pie, let's talk about it, and let's let them know that the community is concerned about the kids, especially since one of them already got hit. And from what I read, I thought it wasn't the needle. Don't see no here, but I swear that people's not wearing a helmet and I don't know what happened to him, but it's it's kind of important. So Thanks for putting us on there. I tried to put this on the agenda on the fifth if I didn't fill out the form.

Okay.

Protocol. Gotta do it.

Thank you. Okay. Okay. So let let me check-in. Do we public comment on this item?

Yes. Max Neff.

Okay.

Alright. So that works. Hi. I'm Maxwell Neff. I live in Ridgemark, which is close enough to Hollister, about a 100 yards from the city line. For four years, I lived in Davis. I went to the university, and Davis has a very strong biking culture. I know that well, it's assumed that you own a car to go somewhere. In Davis, it's assumed that you have a bike. There's just so many. Personally, I can attest that there are streets that were clogged with bikes so heavy that cars couldn't get off the highway. And when I got to university as a part of orientation, they sat us down with a local organization for bikers that said, here's what you do. Here's what you don't do. Do not die. Please.

And so I think that Davis has about a century of experience with bikers that could be helpful in this situation. I'm certain that there are other cities which also have a very strong and established biking culture, and I believe that this is a problem that has solutions that have been explored before to very effective ends. I can say in Davis, I biked every single day that I was up there, even when I had my car, to go to the downtown, to get stuff that I needed, to go to university, to just go and bike around for fun. Right? So I think reaching out to Davis or reaching out to cities that have established volunteer organizations for biking could be a good first step for how Holster should approach this.

Cause the city of Davis did not have a direct influence outside of wear a helmet, this is the right of way for bikes, stuff like that. So thank you.

Okay, great. Thank you, Mr. Neff.

More speakers.

Okay. So let me bring you back. Did there any other last minute comments, questions? Okay. So let me just, I just wanna summarize what we've heard. So I wanna be really clear that there are differing perspectives on this, Our different ways to approach this and different things that we're concerned about on the day. So there's the issue about making sure that they're wearing helmets. So that's one issue. There's just the idea of road safety. So when the kids aren't riding their bikes, if they're darting in and out of traffic, that's another one.

That's what I've experienced, and so that's where I was coming from. And then Council Member Morales got complaints about groups of kids riding their bikes and some concerns about what that might mean. So there's that, there's that issue. And then finally, there's just in general this, I think all of us agree, this idea that we want our kids outside exercising and exploring the outdoors. So we wanna maintain that.

So I I think that as we begin to have these conversations that we keep those in mind and remember that they're three that they're separate things in and of themselves that we don't mix those issues up, but they're all equally important. So let's make sure that when we are having these conversations that we are thinking about that. The thing that I heard overwhelmingly that everybody seemed to be good with starting the conversations with these young people and their parents just at a level around, you know, we heard some concerns about keeping everybody safe and then starting from there just keeping it really low key, some sort of a pizza party or just a discussion and then moving from there. But starting the

In the in the Hollister.

Nice. Thank you for that incredible report. Yeah. I'm really it's it is real exciting stuff. I do I I do appreciate all the level of detail. Please continue to update us on all of these things. I think these are one of the things that we want to make sure that we highlight. I agree with you.

Concern for safety? Okay. But we don't have a thousand cars. You know, we don't have, you know, significant traffic. We don't have any programs. In the past, we talked about Parks and Recs doing programs. We talked about alternatives, right? So they're looking for socialization, you know, socializing with other other kids. It's sad that the only place we have here to socialize is Target. And that is very sad.

But true. So, it's both a preventative measure and a socialization measure and a recreational issue. So, you have three different areas or domains, but we don't have alternatives. Also, I think we need to encourage kids going outside and exercising and actually being able to talk to other human beings, because that doesn't lead to mental health issues. So, I think if we're looking at it from a data perspective, there are groups, right?

They're not engaging in graffiti or crime or anything, which a lot of kids their age, you know, when they're bored and don't have anything to do, they could engage in in. Those kind of activities and they don't. So I think that's great. I like the idea of talking to the youth to see what they like. But again, people don't like to waste their time. If you don't have an option or solution that's realistic, implementable, then what are you offering? What are we going to offer? Let me hear you complain, share. I won't say complain, but some people complain that we don't have anything to do. We don't have anywhere to go.

We don't have anywhere to socialize. We don't have anywhere that we can feel safe or, you know, talk to our friends other than Target. So, think that's wonderful that they're going out and exercising and socializing. Those are two super healthy activities. I wish more kids would do that.

I think once we hear the youth, once we hear the community and all concerns, we actually need to have a facilitated dialogue between all the parties. So what does that mean? Youth, if they want to engage, they might not. But people that are concerned for safety or people that are concerned about whatever it is that they're concerned about and really help facilitate sessions in terms of, Okay, well, what are some viable options? Because if they say build a, you know, a $5,000,000 recreation center.

What are you going to say? So. My comments are, yes, I think having a town hall meeting is fine, but I would get frustrated. We've had a lot of town hall meetings where people have shared a lot of wonderful ideas and concerns and then nothing happened. And I think that's where we lose trust and when people are coming engaged in a process and then nothing happens.

Think people really feel like that's a slap in the face to say, hey, you took my time out of my busy day to bring legitimate concerns without any possible solution that I think if we're going to engage in a process, then we need to be realistic about what we're going to offer and what we're going to do if we're going to follow through with anything.

Okay.

Thanks for those comments. Appreciate it. Council Member Fischer, do you have anything to add? Go ahead.

So I'm a cyclist myself. I mean, not these days, but there was a time like during COVID, I was doing 125, 150 miles a week and it felt good. Felt real good. So I'm all about kids getting outside, getting off the screens, reducing that screen time, getting their energy out and coming home. You know, when I was a kid, it was kind of like when the street lights came on and came home.

It was like old school. It was old school holster And, you know, I'd be there for dinner and hopefully it was something warm. And if it wasn't, I'd eat a bunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. So I'm all about kids getting out, getting exercise. But I too have gotten, you know, reached out to, and there are kids on bicycles that aren't really getting as much exercise because the bikes have motors on them nowadays and they're electrified and they're going above 25 miles per hour on the sidewalks.

And so that for me is a little bit dangerous you know when you're going above 25 miles per hour in a bit of a pack and you've got a business and people are walking into and out of these businesses and you've got a pack of like motorcycle riders I guess, not wearing helmets, not exactly being safe and being a little bit mischievous. So I'm kind of on both sides of this thing. So I'm really concerned about the kids, first of all, because there was an incident on Nash Road a few months ago where there was a kid on a bike, not wearing a helmet, was over on Nash Road by the chase, by the round table, and the kid got hit, right? And the motorist, you know, was apprehended and that whole thing is going through. But the kid, know, you're, you know, as a kid, Hopefully he's going to be Okay and there's not like any kind of life threatening, but I've got hit by a car and my youth pop right back up.

