City Council - Regular Meeting

I'd like to call the meeting of the City Council Public Finance Authority to order. City Clerk, may I have the roll call, please?

Yes. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Gruel? Here. Councilman con Councilman Kennedy? Here. Mayor Pro Tem Twining? Here. Mayor McKeon? Councilman Burns? Present. Councilwoman Vandermark? Here. Councilman Williams? Here. Thank you. You have a quorum.

Thank you. City clerk, do we have any supplemental communications?

Yes, mayor pro tem. For closed session item number seven, we we received one email regarding existing case with Allianza Trans Latinx et al v City of Haneda Beach. That is all, mayor. Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you. City clerk, do we have anyone signed up to speak in closed session?

Not for this portion of the meeting, mayor mayor Proton.

Thank you. Included in closed session today, a conference with labor negotiators, agency designated representatives, Travis Hopkins, City Manager, also in attendance, Marissa Sir, Assistant City Manager Mike Vigliota, City Attorney Zach, acting chief financial officer. Employee organization includes the Huntington Beach Police Officers Association, the POA Police Management Association, PMA Police Management Association, PMA excuse me, Huntington Beach Firefighters Association, HBFA, and Fire Management Associate Association, FMA. Council, do I have a motion and a second to recess closed session?

Motion.

Second.

We are recessed.

I'd like to reconvene the regular meeting of the City Council Public Financing Authority. Madam Clerk, may I have the roll call, please? Or mister Clerk.

Yeah. No. Sorry. Yes. Thank you, mayor. Councilman Gruel? Here. Councilman Kennedy? Here. Mayor Pro Tem Twining? Here. Mayor McKeon? Here. Councilman Burns? Present. Councilwoman Vandermark? Here. Councilman Williams? Here. All members present. Thank you.

Thank you. Tonight's invocation will be given by Huntington Beach Fire Department Chaplain Jeff Lopez.

Mayor and honorable council members, my name is Jeff Lopez and I'm pleased to lead just us in the invocation. I'll be praying today according to my Christian faith. I invite anybody behind me or in front of me to join me according to their own. Heavenly father, lord god, thank you for this government body that is standing before me right now. You tell us lord that you put all authority in place and I thank you for these folks.

I thank you father for this city. I pray that you would bless the deliberations that they have in this room and also that they have had and will have behind closed doors according to other deliberations that they're having now and I pray father that you'd give them wisdom. I pray that what happens in this room with public comments and discussion of council items with public feedback, I pray lord that you would help it to be fruitful conversation. I pray that you would help this whole city to run smoothly, father. We just look for your blessing. We thank you so much for your kindness to this city. We give you praise. We ask for your help in this meeting, lord and it's in Jesus name I pray. Amen.

Thank you, Jeff. Tonight, the pledge of allegiance will be led by Robert McClisch of American Legion Post one thirty three, a San Diego native. Robert is a lifelong Californian with deep roots in service and community. A graduate of San Diego State University, he excelled as a student athlete lettering lettering in wrestling and football, going undefeated in his division and earning an induction into the Hall Of Champions in Balboa Park. He proudly served ten years in the United States Marine Corps Reserve, achieving the rank of sergeant and holding multiple leadership roles, including training NCO and civil affairs group sergeant.

Following his military service, he built a thirty year career in the banking industry and has remained deeply committed to veterans through the American Legion where he served in numerous leadership roles. He currently supports veterans as district twenty nine service officer in Orange County for the past six years. He's a father of two to Nichols and Nathaniel. He comes from a large family of 13 siblings and continues to live by a simple belief that anything is possible and that in life, there are no accidents. Thank you for your service, Robert.

Well, if anyone's wearing a cap, can you please uncover and put your hand over your heart and let's salute our wonderful flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank

you, Robert. Closed session report by city attorney. City attorney, do you have anything to report from closed session?

Thank you, mayor. Yes. One item. Council unanimously authorized the appeal of the attorney fees award in the Alonsia v City of Huntington Beach OCSE case number 30Dash2025DashO1462835DashCUDashWMDashCJC. Thank you.

Thank you, mister city attorney. City council member comments, does anyone would anyone like to make a comment? Yeah. I got one. Council member Burns.

Yeah. We're approaching election season and I just, ask everybody to be informed voters and vote American. Perfect.

Gracie?

Just want to thank everyone who came out to our pet adoption. It was actually really successful. 24 dogs were adopted, 31 cats, one pet was fostered, 69 received veterinary care, and there's one dog, Hickey, who had been in the shelter for over three seventy days was also adopted. So I want to thank Huntington Beach for coming out and offering these pets a permanent home.

Alright. Yeah. Just to touch on that, I was actually so successful that, they had to make three separate shifts to the shelter to get more animals because that's how many were being adopted. So, it's pretty awesome. Any other comments?

Mayor, I have one.

Yeah. Okay.

I'm asking to poll item number 25, which is 26Dash33335. It's the admin item tonight, and it's the discussion on the supplemental, use of fluoride. Perfect.

Then my last comment was that, mayor pro tem Butch Twain and I, went to the first inaugural battle of the bands for Sowers and Dwyer Middle School on Friday. It was a great event. Those kids were rocking it. So Butch and had a fun time and looking forward to, giving them a highlight and then, having that continue every single year. The rebels? Yeah. They were, Sours. Sours. The rebels. Girl singer. It was great. Alright. Any other comments? Alright. Okay.

Now to the mayor's spotlight. So last month, we hosted the mayor spotlight award. First, we honored the Huntington Beach fire department management aid, Beth Davis, who has been a such a valuable employee here at city hall. Beth consistently goes above and beyond her job description to support the entire department. Her commitment was especially evident when she led a massive project to scan 6,300 occupancy files, ensuring every file underwent a thorough quality control review.

Beth oversaw the collaborative efforts of the CRR division, firefighters on light duty, and volunteers, personally orchestrating the workflow and handling a significant portion of the scanning, quality control, and remediation herself. So congratulations, Beth. That was a huge undertaking. Next, we recognized our Public Works Utilities Waste Water Section for receiving its third consecutive award from the California Water Environment Association for excellence in wastewater collection system management. So this continued recognition reflects the team's unwavering commitment to protecting, public health, safeguarding the environment, and delivering reliable high quality service to the community.

This year, the wastewater sir section was honored with a silver award for collection system maintenance, recognized outstanding performance in maintaining and operating critical infrastructure. And this award highlights the dedication and professionalism of the utilities team whose members respond around the clock day and night, including every morning hour early morning hours to address sewer and storm related issues and ensure systems operate safely and efficiently. And yes, that was, mayor pro tem Butch Twining in that Dave the Wave costume right there. We then highlighted the entire public works team as National Public Works Week is next month. Always fun.

So May 17 to the twenty third. And since the week falls on a city council week, we will celebrate the week before on Tuesday, May 12 at Surf City 9th in Downtown HB. That's public works night, also known as touch a truck. So please come down. It starts at 5PM on Main Street.

And public works, as I mentioned before, is one of my favorite departments because of just how much work they do for this city that I think we sometimes take for granted. So please come out on May, downtown Main Street. Next, we had the Huntington Beach High School student, Khan Arzian here for Turkish Youth and Sports Day, which is celebrated on May 19. It's a national holiday in Turkey to honor the start of the Turkish war of independence in 1919, and Khan will present the commendation to the council general of the Republic of Turkey in Los Angeles. Khan is actively working and involved in planning and running the ceremony as part of the Turkish youth group.

Next up, we recognize a music focused club at Huntington Beach High School called Smile Musicians founded by Kate Lee, who has also established it is an official nonprofit organization. The club organizes impactful music recitals to raise funds for UCI cancer patients, and last year, they raised $5,410. This year, they raised $8,200 at the twenty twenty six Smile Benefit Recital, bringing their four year total contribution to over $19,000 for the UCI Cancer Research Institute, so amazing students. We then thank the Kiwanis of Huntington Beach for just another incredible Easter family fun day in ACON that was held on April 4 at the sports complex. And so thank you to all the volunteers at Kiwanis for always pulling off that that great event.

Next up was, junior lifeguard Cash Hernandez. Cash was able to take decisive action based on what he has learned in the junior guard program to help his cousin and cousin's daughter in a boating incident and potential drowning situation. Cash was able to get in the water with confidence in his water skills he has learned from being a junior guard. He made the rescue of the two who were in distress without hesitation, and he brought them safely back to the boat. He responded at a timely and safe fashion and then bring his cousin and cousin's daughter back to the boat safely with no meet major issues, and chief McCoy has already identified him as his top recruit.

Lastly, we honor the Marina High School JV cheer team for placing third in the nation at the USA Nationals. And we're so proud of our athletes and coaches for their dedication and success. And as always, go Vikings. Alright. What's your great award winners? Next on the business highlight. So this month is small business month in Huntington Beach. May is recognized as National Small Business Month in The United States. So in recognition of Small Business Month, we wanna acknowledge our small businesses that form the foundation of Huntington Beach's economy. So nearly 72% of businesses, which is approximately 7,800 in Huntington Beach, have one to four employees, underscoring the essential role of small, locally owned enterprises.

And together, they represent an estimated 3,200,000,000 in annual revenue. So small businesses comprise the majority of our businesses, support thousands of local jobs, and are essential to the strength and stability of our local economy. And they're also integral to the character of Huntington Beach, contributing to the vibrant neighborhoods and a strong sense of community. So we extend our deep appreciation to the small business owners and employees whose works sustains our local economy every single day. We here at the city remain committed to supporting small businesses through programs such as the Surf City Small Business Digital Grant and our streamline Surf City program, which is designed to reduce barriers, improve visibility, and help businesses remain competitive in a changing economy.

So we thank you all for your hard work and your investment. Up next is our business spotlight. So, we continue on with Minute with the Mayor and as part of our week of recognition of local businesses, we have two episodes that we want to feature of our two small businesses. First is Playground Mini Golf. Not posted but there you go. So, first, we're excited to highlight playground mini golf. If you guys know, they're the old black bull there on a walnut. A a dynamic attraction in Downtown Huntington Beach. So this indoor entertainment venue brings together mini golf, arcade games, craft food and drinks, and even a hidden speakeasy adding a fresh creative energy to our downtown experience. So we really wanna thank Stephanie Blood and her team, and let's take a look at this video.

What's up, HB? This episode of Minute with the Mayor takes us down to Playground At 3rd And Walnut. Let's go meet the owner Stephanie. So Stephanie, tell us about playground. Ground.

It's a magical place. It's different than any other mini golf place that you've probably ever seen. It's a very boutique feel, and then we have a full arcade restaurant and bubby. So we have, you know, food, beverages, and then we even do private events. Okay. So we have a little speakeasy that's in the back. So

if someone came in for the first time, what's one thing they should try on the menu? Because I know you guys have good food.

Okay. Well, I am all about living every day like it's my birthday. So I would say get the dessert. We have the Huntington Beach bonfire skillet. That is phenomenal. And then, obviously, the pinball is like I didn't realize how big HB people are with pinball.

What's a feature you wanna highlight here?

So we have Monday through Friday Friday, two to 6PM.

Okay.

$5 appetizers, $5 drinks, and $5 mini golf.

Nice.

So it's a vibe. Like, I want everyone to be able to afford it and just have a great time and turn this into their own playground.

Everyone loves a good happy hour.

Yes.

That's another local gym right here in Huntington Beach. Remember to support local and keep Surf City thriving. Got it on the first shot. See you at the next stop. 100% got it on the What's first up, Yeah. I guess it's Chris Casadova.

Take 10.

Yeah. She was there. Swear to god. Alright. Up next is Postive Plumbing and Drains. So, we recognize Postive Plumbing and Drains with Garrett Postive, the owner. Great great team. These young guys are awesome. They specialize in everything from minor leaks to large scale installations, handling gas, water, and sewer services with a commitment to quality and peace of mind on every job. Very trustworthy, very reliable, very fair. So I wanna thank Garrett Postef and his team, and here's our video. What's up, HB? This episode of Minute with the Mayor takes us down to Postift Plumbing. Let's go meet the team. Garrett, tell us about Postift Plumbing.

Postal Plumbing and Drain started out here in Huntington Beach, and it's really starting to expand and grow into a full blown service that people can trust and depend on. And we wanna keep our roots right here and help out the community as a whole.

And what services do you guys provide?

We do a little bit of everything, so we'll do everything that's residential and commercial. We'll do anything that has gas, water, and sewer. Anything from brand new ADU builds to the smallest pipe leak, water heaters, drain cleaning services, we do it all.

That's great. Then why did you guys choose Huntington Beach to open your business?

Born and raised.

Born raised here. We wanna stay right here and service the community that cares about us and all the people that we care about as well.

Tell us about these wonderful toys that we're looking at.

So this is pretty much our drain cleaning setup that we have here. We range everything from hydro jetting services, mainline cabling, smaller kitchens, and also shower drain, stuff like that. This is our camera setup right here and our locator. So if you ever need anything located or sewer work done, these are the tools to get the job done.

Wes, where do people find you?

If you wanna find us, (714) 907-3078 is the best way to find us. Additionally, you can look us up on Google. We have great reviews. We're ready to rock and roll when you are.

That's another local gem right here in Huntington Beach. We're here to support local and keep Surf City thriving. See you at the next stop. What's up, HB? Alright. What's up? Garen, the team are great. Alright. Thank you, everybody. Next up is community events announcements. Mister clerk, do we have anyone signed up to speak for community event announcements?

Yes, ma'am. We have three people signed up to speak. Please come down to the podium and use both microphones. Community events announced are limited to two minutes. And Justin Makoff, Paula Jean, and Jason Schmidt.

Good.

Hello. Hi. Good evening. Council members, Mayor Casey McKeon. I'm Justine Makoff. I'm with Free Rain Foundation located at the Huntington Central Park Equestrian Center. Free Rain is a sanctuary for abused and neglected horses where they are rehabilitated and well cared for by over 80 active volunteers. We use horses' natural ability to mirror human behavior to support growth, learning, and emotional development. I'd like to share a quick recap of our recent three k poppy stroll. Thank you, Pat Burns and Don Kennedy for attending.

Really, when you guys show up to so many of our events, it makes such a difference, and, we really appreciate it. We welcomed over 500 participants who enjoyed a beautiful stroll through the urban forest and the pastures at Free Rain, and it was a really special day to bring the community together and share what's special here in Huntington Beach. I'd also like to extend an invitation to two upcoming events. On May 23, Chris Septein is gonna be speaking about his new book, Theodore Roosevelt in California, The Presidential Adventure that Saved the Wilderness. It's gonna be at the Red Horse Barn, and again, at the Huntington Central Park Equestrian Center on Saturday, May 23, three to five.

And we also have our annual gala that will be on August 8, and I'd love to see as many of you who would be able to attend. It's where we raise the majority of our funding at Freewayn Foundation, and we always love to have you present. Thank you for your continued support of our programs, and thank you for everything you do for our community.

Thank That poppy walk is so fun, so beautiful.

Wasn't it amazing?

Sherry loved it. Yeah. I did And the dog?

You could bring your dogs. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. ProtectHB would like to invite the citizens of Huntington Beach and the electeds and the city staff here at City Hall to ProtectHB tour of our Orange County Registrar of Voters. Each election cycle, ProtectHB schedules tours of the registrar of voters site as election ballots are being sorted, counted, and verified to educate and inform our HB voters how very safe and secure Orange County elections are. They're super secure.

