Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon, good evening, everyone. It is 519, and I'd like to call the meeting to order of the Indio City Council. May I have roll call, please?

Council Member Miller. Present. Council Member Withron. Present. Council Member Ortiz. Present. Mayor Pro Tem Foreman. Present. Thank you. And Mayor Holmes. Thank you.

Thank you, President. Yes, I was still, I jumped in, because I was so eager there. This is how it's going to go tonight. All right, next is the invocation. We'd like to bring up Pastor Tony Williams. Please stand for those of you that would like to.

Let us pray. Dear Lord, we just come before you this evening, Lord, just thanking you for our city. Thank you for our council members and all of our residents. Lord, we're grateful that our city is safe, our city is clean, our city is well taken care of. And Lord, I ask you continue just put in the minds of all of those that govern that they steward and that they own nothing. that we are in position of honor and duty, and let us not ever forget that. Continue to keep us safe, our children, our first responders, and our law enforcement, and let everybody that comes to this great city feel like they're welcome and they're at home. Thank you, Lord, for this city, for all that it stands for, and all that it will stand for. It is a light. That's on a hill. And please let us handle it like that. It's in the name of Jesus we pray. Amen. Amen.

Okay, next we have the Pledge of Allegiance. So I get to read a little bit. Drayton Jones, Madison Elementary. All right, let me tell you a little bit about Drayton Jones. Drayton is a fun-loving, energetic fifth grader who loves making people laugh and spending time with his family and friends. He enjoys being a part of scouting, exploring the outdoors, taking on new adventures, and is always ready to turn an ordinary day into something memorable. Drayton is excited to lead the Pledge of Allegiance for this City Council meeting and looks forward to this special opportunity. The floor is yours, Drayton.

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 so much. Stay right there. Yes. I'm the mayor, and it's great to have you here. And we have something to give you, some cool Indio swag with some new goodies in there. Yeah. Ooh, goodies. There you go. Goodies are always good.

I don't care how old you are, goodies are always good.

There we go. She's got a thing about us being centered. Great job. OKAY. CITY ATTORNEY, REPORT ON CLOSED SESSION, PLEASE.

GOOD AFTERNOON, MAYOR AND COUNCIL. THERE'S NO REPORTABLE ACTION OUT OF THIS EVENING'S CLOSED SESSION.

OKAY. SOUNDS GOOD. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. ITEM NUMBER 5, 5.1, PRESENTATION OF CERTIFICATES TO THE 2026 NATIONAL GOLDEN GLOVES CHAMPION. IF WE WOULD ALL, HOW COOL IS THAT? COME ON, YOU GUYS. THAT'S A GOOD ANSWER. Thank you, thank you. You can give that one to Wayne. Wow. This is beyond impressive. This is fantastic. So nice to meet you. Yeah, definitely. Here you go. All right, good to see you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Congratulations, by the way. That's pretty awesome. Yeah, fantastic. Well, if this isn't the best picture on the planet, I don't know what is. Three hardworking, dedicated, focused students, this says it all. So we have some very cool certificates for you that we would like to give you here at the City of Indio. And then we'd all like to say something.

Roman, there you go.

Roman Anzaludua, 2026, thank you. National Golden Gloves gold medalist. Let's show the camera. Congratulations, that's so neat. Fantastic, thank you. And then, Renee. That's you, huh? That's pretty awesome, that's cool.

So one wonderful family.

Fantastic. There you go. Thank you so much.

Congratulations.

I mean, this is such an honor truly to be here with you because this just represents just so much dedication, so much hard work, just and really in focus. I am so very, very impressed and honored to be here with you because that takes a whole lot of effort. Would anyone else, Mayor Pro Tem, or you got it?

Well, I think it's very nice of your accomplishment, but where are the parents and the family to these young, where are you? Stand up. They're friends. I've said this in my prior career when I talk to parents and their children achieving something, they wouldn't be here if you weren't there to support them. It's all about love and support by their parents, their neighbors, their aunts, uncles, cousins, whoever inspires you in your life is what gives you the momentum to accomplish your goals, so congratulations.