No problem at all. Now I'm older and I got hit by a car and I like and I was driving pretty safe and sane, but motorists aren't always paying attention and a lot of these kids, even if they don't have a motor, are using some cool wheelies. I mean they can turn the bike while on a wheelie in my 40s. Can barely man roll off like a little pill. You know what I mean? So, but I'm super impressed. So there's gotta be a way that they can show off these skills and do something in a way that's just a little bit safer. So I'd love. I love the idea of a pizza party. I would love to hear what you know.

You know some of the concerns are. But the the the motorcycle like with the electric bikes that that it is really unsafe. The kids are traveling in packs and they're kind of taking over the road. They're almost when I look at it without the helmet. On the road, blatantly disregarding like traffic and safety Motorists are all gonna be at fault if there is an incident, and there's already been one.

So I feel like we have a duty to act and actually do something about this. If it's like putting an ordinance out there on top of guardian state law to have a helmet, If you're under 18, like you have to wear a helmet on a bicycle if you're going to be on a public street, but that's our feeling. So I'd like to engage with the public. I'd like to engage with parents And I think a pizza party is a great way to do it. I think that'd be a great piece of public funds, but there's already something that's already happened.

And I'm concerned like more will happen and this isn't unique to Hollister. I think on our end, maybe before we even have this pizza party, we reach out to other communities. Watsonville, Salinas, Santa Cruz, San Jose, and see what they're doing to give kids an opportunity to feed kids, especially with summer work coming around the corner. So see what they're doing. I know they have bike groups that do, like, bike rides around town.

They'll go grab food. They'll go do something, go to a park, hang out. So there's constructive things to do. And then I'd also like us to reach out to other communities and other leaders and electives and see, you know, what what they're doing about this kind of mischievous part of, you know, being a kid just being a youth and having a whole bunch of energy, young body that's to do cool stuff. So yeah, I'd love to do, I love the idea of a pizza party.

There is a race coming up in July. It's kind of put on by off the chain. I don't know. It's more of a gravel ride, so it's kind of a cross country mountain bike slash it's a new type of riding rig on basically a road bike, but they're riding on dirt. So people just love that geometry and they love riding fast on dirt. So that's something, but I definitely think that this is not a not a real big issue now, but as this gains popularity, I have a feeling something bad might happen, and I'd like to get out in front of us as soon.

Okay, thank you for that. So after we come back, I would like to hear like what is that you'd like to see moving forward because there's a lot in that. So here's what I think. I think that the idea of connecting with the youth and having a conversation with them is good and here's why. It's not just because we may need to have something to offer because I agree with you.

We're not gonna invite them and say, we want to hear your idea so that we can do something. It's just simply so we can have a conversation with them. Here's what I would do. I I I know you have had this experience, Council Member Morales. I have too spoken in our work to a lot of youth who have engaged in some behaviors that are maybe not super safe.

But it's just really about we want you to be safe, how can, what can we do to help you to be more safe, we want you to be outdoors. I think the idea of being an organized activity, that's one thing, But I think this is more of this idea of we're free, we wanna be, we wanna just be out exploring, we're we're young, we just wanna do these cool things. And I think they should be able to do that as youth. That's part of that. And how can we make sure that you can do that and still be safe?

So have that kind of conversation with them about the concerns that we've heard. Because if we've heard it, if all of us sitting here and I've spoken to council member Mora Resendez, and he has also heard from constituents about concerns about their safety. In fact, I have had my incidents myself with these youth and I've asked them to be super careful because I was afraid I was gonna run them over. So we so I think it's just this idea of having this conversation about them so that they know that the community is concerned about them, but also how what can they do to help us to ensure that they're safe. And then we can go from there.

I think moving on to other things such as an ordinance. I don't I'm not excited about an ordinance. What happens if you have an ordinance, it is just another way to in to enforce some things that will limit the these young people's ability to be out in the world and exploring and having a good time. So I would I would be very that would be my absolute last choice, and I don't think that we're there yet. And the idea of, like, offering some kind of a big, you know, as a community center or some other option, I don't know that we're in that position to have that conversation yet.

However, I think just having a conversation about being safe and keeping them outdoors, encouraging to stay outdoors, but keeping them safe. I think that's a good place to start, and it doesn't have to be elaborate. I do also think that what might work what might be a good idea is if we reach out to our schools and see what kinds of things they're doing around bike safety. And city manager Cortez, I don't know if we've done that at all. I know you've had some conversations with the superintendent, both superintendents of the large school districts, but I don't know if we've done any kind of maybe we could find out if there's anything going on at the schools because I think if there is some way to partner with them, think that might be be helpful.

But I think ultimately all we want is we want them to be safe. That's what we want. We don't want our our residents to feel like they are in any way going to harm kids because they're being unsafe, but we also want kids to just be kids. So that would be what I would like to see. Like, let's just start with a conversation with these kids, and I think inviting them.

Again, I agree with Council Member Koretz. If they're interested, we have to find a way to reach out to some of these kids and then see if they're interested and have this conversation, offer their parents to come along and then offer pizza ID, that would be a great place to start. And then we just go from there, but I also think that engaging with the schools would be good. And then maybe, it's another school year, there might, I don't know if there's anything that they can do now. I mean, they're literally like two or three weeks away from the end of school.

But for sure, this is something that we can start to plan for next year. And then over the summer, we just continue to try to stay on top of this with our with with just in general the conversation, having conversation with our with our law enforcement that we want them to be safe, but we don't want a heavy hand at all. We always want the kids to be kids. So that's where I that's where I come down on this. Okay. Any other let me before I go to public comment. Okay. So let's go to public. Oh, go ahead, Council Member Morales.

No, I appreciate those comments, especially the last in terms of law enforcement. The residents that have contacted me are concerned about they're not comfortable with a group of kids hanging out in the street. And I don't want to mess that with it's their safety, right? It's just they're uncomfortable with a group of young boys being together, right? And so that's, I think, the part that concerns me is that just because they're out riding a bike together, a group more than three, that can be categorized as something, right, under the welfare institution code or and so there's a very fine line that I want to make sure we don't cross.

Again, you know, they're from a policy perspective, it can go in a very different road very quickly. So, I think that's where I think we need to also have some type of facilitated conversation with our community that perceive this or see it from a very different light versus, you know, how the young people see it. And so that is just a difference in perception. Yeah. Right? That I think needs to happen.

Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, thanks for that perspective. I had not gotten those kinds of comments. Mine was my, the concerns that I've gotten are literally like, oh, this kid just started out, you know, in front of me in my car. It was like those kinds of things, but that is, there's another layer to that that I think we wanna stay on top of. And that is why for me, I don't want to move into this area of adding another ordinance, asking law enforcement to do anything more than, than they, that they should be around this because we don't want any like profiling of especially kids of color and generally that's what we're talking about. So I agree. Go ahead, Vice Mayor.

Yeah. I City

manager, this staff report that you created was influenced by the workshop, right? The results of the workshop when community members came out for the meeting?

A number of things. I mean, in reality, you know, we've experienced it, all of us. If we live in in Hollister, we've experienced the young people. We see them during the truck Tuesday. We see them during farmer's market. Folks come to city hall and voice their concerns. Also have had just, you know, conversations with neighbors. I mean, that's kinda what I do on weekends. Just go and talk, and you hear it. And then, of course, we had a workshop, and that, if anything, was probably cherry on top at that point.

So that's the full the full circle or cherry on top to really bring this forward. So thank you. I I see that it's important that we just start with the youth first in an informal setting, just so they feel comfortable, in this environment. So I think we need to build trust with them first, just to kind of just gauge where they're at, just get to know them, just approach it from a human perspective. And then once we get a sense of where they are, we have what the community input already and what the serious safety issues have been, right, or public issues.

So I think just connecting with the youth itself first, and then we could come back and see what type of formal facilitation we could have moving forward. But I think it's really important that we engage with them just again in a humanistic approach. I just feel like that would be a good way to get through to them and just try to understand where they're coming from. That's important.

Okay. Yeah. Good. Thank you. Last comments on this side.

I just have some last one.

Go ahead.

There's two things really. Like for me, I, you know, I would prefer not doing an ordinance either or as well. It should be common knowledge at this point that you only have one brain and it's basically it's protected by your skull and what are they called the little gentleman inside your skull but you get a traumatic head injury it's really bad so wearing a helmet shouldn't be any kind of a profiling thing you can be black brown, red, green, whatever. And if you have a helmet on, you do, you're safer than if you don't. It's like wearing a seatbelt in a car when you drive a motor vehicle.

If you're going to be riding a bicycle on a street, it's like a one or a zero. You're either have it or you don't. So for me, I wear a helmet every time I ride. If I ride on dirt, I'm wearing a helmet. If I ride on the street, I'm wearing a helmet. That's just all there is to it. It's super basic. That is kind of, it's just, it's a no brainer for me. So, and they're cheaper than ever. Like there's like helmets you can get, like they're like $40 at the local bike shop, dollars 40 it's not even a tank of gas these days and tank of gas is almost a 100.

So that's, know, for those who have some food insecurity, I'm sure there's stuff that can happen. My other thing is it's not even directly associated with this, but it's just something that I think about when I think about government. People often look at it like you know the government needs to do something when we have a town hall, but government needs to be the one to do the thing that should get everything going. Realistically government is not always the answer. Private groups and private citizens and organizations out masses. Like we have, how many employees do we have in the whole city of Hollister? All of our employees. One and eighty. 180 employees. How many people live in Hollister?

Like 45,000 people live in Hollister, but at the county, 47,000 now, please don't tell me that. I probably see them every day going on to California 25. So that we're outnumbered basically. So churches, community groups, people that care about these young people can do something. We just want them to know that we see the kids and all their cool maneuvers that they can do like turning while you're doing a wheelie is pretty cool.

So your kid's super talented right off the bat, but we care about them and we care about their brains and we care about their lives. And it's super important to wear a helmet. It's totally basic. So I love the idea of the pizza party but I also just want to remind people that government's not always the answer. Like smaller groups, it can get together and if their children like matter to the people that love them the most, stop by, have a slice of pie, let's talk about it, and let's let them know that the community is concerned about the kids, especially since one of them already got hit.

And from what I read, I thought it was in the needle. I don't see no here, but I swear that people's not wearing a helmet and I don't know what happened to him, but it's it's kind of important. So thanks for putting us on there. I tried to put this on the agenda on the fifth if I didn't fill out the form.

Okay.

Protocol. Gotta do it.

Thank you. Okay. Okay. So let let me check-in. Do we public comment on this item?

Yes. Max Neff. Okay.

Alright. So that works. Hi. I'm Maxwell Neff. I live in Ridgemark, which is close enough to Hollister, about a 100 yards from the city line. For four years, I lived in Davis. I went to the university, and Davis has a very strong biking culture. I know that well, it's assumed that you own a car to go somewhere, and Davis is assumed that you have a bike. There's just so many. Personally, I can attest that there are streets that were clogged with bikes so heavy that cars couldn't get off the highway.

And when I got to university as a part of orientation, they sat us down with a local organization for bikers that said, here's what you do. Here's what you don't do. Do not die. Please. And so I think that Davis has about a century of experience with bikers that could be helpful in this situation.

I'm certain that there are other cities which also have a very strong and established biking culture. And I believe that this is a problem that has solutions that have been explored before to very effective ends. I can say in Davis, I biked every single day that I was up there, even when I had my car, to go to the downtown, to get stuff that I needed, to go to university, to just go and bike around for fun. Right? So I think reaching out to Davis or reaching out to cities that have established volunteer organizations for biking could be a good first step for how Holster should approach this.

Because the City of Davis did not have a direct influence outside of wear a helmet, this is the right of way for bikes, stuff like that. So thank you.

Okay. Great. Thank you, Mr. Neff. More speakers. Okay. Okay. So let me bring you back. Did I have any other last minute comments, questions? Okay, so let me just, I just want to summarize what we, what we've heard. So I want to be really clear that there are different differing perspectives on this, Our different ways to approach this and different things that we're concerned about on the diet. So there's the issue about making sure that they're wearing helmets. So that's one, one issue. There's just the idea of road safety. So when the kids aren't riding their bikes, if they're darting in and out of traffic, that's another one.

That's what I've experienced, and so that's where I was coming from. And then Council Member Morales got complaints about groups of kids riding their bikes and some concerns about what that might mean. So there's that, there is that issue. And then finally there is just in general this, I think all of us agree, this idea that we want our kids outside exercising and exploring the outdoors. So we want to maintain that.

So I I think that as we begin to have these conversations that we keep those in mind and remember that they're three that they're separate things in and of themselves that we don't mix those issues up, but they're all equally important. So let's make sure that when we are having these conversations that we are thinking about that. The thing that I heard overwhelmingly that everybody seemed to be good with starting the conversations with these young people and their parents just at a level around, you know, we heard some concerns about keeping everybody safe and starting from there just keeping it really low key. Some sort of a pizza party or just a discussion and then moving from there. But starting there.