What is unique about our tour is that we have following is a q and a session with some of the registrar of voters directors and some staff. It is an amazing award winning facility that is often visited by other election officials around the state and around the nation. We are proud of our Orange County registrar of voters. Last election cycle, we invited all of the electives to our tour after quoting one of our councilmen that we will never get rid of fraud in our elections until we get rid of mail in ballots. Although that council member, but was invited, he did not take us up on it, but Andrew Gruel did.

We hope that we, proved to him the statement above was wrong. Again, to take the Protect HB tour of the Registrar of Voters and the question and answer session scheduled for May 23 and May 26, both at 10:15, write to, one word, hbcitizensforgoodgovernance@gmail.com to sign up. Almost done. Sorry. We would love to show off the facility and knowledge to HP. Of interest, I asked to have this flyer projected on the TV screen here for citizens to see.

Thank you.

And it was not. Thanks.

Thank you, Paula. Was I in the hospital when that when that invite came out? I You went

later, but she was

still with

us. Oh, I would have gone with you. I do have to say that Paula Jane did have the winning hat at the Kentucky Derby, Rotary Club Suave at at Central Park our sports complex last Sunday Saturday.

Amen to that, and thank you, by the way, Butch and Andrew, for both being at the Surf City Derby as a as a Rotarian. So good evening, council members, and let me be the first to say happy Cinco de Mayo. First, I wanted to thank Adolfo and Rosa at United Way for their tireless work that they've put in to making our five part financial literacy workshop such a success. We heard wonderful feedback from participants on how these workshops changed their relationship with their personal finances. For anyone who wanted to attend but couldn't, all the workshops were recorded and posted on our YouTube channel.

We have more exciting announcements coming on that front this summer, so stay tuned. On a totally different note, my husband Michael and I were watching a movie last night when there was an unexpected knock at our door. We opened the door, and there stood in a Southern California Edison uniform, our friend Ricky, who was just stopping by to fix a critical lighting issue in our building. Luckily, we had just taken Steve Levin's class and quickly realized that Ricky was no ordinary SEC employee. Instead, the only thing Ricky was there to do, the scam artist, was to lighten our bank accounts by eliminating a few zeros.

Now you too can learn how to spot these door to door scams by attending our new investment scams class on Wednesday, May 20 at 6PM in the Talbert Room at Central Library. This class will cover a range of door to door scams from utilities and contractors to charity asks and lost travelers looking for directions, and Steve will teach us how to eliminate these risks before they can spell lights out to your bank account. Thank you.

Thank you. Up next, announcement of supplemental communications. Mister Clerk, do we have any supplemental communications?

Yes, mayor. For city manager's report item number 18, regarding the introduction to the proposed budget in advance of this official study session to be held on on 05/19/2026, we received a budget memo and attachments, fiscal year twenty twenty six, twenty seven proposed budget book, fiscal year twenty six, twenty twenty six, twenty seven capital improvement program book, and PowerPoint presentation received from acting acting chief financial officers Zach Z, for consent calendar item number 21 regarding adoption of resolution number twenty twenty six dash 15 declaring 05/07/2026 as Theodore Theodore Roosevelt Day in Huntington Beach. We received one email, for item number 24, updated Pier updated Pier Plaza flagpole rededication plaque honoring veterans and America February. We received one email. And then for administrative items, the item that was withdrawn, request for city council direction regarding an operating permit amendment from the California State Water Resources Control Board to discontinue supplemental fluoridation of the city's drinking water supply.

We received 25 emails and finally, for council member items number 26, proposal for installation of commemorative plaque at Sunset Beach, we received one email.

Thank you. Up next is public comments. Mister Clerk, how many speakers do we have?

We have 35 speakers, mayor.

Okay. Please call them up.

Okay. The city council will not receive public comments for any topic, including items on the open session agenda. When your name is called, please approach, use both podiums, state your name and organization for the record. Olivia Chang, mister Amory Hansen, Andrew Einhorn, Tuca Zokai, Bob Hans Hans Hanlow, Del Fike, Alice Fike, Anne McCarthy, Linda Diaz, Jessica Gopayo, and Shelby. Please use both please use both microphones. Thank you.

Go ahead, please.

Thank you. My name is Bob Hamlin. I'm the current president of the California Dental Association, representing 27,000 members statewide and 2,500 members here in the local community. With appreciation and gratitude, I want to thank you, okay, for removing item number 25 from your agenda. Appreciate it very much.

Hello, I'm Touka Zokai from the California Dental Association. I also want to express my gratitude for listening to your constituents as was shared. There were a number of individuals that shared their concerns about the item. And that included over 150 signatures that was only collected over a number of few hours less than five to share that with you. So thank you for listening to your constituents, and the California Dental Association deeply extends their gratitude.

Next speaker please.

Hi, my name is Anne McCarthy. I'm here to speak in support of the approval of the Huntington Beach City School District Maintenance And Operations Building on behalf of AYSO Region fifty six. I've spoken to this council many times before advocating for youth sports in general and AYSO soccer specifically. Unfortunately, nationwide, participation in youth sports is decreasing with many being priced out of club sports and volunteer programs shrinking. Happily, that is not the case with AYSO region fifty six.

AYSO Region fifty six is one of several AYSO regions serving Huntington Beach. We specifically serve Southeast Huntington Beach, essentially the same geographic area as the Huntington Beach City School District. AYSO at the regional level is an all volunteer organization, and we serve 14 to 1,600 kids annually, including our EPIC program that serves 40 special needs players. Our players range from the age of three to 16. AYSO is reasonably priced for all families and has a self funded scholarship program.

No child is ever turned away based on their skill or level or ability to pay. AYSO Region fifty six has served Huntington Beach since 1975 and has partnered with the school district that entire time. We currently use six fields, Hawes, Dwyer, Smith, Moffett, Peterson, and Eater, and we plan to use Sowers again in the near future. The school fields not only serve the school during school hours, the YMCA programs during after school hours, but also serve our 1,600 players for weekday practices and weekday games. As our region experienced when the Geisler School site was sold, field space in Southeast Huntington Beach, especially full size soccer fields, is very limited.

For our program, having fields at a reasonable cost that are close to our families is extremely important to keeping our families and our kids participating. This is where the school fields are essential. Having approximate and functioning maintenance base for the district employees that is not costing the school district significant additional funds is key to the district's ability to care for their fields and provide the best possible playing service for all of our local kids. A strong school district is important to every community, and a school district that can partner with and support youth sports, a sports especially when there are very limited other viable field options, helps create a strong cohesive community for our kids. I appreciate your consideration. Thank you.

Thank you.

My name is Alice Fike. I'm here regarding the Redundle Circle Project replacing the reliable lumberyard. Our group, Cherry Park Community went to the last planning commission meeting. They basically told us, we're gonna pass and let city council deal with it. Although there are some commissioners that were very concerned on their studies. The big one, the sound test. They tested one diesel truck. No trailer docks, no beepers of the backups for numerous trucks. The plan is set for two forty high buildings, one about 85,000 square feet, the other about 97,000 square feet. Each building will have 11 docking bays for a total of 22.

The plan allows for 95 trucks, twenty four hours a day. The only small concession they give us is, well, we'll do six trucks per hour from 10PM to 7AM so you can sleep. I don't know about you guys, but good luck. I live at 7582 Taylor Drive directly across from this project. My kitchen window, my bedroom room. Hello. There it is. We know we can't stop the project because it is commercial property. We know that. And we know city city wants to make income.

That's how things work. All we're asking for is a taller wall. We would love 14, if not at least 12, and better landscaping. The wall across from me is seven feet tall. Zoning administration said they only have to build a nine foot wall. That is two layers of bricks taller than what my wall is now. That is ridiculous. Go look at the Walmart wall. It's on a berm, so it's tall. Go look at Smart and Final.

It's tall. And neither one of those very busy businesses have deliveries or pickups any time at night, especially sleeping hours. And when we talk to the representative from the development company, and I'm not going to say his name, he keeps changing his story of what's going on. And he's trying to tell us, and the planning commission the other night, go look at the Gateway project. Same size buildings, same floor plan, everything the same. Do you guys know where that's built? It's built at the Boeing Corporation. All that land. It doesn't back up to attractive homes. Senior condos and Terry Park, which is a very, very busy park for our our kids playing sports.

You know, my husband and

I voted for a lot of you because of your values and your beliefs. You came to Terry Park, you had a meeting with us saying, this is how we want to run our city. I'm inviting you, any of you, please meet us at Terry Park again. Walk with us down Taylor Drive. Walk with us down Carnaby Street. We have been there. We're older. A lot of us have been there thirty five, forty plus years. We don't wanna move Huntington Beach. I grew up here. We can't afford to move. So please, please meet with us.

Thank Alice, would you grab a Thank a blue card on the way out and we'll be able to get in touch with you that way.

Just

Thank you.

Good good evening. This is, Dale Fike. I'm here to talk about the Taylor, Terry Park and the, lumber yard. We live directly across from the main part of the project from the, lumber yard. We've had a few problems now and then, but we get a hold of them and they kind of take care of it.

Sometimes they start their buzz saw too early in the morning. Talk to them and it's fine. They don't work twenty four hours a day, but this project, seems to be exempt from that procedure as far as loading trucks and delivering stuff, twenty four hours. Some of my main concerns basically is going to be the height of the wall. I know my wife just talked about that.

Right now, our wall is anywhere between six and a half to seven feet tall depending on where you measure it from. It's right in front of our house. They say that, we can only build a nine foot wall, but, that's what they're gonna offer us, and that's what they said is is the limit. That's what the Huntington Beach code calls for. Directly next to the senior center condos is right down, the, right by the park.

Their wall is 14 feet high. I don't see any reason why we can't put an agenda in or whatever you call it, to take and, exempt us from the nine foot wall to a 14 foot wall. Like I said, we look right out our kitchen window, right out our bedroom windows, and we're gonna see this giant 40 foot buildings, and we're not sure what the setback is on them, how far back they're gonna be.

So let's see. We

wanna take and be, protected as best we can, from the noise and the, onset of the trucks moving in and out. Don't forget that this is a twenty four operation twenty four hour operation. There could be up to 95 trucks a day, of operations. And don't forget that this is a twenty four hour project. Landscaping and trees.

Last planning sis last planning commission that we went to found out that there's supposed to be a sidewalk, curbs, and a four foot planter placed in front of that, by where the wall is. I measured it, and it's 14 feet from the wall to the curb line. I don't see how they're gonna take in and, have enough room for a buffer of noise and, the, construction. Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you, sir.

Good evening, mayor and council members. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. My name is Jessica Gopiao, and I'm proud to call Huntington Beach home. I wanna take the moment to share how Orange County United Way is making a difference right here in our community. The work their work centers on education, financial stability, health, and housing, the building blocks that make families not just get by but really thrive.

One of the most important resources they operate is 211, our county's 20 information and referral line. Last year alone, more than 7,000 Huntington Beach residents reached out for help with basics like housing, food, and utility assistance. With changes to Medi Cal and CalFresh this year, many families have questions about eligibility or renewals. 211 remains a trusted resource to help navigate those changes. We have given the city staff two eleven resource cards, if anyone would like to take one home.

Another program making a real impact is OC free tax prep. It provides free IRS certified tax services so families can claim the refunds and credits they've earned. This is now for next year. Here in Huntington Beach, that means helping three thirty four households last year, bringing back over $730,000 into our local community or economy. Orange County United Way is currently looking for volunteers, and there are a variety of roles available. No experience is needing and needed and training is provided. To learn more or get involved, you can visit unitedwayoc.org. Thank you very much for your time and for supporting efforts that strengthen our community.

Thank you.

Next speaker, please. Thank you, mister mayor. My name is mister Amory Hanson. I'm speaking tonight in support of item 27, the mayor and councilman Twining and Kennedy's item to install commemorative plaque in our memory of mister Colby Apa. September 18, this plaque not only honors mister Apa's legacy, but Huntington Beach's legacy as a significant place for a surfing community. I urge the council to show what it means to be Surf City. Once again, I urge a yes vote on I'm 27. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Hi there. My name is doctor Olivia Chang. I am a citizen of Huntington Harbor, parents of two children who attend Harborview Elementary School and a practicing physician. I'm here today to make an official request to improve signage on Sabrick Street and improve the traffic flow for cars exiting Pickwick. You all have a packet in front of you with pictures if you'd like to follow along.

Currently, the only way to cross the park through Saybrook onto Harborview is these two stop signs that are half a mile apart. There is a school crosswalk, but it's only active when there is a crossing guard here, which is only an hour and a half a day during school hours. This means on weekends, there is no school guard, and you are at the mercy of these children crossing on their own across the street. I direct you to page two. Especially on a foggy day, which is often in the harbor, it's challenging to see the school sign.

If my three year old son trips while crossing the street on a weekend, I have zero faith that oncoming traffic will stop in time for an accident to happen. Multiple people have stated concerns, including the 10 parents who have co signed this letter with me, the school PTA, and our own school cross guard who stated, I have concerns. There should be speed limit adjustments. Note, this is from a professional. Next page. We have examples here in HB where we can do it well. On Heil, Biology, there is a crosswalk with lighted signs. We need lighted signs for pedestrians because we use this crosswalk at all times. We use it for AYSO games on weekends. We use it for birthday weekend parties on weekends.

We use it after school for Girl Scout parties. People need visual reminders of not speeding or to entirely limit the speed entirely. I have been raising these concerns since December 2024, and I wanna thank Pat, Mr. Pat Burns for improving some of the the visibility of the signs, but we need to do more. I was notified today, this morning actually, after I mentioned that I was coming here, that they're gonna be installing a yield to pedestrian sign.

But, and thank you for that, but this is not enough. This is a start. We need reduction of the speed limit on Seabrook Street. We need experts to look at the traffic flow to really understand and know where the challenges are, where accidents are prone to happen. We need to interview the school, the parents, the school cross guard, so we can know where change can make happen.

In conclusion, my first request is to add on the corner of Saybrook and Brantford a pedestrian crossing light with appropriate street markings on both ends to ensure that our kids can cross Saybrook into Harborview safely at all times. I reiterate here, this is not just a school crossing. It is a neighborhood crossing so that we can get to the park. My second ask is for the city to closely work with the school, the parents, the professionals to ensure that we optimize the traffic pattern on Saybrook to ensure that cars leaving Harborview School from Pickwick. As a physician, I know how important it is to address risks and prevent them as soon as it happens.

I am standing in front of you today as a parent and a representative of many parents listed here that you have the opportunity to prevent a child's injury and death. Thank you so much and please be our champion.

Thank you, doctor Chang. Can you, get a blue card so we can reach out and contact you?

Thank you.

Thank you.

You. Next speaker, please.

Hello. My name is Linda Diaz, and thank you honorable mayor McKeon. I thank you for your loyalty. I thank you for your ethics, and I thank you for your love for small business. I recently had a business that I wanna plug. It's called interior doors and commercial closet closet doors. It's they're located on commercial. The gentleman's name is actually Stephen King, believe it or not, which is kinda funny. But I had I I had new closet doors put in my my bedroom after suffering for twenty years. And I think a lot of us women are probably doing that.