Congratulate you on making Indio proud. The dedication it takes, the Diaz brothers, we've had some great boxers come from here and you're gonna lead us into the future. But the work and dedication you do and your family to be able to support you, congratulations and those are some cool belts.

Let's say congratulations to you guys. You know, we might be at the city council chamber, but in your world, in your school, and what you do, you guys are leaders. So continue to lead. You guys are trailblazers, and this is incredible to see your accomplishments. And so I'm proud that you guys are out there sharing the Indio name and being proud. And also kudos to you, a young lady that's out there, a champion boxer. Give her a round of applause. Yeah. Looking forward to seeing you on HBO and Showtime. And so keep going, keep up the good work. You always have our support.

Thank you.

Yeah. I just want to say congratulations. It's great to see that all your hard work is paying off so well for you guys. I want to thank you for representing our city well when you're fighting all over the country. I've been watching you guys fight since you were like this little, remember? I've seen you at some of the tournaments and you guys are always, you know, the crowd always loves the way that you guys fight. It's a really important part of our culture here, right? The boxing. And so you guys are doing well and carrying that on for the next generation. So thank you very much.

Okay, so we're going to take a few pictures and then I'd like to invite the parents up here to take pictures with them.

a little bit, we're gonna get behind you. There we go. Yeah. Good stuff.

Okay, mom and dad.

They have a picture of themselves.

Aunts, uncles, brothers and sisters.

Congratulations again. See you guys soon.

so if we can ask you how how can folks support them how can they get it get a hold of you who should how about this why don't we get a hold of the city give us your contact information and we'll give these folks here opportunity uh to help how about that that sounds like a plan right yeah

All right, boy, that's a great way to start the meeting. I don't know about you guys, but the Pledge of Allegiance and this presentation just really sets the tone. The next thing on the agenda, next item, 5.2, presentation by Lorena Marroquin, interim president of Find Regional Food Bank. Welcome.

Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Mayor, council members, and community members. I'm here in honor of Hunger Action Month, a nationwide campaign to encourage communities to take action in the fight against hunger by donating, volunteering, providing resources to a neighbor in need, hosting a food drive, or engaging in any community events that take place throughout the month of September. As well as wearing the color orange. Today I'm here to share the Indio impact report and what those numbers look like and how our community is coming together. And Indio, it's especially important to us because Indio is our home, is where we operate, and is the home of one of our, most of our largest distributions for community mobile markets in the area. Mathis Brothers, Shadow Hills, where people line up as early as 4 in the morning to access food. And with the expansion of our new building, we now host a distribution every Friday at our food bank, so neighbors can access food there every Friday. What that means in the city of Indio, our statistics show that 16.3% of Indio residents are food insecure. So more than just doing it for this month engaging, we do it day in and day out to be able to serve communities. And we do it through a variety of different methods. We have our community mobile markets here. We have six in Indio where we serve over 200,000 people. And then we also have 24 agency partners where 149,000 people are able to access food through those distributions. We also have amazing Indio volunteers. 283 people, residents here in Indio, contribute to a volunteer service at FIND. And then our numbers of distribution in our report, through our community mobile markets alone, we distribute 1.4 million pounds of food assistance here in the city. We also, through our partner agencies, another 1.6 million pounds of food. Other than just food, we also have assistance through our community health workers that are able to provide resources such as medical utility assistance, rental assistance. We were able to serve 513 residents, Indio residents with those benefits. We also have launched ending hunger programs, which are programs that help address the food, the root causes of food insecurity. We have provided two high school students in the city of Indio $4,000 in scholarships. And then we also have eight students participate in our workforce development program. Our most recent program with the City of Indio is our partnership through SB 1383, where we partner with local restaurants and establishments in order to rescue food and provide that food to neighbors in need. Through this program, we've been able to rescue 400,000 pounds of food assistance that goes back into the community. So to end my presentation, I just want to give you a few resources for which you can be able to access if you choose to participate in this month's event. Handel's Ice Cream at Jackson Street on Avenue 42 is hosting a fundraiser on September 30th that proceeds go to find. Indio City staff will be volunteering. We're looking forward to that on September 25th. And if you want to volunteer with us or host a food drive or even just want to give out any resources to those in need, please visit our website at finefoodbank.org. Thank you.