And I also just wanted to add to that. I do really want you, city manager, to reach out to the superintendents to see if what they are doing around. I mean, think Councilmember Beshay's comments about helmet safety that should be, I think, maybe a simple thing that they might be able to do or that maybe they are already doing. But let's explore that. That might be something, some place where we can partner really, really nicely with. Okay, so with that. Mayor. Go ahead. I just. Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry, Council Member Ramos.

Thank you for summarizing. I think that's very important. I think that two other elements that we should also consider is that there's there's they're gathering because they're socializing and the lack of opportunities in the city of Hollister to gather together to socialize the options that we had, the cafe, what is called the first street clothes. So the areas where they had the ability to socialize are closed. And so those are other two human elements of connection that should also be considered.

Okay, good. Thanks for that. Thank you for that. Okay. Okay. With that, let me just, let me double check and see what we need here. So with this, we are not, I don't think we're gonna, I don't think we're gonna make a motion. We're simply gonna give direction on next steps. Is that right? Okay. So let me get just consensus that we're gonna start by reaching out to these young people. And I think that, I think we have a starting point. I think we know at least the kids that I'm thinking about, I think we can start with them. And then, so I think we have a way to connect with them so we can start there. And I will volunteer to work with a city manager on doing that if that's okay with everybody.

So thumbs up that everybody's okay with that. Okay, looks like we're good with that. And then anything else that we need to do?

Yeah, actually I wouldn't mind talking to the youth in my neighborhood to formally invite them as well.

Yeah, Yeah. Yes. Okay, good. That'd be great. Okay. And then anything else city manager, I think what we're saying, you guys correct me if I'm wrong, is that we wanna just start small with this one small first step and then we'll figure it out after that. What we think is necessary after that. Okay. Okay. Okay. So I think we're good with that. Okay. So we're gonna move on then to information, informational reports, committee assignments. So this is the time for any members of the council involved in any ad hocs or to any committees to make any reports as needed. So let's go to, I'll start over here.

Vice Mayor De Yada, anything to report? Okay. Council Member Morales, anything to report? Okay, Council Member Bichet,

go ahead. Yeah, so on the thirteenth, Ambag, basically the number, the most important things that we did were we had a public hearing on job vacancies and recruitment and retention efforts at the Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments. So So we received a presentation on the vacancies and recruitment efforts and retention efforts. It's actually very positive, very few vacancies, they have very high retention and just seems like a great place to work. We look very happy, so not really too much to report on there.

So just received a presentation on that. And then the Monterey Bay Regional Overall Work Program and Budget. It was just basically a budget talk and we just basically approved the budget. Everything seems healthy with the Monterey Bay Regional Overall Work Program and its budget. We went ahead and approved that.

So that was basically AMBAC in a nutshell. Was actually kind of a quick meeting. The other thing was on Sunday, as it relates to the rally, I was able to attend with the mayor and the manager a meeting with the Monterey Bay Confederation of Clubs. I believe this is like third meeting we've had with them, might have been fourth. And it was a good meeting.

We just had a conversation about the rally and expectations and keeping things safe and then basically policing themselves so they can keep their members, have a great time, keep their members safe. If anybody gets out of line, they kind of police themselves and they seem to commit to doing that. So everything stays safe, sane, and fun over the course of the two day event. And I'm glad to see SEI LUISE members stay here because you guys put up the K rails. You guys help clean up the joint after, know, we, it's tough stuffs just everywhere where it's not supposed to be.

Crush gets left on the ground. That's not good. But, you know, it's all about the businesses in the area. A lot of them have told us time and time again, that rally got us out of COVID debt. That thing, as crazy as it sounds, it's part of our history, it's part of our heritage, it's part of who we are as Hollister, along with being an agrarian and growing food for people to put in their bellies, taking the power of the sun and turning it into food.

It got people out of COVID debt. At one point in time, a couple of business owners were telling me, I put payroll on a credit card and that's just not a good way to run a business. Our hotels are full and our restaurants are full and cash flows in when those bikers come through and the first one at 47, if I'm just going to be so bold as to say, a lot of them were military veterans coming back buying military surplus.

Councilor Moshe, I'm just gonna remind you that this is your committee report. I'm just so sorry. I'm just gonna interrupt you. I'm just gonna remind you that it's just your committee report that you should be getting right now.

That's all I have.

Okay. Thank you for that. Appreciate it. Thank you. Go ahead, council member Morales. Alright.

Integrated waste management, and I'm looking at our city manager for this one. So we had we've had a lot of robust conversations when it comes to integrated waste management because we're going to have our an RFP for services and it happens every twenty years. So we're at that mark right now. We have a couple of years, but one of the items, one is I asked our city manager to see at the negotiating table. There's going be a consultant there, but I think she's the best person equipped to be able to look out for the best interest for the City of Hollis.

That's one. Two, we talked about the structure of the committee because that's an advisory committee. There's a lot of things that we're at the very end of the workflow process. So, when the county's talking about transportation or the landfill capacity, you know, we're only having a couple of years. We're looking at raising the cost for our residents.

We're going to be at the very end of that workflow and very little input. Right now, there's an affordability issue with most of our citizens, especially if there's going to be a water increase and a garbage increase at a significant rate to our residents. The City of Hollister needs to be at the table to negotiate that and redirect other funds like for outreach or for maybe county priorities, either for us to do it internally or for that money to just be redirected so that the residents are paying such a high cost for garbage. Also, we did request that the integrated waste management, come here and do more reports. Again, my role in that committee is an advisory.

It's the workflow. If we're at the end and we're supposed to get, and I have no authority, then we need three members, right, to be present to get anything passed. So the only way to do that is to come to the city, but not as a line item expenditure, not as a consent or here's the list and then just approve it as a verbal stamp, but really have a meaningful conversation to talk about how those we are the largest contributor by far. We should be able to prioritize the city's needs. And our residents needs and be able to really focus on the cost of those services for, as everything else is going to be increasing.

No, Councilwoman, you've got it all.

Okay, great. Yeah, great. Yeah, I agree. Wholeheartedly agree. So yeah, let us know how we can support you on that. Okay. And then all I had to report is a fire advisory happened week and a half ago and we are still in the midst of getting the Baker Tilly what we call it? Evaluate report. Thank you so much. I couldn't remember that word.

Feasibility report and the feasibility report is specifically around the formation of a fire district in this area as a different model for providing fire service. So we just got at just a some basic updates about timeline and some basic activities that are ongoing including reaching out to stakeholders, getting their input, getting some data. So not any real, real major reporting happening. At the next fire advisory meeting We expect to have a little bit more of a robust report, but that is moving along. That's really important.