And I'm just very pleased. So I'd really like you to do a few minutes with the mayor with him. And I wanna congratulate Butch Twining. You've been a great businessman and a great gentleman. And you deserve to be the mayor pro tem. And I not now for the not so complimentary news. Oh my gosh. I watched the city council meeting last week. And my heart breaks for Chad. What I saw come from you, Chad.

I voted for you. I read your book. I drank the Kool Aid. I would vote for you again. I still believe in your potential.

You've got it going on, but you're not ready right now, young man. But your future looks bright and great. When I read your book and when I saw last week that you don't have a business license and you've had that book for about fifteen years, that means you don't have fifteen years of having a business license with the city of Huntington Beach or paying sales taxes. It broke my heart. I think I lost five pounds in one week over this.

But I still have great love for you, and I know things will get better. And I know you can make it right. Just pony up and do the right thing. I belong to a church called Beach Cities, and we're learning about the belt of truth over the last few weeks. And basically, they said, if you don't put the belt of truth on first, nothing will hold.

So there is no light to shine if you don't put the belt of truth on first. So that's for all of us. Because the truth always comes out even in darkness. Now we all love our city. We all believe in you. We all believe for positive change. And I believe that you can all work together in love and harmony. Thank you.

Thank you.

Bye bye. Bye.

Next week.

Andy Einhorn, Huntington Beach. The right to vote is the foundation of this city and this democracy. When Trump speaks, this council marches in lockstep, a group think process that betrays Huntington Beach. The SAVE Act and the voter ID have nothing to do with election integrity. They are disenfranchisement by design.

No passport, no certificate, birth certificate, no vote. Over 51% of Americans don't have a valid passport. 21,000,000 citizens lack the requirements. The elderly, the poor, the young Americans, and 69,000,000 married women whose names do not match their birth certificates are not disqualified by law, they are pushed out by it. That is voter suppression, Trump sponsored, counsel endorsed, and deliberate.

Non citizen voting is a federal crime and sick statistically nonexistent. Every audit confirms it. They avoid government contact because work matters more than risking everything. Trump called mail in voting, quote, cheating, then voted by mail in March, then signed an executive order restricting it for everyone else. Mail ballot fraud in 2020 was five votes out of 10,000,000 per the Brookings Institute, if you want to look it up.

A president who uses what he bans and lies about fraud to restrict your vote reveals hypocrisy on full display. Anyone on this council echoing echoing that narrative is either delusional or lying and smears the dedicated officials who keep our elections fair and free. This council litigates relentlessly, unbothered by its losing record. The library fiasco alone will cost another million dollars. The tab falls on the taxpayers. The embarrassment on our city.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Hello, city council. My name is Shelby. I'm a long time resident of Huntington Beach, who is represented by a seven member part time city council, which is all of you. In this city, the council establishes policies and priorities for the provision of effective and and efficient municipal services. The city council is the city's legislative authority, sets policies under which a city operates.

The city council's duties include establishing goals and policies, enacting legislation, adopting the city's operating budget, and appropriating the funds necessary to prove services to the city's residences, businesses, and visitors. Huntington Beach mayor is selected annually, from among the city council members and is charged with running the city council meetings and representing the city throughout the community and region. Many of you up there have had the privilege and honor to sit in that seat. Let me respectfully remind all city council members, boards, committees, commissioners, staff of the affirmation, not the oath of office that you took to represent the people, the citizens, the residents, the inhabitants, and the stakeholders of Huntington Beach. There is also a code of ethics that must be upheld.

Knowing that this is an election year, temptation pressure can be intense. I hope that all you remember who voted for you and why we want you here to represent us with the people of Huntington Beach. Currently, there appears to be intentional disregard for the will of the people in respects to quite a few matters in the city, sadly. But my priority is the Lumberyard project located at 7600 Redondo Circle. That project is encroaching on the health, safety, well-being, and life liberty of the people that you represent.

This project is surrounded by sensitive receptors such as a church, a preschool, senior living, assisted living, public parks, low density residential homes. We are compromised of living beings that are within a stone's throw of the walls that will surround this land redevelopment. The city clerk has been given a copy of the neighborhood petition and a copy of the planning commissioner's packet for your review. An appeal was recently made by Pat Burns to the city council, so this is coming to you. We understand the owner has a right to develop on their property.

However, re until recently, there's been no community engagement, and the developer, along with the zoning administrator, refused to address the multi zone complex situation surrounding this project. It has been appealed again, and you will be hearing from us again. The local community wants a win win, and we are trying to find ways to come to terms with everybody involved. The Terry Park community has requested study sessions with all of you, so you can be shown the inconsistencies on all the reporting and all the data from the MND initial study and conditional use permits. Again, we're not trying to stop development in Huntington Beach.

However, this project, as presented, is not a good fit for the community as is and needs some adjustments with concessions before moving forward. They need to go back to the drawing board literally with their sketches. There's also apparently a need to update the fee schedule for repeat municipal offenders. Thank

you. You.

Hey, Roger. Just before you speak, how you doing? I just I just wanna make a comment and thank you Linda for the nice compliment. But in defense of my my cohort over here, Councilman Williams, there was a few of us up here that beat a path to the treasurer's office the next morning and got our business licenses too. So it wasn't just it wasn't just councilman Williams. I I might have didn't know I was supposed to have one. So, anyway, I just wanna say that and and thank you and thank you, Linda.

Go ahead, Roger.

Thank you. Good evening, fellow good evening, council members. Today, I wanna talk to you guys about the air show. The air show seriously, the people that that completely, completely agree with the air show, I mean, the the negotiations that we did that was under that was done completely in the back doors, in the back rooms, that was so unfair. And anybody that says, I mean, that, hey, we should just pay it and move on, I mean, the thing that was the biggest insult about it was the $25 for the parking. It was gonna go all go to the air show. I mean, to the the people that run the air show. And we were gonna have to pay for all the safety services. I mean, for everybody. We're gonna have to pay for the parking attendants.

We're gonna have to pay for every and all the money goes for the parking to the air show for the next whatever amount of years. And but we're gonna get $10. We're gonna start getting $10 per parking spot after five years. Now if it's $25 now, I'm pretty sure it's gonna go up to $35 next in five years. And that's another legacy that Bill Gate or Michael Gates did, I mean, with I mean and he kept it quiet.

This is so unfair. At least we noticed I mean, the people in the federal the the federal government at least noticed who he was, and he they fired him pretty quick. And then he tries to come back over here. But, I mean, he was being secretive about this, and this is it's it's so wrong. And, I mean and why are we giving this why are we giving the money out to them? It's because of an oil what was it? Like a boat or something that that made a spill or their anchor hit one of the pipelines, and it leaked, and then we ended up getting $350,000 from them, and then we're losing all this money? I mean, why don't we charge them for for the air show? And they turned off the air show. There was only one day for the air show that we closed down, and he's getting repercussions.

I mean, he was for the next ten years, this is crazy, guys. Seriously, anybody that says that we should just move on instead of having a real, real in-depth who's making money on this? I mean, who's making money that's I mean, they they sponsored a bunch of you guys for, I mean, for the, for the campaign posters. Yeah. That's right. But, I mean, overall, I mean, that's nothing compared to how much you guys gave away. So please change your stance. Change your stance and do an audit about this and redo this whole thing. And who cares? I mean, seriously, if they're not gonna leave us, they're not gonna leave.

We need them way less than they need us. But please don't give them for the next ten years, we're gonna give them all the I mean, we're gonna have to pay for all the city services, including the insurance, everything, and they just re they just take all the profits? That's insane. Thank you.

Hey, Roger. Just a correction. We actually sued the oil company and brought back $5,250,000 to the residents of Huntington Beach. It wasn't $300,000.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Thank Yeah. 5,250,000. Thanks, Roger.

Wait for a favor. How much is that? Next speaker, please.

Okay. Next speakers. Joseph Henry, Andrew Levin, Marcy Quick, Laurie O'Brien, David Telles, Chris Cluey, Janet Jacobs, Michael Shrew, Taylor, Daniel Tasa. Please use both microphones. Thank you.

Good.

Thank you for your thank you for your time. My name is Dave Tullis, council members and mayor. I'm currently a Huntington Beach resident, a business owner. I'm an oral surgeon, And I just wanted to, express my gratitude and appreciation of pulling the item, number 25. I've been a Huntington Beach resident since 1987, and, an Edison High School alumni in 1997.

And we grew up very poor when I was young, and fluoride in the water is a very essential thing for underserved communities. So I want everybody to keep that in mind, that there were a lot of different communities, that tried to remove fluoride in the water, and it created, increased incidence of caries, meaning cavities, in children especially, as well as, because I'm an oral surgeon, we see a lot more hospital admissions. So, it's actually a lot more expensive of a repercussion if we consider removing that important supplement. Thank you again for that consideration. And hi, Bush. Thanks.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Laurie. I live in the Windward Cove, the senior committee just east of the proposed Redondo Circle project. For seven years, I've I've lived in the area. I previously served as president of our HOA board.

And during my time there, I've come to deeply appreciate the quiet, stable environment our residents rely on. This is why I'm extremely concerned about the proposed nighttime truck activity. Even from a distance, we already hear the noise from the sport complex, and that facility is significant significantly further away. The idea of six trucks per hour operating between 10PM and 7AM would dramatically change the soundscape of our neighborhood. Many of our seniors already struggle with sleep issues and constant nighttime noise will make that worse.

I'm also concerned about the impact on property values. These home represent years of hard work and are, for many of us, our forever home. A decline in value due to nighttime industrial noise would unfairly punish residents who have invested in the community. I want to be clear, I am not opposed to progress. In fact, I welcome the improvement of industrial complex the I'm sorry, the improvement an industrial complex would bring to that area.

But progress should not come at the cost of the health and well-being of people who already live here. There are many companies that do not require overnight truck deliveries. Why not lease it to tenants whose operations align better with the surrounding neighborhood? Additionally, I believe in the principle that good fences make good neighbors. A 14 foot wall and landscaping designed to grow tall and dense would go a long way toward reducing noise and preserving the character of our community. Tonight, I'm asking for your support in protecting the quiet nighttime environment our seniors, families, and children depend on. Restless sleep is not a luxury. It is a basic requirement for health and quality for life. Thank you for your consideration.

My name is Marcy Quick and I am speaking in regards to the Redondo Circle development as well and I am located at the Windward Cove community behind Terry Park, east of the fencing of the lumber company. I serve on the HOA board as treasurer and want to represent Windward Cove community. I have lived at Windward Cove for thirteen years. I love the community and the quietness of the area. Currently, I enjoy having my windows open for fresh air and all during the day and at night.

After last week's meeting, I came home and opened my bedroom window and took a piece and took in the piece and of the evening setting setting into its quietness. Then thought of how the sound of the trucks, the gears, and the reverse beeping, the forklifts, and the hustle and bustle of the company that never sleeps. It saddened me. My beautiful peaceful community will no longer be that with a 20 fourseven community company moving in all night long. The fresh air will give way to diesel fuel and exhaust.

Driving home down Taylor Street the other night, I saw something that I've taken advantage of for the last thirteen years I've lived here. The beautiful sunset and a sunset that will be blocked by 40 feet of building. I thought of all the seniors, the family, and the children who play and walk in the park and enjoy the fresh air and the sunsets that will be blocked by this building. Our sacrifice to development. I'm asking for a compromise.

I'm sorry. I thought though I'm saddened by a large building, I do understand the call for progress. So my sacrifice is that. I don't want that understanding of progress to steal my joy, my peace in life. No business and no one should have that right.

I am asking for a compromise to the development of the progress without 20 fourseven sacrifice. That between the hours of at least 10PM or midnight and 6AM to 7AM be that peace that we all cherish and have the right to live in our community and residential area. Without the business hours compromise, property values of our community will be jeopardized with a 20 fourseven noisy business right next door and should never be allowed. That's stealing the equity from the seniors who have worked so hard, who want to who would want to buy a noisy a home in a noisy 274247 community. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next speaker please.

Thank you, Mayor and members of the council for pulling agenda item 25. The Orange County Dental, Society truly appreciates that. My name is Doctor. Joseph Henry. I've been a practicing dentist for over forty three years, and I'm the immediate past president of the Orange County Dental Society, 2,500 members strong.

You're already aware of many of the benefits of community water fluoridation. For every dollar invested, it yields more than $30 in reduced dental care costs. Few public health measures provide that level of return. Fluoridation is especially important for our youngest and most vulnerable residents here in Huntington Beach. When fluoride is present in the drinking water, it becomes incorporated into developing teeth, making them stronger, even before they erupt.

This provides long term protection against tooth decay, protection that goes beyond what topical fluoride, like what's in toothpaste, can offer on its own. Communities that have discontinued fluoridation have experienced, on average, a 25 increase in tooth decay. The impact is even greater among those who already face barriers to accessing regular dental care. Let me ask you to reflect on your own experiences. How many of you had a small filling replaced with a larger one over time?

How many have needed crowns or root canals after those fillings failed? And how many have ultimately faced tooth loss and required implants? Now imagine that progression happening more often, twenty five percent more, for your children, your grandchildren, and for the most vulnerable members of this community. So once again, I want to thank you again for pulling the item, and thank you for hearing my concerns.

Thank you. Next speaker please.

Hi there. My name is Andrew Levin. I'm an orthodontist in Huntington Beach. I've also been a long term resident of Huntington Beach since 1990. Grew up here, raising my family here. I just want to express my gratitude for pulling agenda item 25 on behalf of our community. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next speaker please.

Hi, my name is Janet Jacobs and I am here on behalf of the Terry Park Redondo project. I'm extremely upset about this whole project. I live at the Windward Cove community, senior community, and I moved there for thirteen years ago, and it's right next to Terry Park, which all of you guys, well, many of you guys remember, Terry Park, because that's where we had the largest campaign for you guys of 75 plus people, Dawn, Butch, Gracie, and Pat. I think you were there too. And we all got together and voted for you because you vowed to fight for us, the people.

I love my community. I'm on the HOA board. After years of saving, we finally finished a huge paint project that enhances our appearance. And after all that, we're faced with this project that would literally suffocate our little community because we'd be surrounded by concrete buildings. It would be like we're living in a cave because on one side there's this storage facility that's been there for years right out my front door and that's been there.

But now to put another block of 40 feet tall right up against our property, we're going to be living in a cave. I'm going to have no sunlight. It's going to take away any airflow that we get. The sunsets, the three palm trees that are there. I mean, it's the only beauty that I have going that direction and now, I'm going to be faced with having a 40 foot wall outside of even the noise and everything else. The fact is the lumberyard is selling. Yes, it's selling. We have no control over who he sells to. But there hasn't been any community engagement on this proposed project at all. So we realize that it's about the tax dollars.

It's always about the money, right? But find other ways. Start finding people on the code, code fines. Find a smaller project to put in that area. We're not opposed to it. He sells something has to be built there but why so such a grand project? And I know once the owner gets the deed for the water and the electricity, the entire property will have higher value and more tax dollars. So, I know that's a fact too, but our Terry Park community is requesting a study session to clarify a lot of the issues, which are height walls. I just want the buildings to be lower. Night traffic is ridiculous.