Please don't go away. We do have a proclamation for you. But those numbers are extraordinary, those services that you provide to this community and beyond. There are people that otherwise wouldn't have food, wouldn't survive, kids that wouldn't make it to school on a full stomach. And it's becoming even more challenging. We thank you immensely for the level of effort, ongoing effort, and your new facility is beautiful. I'll be right down. Thank you. Please, if you guys.

Thank you so much.

FOR EVERYONE, FOR PICTURES. THIS IS THE PROCLAMATION. THERE YOU GO.

HANG ON TO THAT. MY GLASS IS OFF. ALL RIGHT. OKAY.

I'd like to read this to you. Hunger Action Month, September 2026. Whereas Hunger Action Month is observed each September to raise awareness of food insecurity and encourage individuals, organizations, businesses, and communities to take action to help end hunger, And whereas food insecurity affects individuals and families throughout our community, with approximately 16.3% of Indio residents facing food insecurity, highlighting the continued need for accessible and reliable sources of nutritious food, And whereas Fine Food Bank, the desert's regional food bank, plays a vital role in addressing hunger in Indio through its community mobile markets, network of local partner agencies, food distribution programs, and other services that connect residents with nutrition food, nutritious food, and essential resources, helping the individuals and families meet their basic needs, And whereas fine food banks efforts have provided more than 1.4 million pounds of food through its community mobile markets and more than 1.6 million pounds of fresh produce through fine sites and partner agencies in India while also providing outreach services and programs that address the root causes of hunger. Whereas the City of Indio recognizes the dedicated efforts of Find Regional Food Bank as volunteers, partner agencies, donors, businesses, and community members who work together to combat hunger, strengthen families, and promote the health and well-being of Indio residents. Therefore, be it resolved that I, Elaine Holmes, Mayor of the City of Indio, along with the Indio City Council, hereby recognize September 2026 as Hunger Action Month in the City of Indio and encourage all our residents, businesses, and community organizations to support local efforts to combat hunger and ensure access to nutritious food for all.

Yeah, you can't escape.

Yeah, you get to hang out here. You can't accept. Again, and being able to provide people the services and the assistance in managing food insecurity and how to prepare them for the future I think is very, very important. Those numbers just are enormous. They take an enormous amount of work, an enormous number of volunteer services, vision, and they just keep growing and growing because the needs in our community are growing. And I just really thank you and support everything that you do here at Fine Food Bank. Mayor Pro Tem.

I echo those words, but I just want to thank you. I sit on the CVAC Homelessness Committee, and I understand the services that we need in our valley to take care of folks. And not everyone's unsheltered. It's just some folks who need assistance with food insecurity. And Fine Food Bank steps up to the plate every time. They've been a great partner, and they're going to continue to be a great partner with us. Here in the Coachella Valley, we do have a lot of services and we have to continue to support them to take care of our families. So with that being said, thank you for the work you do and we're looking forward to continue being a great partner.

And I'll just add, you know, I remember during COVID, how important your organization was to helping us out during that time. I know it was a really hard time for our families, but we always had somewhere to send them to for food. So I really appreciate the work that you all did during that time. And you're only getting better now, right? These new programs, rental assistance, you got the new warehouse on the side. You're doing the food recycling program. So you guys are doing a great job. And we just really appreciate all your hard work. Thank you.