The other thing that I wanted to just mention is a week ago I was able to go to the high school. Superintendent Tenenbaum invited me to meet with the student congress and I met with their group. It was really, really a great experience. The president, their vice president, super impressive kids and leaders at the high school, gonna be our future leaders and no doubt, and the entire congress, which is they're about, I think they're about 75, maybe a 100 kids strong, but very, very impressive. And the idea of me doing things like that is just really to encourage service.

Like the idea of public service and this idea of moving those or or bringing those leadership skills that they're learning in this experience into their their college experience, their work experience, and then and and just in general into adulthood. So that was the whole idea and they just seemed super receptive to that. So I'm just really happy to be able to do things like that. And just wanna let you know that we have some incredible kids in Hollister, as I'm sure you all know. And I won't say anything about our Confederation of Clubs meeting as council member Foshee reported on that. And that's all I have to report. So I'm gonna move it on then to we don't have any future agenda item requests. City manager report.

So I basically have three topics today. One of them is the airport, and we will start with a short presentation by our airport director. Then we'll do a quick update on sewer matters. And last but not least, we'll talk a little bit about the impacts on our low income families due to the changes in the federal government around food stamps and health coverage. Mister?

Okay. Good evening, council members and mayor, members of the public. So I was asked to give a brief little update here on, advanced air mobility and unmanned aircraft system progress going going on kind of activities at the airport. So with that, let's move to the next slide. So one of the things is we have over a 100 plus companies in that are advanced air mobility or considered uncrewed aircraft systems located in California.

There's great potential for economic development, job creation, and workforce development across the San Benio, Santa Cruz and Monterey Counties, as the region has become highly recognized on a national level in these emerging technology and markets. In January, the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership received the grant award for California Advanced Air Mobility Corridors Initiative, or CAMHSI, that positioned California's first FAA compliant multi airport flight corridor network connecting the rural public airports of Watsonville, Marina, Salinas, and Hollister. This integrated corridor would be utilized to support the testing certification and commercialization of clean energy aircraft for passenger, cargo, defense, and next generation drone operations.

Mister director, can you indicate how much the grant was for?

The grant to MBEF, Monterey Bay Economic Partnership, was 7 point I believe it was $7,700,000, and it's anticipated that for infrastructure to be located at the airports, need charging equipment to serve as an endpoint to these corridors. So we're probably looking somewhere between, half 1,000,000 up to 1,500,000 maybe for each airport to accomplish attaining the infrastructure necessary to serve as that endpoint.

And if I could jump in, because I think that our airport director knows this so well that he doesn't realize how cool this is actually. This is like Waymo, but for airplanes. It's that same idea. This is like Uber changing the business model on how we do taxi services except for airplanes. And we are one of four potential hubs for this new technology to really explode to the next level. I cannot emphasize how exciting this particular technology is and how strategically positioned we are to take advantage of something like this. Sorry, I had to jump

in. No.

I don't.

You're so you're still

waiting. It's your report. So the next slide. Okay, so in March and April, the LIFT Summit Conference was held by the Monterey Bay Drone Aviation Robotics Technology, called DART organization. The conference was in Monterrey, California, and it focused on the advanced air mobility and the uncrewed aircraft systems.

And the conference was very well attended by industry representatives, companies, aviation colleagues, Federal Aviation Administration and Caltrans Division of Aeronautics, providing excellent networking opportunities and updates on this emerging ecosystem. Exciting when you get FAA and Caltrans coming to conferences as well, it just speaks to how valid this industry, this emerging technology is going and the dedication to trying to see this come to fruition. That being said, I was invited to speak on a featured panel for the Advanced Air Mobility Lessons from the Field panel. So it was the very last panel to speak at the conference. We closed it and, I was just very honored to speak and share my experiences and highlights in particular that I could show the highlight the progress made here at the Hollister Municipal Airport.

And also, just prior to demonstration day was on May 31, and we were actually off on May 31. Beta Technologies is a company that makes makes charging infrastructure as well as has aircraft for cargo and passenger disciplines, so one of the electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. They came to our airport, very interested in supporting us with charging infrastructure for electric aircraft as well as the advanced air mobility, the electric vertical takeoff and landing, and it could also potentially charge UAS like drones because obviously drones go everything from under 55 pounds in the recreational world on up to airplane sized drones as well. So that was very exciting to have them visit our airport. They currently have chargers at the Salinas Municipal Airport.

Next slide, please. In April, the airport hosted Wing, a local USUAS operator, to provide a presentation followed by question and answers. So on Wednesday, April 22, in the airport office conference room, we had about 30 tenants of pilot, mostly pilots, attend. According to their message, was come meet the wing team and learn about the UAS operations taking place at Christianson Ranch, which is a private airfield just about 1.3 miles to the east of Holster here. So so they're just one of our local neighbors here.

The wing presentation highlighted their home delivery operations for DoorDash and Walmart that are currently going on in the greater Dallas Metro Area. This presentation highlights the advancement of the safe UAS operations and integration into the national airspace. Really, really cool.

So, again, to interject because it's so cool.

We'll we'll get to a photo. What you'll see is their drones actually fly out to an area where store clerks are trained to go set a unique bag that is proprietary to them. Little hook drops down and it connects to the bag and pulls up. You as a customer, you get on an app, right? And you say, I want a home delivery, and it lets you pick, would you like it on the front door, the driveway, the backyard? Really, really cool stuff, right?

So let me emphasize, less than two miles away from Hollister, there's research and technology taking place that is allowing the residents of Dallas and other larger cities to receive drops from drones. Again,

this

is this is the future. Yeah. This is the new way this is the new economy, and Hollister is part of it.

So the wing operation at at Christensen Ranch, there's kinda of like an aerodrome over the Christensen Ranch Airfield. So it's about a mile, so about a half mile in each direction around in a circle. They post NOTAMs and they fly daily up to twelve fifty operations of drone flights each day researching and trying to perfect the platforms for various types of deliveries. So that's really, really cool that they're here. And of course, I took that opportunity to say, let's have some discussions about how Holster might meet your needs.

Maybe you need a bigger building, maybe you need some more facility, right? So, okay. Then in February through April, the airport has been meeting with representatives of NASA Ames Research Center for air traffic management and safety project to discuss the technology and potential development of our deployment of advanced awareness sensors at the airport in support of the Holster Airspace Ecosystem Research Project. This was news to me. So NASA Ames Research Center, they are involved in collecting data and informing the FAA to develop policies and and how how they're going to write regulations for the integration of all this technology into the airspace.