We're in a residential community. It's everything about this is wrong. It's environmentally wrong. The types of the truck traffic, the noise steady was incomplete, decreasing the building heights as I said, please, please decrease that. And what about the 38 electric vehicle charging stations that they have already cited to that's gonna put out so many different toxins. Is my time up? Yeah. Thank you for listening.

Thank you, Janet.

Hello. Chris Clewy, Huntington Beach resident, candidate for Assembly District 72. You might have seen me on your ballot. I'm here tonight. First, I wanna thank, mister Burns for encouraging people to vote. That is our American right and duty. And, if it wasn't so important, people wouldn't try so hard to take it away from us. So yes, everyone does need to go out and vote. I showed up tonight to talk about agenda item 25, which I'm very glad to see was pulled from the calendar. The problem is is that it made it on the calendar in the first place.

That shows a complete lack of leadership from everyone sitting in those chairs right now because the science is incredibly clear. Fluoridation in our water keeps kids from getting cavities. It keeps adults from getting cavities. It saves us, as a country, 6 and a half billion dollars a year. We have the evidence from other communities that have removed fluoridation from their water, in Juneau, Alaska, and in Calgary, in Canada, that cavity rates went up by twenty five percent, right in line with the numbers that the CDC says fluoridation prevents.

It cost Calgary $28,000,000 to reintroduce fluoridation to their water supply. When kids get cavities, as you heard from the previous gentleman, it falls more harshly on lower income communities. It affects those who are more vulnerable because they don't have the income, they don't have the wealth to be able to go see a more pricey doctor, to buy expensive topical fluoride treatments. And so I am asking, do we want to be a city that goes after children? Because I know for a fact, I've heard you guys before say we're here to protect the children.

And I don't think giving kids cavities is protecting children. So I am very hopeful that I will never see this item on our agenda ever again. And that we can keep culture war nonsense off of our city council business. And we can actually work on stuff that helps Huntington Beach. Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Yeah. Hi. My name is Daniel Tessa, and I'm here about also the Redondo Circle Terry Park project. I'm also a resident. I live about 300 feet from the property line. I have all the same concerns that you've already heard, so I'm not going to be redundant. Okay? Primarily though, we did hear from the developers in the park. They told us that an environmental impact report was not necessary. It didn't require it.

I can't imagine why because a project this scope, this size, this close to houses, how can it not require a full impact report? The noise, the emissions, it's got to. So I'm here to request that it gets done, that the impact report does get done. I, along with 75 signatures that I got personally in the neighborhood, would freely say I'm not against the project necessarily. I mean, I know we're trying to make money here.

Income, jobs. I'm all for it. But I think compromise. We're gonna have to compromise because even if if if if the codes are met, they kept saying the codes are met. And the planning commission, they did say that they agreed that it was insufficient. We need a new report on the sound. So I just want that to get done, the EIR. And even if it does pass the codes, maybe people are still going to stay up at night. I'm trying to get used to the thought of a backup bill every ten minutes all night long. How do you how do you know, it just seems like to put to put the project there without making it work for everybody.

I know it's gonna be tough but I just can't imagine building a dysfunctional community. Business is good. I'm for it. But we gotta make it work. And, the noise and the scope of the operation and the all night trucks, it's gonna be tough. I just hope we can compromise. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Hi. My name is Mike, and I also live in the community behind at Round Terry Park, and I'm here about the lumberyard as well. I've been in the neighborhood for twenty nine years. I've raised my children there. My children own homes in Huntington Beach, and I think the city council has lost their way. I think you need to protect the citizens, not the property owner. The property owner has been dumping chemicals in there on their and treating their lumber since 1972 as far back as we can go. When they cut the property apart to make other areas, he went ahead and cut around all the old oil wells. He's not a stupid guy. I mean, he knows what he's doing.

He's not community friendly. The city's been very good to him. He's made a lot of money here. I don't know why you guys would support this project. And to be honest with you, I don't think the planning commission is capable of putting together a project like this. They don't think they've ever built anything this big in the city of Huntington Beach. And you can stand there and you could ask her a question, any question about the plans, and she doesn't have an answer. I've looked at the plans for maybe an hour, and I probably know more about it than she does. I I would hope you would stand up for the community and not the commercial project. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Hi, everyone. I'm Taylor DeBico. I'm also a resident of the, Terry Park neighborhood. I live on Taylor Drive. Taylor on Taylor Drive, easy to remember. And I'm I'm deeply opposed to this project, particularly because there has been no ERI and there should be. It's highly toxic. It's highly contaminated. And it is so disgusting that and implorable that it would be allowed near the sensitive receptors of children that are in the park, of the elderly senior living folks that are within 50 feet of this project. I'm gonna You heard from a lot of my wonderful neighbors.

Okay? I'm gonna tell you about my not so good neighbors. Alright? And if you don't know what they are and what they do, I'm gonna beg of you to please look into the because I wanna live to be old. Okay? And I wanna live in that neighborhood through that old age. Okay? And I think I deserve that, that level of environmental justice. I think I deserve that, and I think anybody in this room deserves that. And if it were you, I would stand up for each and every one of you and anybody in this room to fight for that.

So here are my unsavory neighbors. Benzene, Toulene, Tetrachlorothene, PCE, acetone, terbutyl alcohol, bromiform, barium, beryllium, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, copper, lead, mercury, nickel, selenium, thallium, vandium, zinc, zinc. That's just some. Do I have enough time? Let's see.

Arsenic detected in six samples, exceeding commercial and industrial, levels. Freon 12 and Freon one thirteen, They're friends. Chloromethane, vinyl chloride, chloroethane, bromomethane. This one I can't pronounce. There's a thousand letters in it, but something something methane. Acetone, again, carbon disulfide, isopropin, chloroform. I think that's what serial killers use to put people out before they, you know, drag them away somewhere. Scary that that could be in our air, in our groundwater. This is what the samples are showing there. This is why I'm begging you.

I am begging you for the health of this neighborhood and for the health of you in your neighborhoods because if it comes to us, it's gonna come to you eventually. That's what happens. That's what happens with toxins. This is not just for us in this exclusive neighborhood. This not it's not exclusive, but I mean it's not just exclusive to us. This is for anybody living in this city. This is for anybody who cares about their neighbor, who cares about their longevity, their children, their future. Like, I'm begging you to help out this neighborhood because I know how sickly this can make us. And to not have an ERI, EIR partner who did all of the the sampling and the lab tests, they even had said that the extent of the impacts are unknown. I'm so sorry.

Please just let me read this, but it cannot be assumed.

Thank Thank you so much. Thank you. Speaker please.

Good evening, I'm Doctor. Richard Mungo. I'm a pediatric dentist, practiced here in Huntington Beach for forty three years. Raised my kids here and just love the city and love the people. But the fluoride issue is very, very important and we appreciate you taking it off the agenda tonight.

The thing is that we're about prevention. If we can prevent the disease and infections and all that from happening, we don't have to worry about it and it's a financial gain for the parents. And when we look at all this, what happens is my major concern because our specialty works mainly on children that have medically complicated healthcare. And when you're looking at kids that have handicaps and disabilities, you know, the parents go home and they have to perform oral hygiene. It's very difficult for them.

And when you put that along with underserved and underprivileged children that don't have any access to care, it really is terrible. So when we look at the collateral damage from something like this, that's who it's going to affect. It's going to make these kids sicker and we always have to remember the mouth is part of the body. What happens here is it affects the heart, affects all the other organs. And the thing is we can prevent all this.

And when you look at twenty five percent more of cavities so the kids come in, the two things that fluoride does, one is it prevents a lot of cavities from forming. But it also makes the damage that that causes the cavities lesser. We would see kids that we have to take 18 old babies into the Operating Room at Shock Hospital. And the reason is that they go to bed with some milk bottle. Mom doesn't know that she shouldn't be doing that. Should just be water. But that's an hour and a half in the Operating Room taking care of that child maybe 14 or 15 cavities. So we look at all of this, all these things put together. Fluoride is wonderful. It's the best investment you can make.

And let's do it for, let's keep that fluoride there for all of our patients. Thank you.

And more speakers?

Yes, Mayor. Gerald Chapman, Rod Teles, Ross Price, Russ Neil, Tim Geddes, Irene Garcia, Robert Maniachi Maniachi, Gerard Sivlowski, Noah Rhodes, Pat Goodman, William Welsh, Libby, Catherine Goddard, that's it. Thank you.

Go ahead, sir.

City council, my name is Gerald Chapman. I've lived and practiced dentistry in Huntington Beach for almost fifty years. You received the letter from the Dental Society. I won't go over that, and I'm glad that you have pulled this item. But it's hard to believe that you would want to do away with one of the most successful public health programs in the history of mankind.

Yesterday, I went to the city water department to ask questions about why this was being recommended. The answers I received were deafening silence. Nobody would talk about it. You were willing to spend over $700,000 to design a patch for the mayor's baseball cap instead of paying, spending $1 per citizen to perfect protect them from the discomfort and cost of preventable dental disease. You have spent millions of dollars trying to save the morals of young people that use the library, but you don't want to help preserve their dental health.

I'm glad again, I'm glad that you have pulled this proposal. But if you pass this, you will be taking a step towards the dark ages. You should be ashamed. Do the right thing and reject the proposal. Thank you.

And just to clarify, council doesn't put things on the agenda item unless it's an h item, a council member item, staff puts items on, and so staff pulled this item off. So I just wanna clarify that for the record. Thank you so much.

Good evening council members and mayor. Tonight, I'd like to speak in support of item agenda number 23, the memorandum of understanding between the city of Huntington Beach and Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center. I appreciate the city continuing to invest meaningful partnerships that strengthen the health and well-being of our community. Collaboration like this creates opportunity to better serve residents through outreach, wellness initiatives, education, and community support programs that can truly make a difference in people's lives. I can't wait to see how this donation is put to good use.

As someone deeply involved in non profit and community outreach work here in Huntington Beach, I've seen firsthand how partnerships between city, health care organizations, nonprofits, and multiple impact can create stronger, more supportive systems for families, seniors, veterans, and residents in need with the lower income population. I also believe it's important to recognize the partnership like these can be mutually beneficial. In addition to helping our community, they can create positive, long term financial value and advantages for participating participating in organizations through charitable and community benefit initiatives. When done responsibly, it's truly a win win for everybody involved including our tax saving benefits. Huntington Beach thrives when we work together with government, health care providers, businesses, and nonprofits alike, all focused on strengthening our community with love and support.

I'm Roz Price, your Huntington Beach City Council candidate for 2026, committed to community partnership, compassionate leadership, and common sense solutions throughout. And I appreciate all you guys and all the service you do, and thank you for pulling the agenda mine off for the fluoride in the water. Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Good evening, mayor McKeehan, council members, Brian Theenis, long term, Huntington Beach, thirty eight year Huntington Beach resident, your favorite planning commissioner. I'd like to thank, council member Burns for appealing the Redondo Circle project, the industrial building next to Terry Park. I was one of the two planning commissioners who voted to at least continue that project while I am in favor of development rights. That's a, you know, developed by right project. It's zoned industrial, but according to our land use controls, there's a 300 foot buffer, if you are near 300 feet from residential property, then you need a conditional use permit to study the effects of the project on the residents such as sound and noise, etcetera.

And I believe that the sound study wasn't as good as it should have been. I think there is an easy site plan fix to close the gap between the two buildings and provide a bigger setback and a nice tall wall with a landscape berm and I think they can fix the project and make it more compatible with the neighborhood. Appreciate the appeal and and, you know, the the citizens are our customers, right, the city hall's customers, and they're they're the number one customers, and the real estate developers, they're kind of they're important customers too, those are the new customers. We gotta focus on our our current customers and so far, I think this city council has done a great job focusing on the current customers, our our our citizens, crime illegal again, crime's down, attacking the homeless problem. You guys have done a great job and that's why I'm running for city council.

I wanna help out and be a part of this great city council and continue to make this city as good as it can possibly be. I'm not opposed to land development. I do think that we can be more responsible about it in some cases and in this park, this Terry Park, industrial building, I think we could just do a little bit better job. I just realized today that, the architect was also one of my clients, so I'm not getting a a card from them either. I voted no on their project just like, there was a project outside my neighborhood that got me involved in in being a a part of, of this, you know, city council, getting myself on planning commission where I opposed a project outside my neighborhood.

So all you Terry Park, participants here tonight, I I I feel for you. I was part of that group and, I did have to sue the developer on that project and, we did settle, but, the developer happened to be my own client and, but that's kinda me, that's how important it is for me to do the right thing for the city.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, city council. My name is Noah Rhodes. I'm here to request, and discuss pedestrian improvements in two areas near where I live, and I'm here to ask for a report on the nitrous oxide prohibition that was passed last November. I would like to know if the nitrous oxide prohibition has been successful in the course that were stated then, at this point. I would like to know if it has has reduced DUIs, and I would like two additional crosswalks outside of Edison High School.

I drive through there frequently, and there is many students there that just cross across the road, and you don't know when they're coming, and it's utter chaos, and it's hard to drive through. And I would like, two handicap ramps at the intersection of Bouchard and Banning, hopefully, to allow more access to wheelchairs and cyclists. There are many kids who go there, and I'm hoping that it could be more wheelchair accessible when they cross. And I have should have given you a pamphlet like this. It details my general ideas, and I'm hoping that you look through it.

I've emailed it as well so you have a digital copy. Thank you very much for your time.

Have a good day.

Thank you so much. Next speaker please.

Hi, members of the council and mayor. Thank you for having me. My name is Irene Contreras Garcia. I'm a fourth generation local Huntington Beach. I grew up in the corner of Garville and Delaware.

My family owned half of the block there. The city took it by intimate domain, took my our family home and part of my grandmother's. I just wanna say that when I got married, I moved to the the neighborhood at the Huntington Riviera where, reliable lumber is I live in Ontario, so I'm behind, mister and missus Faikes' house. And, you know, I concur with everyone from the Terry Park community that spoke and asked for the things that we're asking for, and I don't think that's a lot to ask for. You know, I've lived there almost sixty years, and I raised my children there.

And there's there's nowhere I'm gonna move to. So if it were in your backyard, I don't think you would appreciate this project. This project includes two forty foot buildings that don't even coincide with the rest of the landscape. It it doesn't need to be 40 foot buildings. They don't need to be trucks coming in and out for us not to be able to sleep at night twenty four seven, not even after 06:00.

Just think of yourselves if you wanted to be in that situation. I don't think you would be comfortable with that situation, and we're asking to please reconsider, the project. Have a a a good, adequate noise control study. One that's done with as many trucks as there there's going to be, etcetera. The the toxins, we have to live with that.

So we're asking you, please, to ask the developer to redesign or put the buildings 20 feet just like the other buildings in the area so we can see the sunset, so we can see the sky. So we're asking. And thank you, council member Burns. Thank you for the appeal. We appreciate it so much. Thank you for meeting with us. Thank you for representing the community, and thank you for your consideration.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, mayor and city council. Tim Geddes in the house or should I say cantina because, we're celebrating Cinco the Mayo. Once again, no report from the city attorney on our litigation with the state leaving us to with speculation only which isn't exactly music to our ears. Or maybe we should come up with our own song by a group by a group called Huntington Beach Boys called Help Me Bonta. You know, help me Bonta.