Thank you for taking over for Debbie Espinoza. I want to give a shout out to her. She was the CEO for a long period of time and she went to Kansas City. So good luck to her. But the work that you've done, the work that you continue to do, the Houston family for what they did, but really the volunteers and your amazing staff that continue to support that amount of food that goes out because it takes people to put it into the baskets, put it into the areas, get them loaded up and ready to go. So my hat's off to everyone that's volunteering and everyone that works for you doing an amazing job for the city of Indio and the Coachella Valley.

I remember when the Houston family decided to make an investment in India because there was commercial property that was available. Mr. and Mrs. Houston made that investment. I don't believe, if they were both still around, would see how far it's gone. I believe you're the third director Yeah, so you're the third director, and their daughter-in-law was the first, and then who did you just replace? But each one of you leave an accomplishment. That's what's really neat. You could see where you started. Councilman Ortiz just mentioned the warehouse. Well, when it started, that second part wasn't envisioned. I think it was thought about. But it goes to show what the organization does to feed our valley and our neighbors outside the valley. And it goes to show that your collaboration, not just with the cities, because you're based in Indio, which is, I think it's a privilege. It's the largest city in the valley. We are the city of the second seat of the county. But it brings a title of what you've accomplished. Our ability to give more, as organizations like this, you're based in Indio, not just taking care of Indio, working with the nonprofits, the churches, the faith-based community, you establish a really good relationship. But those relationships, that food that comes to their home is priceless. So thank you for doing that.

Last words.

Thank you. Incredibly honored. I've been working with FINE for 12 years now. And to see the growth personally, it's just amazing. And seeing the community come together and really just support FINE means so much. So thank you.

Okay, and I'd like to call up Alicia Grantham, Chief Development Officer of Martha's Village, to give a presentation. So much going on at Martha's Village, yes.

Good evening. I brought some people that I wanted to introduce as well. Mayor and members of the City Council, thank you so much for this opportunity to come here tonight with me. I have my Director of Communications, Emily Langenbaum, and then our Senior Director of Programs, Angela Mendez, here in Indio. And I just wanted to take this opportunity to introduce you in the community or reintroduce you to Martha's. For three decades, you know, Martha's has been proud to call Indio home. And we serve individuals and families throughout this community who are experiencing homelessness and food insecurity that are impoverished. And while many of you are very familiar with Martha's, our work continues to grow and evolve. And I wanted to share a little bit of that with you tonight. And then we have a short video that we wanted to give you as an overview, because like I say, we continue to evolve and then just open it up to questions if you have that for us.

Perfect. Thank you.

At Martha's Village and Kitchen, Every day begins with a simple belief. Everyone deserves dignity, stability, and a place to call home. Here, hope isn't just a word. It's a meal served with care, a safe place to rest, and a hand extended when it's needed most. Through housing services, we help individuals and families move beyond homelessness and into homes that open to a brighter future. For families across our community, our Child Development Center offers a safe, nurturing place where children

And we are really proud of the services that we continue to add to our programs. And we're listening to families. We're seeing their need. We're seeing the barriers that are preventing people from coming in. For an example, someone that doesn't want to become separate from their pet. We're now pet friendly. But yeah, we're continuing to expand. Our Child Development Center is something that we're incredibly proud of. It's open to the community. We serve up to 103 children. We're accepting enrollment currently. But overall, what I wanted to say on the, after, I don't know if she just stepped out, Lorena, after she spoke, it is so amazing to see this community come together. We are working together. And together we're stronger. And the relationships that Martha's is building with Fine Food Bank, I mean, it's just, it's incredible the impact that we're going to continue to make on this community. So I just wanted to come and say hello again. And then if you had any questions for us.

Thank you so much. I mean, yes, what a great resource. And it's just so wonderful to watch it grow and thrive and evolve. Council, any thoughts?

Yeah, I have one question. First of all, thank you for the work that you do in our Valley. It's invaluable work. So I appreciate that. I do have one question. I toured Martha's a few times and now you have recuperative beds. How many beds do you have now?