So when you are talking about drones, you're typically talking about 100 feet and down in altitude down the ground level. And then the eVTOLs, it's anticipated that they will operate between the 500 and maybe up to 2,500 foot level above ground level. So this is really cool to be working with NASA and we just took this to the Airport Advisory Commission and they made a recommendation that we bring forward an airport use agreement with the first partner company that would be deploying installations, so it looks like we'll have two installations and we'll put multiple sensors there and we may have various companies, so each payee would, I anticipate, would probably have, an airport use agreement, so but again, the role that the airport is playing with its partners like NASA Ames Research Center in formulating information and data gathering so that we are participating in in the evolution of this whole emerging technology going into the national airspace. Really, really cool stuff. So next slide, please.

In May, the airport received the Federal Aviation Administration determination approving the Jovi Aviation through the fence access permit. The site will be supporting the flight testing activities for pursuit of the FAA certification. That is located at 1891 Airway Drive. So here in another month or two we should be seeing Jovie Aviation's S-four aircraft flying out of the airport going to the north. They've already filed for what's called a certificate of authorization for their flights to happen up the valley a little ways to the north of us.

So, you know, in our long time committed and very long term tenant, Whisk Arrow, they've, since September 25 through the present, they continued to grow their presence at the airport. They were at about 35 employees daily prior to September of 'twenty five, and that's now morphing up into the 80 to 90 people a day level. That being said, they utilize over 30,000 square feet on the West Side and over 10,000 square feet on the East Side, so they're in multiple spaces, and I'll get to a map to demonstrate a little bit of that here in a second. Wisk is making tenant improvements at what they call the Hangar 2, the through the fence location. They have a ground leased additional area for increasing the employee parking, serving both their Hangar 1, their building that they built back in 2017 on the airport, and the Hangar 2 locations there on the West Side of the airport.

And the West VertiPort project is in FAA review. We've already achieved the technical airport layout plan pen and ink update that's been signed off by FAA. We are hopefully wrapping up the environmental effort that is required here in the next week or two, and we're excited to have construction. Wisk has just started receiving off of containers and so we're eagerly waiting to get the project started. And the WISC through the fence location, that's 1969 Airway Drive.

Next slide, please. This just gives you a little diagram of where some of these locations are. So the Wisk Hanger 1 Building, which again was built in 2017, 15,000 square foot hangar building, and then the whisked arrow through the fence, the Hangar 2 building there, 1969 Airway Drive. The parking lot will just be to the immediate south area of the current Hangar 1, so it'll be on airport property and it will serve both locations so that they can increase the occupancy load in both buildings, but primarily in Hangar 2. Jovie Aviation through the fence, that's right there at the large building at the back of the gate.

It has a nice aviation door. It was designed as an aviation building. However, in the last fifteen to twenty years, it's been serving, as a cannabis type location, cannabis dispensary, I believe. So that being said, it's great. We will be adding a 60 foot rolling gate there for access.

They will be taxing to the west down along our access road and then up through the hangars and enter into the aviation system that way on Taxiway Charlie. And last, Wisk Vertifort location, that will just be there to the west of our main runway. Yeah. We're looking forward to that. That sets them up so that they don't conflict with the, legacy aircraft operations that are coming in on the main runway.

They kind of get to use the VertiPort in parallel to that approach. So we're excited to see those operations go and again, Wisk is a major partner in gathering data that will inform FA on Verdaport policies. So that's one of the exciting things to have this verdaport there. And just to note, we are the first airport that is getting a fully approved permitted verdaport on airport property. So that's pretty cool.

And then just to give you some cool pictures here that we want to cover. So, you know, you know that we participate in the Monterey Bay Tech Hub, which is all about advanced air mobility and the UAS companies and operations. So the, yes. So here Archer Aviation, Salinas Municipal Airport, this is what they call their Midnight Express, their eVTOL. So this is one pilot and four passengers.

They they are slated to they were selected to provide eVTOL transportation for the Olympics in the LA Basin. And I think recently I read that they leased out the Lancaster Airport or something like that, a majority of it for their to stage their operations in support of the Olympics. Archer is considered the probably second to get to, soonest to get FAA flight certification with a pilot in here and start offering passenger, rides. That being said, next slide please. Jovy Aviation, they were at Marina while I was there.

I brought them to the airport and it's very exciting to see how they've evolved over the time, but they are at the Marina Municipal Airport and they are also at the Watsonville Airports. They run a nice pilot training program and they also build aircraft at the Watsonville Airport in the hangar. So they're they train kids and and other people to build traditional, like RV-eight type aircraft. And then they have pilot training where you can train to actually be a pilot for the EV to all I understand. And last but least here, well, last, but our next slide, please.

Our long term tenant here that we're very grateful for with this is their generation six aircraft again. So this is going to be autonomous, and this is meant to take four individuals and fly you to your destination. So WSC Aero is considered the leading candidate to get FAA certification for autonomous flights for passenger travel. And Jovi Aviation is considered the first to be to get the certification for piloted passenger flight. So very cool to have them both here now utilizing our airport.

And then next slide, please. And just wanted to give you a picture of what it looks like for the wing operation. So this is a photo from their one of their Dallas Metro operation points, probably at a like, near a Walmart. You can see there that they have multiple pads that the drones actually charge on. That's a proprietary pad that does the charging, kind of similar to putting your cell phone down on a charger, Right?

And that's what that looks like. And so to give you an idea, that aircraft would probably sit between the two of us right here. Pretty cool. And there's a lot of safety, lot of programming that goes into that and as their test operator here said, you have to fly literally thousands and thousands of flights because you're always trying to find where does the computer program break down so that you know how to fix it. Right?

And so that's why they do the testing that they do out here. So pretty cool operation. And then city manager asked me just to touch base on, we are going to be bringing staff reports to you guys to do our typical authorizations and acceptances for the, FA, the anticipated FAA grants for, our airport improvement program and the infrastructure law money. So the AIP project this year is a planning design for the taxiway alpha reconstruction. So it's a grant that'll be somewhere in the 8 and 30 some odd thousand if I remember right on top of my head.

And then, airport, the bill money project will be the airport layout plan update along with a narrative and with AGIS surveys. And so this is opportunity where about every ten years or so airports typically go through this airport layout plan update, which is your technical document. So we've had safety changes, so the configurations of the ends of the runways have changed a bit, And, this will be where we add the, site plan for the CAL FIRE new air attack base on there and potentially some of the other West Side upgrades, deeper port for WISC will be on there. So this is a very important step in in things that we need to get accomplished.