Help help me Bonta. Help me, Banta. Yeah. Get us out of our audit. But there are other fish to fry, so to speak, with the independent campaign signs of council member Gruel. It's like America's chef claiming, hey, I didn't cook the books. It was those other mega meatballs. Sorry, Andy. It's it's guilty goulash by association. You're all on the menu, I'm afraid.

The flaws of the incumbents are just too numerous. This council has done nothing in terms of solving our most pressing issues with the county and the state. Where is our housing element? Are you exhibiting high density by not producing one? What about voter ID?

Don't think don't think that any state initiative will come close to passing or that the council will let you off the county will let you off the hook. ID or not ID? That is the question. Don't expect a different answer on an issue you haven't begun to think through. What about our PR branding effort? RFP or not RFP? That is another question. And what about the library system you doggedly you dogged your dogged determination to punish the community? What about the library system? I mean, it's it is you who are gonna get punished in November.

I can't wait for the Surf City Four Bonfire and barbecue where the weenies being roasted will be you. You don't need to read between the lines on that one. You you have less strategy for getting us out of our dilemmas here than Commodore Trump has for opening up the streets of Hormuz and getting us out of the Iran war. Like his, these have been wars of choice on your part with ideological idiocy substituting for practical policies and civic common sense. Go ahead and celebrate Cinco de Mayo now, but be prepared for a long hangover. Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Thank you. Good evening, council members. My name is Russell Neal, and I live in Huntington Beach. The American system of government, the two hundred fiftieth anniversary of which we are celebrating this year, introduced a system of government strong enough to be a servant to the people and yet constrained enough to prevent it from becoming a fearful master. This design has been copied by nations around the world to their benefit.

The key elements of this design are the separation of powers and local control of local matters with only the most necessary functions being delegated upwards to centralized government. This is clearly seen in the federal system of our constitution and is embodied in the California constitution's provision for charter cities and counties, which California courts studiously ignore. On the fearful master side, we see one party states like California constantly violating this principle and striving to consolidate all power in Sacramento. Some may like this when Sacramento aligns with their policy preferences, but they will hate it when the situation changes as it always does. For this reason, I salute this council for opposing Sacramento's attempts to consolidate power in the matters of housing policy, our library, parents' rights, election integrity, and many other matters.

This is the single most important thing you are doing. Freedom isn't free, and preserving our freedom requires sacrifice. The cost this city incurs fighting the state in court is the best money we could ever spend. And I salute you for it in spite of the ill ill informed criticism you receive from community members who prefer slavery over freedom. Thank you, and good evening. Next

speaker, please.

Huntington Beach, mayor, city council, citizens, city manager Travis, city attorney Mike, I am brother Steven Gerrard Sidlevsky before you, once again appealing to you to move in the new direction of what I call The USA preborn personhood two step. And I have, in the past delivered, beloved mayor and council, the, resolution and support of a Huntington Beach, California declaration of a safe preborn personhood city. And of course, Mother's Day is coming upon us right now, and we're in that timeline of Mother's Day to Father's Day. And this step one approach is the crucial initial leadership step for new USA preborn personhood cities. On this particular resolution, probably many of the citizens have not reviewed yet, and I hope all of you have at least reviewed it several times, there are 10 whereas statements, and there are four be it further resolved statements.

And, of course, I cannot read them all in the time that I have, but I just wanna look at whereas statement number five. Whereas California's motto is Eureka and is known as the Golden State, and citizens pre prefer to honor the Golden Rule. Now the Golden Rule is holy bible. Right? The golden rule, which states that one should treat each others as they would like to be treated, is primarily located in the holy bible in Matthew seven twelve and Luke six thirty one.

And Jesus, our Lord and savior, shared this principle during his sermon on the mount, describing it as a summary of the wall and the prophets. So I'd like to just continue to amplify that, of course, equality begins in the womb. Fatherhood, motherhood, childhood, and preborn personhood also begin in the womb. So let's remember that our country, before 1973, when I was born in 1961, I was considered a person in my mother's womb. Then 1973 came along with the Roe decision, and the first Supreme Court justice to mention the word personhood was Supreme Court Justice Rehnquist.

Okay? So that you know that from a legal standpoint. But after 1973, we were no longer considered persons in our mother's womb. We can restore this personhood, preborn personhood, because of the US Supreme Court Dobbs decision. You now have the ability to become champions in this new direction. Thank you. God give you a loving wisdom and understanding and I hope and pray that you put this on the agenda between Mother's Day and Father's Day. It's a great time to do so. God bless you all.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening. Hello. Catherine Goddard here. And I've been thinking about I came to, became aware that the city of Long Beach has been denied the permission to have a a fireworks show in the July 4 by the coastal commission. And I'm thinking that that may have an impact on this city.

And I'm thinking if you all are looking for a way to change the image of Huntington Beach, why not take a look at a celebration like the fourth of July and the fact that we're all sharing this little spaceship Earth and the air, land, and water are belong to all of us and do something different in the fourth of July rather than fireworks, which we'll have an abundance of, by the way, since we now have people selling them on for our backyards and house, you know, there's always a lot of fireworks in Huntington Beach because of this. But if we were to do something different and put some of the money that you have found that you were going to put into this idea of creating a new image for Huntington Beach and start with this idea. Do an environmentally more friendly, spectacular drone show instead of fireworks. Instead of blowing up a lot of chemicals, try using the drones and doing something special with them for the fourth of July celebration. It's a new era.

You could make a big mark by doing something like that and claim the high road with protecting the environment while celebrating our two hundred and fifty years. Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Good evening. I'm glad you pulled item 25. And mayor McKeon, you talked about all the adopted pets that we just had here in Huntington Beach and how much we love our pets here. I And just want to point out, our pets drink our fluoridated water and they have teeth too. And we want to make sure our pets long live long lives with their full mouth of teeth.

So, another reason to maintain the fluoride. But what concerns me even more is the blatant disregard for the will of the voters about the fluoride. On 06/06/1972, the voters of Huntington Beach voted on a proposition that asked, shall fluoride, in an amount not to exceed one part fluoride per million parts of water, be added to the water system of the city of Huntington Beach? The yes votes were twenty three thousand one sixty one, and the no votes were fifteen thousand one ninety four, making the yes votes 60%. Claiming that vote was simply advisory is rewriting history.

The question wasn't should fluoride be added, but rather shall fluoride be added. Until yesterday, the city's own website acknowledged that there was a community mandate by majority vote in the early nineteen seventies. Good thing I took a screenshot. I'm not a lawyer, but neither are most of the city residents. When they vote on a question, they expect the city to honor the results of the plain language question. If you move forward with the claim that an election by the people was only advisory, you should be prepared for What is with the microphone? It keeps cutting in and out. Okay. You should be prepared for more citizen lawsuits. Now, to rehash the history that I could find.

After proper notice in the local newspaper, there was a public hearing on 07/20/1970, and at the conclusion of that hearing, the council voted unanimously to direct the city attorney to prepare an ordinance to provide for the fluoridation of the municipal water supply. The second reading of ordinance fifteen ninety four was passed on 08/17/1970, authorizing and directing the superintendent of the water department of Huntington Beach to add fluoride to the water. Residents that had concerns about fluoridation published notice in the local newspaper on 03/25/1971 that they were going to circulate a petition for a ballot measure to prevent the fluoridation of local drinking water. In a memo from the city attorney dated 06/23/1971, it was noted that the circulators of the petition had indicated that they would discontinue those efforts if the city council set a special election for a yes no vote on fluoridation. As already stated, that proposition received a 60% vote affirming that the residents wanted fluoride in their water, and directed the government that it shall add fluoride, which affirmed ordinance fifteen ninety four.

Fluoridated water began to flow in July 1973 in accordance with that city law. If the city council moves forward with the claim that that vote was only advisory, how can your citizens trust that you or a future council won't undermine any other vote? Why spend the money on elections at all if the council can just overturn those decisions on a whim?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Honorable mayor and wonderful

Honorable mayor and wonderful

city city council council members. Members, it's my pleasure to address you. It's a first occasion for me and I'm quite excited about it. About eight years ago, I had an accident that rendered me paralyzed from the waist down. Four and a half months at Hoag Hospital, one more month at, UCI, and I was told I'll never walk again. I've got an attitude of gratitude because I'm blessed with partial walking capabilities. I was laying in bed alone in my home being paralyzed from that waist down with the inability to even get out of bed, and suddenly my home started shaking. I was alone at that moment. I didn't know what was happening. At first, I thought it may be an earthquake.

It continued. It continued more. The home really started trembling. It started actually twisting, twisting. This went on for forty five minutes. There was a home two doors over that was being torn down and the slab was being removed by a large caterpillar d nine tractor. I could not do anything. I called for help. I called the city. I called the fire department.

I called the police department. I could not get out of bed. I couldn't do a thing about it. The house was being torn down, so the demolition crew was using equipment that was far beyond what was needed for the job. And consequently, my house suffered over a $180,000 worth of damage that day.

With very little personal legal recourse available to me because inability to prove the proof that the damage happened at that time. I've lived with this for the last few years. I've been doing as much as I can to get all these these problems corrected. Some of them are very, very difficult that cannot even be find a contractor that's interested in taking on the job. The problem that I'm faced with right now and I'm seeking guidance.

I'm here tonight seeking guidance. I don't know what to do. The property next door to me has been sold and demolition will occur any day now. I've met with the new buyer, an Asian fellow, extremely arrogant. I have a current problem.

The house has been vacant for a while and the lady was bedridden before she passed. The watering system for the yard was not used at all. These huge trees, ficus trees in the front yard have grown under the wall and have invaded my property for the for the ability to to obtain water. My front driveway has erupted. You cannot walk on it. You you will fall down.

Sure.

Bob. Go ahead.

I'll give you a call tomorrow.

Yeah. See what we can do for you.

Thank you. Thank you very much. I enjoyed listening to you folks this evening. You're doing a great job.

Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.

Mayor McKeon and city council, Pat Goodman. I want to extend appreciation for the roll out plan for the twenty twenty six, twenty seven budget including the May 13 Finance Commission Meeting and the May 19 City Council Study Session with adoption anticipated in early June. We're hearing a lot about generating revenue and I'd like to offer two suggestions, as resources or sources of revenue. First, strategically address housing needs while fostering a business climate that attracts responsible developers, especially in areas are already zoned for housing. Second, prioritize obtaining a certified housing element as required under court order, and part it's the law.

This would allow the city to access multiple years of backlogged permanent local housing allocation funds providing meaningful support for the navigation center, homeless prevention, and other housing programs. It also preserves local control over zoning and design. Regarding tonight's presentation on the budget, I'd appreciate clarification on the $15,600,000 budget deficit. Is this figure after all the adjustments, that's shown on that slide, staffing, operations, transfers, and infrastructure? It would it would be helpful to know the current general fund reserve balance, in the presentation net of this deficit, if there is a true deficit or estimated, and whether the city will maintain its two month reserve policy.

Last year, finally, please let the public know how to submit questions in advance of the May 19 study session. Probably in advance of the May 13, Finance Commission meeting. Thank you.

Thank you. Alright. Now moving on to council committee appointment announcements. Council members, do you have any council committee appointment announcements? Alright. A b one two three reporting, does anyone have anything to report? Openness and negotiation disclosures. Does anyone have anything to disclose?

Yeah, I do. Last week, I talked to two POA members, actually board members, and today, the POA president called me.

Okay. Quick chat. Alright. Thank you. Anybody else?

I spoke with, POA members as well. Okay.

Anybody else?

I spoke with POA.

Alright. Same here. Alright. Spoke with POA members.

Ditto.

Round the horn. Alright. Now, we're moving on to, four public hearings. So, the first one is the appeal of the Planning Commission's action on conditional use permit number 23Dash014, HBCSD Maintenance And Operation Building. Does anyone have any ex parte communications to disclose on this item?

I I met with residents within the community Okay. As well as the, maintenance and operations manager

Okay. The school. Anybody else?

I also, met with the maintenance and operation manager and the assistant superintendent.

Okay. Anybody? So met with the maintenance and operations manager and members of the community.

Okay.

I met with one of the maintenance operation managers as well today at the at the facility.

Alright. I met with the maintenance and operations manager as well. Butch, any? Nope. Alright. Mister Clerk, do we have any supplemental communications on this item?

Yes, mayor. For item number 14, pertaining to appeal of planning commission action, planning commission's action on conditional use permit number 23014, HBCSD Maintenance And Operations Building. We received 16 emails, a document relating to Ascon landfill site, and a document titled expert environmental opinion and analysis regarding the validity of the CEQUA notice of exemption for the HBCSD maintenance and operations building project, with appendices A through D. That is all mayor.

Thank you. Staff, please introduce the report.

Thank you, Mayor Jason Kelly, senior planner will give the staff report.

Thank you. Thank

you, mayor. Members of the city council, the item before you tonight is an appeal of conditional use permit 23Dash014 for the proposed Huntington Beach City School District Maintenance and Operation Building. The project before you is a request to construct a 7,500 square foot maintenance building at an overall height of 17 and a half feet at an existing school district office. The project is located at 8750 Dorset Drive. The project site is 4.8 acres and consists of a 34,000 square foot building at an overall height of 21 feet.

The existing building was formally operated as Kettler Elementary School which was closed in 2005. In 2018, the city's the school site was repurposed into the current Kettler Education Center. There are currently a 119 parking spaces on-site and additional 14 spaces will be added as part of this request. The subject site along with the property to the south is currently zoned PS, which is public semi public, and the properties to the north, east, and west are all zoned for single family residential. Project was first approved by the zoning administrator on 06/19/2024.

It was in appealed and heard by the Planning Commission on 07/23/2024. At that meeting, the item was continued. The project was then presented back to the Planning Commission on 03/10/2026. At that meeting, the Planning Commission discussed noise, building heights, setbacks along with Sequa, and after discussion, the commission approved the project. On 03/18/2026, Councilman Gruel appealed the project to the city council.

The next slide here is the proposed site plan. Building is located along the westerly side of the property. Per zoning regulations, the minimum side yard setback is 10 feet. However, building, this building is being proposed at a setback of 22 and a half feet. Maximum allowable building height is 18 feet whereas this building is being proposed at a 17 and a half feet.

The dimensions on this site plan represent the distance to the nearest structures to the east and west of the property. This next slide is the proposed floor plan. The interest points and the roll up doors to access the building are located along the eastern side of the building which faces the current parking lot. The use of the building will consist primarily of storage, a workshop, and maintenance area, as well as an office area for their staff. Here we have the front and side elevations.

These elevations incorporate some metal siding along with some wall panels with the roll up doors. The rear elevation is the side directly adjacent to the residential properties. Even though the building has a greater setback than what code is required, staff has worked with the applicant to incorporate design elements such as faux windows, wall panels, along with some landscape trellises. The project is also conditioned to add enhanced landscaping between the West property line and the building to minimize impacts to those adjacent neighbors. The Planning Commission's action was appealed based on the incompatibility with the surrounding uses, the inconsistent with the general plan and the zoning, light pollution along with the increase in noise.