So council members, the big picture impact of the airport is basically that it is at the core of our economic development strategy. A few minutes ago, we started talking about economic development, and we talked about the districts. And as you may recall, one of them was the airport, and this is the why. Because exciting technology, the future is actually here in Hollister. We are part of the Silicon Valley. We are not, you know, some town in the middle of nowhere. We are in the thick of the new technology for, electric planes and and what do you call them? Auto auto what?

Autonomous.

Autonomous. Autonomous, flights. Not sure who would do that, but, you know, I'm excited for those who wanna do that. And so this is what's exciting. Again, we we have assets in our city. We have exciting things happening in happening in our city. And, hopefully, as we move forward, the energy can be shifted from all the bad things and the negativity and the disagreement and really focus on the good stuff, on the things that we can all agree on because these are good for our city. They're these are good for our residents. These are good for our high schoolers who hopefully will have internships at these shops. One of the things that I did when I visited, one of the, one of these, tenants was I asked, where do you guys live?

Because what I was hoping to hear is we live here in Hollister. And actually, one person did. There was one from the South Bay, one from the East Bay, and then one from Hollister because that's what we want. And so I hope that as we continue to have conversations about economic development, the need to invest in our districts, in this case, the Airport District, you begin hopefully to feel the same excitement that I think we feel for the technology that we have and the competitiveness that that gives us as an area, as a region.

And along the lines of workforce development, planning to be meeting with, Sean Tanenbaum, the superintendent, and talking to their curriculum counselor about how to start to shape some classroom courses around preparing high school students in this emerging technology industry. And then we're also trying to encourage Galvan College to look at upgrading their aviation program to start to take advantage of some of the workforce grant monies that's out there as well so that we could make sure that there's a career pathway available to our citizens here in the in the Hollister.

Nice. Thank you for that incredible report. Yeah. I'm really it's it is really exciting stuff. I do I I do appreciate all the level of detail. Please continue to update us on all of these things. I think these are one of the things that we wanna make sure that we highlight. I agree with you, city manager. We have to highlight these. I think what I hear from members of the council as well as people from the county, the airport, that's our that's our gold mine.

That's where we need to really focus in on like real like industrial and retail and commercial economic opportunities because that's where we it's like the the plate is set for us to be able to do that. These are two examples of that. So it's an incredible report. So thank you for so much for bringing this report to us. Let me check-in to see if anybody has any questions or comments. Questions.

Thank you for that update and report and I'm really excited and looking forward to coming months to see how much we progress. Good job. Thank you.

Questions or comments?

This is super exciting. I was excited when we were talking about Whisk Arrow and Joby Aviation when they were coming to town. Was like, this is really cool. Like, we could be the center of, like, some electric vertical takeoff and land aircraft. I mean, for deliveries, moving human cargo, like human beings around. It's like jets and stuff. And I I was like, Every time I think about this, I think about those popular mechanics that have come up in the sixties and they're like, when is this stuff gonna start like finally coming out? Right? Like in like, is like real, like Jetson's type stuff. And it's like finally, like, coming in here and all.

Right here and all. So my ear my ears perked up. I have money. There was like a point something, and then there was a $1,000,000 I I remember the center. What was that for? Was the

AMC grant. That was that air corridor grant. Yeah. Yes.

And that's between like us and Watsonville and Silliness. Yeah.

And Marina.

And Marina. Oh yeah. Great. He's got a lot of good stuff going on too. Yeah. With their airport. I think Joby's over there too. And then I'm here in FAA and NASA. I'm like, this is like some brutal stuff. So, and then that Christianson Ranch, I had no idea. I've never, I've never even heard of that. I've lived here since I was pooped basically. So blown away. Yeah, exciting. Keep it up.

The airport is the great place for development expansion. That whole Northgate property has got so much potential. So hopefully we get this California 25 figured out so we can get people in and out still by road. But if people wanna like hire and Uber or wanna live because they're being too, you know, and if people wanna like leapfrog over traffic, counsel with that, right? Yeah. Is not what Joby's doing. It's not what Joby's doing where they have a car to drive the road. And then if I

That is that company, I forgot to put them in the presentation. That's, ALEF, a l e f, flying car. We did an airport use agreement for them to be doing testing, and they are the top rated company that actually has a street legal driving car that can also fly. So it can hopscotch another car if you just encountered an obstacle, but it can also get into the air and then it rotates on its axis axis and flies like a biplane so you can take off and fly much greater distance at a greater speed. And so that's really cool.

They've been on kind of like a world tour so they haven't been down to the airport since we did the use agreement so that's kind of why I left them out of here, but but they still have the right to come and and start doing their testing here at our airport. Simple.

Yeah. Great. Thank you. Thank you for that incredible report. Like really great to hear some exciting stuff like that. Okay, city manager. I'm gonna ask you to continue on with the rest of your report, but but, Jeff, please come and bring us some more of this good news anytime. We'd love to read this.

So we started with the high, and now we'll go to the low, unfortunately. And we do have a partner here in the audience. The executive director of the community foundation is here. Cassandra, do you want to address the council at all? We had a meeting and we talked about HR one, the big beautiful bill, and the impact that is having on the low income families, on the working poor from various angles, from anywhere between food and food stamps in uncertainty as far as how people are going to eat, all the way to health care and everything in between. And in the question of what is our role, if any. Cassandra?

Thank you, and good evening, council and mayor. Well, as she said, my name is Cassandra, and I'm the new ish adjacent, CEO of the Community Foundation for San Benito County. And I really wanted to spend some time to talk about the impact on HR1 in our community. This is going to be something that is going to have a huge impact on a lot of our very important infrastructure in our county. And I hate to segue after Jeff because that was such an amazing report.

I want to get a shirt that says the future is Hollister. But talking to the other side of things, for many people, including myself, when I hear about federal policy, it's hard for me to draw a connection on what that means often on the local level. And what HR1 did is it put restrictions on who qualifies for Medi Cal and for CalFresh. And in April of this year, I heard from Tracy, our public health director, over 1,000 residents lost their CalFresh benefits. So this is our food stamps, and this is a tremendously horrible thing to have happen.

In our county, we have about 19,500 citizens who qualify and currently have Medi Cal. So this is insurance that helps people who are very low income with it's an additive insurance that covers their health costs. And when we think about the impact of community members losing their health care, the cost of covering their health benefits, this is absolutely detrimental. It's detrimental to them on an individual level because many of our community members are living paycheck to paycheck. A lot of the folks that are going to be impacted by this don't have US citizenship, so there isn't a safety net for them, and they're living paycheck to paycheck, as you know, and often houses that have a lot of family members in them.