With regards to the incompatibility with the surrounding uses and the inconsistent with the general plan and zoning, this proposed maintenance and operations facility is a permitted use within the PS Zoning District as long as it is approved with a conditional use permit. The proposed building also incorporates design elements that support the architectural mix within the neighborhood and it also is exceeding the minimum setback and height requirements allowed. With regards to light pollution, there is a condition of approval. Staff is proposing that requires the applicant to submit a photometric plan to ensure that there is no light spillage onto adjacent properties. And then to address the noise concerns, the there was a noise study conducted.

Which concluded that the proposed location of the building provides noise levels that are in compliance with city standards. Also, with the greater building setback, the new block wall, the building orientation, the additional landscaping, It all helps to mitigate the noise levels and then, on top of that, they must comply with the municipal code as far as the noise ordinance goes. In summary, the city council may approve conditional use permit 23Dash014 based on the following that it is consistent with the general plan, goals, and policies. It is consistent with the requirements of the base zoning district as well as the other applicable provisions of the municipal code and it is compatible with the surrounding land uses and consistent with the conditions imposed for the development and its operation. With that, staff concludes the presentation.

We're here for any questions.

Thank you so much. Council members, do does anyone have any questions on the report itself?

Yes, I do. On the, yeah, the second to last slide, believe it is. Just, secondly, next, yeah, that one. It says, based on the following or take an alternative action. Is there just one alternative action or can there be several and can you please state what that, alternative action could be?

Council member Burns, the alternative actions would either be to not approve the conditional use permit or continue it and direct staff.

Does it have to be based on something to deny the, conditional use permit?

A denial of the conditional use permit would be the city council unable to make the findings for approval. That automatically results in denial.

Okay. And there's one part where it said that it would be to city code if the CUP was granted. But that would be if we didn't grant the CUP, it wouldn't be the code.

If you didn't grant the CUP, then the project could not move forward. That's what's being requested by the council tonight.

Yeah, I just want that clear. The alternative action, I'd just like to see alternative actions if you're gonna place reasons to approve. That's

all. Okay.

I've got a question if that's alright.

Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah. So, when it comes to the the sequel analysis, could you maybe just for the benefit of us and the public, describe the difference between, the responsibilities of the lead agency and the responsible agency, which would be us?

Sure. So a responsible agency is, essentially an agency that has discretionary approval of a project. Because we have discretionary approval over the land use entitlement, the city's required to exercise its is required to perform a CEQA analysis. As part of that, we are able to review the CEQA analysis that was done by the lead agency and make a conclusion on whether or not we agree we can choose to adopt the lead, the lead agency's CEQA analysis or supplement it with our own or do another one.

So just from my understanding, the governing body, which should be us, is discretionary up to us whether or not we want to accept the CEQA analysis that was provided by them, the lead agency, or as you said, you know, pursue an alternative

That's correct. So, as part of this action, the city council has requested to do two things. One, make a sequel finding, and two, act on the conditional use permit.

And then what is the current use of that site as we speak right now or or maybe if we could just step back in in history? We we all know that it was an elementary school, Kettler Elementary School. It's currently not an elementary school. What what is the use of that facility as we speak right now?

The school district uses it for their administrative offices. And I believe there's some other uses like their central kitchen. They currently have their maintenance operation there now as well.

And so regarding that maintenance operation, my understanding is is that a CUP would be required to make that change from being a school that houses children over to a maintenance operation. Is that correct?

Yes. That's the subject of the requested action tonight.

But they already are functioning as a maintenance operation as we speak. I believe that shift happened around 2018 or 2019. Is that correct?

Yeah. During that time, they have the school district has indicated they sought authorization from the DSA, which is the Department of State Architect.

My understanding is that the DSA doesn't have any authority over land use or any type of use. All they can really have authority over is just architectural structure, whether or not a facility is safe for children based off of earthquakes or fires. Did they have authority in Huntington Beach over land use or is that us, the governing body?

It depends on what the use is. So the DSA does have authorization over schools and classroom facilities. It's been the, I guess, the position of the school district that their current administrative office is subject to the authorization of the DSA. When they came to the city or when they proposed the, the proposed maintenance and operations building, the city believes that it needs to comply with the zoning code and would be subject to a conditional use permit, which is why the request is before you tonight.

And so just so that I'm I'm clear, they did require conditional use permit to make that change over to a maintenance and operations, and they've been operating that way since about 2018 or '19 unpermitted?

Well, they have indicated that they received permission from the DSA, and that's been their position. When they proposed the new building for a maintenance and operation facility is when they came to the city, and that's when we said that according to our zoning code, you're required to do a conditional use permit, which is what they applied for.

So does the DSA provide conditional use permits? They they grant authority to facilities that don't house children?

I'm I'm not aware of that they authorize or grant conditional use permits, but I think, that might be a good question for the school district.

Okay. So if the DSA does not actually have the authority to grant them the ability to operate as a maintenance and operations facility as they are today. If they did not have that authority, then and the authority really rest in in this governing body, and there is no COP that's been granted from the city yet. Correct?

Correct. That's the subject of this action tonight.

And so if that is the case, then since about 02/2019, they have been operating as a maintenance and operations without a permit.

Without, city approvals.

Okay.

Can I just throw in here? I've I've been over over to to Kettler before, and they aren't really doing maintenance and operations that I see at the school. What I've seen over there when I've been there and I could be wrong. I've been wrong before. They're using basically, I believe, three or four containers to store stuff in, which I believe and they're they're prefabbed buildings.

Basically, everybody knows what an ocean going container looks like. And basically the workers, the people that go out in the field and actually fix stuff, they come there in the morning, they pick up their equipment, load it in the back of their pickup trucks, and then they go out to the schools to repair chairs, desks, tricycles, you know, whatever's required on the, you know, the be repaired at the schools. They're not actually doing any maintenance at facility themselves. Now, I've observed that. They've been those those containers have been subject of break ins, thefts, all that type of stuff.

But really, you don't see much. I I I've never seen maintenance and operations going on at the at these oceangoing containers. Obviously, this structure will change what they do, at least that's what I've observed.

Yeah, So, that's if don't mind, let me open the public hearing, get take public comments, close the public hearing, then we can ask questions, deliberate. You guys okay with that?

Can I can I I have more questions if that's alright?

Oh, the report?

Yeah. I'd like to defer to the city attorney, city attorney Vigliada, since you're a land use expert. Would it be required for a CUP to shift over from school that houses children, us as the local governing body to be the ones to actually say yay or nay to a CUP on that facility?

I think miss Villasenor, yeah, answered that question for sure. That's why the project before you tonight.

You're saying for sure they need a CUP?

That's why they're here, yeah.

Okay, so just to be clear, all of this time they've been performing those functions without a CUP, all these years.

As in, I guess I'll defer to to what council member Twining was saying, we don't have evidence of exactly what they were doing out there, if it was maintenance, if it was just minor

Okay, so if it was maintenance that they were doing, they've been functioning all this time without the correct permit?

If they were operating as a maintenance yard, then yeah, they would need to get a CUP.

And I think that's all over their website that they're an already existing maintenance operations facility.

Alright.

Real quick, Jennifer, didn't you say that your thought to Councilman Williams' question about the CUP was that the DSA, you thought, you were under the impression they did have the right to whether the right to say they could do that? I thought I heard you say that. Did I not hear that?

Yes. According to the school district, they received authorization from the DSA to operate their administrative offices, which included their maintenance function, which currently deploys as council member or mayor Pro Tem Twining suggested, which includes, you know, the maintenance workers showing up to the site, collecting their whatever they need to deploy to the various schools. It included that as well as a central kitchen, and there may be some other other parts of the administration function that, they were granted approval from the DSA for.

So, Mayor Pro Tem and myself are on the Planning Commission, and we were really the the driving force to send it back for the sound study and the soil samples. But at that time, the attorney or someone from the DSA stood there and basically said, we can do this without any approval. Did they have that kind of hierarchy? I mean, you said you heard from the schools, but has anybody checked with the DSA?

No, we Do

they, I mean, not did you say that, do you have that autonomy to, do we even say that?

We only received confirmation from the school district that they received authorization from the DSA.

Okay. So let's say you did hear that from the school. Has anybody looked in, I think, city attorney waited a little bit, but did anybody vet that? Do they have that autonomy? Do they have that judicial right to say, go ahead?

Well, we believe for this request, it's subject to local zoning, which would be a conditional use permit, and so we're we're glad that they applied for the conditional use permit, and it's the subject of the reason why we're here right now.

That's understood. Not to split hairs, but it is important. I'd like to you know, I spent some time today at the maintenance yard. I wanna commend the the group for doing the things we asked a couple years ago. It's been a long time since they were here and now they're back. But, this part is important to me, whether I I wanna vote for it or against it. You know, as a city, I I believe we need to check these things out. I mean, does does an entity have the right to to say something? And not to point fingers, but if somebody was in business and and he said, hey, Johnny said I could do it. I mean, we're gonna look into it.

You know, we, don't we check that kind of stuff? This is a, this is kind of a major step in, you know, proof of, you know, proving out what somebody may say, an entity, it's a big, big, you know, hey, the school said, the DSA said, we can do it. I mean, I don't know about that one.

To councilman Kennedy, yes, good point. Guys, if you To councilman Kennedy's point, I would just like to ask the city attorney, does the DSA have the authority to do an end run around our city and approve this without us.

Generally, they do not there's certain operations and school functions that they do have authority if they take a certain vote and they can override the local zoning, on a on a on a project.

For building housing children, correct?

Generally, that's the that's the standard, but there are exceptions or court cases that say like

Okay.

Fields and things like that are also considered within their purview.

So I'll open the public hearing. Okay. On report? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Just moving away from that really quickly. In regards to the the actual CEQUA, does the city did the city do any study of the land there or would that just be completely on the applicant?

Well, we do review as part of the CEQA process. What we review is the environmental setting and the regulatory framework when we're evaluating if a project is eligible for an exemption. So in this case, we would have looked at, like I said, the environmental setting, which is what are the environmental conditions that currently exist on the site, are there, because we have to make certain, findings when we do an exemption. We have to examine, for instance, whether or not there's any sensitive biological habitat, if there's any existing other, like if it's on a list of a hazardous waste site, something like that. We evaluate all those as part of our analysis for the exemption process.

And then did, for this site, did we do that? Did we undergo that process?

Yes, we have to do it for every exemption.

Okay. And then just based on the history of this site itself, did anything pop up or, it wasn't covered

in No.

One, one, I guess, part of this is that the site is currently, fully disturbed. Right? It's it's an existing graded site. There's an existing development on it. There aren't any environmental conditions that would have raised to the level that would precluded the city from utilizing the categorical exemption. And there are six different exceptions, that would apply, and we did a check for all six of those.

I don't know the exemptions off the top of my head, but just given the proximity to AskON and that being a previous landfill, was that taken into consideration on any of those exemptions?

Sure, yes. So one of the things that we have to look at is whether or not the site itself is a hazardous, is on a it's a specific list under the government code. In the proximity to the landfill doesn't necessarily preclude us from using exemption it's not covered on that list. Okay.

Can we take a look at the PowerPoint presentation?

Alright. I'm gonna open the public hearing.

Yep. I still have questions for staff.

Just on the presentation? And there there'll be plenty of opportunities after we open the public hearing Correct. Take, you know, public comments. We'll close the public hearing, ask any questions, deliberate. So that's just like the proper protocol. Can you wait till we open it?

And I still have questions for staff.

Got it.

Okay. Okay. Alright. So could we go to the presentation? I believe it's slide number three. It shows a a vicinity map. Slide number three, it should be there we go. Okay. So just for my understanding, kinda get my bearings straight and maybe the staff's understanding of where that, the Cannery Waste Landfill would be in proximity to the school that we see boxed in red. Maybe we can get, like a a mouse or a scroller over the top and and Jennifer perhaps you can kinda guide and and explain. Maybe it's on the map or off the map, your understanding of where that cannery waste landfill is?

Sure. The the landfill would be just south of the red, the red project site, and then on where it says Edison Park. That's our understanding of where the landfill was. Basically, just south of the project site.

How how south? And I'm I'm just curious. So this is kind of important. Is it, like, kissing it? Is it right on it? Or is it nearly quarter of a mile away?

I don't know the exact delineation, but I would say probably the entire parcel. I mean, if you wanted to be conservative.

That entire parcel below the red was cannery, if we wanna be conservative, cannery waste landfill. Okay. Thank you. Okay, mayor. Thank you. Alright.

We're gonna open the public hearing. Mister Clerk, do we have any saw anyone signed up to speak?

Yes, mayor. We have 15 speakers.

Please call them up.

Yes. The city council will now receive public comments for the public hearing item only. Each speaker is allotted three minutes. When your name is called, please approach and use both microphones. Say state your name and organization for the record.

Erica Vega, Daniel barb Barbara, Heather Sorensen, Lucy Granger, Becky Granger, Robert Granger, Evan Sorensen, Mark Montstoff, James Torres, Brian Tines, Pete Minko, Linda Minko, Peter McLaughlin, Dana DeVore, and Brian Breuerman.

First speaker, please.

Thank you. Good evening, honorable mayor and members of city council. My name is doctor Danieli Barbara. I'm a registered environmental professional, hold a doctorate in health science and in board certified in public health. I represent Robert Granger in the residence of Bretton Lane. We are not here to stop the school maintenance facility project. We are here because this project, an industrial scale maintenance yard placed 22.5 feet from single family homes has bypassed the most fundamental safeguards of the California Voliblical Quality Act, CEQUA. Our expert opinion concludes that the district's notice of exemption is both factually and procedurally invalid. First, this project relies on an unlawful baseline. The district relocated its operations at the site years ago without a required conditional use permit, and the state architect, the Department of State Architect, did disclaim in writing its ability to prove this project in the past.

Under CEQA, you cannot use a de facto on permitted industrial use to justify a quote, unquote, negligible expansion today. Furthermore, the district filed this notice exemption on 11/01/2023, before a project decision was reached and before permit requests were submitted. This is a direct violation of sequel guidelines section fifteen oh six two a. You cannot record an exemption for a project that has not yet been legally defined or decided upon. Second, the district claims a class three exemption for small structures like offices or stores, not a store.

It's an industrial facility housing, servicing diesel powered vehicles, heavy machinery, storing, and or utilizing industrial solvents, pesticides, and other controlled industrial chemicals in extraordinarily environmentally sensitive environment. The Kettler site sits in a cluster of historic environmental hazards, which already affect the health and quality of life surrounding residences, including the Ascon Superfund site, the Cannery Street Landfall, as you mentioned, which does in fact kiss the site. In fact, it's arguable that it includes the site because that land was previously given to the city by the county as a part of the entire site, the entire Cannery Street Landfill site. Our physical setting report shows the soil here is poorly drained, with a seasonal water table just 4.5 feet below the surface. This shallow water table serves as a direct conduit for toxic vapors to migrate laterally into residential foundations.

This is further complicated by the known condition of large quantities of methane gas immediately below the soil surface, conditions which caused the classroom operations at this site to cease. CEQA's Unusual Circumstances exception was written for this exact scenario. When a project combines extreme residential proximity with active hazardous waste remediation and sensitive hydrology, the law requires a full environmental review. Finally, as a public health professional, I must emphasize the chronic environmental stress and physical health risks posed to this fence line residents. The district has already demonstrated a lack of transparency by recently denying us simple access to conduct an independent visual review of the art.