And so when we're thinking about what this means, it's incredibly difficult for the individuals, but it's also really hard on our infrastructure. So for example, Hazel Hawkins Hospital, we almost lost our hospital a few years ago. And when we have more people that have Medi Cal that they can't tap into, we're going to see an increase in uncompensated care. And so with that, that means the hospital has to foot the bill in covering the cost. That money doesn't just disappear because someone can't pay.

And so we're talking about what this looks like for a hospital. And so what does it look like to potentially lose our hospital if we don't do something? And then when we think about CalFresh, being able to have access to fresh food is a basic human right. And what this bill does is it says that only some people get this basic human right now. And in Hollister, that's not the way that we work.

If a neighbor's hungry, we feed our neighbor. But what does this mean for our food bank? It means that they are going to have more community members reaching out to them asking for help because community members no no longer get that federal benefit. So we're also expecting that we're gonna see a huge incline of, needs for our food bank. And we also know that all of our nonprofits who have received federal and state funding are kind of under attack right now.

So CASA lost two thirds of their funding because it came through the feds. EMEA's house, our women's shelter, they lost one third. And we're a small community. So when we lose that much money, we lose that much money, but the needs don't go away. And so I had a conversation with Anna Cortez, our city manager, about what this looks like and how this needs to be something that we're not only talking about, but we don't wait to find solutions.

We're starting to have conversations now about what this could look like, who needs to be at the table, and not working in silos. So one of the things that we did is we just secured a grant with, the Health Trust, which is based in San Jose, to put together a work group to start looking at this issue and develop a strategic plan for what we're going to do as a community. Because we can't do what we do, which is be the defensive. Something bad happens. We're like, oh, that's a bummer.

There's lots of resources. We can't afford that logic and that way of doing business. We need to think creatively about how we're going to position ourselves so that way as many community members don't lose the benefits that are available to them. And so as part of this, we're a work group. We're going to come up with a strategic plan.

And then the health trust said, If you do this, we'll also come back and support whatever it is in your plan to help with implementation. So we're bringing out outside resources to help support our community. But one of the things that I wanted to share with you all today is, it's been shared with me that we're looking at exploring increasing the costs of sewer and water. And so when we think about what this is like on an individual level, you've just lost your insurance. You just lost your food.

And now the cost of your your basic necessities in your house, your water and your sewer just went up exponentially. So it's a triple whammy. And so one of the ideas that I just want you to explore, because you've got a budget, you have to figure out what to do with it, is if you do go that route, to take the lens of how can we have financial assistance for our residents that are really struggling financially right now. So that way, the increase in cost doesn't impact them as much as it otherwise would. We can't do this work to protect our community members in silos.

We need partnership, and we need creativity. This is one of the ways that we can be creative in coming up with solutions, but I hope to work with all of you when we're coming up with what this looks like in our community.

Thank you so much. Yeah. Thank you council members. I felt that it was that Cassandra would do a much better job at explaining the impact that HR one is having already having in our community. Again, this is not some theory. It is real. It is happening. And we will take into consideration the information that we just heard as we crunch our numbers. So and that's my report. Thank you so much.

Yeah. Well, thank you for that, Cassandra. We appreciate this. I mean, it it does force us to look at this, from all different angles or different perspectives. So this is really important information for us to have as we consider. Go ahead council member Morales.

Thank you for bringing this and thank you for bringing this and actually bringing people together. I just want to share a few things that some of us are working on. I want to let you know that lobbying started in last year, September, October time frame in various jurisdictions from a regional approach. So various regions got together, Santa Cruz, Monterrey, San Benito, not so much, and Santa Clara to lobby our legislators to put money on the books to help with CalFresh and for Medi Cal. Our Senator, Senator John Laird, actually passed legislation just recently for distressed hospitals, keeping in mind Watsonville and Hazel Hawkins.

So he just here explaining what the legislation means for us, and they also have money moving forward for distressed hospitals again to make sure that hospitals don't close. We know that most of our residents commute, so about 60 to 65% actually get their medical services outside of San Benito. Those hospitals are aware. They've actually done studies to look at the impact. And so they are prepared.

They're prepared for closures. They are also taking a significant budget deficit that they're trying to close through either measures like Measure A or other measures. And other jurisdictions are looking at tax measures to close kind of that gap, not long term. I think the scary part is that next year, 2027, is when we're going to feel it the most. And that's where it's good to plan now for that because I think we're going to see a significant impact to not just food and medical services, but we're also seeing the impacts of the federal budget, right, with the recent news that we might have $1,300,000,000 withheld.

Of course, I'm hoping that the state of California will sue in order for that not to occur, but it is layer after layer after layer of just impacts to our community. The good thing is, I think, is that there are several bodies in San Benito from a regional perspective. So the central committee passed the resolution. The labor council passed a resolution. The neighboring jurisdictions are all working with one voice to really identify the impacts to individuals.

And what does that mean in terms of numbers? It also forces jurisdictions like the counties to look at how does social services work with the hospitals so that residents are not losing their medical services. So what does that paperwork work? What does that mean? How can we change our workflow to make sure that folks are not losing their benefits if they're eligible?

How can we maximize and provide services to like our food banks to make sure that they're they have the capacity to serve our community. And how do we how do we identify private or corporate partnerships to make sure that we're closing? And again, this is only going to get worse. So as we're bracing for those impacts, I think it's really good to have a strategic plan, to have a work plan that really builds our community and focuses on our strengths so that we can help each other through these tough times. So thank you for bringing that. Yeah.

Thank you for that information, council member Morales as well. It's, yeah, it's, I mean, a lot of people are working really hard to try to figure out how to get around some of the things that are coming out of the federal government and we just need to keep working together on and considering these issues from different angles because it's not so straightforward anymore. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you for that. I'm gonna check back with the city manager. Anything else before we go to closed session?

That is it, ma'am.

Okay. Thank you for that. So will you go ahead and re read the closed session items?

It's a pleasure. There we go. We have four items to be discussed in closed session. 11.1, public employees performance, title city manager. 11.2, conference with legal counsel, anticipated litigation, significant exposure to the to litigation related to the purchase of right of way in eminent domain. 11.3, conference with legal counsel, anticipated, litigation, Venezuela Water. And 11.4, conference with labor negotiators, pursuant to government section fifty four nine five seven, and it's regarding our various unions and nonrepresented employees.

Okay. Thank you for that. So let me check with the city clerk. Any public comments on these items?

No, mayor.

Okay. Okay. Then we're gonna move into closed session. So I think we're gonna I think we're gonna take a quick break, a five minute break. And then we will we're gonna clear the chamber and then we will go into closed session. But we're gonna go ahead and take a five minute break.

Yeah. Yeah.