City Council approving this project tonight based on a flawed exemption would be an application of leadership in the area of environmental stewardship and protection of resident health and safety. You may consider this project to be limited in scope and therefore not a significant environmental hazard. In other locations, that may well be the case. Just as your physical health is the product of so many small decisions you make, the cumulative effects of permitting a large or small environmentally significant action, an action that places small generators of air sized or soluble volatile organic compounds in close proximity to homes, a shallow water table and a vulnerable ecosystem in an already environmentally sensitive area can result in substantial damage. We respectfully urge you to overturn the Planning Commission's approval and declare this NOE invalid.

He's credentialed, can I ask him one question? Can you just repeat your first couple of sentences where you said the DSA disclaimed or or what can you slow down and say that one more time? Were speaking quickly.

Yes, I understand. The the DSA actually and, you're our the our patron here, mister Granger, actually had provided this to you in writing. The DSA actually disclaimed the authority to make any decision with regard to this project in writing as a result of the fact that it is that the the facility does not house children.

Point of order, mayor. Would it be okay during the applicant's time that they have to present later on if we have this gentleman just present a little bit slower so that we can hear a little bit clearer. We'll provide you more time accordingly. Definitely. Thank you.

Next speaker please.

Honorable mayor and members of the City Council, my name is Erica Vega. I'm a senior consultant with Pacific Rameco. While Doctor. Barber has detailed the procedural failures of the project I'm here to address the hidden technical and health risks the district has overlooked. The district's environmental claim rests on the idea that this is a small structure with negligible impact. However, our analysis reveals a high sensitivity environment. We're standing on a 4.5 foot seasonal water table at the site. In environmental science, a water table this shallow acts as a high speed conveyor belt for contaminants. By placing a maintenance yard here with associated fuels and solvents, you're placing a source of pollution directly into a hydrologic system that connects to residential foundations and eventually to the Huntington Beach Wetlands. Let's be clear about what fence line property means for human health.

We're talking about families living just 22.5 feet from industrial activity. Maintenance yards are hubs for diesel particulate matter and aerosolized VOCs, volatile organic compounds. In a neighborhood with a shallow water table, these toxins don't just stay in the soil. They can undergo vapor intrusion into nearby homes, posing long term respiratory risk to children, the elderly, and the immunocompromised. The district has not conducted a noise study.

Chronic exposure to early morning industrial noise, trucks idling, power tools, and heavy equipment is a documented trigger for hypertension and sleep deprivation related health issues. Industrials like traffic beginning early mornings coupled with unmitigated bright lights results in a cumulative effect on residential physical and mental health including stressors that are likely to increase the likelihood of cardiovascular disease, anxiety, and the health burdens of sleep death such as immunosuppression. When we requested a simple visual site inspection to verify the district's claim about their hazard material storage we were denied access. We could see through the fence line though that they did have some things like pesticides and had put up a sign warning the neighbors of the same. Transparency is a currency of the CEQA process.

If there's truly nothing to hide, the district should welcome an initial study. Initial study is not a stop button, it's a safety button. It ensures that mitigation measures like vapor barriers, sound walls, and runoff filtration are legally mandated rather than just promised. Without the study the residents have zero protection against the industrial creep of this facility and no guarantee of the proper handling and disposal of any hazardous waste generated or stored there. A site that is literally on top of an already contaminated historical industrial disposal site like such as the Cannery Street Landfill.

In closing Pacific Remico's finding is that the unusual circumstances at this site, the shallow water table, proximity to the Ask On Superfund site, the Cannery Landfill site, and the extreme residential proximity legally disqualify this project from a categorical exemption. The residents of Huntington Beach deserve an environment that is safe by design, not just safe by a notice of exemption. We ask you follow the science of the law, overturn this exemption, and require a full transparent environmental review. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Heather Sorenson, and I've lived with, the former Kettler Elementary site right behind my house for over twenty years. I want you to understand something very clearly. To those of us who live here, this project is not an abstract policy debate. It's about whether our neighborhood remains a safe place to live.

We bought our homes next to an elementary school site, a quiet campus that shut down at predictable hours. The transition to the district's office did not change that use. What is being proposed now is something entirely different. A permanent maintenance and operations facility with trucks, equipment, early morning activity, mechanical noise, and ongoing industrial type use right behind our family backyards. This site shouldn't be 22 feet away from anyone's backyard. It should be in an industrial area. The site will change the character of our neighborhood forever. This isn't just about noise, it's about safety. It's about more vehicles moving through residential streets. This project disturbed soil and materials adjacent to a landfill.

And this building would sit on a major thoroughfare from the neighborhood into Edison Park for people walking dogs, exercising, and kids going to Edison High School. For me, this is about backyards that were once peaceful, Now backing up to a work yard with industrial fumes and waste and that's unacceptable. Once a permanent operations building is constructed, there's no going back. The activity becomes locked in. The intensity of the new use becomes the status quo and the neighbors bear the health, safety and overall livability consequences, not the district.

What is most troubling is that it's being pushed through under the claim that nothing's really changing. We've had our maintenance there already. But we all know that at best that's a gross misrepresentation and at worst a blatant lie. Everything is changing. If nothing were changing, there would be no need for a new building, new studies, new approval approvals, or a condi conditional use permit.

We're not asking you to vote against education. We're not asking we're asking you to protect the people who already live here. We're asking you not to sacrifice a residential neighborhood for operational convenience. Please do not let our community become the place where the city decided, residential safety and quality of life are acceptable collateral damage. Once this building goes up, the neighborhood loses permanently. Tonight, you still have the power to prevent that. I respectfully ask you to grant the appeal and to stop this project.

Next speaker, please.

Good evening, city council members. My name is Lucy Granger, and I'm here to oppose the Maintenance And Operations Building from being put in. I live right behind where the school district plans to put this new Maintenance And Operations Building. This is my childhood home. I've lived here my whole life.

I grew up playing softball at the Edison Community Park, and I I still go there almost every day to walk my dog, go on runs, and it has always been a safe haven for me. But I'm here tonight to stand up for a fundamental principle. The rules the rules exist for a reason, and no one should be allowed to simply ignore them. We refuse to let the school district control what happens happens in our neighborhood and ignore our safety. The district is attempting to force this industrial facility upon us by deliberately evading proper permitting process.

They are trying to establish an illegal baseline based on unpermitted industrial use that began in 2018, completely lacking the city conditional use permit. They are also falsely claiming a small structures exemption to avoid a full environmental review. Let's be perfectly clear. An industrial yard bringing in heavy machinery and hazardous material is not a small structure. By exploiting these loopholes and claiming exemptions from local zoning, they're intentionally leaving this facility in a regulatory gap with zero oversight.

The core issue here is principle. Nobody is above the law. Just because the district wants to bypass environmental and city oversight to save money doesn't mean my family and my neighbors should be their collateral damage. This proposed building will be just 22 and a half feet from prop from our property line. It interferes with the Edison Park Walkway and create and will create a huge dangerous dark corridor right behind my house.

As a young woman who walks there almost every day, this directly threatens my safety and peace of mind. We aren't here to simply stop a building. We are here to demand accountability. Put yourselves in our shoes. Would you want an an industrial building forced 22 feet behind your house by an entity that flat out refused to follow proper environmental reviews? We are standing up for what is right and safe for our community. We urge you to reject the the district notice of exemption and legally demand the formal initial study they should have done years ago. Do not let them bypass the rules at our at the expense of our neighborhood. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, city council members. My name is Becky Granger. I have lived in Huntington Beach for the past thirty three years. My home will sit 22.5 feet from the district's proposed 7,500 square foot MNO building. I am speaking tonight to stop the city from giving approval to the Huntington Beach City School District for a conditional use permit. I'm asking the council to stop this project until a proper and thorough environmental review is done. The district has made many claims that are not backed by facts. They have cheated the permitting process unpermitted since 2018. They've cheated the CEQA process, misapplied exemptions. The the district continues to push the narrative that it's all about the kids.

Well, what about the kids in our neighborhood? What about the kids and adults in our community that have been exposed to hazardous materials, diesel fuel, solvent noise, and industrial equipment that will now be housed in a building? Each morning as the district opens the doors to this facility, all these concentrated environmental exposures will be drifting into our bedrooms and living rooms. What about the potential fire hazard of all chemicals all the chemicals so close to our homes and the park? What about the air conditioning noise?

What about the methane gay gas, which is prevalent on the Kettler site? What about the dark corridor that will be created by a building that's 17.5, feet high and a 7,500 square foot building 10 feet from the walkway? This is the entrance to the park, so now this dark corridor will create an illegal activity for which is steps from my back fence. Kids ride their bikes to Edison High School every day. Families walk their dogs.

The softball league plays at the field steps away from this walkway. On a personal level, this project has taken a toll on me, my family, and neighbors. The misinformation the district has posted on their website along with them cheating the environmental process has caused a lot of stress and worry for us all. We are trying to protect our home safety, health, and well-being. By having an independent environmental consultant like doctor Daniel Barbara review this part project, it has opened my eyes to even more potential exposures we will face.

Now I understand all the potential further health wrecks risks I can face, having an industrial building so close to my home. I have leukemia. Do I think the remediation of Ascon with all its airborne benzene could have contributed to my cancer? It's crossed my mind. The district's CEQA consultant has not considered any of the environmental issues surrounding the the district in her report?

How about the Cannery Street landfill currently adjacent to my home? We are in a hotbed of environmental exposures, and we are going to add and we are going to add one more without an environmental review. How will all this further affect my health and the health of my family and neighbors? Why is the city continuing to allow this to go through? We, as a community, require a full environmental report to be done. This will set further precedence for the district to do whatever they want.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

My turn? Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. So my name is Pete Minco, and, I'm a resident of Huntington Beach for many years now. And I have to say, when I moved here, I knew about the power plant. I knew about the poop plant back, but and it but they were in different location. I knew about Ascon, and it was over here. And I knew about Kettler Elementary School, I thought to myself, what a great place to raise kids. All three of my children went to Kettler Elementary School, and I and I'm blessed here today to to know that after my youngest daughter graduated, they, you know, for some when I say blessed, I I'm I'm pleased that they were allowed to do that.

But I knew the environment. That's where I'm going with this. Now I I wanna share this about our school board because it's not all bad and it's not all good. But some of the things that have not been very good, and I wanna share with you the overflow of some of the outfall of their bad decisions and selling off school sites have been the light pollution that's now at Edison Park to accommodate the youth sports that take place there. And it isn't just the the light pollution.

I I wanna share this. It's it's the noise. And and that I don't mind the the I just want you to know that there is noise associated with sports. The traffic issue is another concern, and that's because they don't have the school sites to use for the they don't have all of them anymore. The other thing is trash. It seems like some of these games when these guys get out, they clean out their cars right on the street. And, you know, that's pretty messy. I don't really care for that. That's a type of pollution. Now let's move to this.

That building, it's it was never anticipated that they would put a building there. And I and I've learned from from experience that once you let a little bit in, then another bit, a little bit. And they kinda snuck this in here. I don't know how they raised the elevation without a permit, but somehow they did. That said, I'm a little concerned I'm more than a little concerned that this would be all that there is and that they would only do forgive me. I don't have the dexterity I used to have when I was

younger. But

in addition to now even more noise pollution from this site, I'll have to be concerned with. I'll also have the traffic, the big trucks, and you guys will love this. Beep beep beep beep beep. 06:00 in the morning. That's very annoying.

There's the potential for chemical spills. There's the potential and there's there's other issues, but I the visual issue is also something I think that needs to be brought up. A big steel shed, I don't care if they have a

Thank you, sir. You're welcome. Next speaker, please.

Good evening, mayor and councilman. My name is Evan Sorenson. I'm an attorney with significant land use experience and Kettler is in my backyard. I want to respond directly to the city's conclusions that this will not be detrimental to nearby residents and it is merely a small, low impact facility. This building is a new purpose built maintenance and operations facility, permanent storage, repair functions, fleet activity, and mechanical systems located directly next to family homes.

That represents a change in the intensity, permanence, and character of use at that entire site. The district's CEQA exception is based on the belief now that it's a small building. The city describes this one story, 7,500 square foot building as being small. The houses are owned. All this neighborhood are less than 2,000 square feet.

Primarily used for storage and maintenance work. But when you build a permanent maintenance and operations facility, it does not feel small to the families whose backyards now face it. It feels permanent, it feels industrial, and it fundamentally changes the character of our neighborhood once build activity becomes fixed and intensified and ongoing. This is not a negligible expansion. It's a permanent land use change.

Even where a categorical exemption is claimed, SECRA removes that exemption when unusual circumstances create a reasonable possibility of environmental impacts. A maintenance operation facility abutting a single family backyard fences is unusual by any common sense definition. And the fact that noise and soil studies were required confirms that there is a reasonable possibility of impacts. That's all SECRET requires to remove a categorical exception. The City concludes that this project is not detrimental to the general welfare of nearby residents.

I respectfully disagree. Safety and quality of life are part of the general welfare. This project also does not exist in isolation. The maintenance Operations building is part of a broader district effort to centralize operations, which includes a proposed bus storage facility. CCRA also requires agencies to evaluate the whole of an action, not divide it up into pieces to avoid review.

The sequel issues aside, this council must make an independent finding that this is compatible with the neighborhood. A use that would clearly be considered an industrial in another zone does not become compatible simply because it is to support a school. Proximity, intensity, noise, and permanence all matter. Tonight's decision is not about whether the district needs maintenance of facilities, it's about whether the city is comfortable standing behind a legally vulnerable CEQA exemption. When the approval is challenged in court, it is the city, not the district, that bears that risk.

If this were built next to your backyard, it would not feel minor, would feel life changing. For these reasons, I respectfully request that the city council deny this project or at least require proper environmental review before any further approval. The reality is that there's something wrong in the state of Denmark.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Yes. Yes. I'm Robert Granger, and my home backs up to the school district property. The building will be 22 and a half feet from my back fence. And I just wanted to commend Pat Burns for standing up with this overuse of authority with the zoning administrator.

I completely agree that one person should not have that much authority to listen to an applicant and approve a project. And I'd also like to thank Butch Twining and Don Kennedy and Andrew Gruel for appealing this a couple times now. This is, let's just make it clear, this is a non classroom facility, specifically categorized by the state code 53094, the same code that allows them to build as many classrooms as they want and the city can't tell them what they want, but it limits it to classroom facilities. And don't let others fool you and pull on your heart strings and tell them that the delays are costing thousands. It's costing them thousands because they moved out of their industrial MNO facility at Dwyer.

Don't make our neighborhood pay for their mismanagement. On what planet would this MNO building be considered a classroom? Maybe a new class taught by the MNO technicians for middle school kids, kind of like a quasi detention for bad middle school kids that they have to go to MNO school. And as far as CEQUA, they'll tell you that this is just a little shed. My home is 1,500 square feet.

Their shed is 7,500 square feet. It's quite a lot larger than the homes around there. There's no disputing this one too, that, it does not fit with the the goal the use goals, goal use l u two, that a new development preserves and enhances a distinct Surf City identity, culture, and character in neighborhoods. And Don Kennedy, you're my favorite quote from last meeting. Nothing says Surf City like a pre manufactured metal building in a residential community. I love that one. That's a classic. Police Department. Where's the police department? There's a dark alley in my neighborhood already.

We already have one and now you're gonna make it a 100% hidden corridor with 60 foot melaleuca trees and a 20, 17 and a half foot building to darken that whole corridor that we have to walk along. And then my fence and all the neighbors' fences are right there, easily for the criminals to hide and jump over our fence. I have to protect my family. I don't know what I'm gonna do. And fire department.

Where's the fire department? They're building all this brush and structure so close to my home. As an insurance agent, I recently wrote an article about the sky is watching, and it talks about AI, satellites, data sources, used back in the day, I had a clipboard. I went out there and I underwrote things and took notes. Now, I sit behind my computer and I let the AI and the satellites do all the work. I will be pinpointed and I will lose my insurance because of this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Good evening, council, staff, and community. My name is Mark Mansoff. I'm a resident of Huntington Beach, and I'm also an HBCSD employee, like five zero nine of our employees and families who live in this community and call it home. I want to thank council for the questions, discussion, and everything leading up to this, including site walks, to get a complete picture of what M and O operations are for a school district and how they are managed. I am available to answer questions and clear up any misinformation as we progress through the night. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

My name is Linda Minko and I lived in the Kettler Track for thirty five years and I oppose the proposed maintenance yard at the Kettler site. This is a neighborhood, not an industrial site. We worked hard and bought our home in a neighborhood and it should remain a neighborhood. This will affect our home values. You know, when you all were up for election, you were saying that you will represent us.

Now is the time to do that. Already, we've had to deal with Ascon, the power plant that now box our view from the end of the street. We're waiting for the old ones to come down, the desal plant. We don't need a maintenance building additionally ruining our neighborhood. And why should the school get special treatment? The fact that they started doing this without the proper permission is an indication that this shouldn't happen. That building will create a blind spot for the walkway to the park that the softball kids and the park users use. It would be an easy place for somebody to do something, and no one would see. It's a big safety issue. The building will be an eyesore.

People who once sat in their backyards and saw the sky will now see a big brown wall. Please keep our neighborhood a neighborhood. Let the district find an industrial site for their industrial needs. Please represent us and vote against this project. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Dana Devore, and I'm speaking, to challenge the notice of exemption for the maintenance And Operation building. I'm not gonna repeat, a lot of the same points, you know, we've all talked about the unlawful, baseline, that it, there is no baseline for maintenance and operation. So I'm gonna talk about, the fact that they've already built up this site. So they've built it up approximately four feet, and the neighboring properties are already two feet lower.

So that's effectively five to six feet higher than the the residences behind it. That means that this 18 foot building is is effectively a 23, 24 foot building, and it's only 22 and a half feet off their property line. That combination of height, elevation, and proximity is unusual and creates a reasonable possibility of significant impacts, specifically, the loss of light, reduced air circulation, and overbearing mass on the neighboring properties. And this triggers the CEQA's unusual circumstances exception, which defeats the exemption. The other point I wanna make is the grade differential.

It changes the drainage. Raising the site four feet changes the natural drainage patterns and pushes runoff towards lower lying residential properties, increasing the risk of ponding and localized flooding during storm events. These are real, site specific impacts that cannot be dismissed under a categorical exemption. For these reasons, no unlawful baseline, unusual physical impacts, and drainage risk, the notice of exemption is invalid, and a proper CEQA review is required. And I wanna add, I you you all spoke about how you were given a tour of the current, operation there.

If you go back to their presentation, I'm not sure what they presented you guys on, what was happening there, but you'll see that there are rooms for woodworking, metalworking, things that aren't just picking up supplies and going to their job. So I thank you for your consideration.

Thank you. Next speaker please.

Okay. I'm probably going to get booed. Brian Theinis, Planning Commissioner, Mayor McKeon, council members. On the Planning Commission, we we did vote to approve this project. We and I believe this is this is still accurate.

We reached, I reached out. You know, anytime that I'm involved in any planning commission item, know, owning a civil engineering and land surveying company for forty years, I have a lot of resources available to me. We know how to reach out to the Division of State Architects. We we from 1990 to 1998 kind of recession years for us. We did a lot of elementary school, high school projects, worked with the division of state architect quite a bit.

So we reached out the rules and and it it isn't exempt from the division of state architect, but it says, when authorizing construction of exempt projects, the school district assumes responsibility to ensure compliance with applicable code provisions. So, it's my understanding, and I reached out to one of the partners of one of the largest architecture firms in Southern California. They've probably done thousands of school projects. And he told me that they're their own entity, that they they have the authority basically to just do what they want. They have to hire, you know, they have to hire the the school board's responsible to employ and retaining appropriately licensed architects and engineers for their projects.

So that that means that when I believe that when they filed their exemption in October 23, since no permit was required, I don't know how that would invalidate their permit. And while I feel for the property owners and, you know, feel bad for them, we we couldn't find a reason to deny it because the consultants that I talked to, the vision of state architect, reading their rules, it they they have the right to to to build this facility and I think they're just trying to be good neighbors and and ask the city to confirm that they are complying with codes. I I I I would like to add though that one thing that wasn't mentioned that prior to it being presented to Councilman Kennedy and Twining's Planning Commission, the design review committee recommended an additional 20 foot setback. They they I I think we failed to mention that tonight but they did they did recommend that additional setback to help buffer from the neighbors. So, you know, I think we should encourage the school districts to use these sites because as demographics change, maybe someday we'll need this site for hopefully as an elementary school again someday.

So, thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next speaker, please. Is that it? Alright. We're now gonna close the public hearing. Public hearing is now closed and now we'll open up to council discussion and questions.

I got real quick. It was said that I know that that area of Edison Park was used as a dump and it is a mess. The tennis courts went to poo. The baseball fields, I've never seen baseball fields so uneven. And that actual Kettler's the school property actually extends out into, Edison Park, I think about 40 feet south of that red box.

But I'm not sure. You, they say they walk through the park. I got a feeling the school grounds is less polluted and because it's covered with asphalt or it's covered with ground, less polluted than that park could be if the methane and things like that are oozing up on water low water table. And I'm wondering if there's been a comparison from the Kettler to the park side of any kind of, I don't know, tests being done for the environment.

So you are you asking if the if there's been

A comparison between the the build site versus the park site.

Well, we know the landfill was on the park site and also on, the softball fields as you mentioned. Right? We don't have any evidence that the landfill was on the school site. That being said, as part of the project, if it's approved by the city council, the code requirements would require, one, a geotechnical report. Right? So that is to ensure that the foundations take into account whatever the soil is. Right? So same as when

Jennifer, real quick. Just explain what a geotech is. It's actually doing physical borings to test the composition of the soil.

Exactly. Yeah. So and that's that's done one by the project's engineer to determine what the design considerations should be, what the foundation should be, and how they should build the site. When that was done for Edison Park, it was mentioned that be there's a lot of settlement potential because of the landfill materials, and so you have to design projects to withstand the potential settlement in the future. So that's one thing.

Then the other consideration is that there has to be soil testing in accordance with city's current specifications for soil contamination as well as methane. This project site is within a methane district, and so methane mitigation is already required. As part of that, the applicant will have to provide basically, a work plan. They'll have to do, testing for methane and then mitigation, whether it's, a methane barrier or, like vapor vents venting. Right?

That'll all be done if this project is approved that no permits can be issued for grading or building until that's done.

Alright. So just to summarize that. So what missus Villasenor is saying is that should the council approve this project tonight, the applicant would then have to go and submit construction drawings and plans to the city, grading plans, building plans, landscaping plans, etcetera to all the departments to get to go through plan check. And then I believe we have a gentleman from the fire department. And as part of that process, they have to do soil testing. So geotechnical analysis, digging actual physical borings, testing the soil. They have to comply with four three one nine two where all testing and and soil sampling is required for a work plan. Correct, Jennifer? A mediation action plan if there is contaminants. So all these things have to be done before you get your grading permit, before you get your building permit.

And Jennifer touched on it per city specification four two nine, they have to do methane testing. If they have methane, as she mentioned, there's methane districts in the city. So if there's methane discovered, have to do methane mitigation. That could include, like Jennifer said, installing a methane barrier or ventilation system. I mean, much of HB is an old oil town, there's methane districts throughout the city. So, did I get that right, mister Fireman? Is that basically correct? Do you mind kind of elaborating on that a little bit to give people comfort about any potential contamination issues, etcetera?

That is correct. That was something that we would do before building permits or grading permits would be issued. I

have a question. If they didn't have a categorical exemption, which we could, you know, analyze that a little bit more, but is there any reason why we wouldn't do any of that environmental just upfront before we approve the CUP? Would that be part of CEQA?

No. Not necessarily. So the presence of a landfill doesn't automatically mean that a project needs a EIR. An EIR is required when there's potential for significant environmental effects to be caused by a project based on substantial evidence. So when we talk about that it's near a landfill, that doesn't automatically mean it needs an EIR.

It means that we have to consider that in terms of how would the proximity to the landfill and the proposed project, what would be the environmental effects of that. So in terms of the landfill, we would look at something like groundwater. We already know that the groundwater's been tested, from older test when, when there was construction of Edison Park. And part of that basically said that the groundwater has high salinity levels from saltwater intrusion and that there wasn't any evidence of a significant environmental threat to groundwater because of the landfill materials. The other area we would look at would be, off gassing.

Right? So we already know that in the mid two thousands, there was, methane detected and a system a control system was put in place, on Edison Park, and there was also a passive system that was placed on Kettler. So those two things have already been mitigated and addressed. And then the third thing, as I mentioned, would be, the potential for settlement, which will be addressed in the geotechnical report and the engineers' recommendations.

So correct me if I'm wrong, but it it sounds like there are some unusual circumstances that are surrounding this project. Not not every neighborhood's facing, you know, it's migration of of methane, a landfill within kissing distance.

No. I wouldn't say that there's any unusual circumstances to meet the standard for CEQA. So the the items that were presented by, I think we had a public comment about it. One is that, you know, like, for instance, methane. Because we are an oil community, we have large areas of the city that are part of a methane district, and it's more common than not to have methane mitigation on on development proposals.

So that that's one area, but pretty much all of the other areas that they suggested, for instance, poorly draining soils, that's very common in the city. Shallow, or a high water table. Right? That's also very common in the city. These are not, unusual circumstances.

I I guess what I'm I'm looking at that might be unusual. You know, we all got documents at the table here and it'll actually delineate the lines. I think it's page two and page three, you can see, where the lines delineated for that Cannery landfill that actually, it looks like it goes beyond just where the fence line would be for the school. But, I mean, in terms of unusual, looking at LA Times article, 02/05/2004 by Jenny Marder, methane found beneath Kettler. The lot in the park were part of an old landfill formerly known as the Cannery Street Refuse Disposal Station.

Test taken in November and again in January 19 found methane emissions five feet underground at the school. One Kettler kindergartener parent said, I just want them to tell me that it is safe for my kid to be at the school. Another article in in 2009 that we have here, it basically wraps up the article saying the landfill also lies beneath the Kettler Elementary School, which is closed and will be part of future upgrades. And and so I guess this meth methane had migrated from the landfill directly under the school to the point where temporarily they had to shut down this. So I would say that's a little unusual. That's not normal for most residents in Huntington Beach.

It probably migrated under the homes on Brit on Breton Lane too. I I I don't think a lot of people in here know that methane is not a is not a toxic. It's flammable, but it's not toxic. I just thought I'd throw that in there.

Well, I think Jennifer touched on it before. I know there's there's concerns on on contaminations, but a, she she touched on it. The site's already been developed. It's already been disturbed. So, obviously, there's already buildings on it, the main Keller School. The good news, as I touched on and the fire fireman confirmed, is that going forward, they have to do further testing. They have to do further geotech analysis. They have to drill borings to test the composite the composition of the soil to see if it's sturdy enough to to put a prefab building on. They have to test the soil for contaminants. They have to test the soil for methane.

If there is methane, then they have to implement systems to mitigate those environmental concerns, put in new barriers, maybe some ventilation system, right, to further protect the property and the surrounding property. So that's what I think the important point is to that this site's already been developed. And now going forward, before they get any permit, their grading permit, their building permit, their landscape permit, they have to go through on all these analysis and tests and results to get signed off by the fire department.

I just and I wanna just add a couple things too. The geotechnical report, the geotechnical engineer, because one of the speakers tonight mentioned the four foot buildup of a pad and then everything's going to drain to the homes. The geotechnical engineer will devise, develop, design a drainage system, a drainage program that'll drain away from the structures and will go to a drain. I mean, that's all part of a geotechnical report.

And and more and more so just on that too, Butch, because I am in development. Your grading plan, right, you have to submit your grading plan to the city for to plan check. Every project has to retain their own storm water. You can't run your storm water off to your neighbors. You can't run it off into the public system. So their grading plan will have to address drainage. They need to put in a drainage inlet, an underground detention basin, etcetera. All those things will be flushed out and vetted out through their construction drawing process as they're going through plan check, and they will not get their permit until all those plans are are are secure, signed off by the city per code, all the environmental tests are signed off by the fire department per code. At that point, they would get their grading permit and their billing permit.

I just wanna add a couple other things and and Councilman Williams brought it up The in in a in that LA Times article that the shallowest, or I say the yeah, the shallowest methane detection on that whole site is is five feet underground. The expert and I wrote down his words, he said methane is immediately below the surface. Well, it's five feet below the surface at the shallowest. I just want to go over a couple things that I've I learned, you know, in my research is that that dump has been there since 1957. Probably long before the residences maybe.

I'm thinking it was it was there before the housing was built in that in that track.

Just so people understand that fill was for all the homes that were built in the sixties, all the construction material that was left over was put in this landfill. So it's from all the massive development of of single family neighborhoods that were built in Huntington Beach. That's what's in the landfill is is construction material.

The landfill the landfill includes the entirety of Edison Park and extends to the community center and in reports that I read over the last couple days, it extends onto the Kettler project and there's no accurate depiction of where the the the lines are that the Cannery Street you know, the dump actually extended. They're pretty sure that they've got it and it's and it's pretty good there on the you know, where the red marking is. But, you know, it has migrated into there according to reports that I read.

I'm butchering, I've been over ping ponging here, but same thing with Edison Park, right? Before we did that, we approved the Edison Park remodel, we knew there there was a landfill there. So we started doing geotechnical boring samples. We're able to actually delineate where that landfill line is. And so then we wanted to move all the the heavy playground equipment, courts, all that outside the landfill because it wasn't sturdy enough through the geotech analysis to handle all that weight. So through this geotech analysis, you can start to identify where that border is on the landfill and the soil composition and the contamination and the methane.

And Just just for reference, Butch, I'm not trying to steal away the mic. We'll we'll get it back. But, Jennifer, perhaps we could pull up as the last attachment that's on the agenda. There's an aerial shot and it actually delineates where ASCON is. I don't know if you have control of of the attachments or who who has the the control of the attachments on staff?

Control of the RCA attachments?

On the agenda.

Yeah. The screen.

So right now, we have the PowerPoint presentation up there, but if we could get the last attachment, I'll get the number of it for you. It's attachment number 17. It's a project navigator as con landfill site. Okay. There might be some future clicking around on those attachments too.

But but you're still going. But

Yeah. This is just, it's gonna be helpful, I think, to Butch's point. Page nine. Okay. So, this is this is an aerial shot, and you can see the Cannery Street disposal site right there.