Do you want to answer that question? Okay. Currently, on the Indio campus, we have 30 beds. Really? Yes. Wow, that's great. It's expanding. It's continuing to expand. And then in Palm Springs, we have, I believe, 14 beds, or 16. I think we have a total of 46. It's always changing. So, I mean, unless I just got, like, the current data before I came over here. But I believe it's 46 total.

That's great. And just to conclude, can you give the public information on how they can donate, whether it's a food pantry or make a monetary donation to Martha's?

Absolutely. So our website is the best way to get information. If you want to volunteer, donate, get involved in any way, if you want information on the Child Development Center resources, and it's marthasvillage.org. It's very simple. So marthasvillage.org. And please feel free to reach out to me personally if anyone wants to ever come and tour. I'm always happy to introduce someone because you can just see the light bulb go off.

Yeah, thank you.

To just see it in action. So thank you so much for having us tonight.

No, thank you. And if you all get a chance to tour, I advise you to tour, especially the area where they do the child development. I tell you, I get emotional every time because they do phenomenal work. And especially during, we talked about the pandemic. That's one of the only places where some of our first responders and essential workers could take their children for childcare. And so this is a valuable, valuable place in our Valley. So thank you.

Thank you.

i just want to thank you for all your hard work i always tell folks you know the homelessness recovery is one of the most difficult areas to work in in our communities are when they can't afford to take care of themselves or need some extra help they can go to martha's and get the care that they need there while they're transitioning out of that hospital state so that's some amazing stuff that you guys are doing out there i was there for the ribbon cutting on the new child development center to the expansion there so really appreciate you keeping pushing and you know expanding also you know seeing the need out there like you mentioned with the pets right that was an issue for a long time that people who didn't want to leave their pet behind wouldn't go into a shelter right so it's great to know that's available out there as well so thank you again okay councilmember goodron i just uh again i i reflect with the founders with gloria gomez and claudia custom

There are two innovative ladies at the time where obviously a lot of people don't know this. They were doing a soup kitchen at L'Oreal Perpetual Health. Then Father Joe Ministries out of San Diego came out and it was a really big, interesting impact to India because we never even had thought of having something that would do so well like they did in San Diego and like they did in Las Vegas. with the mash and it's nice to see that their efforts of starting it and it's still continuing. Obviously they've moved on and done a really special place with the Galilee. The neat thing is you're all collaborating and that's what's good about India that we collaborate to multiply our resources to get out there and I also appreciate the continued relation you have with our city police department and our quality of life team and everything else because the frontline is out there where the families have need And I honor all of you for your efforts and continuing those relationships more than what you probably expected and continued your efforts with blessings.

Well, thank you. Thank you very much.

And thank you for the work that you do. I think Oscar and everyone said that it's a unique services that you do. You've been able to adapt to the niches that people need from the pets to the hospitalization people need. So thank you very much. to continue your mission to expand. I know you're asking for help from the community, but you're really one of our major resources here in the city, along with the Rescue Mission, which you work well with, and Fine Food Bank, and we have the ABC Recovery Center, and then the Gali Center also. All of you working together to be able to support our community. How can we help you?

I think the help that we need is just continuing to talk, continuing to come together, to work with the police, just keeping the communication open, and how you know, how do we adapt together because we will have to continue to do that. So just being, open and having a point of contact. At the open house, the ribbon cutting that you mentioned is the first time that I ever met Mayor Holmes. And just having discussions, it's like just knowing about the quality of life. I didn't know that that was something that the city had. But just furthering those discussions on how can we better serve this community in need together. So it's just to open the door to further discussions.

we're always here to support yeah thank you that's right we'll do that again thank you so much thank you okay item 5.4 head trip festival update mr curtis

Good evening, Council. Jim Curtis, Community Services Manager. I haven't been here for a while to see you guys, so I'm glad I'm here. But I just want to talk a little about Head Trip. Head Trip is coming October 10th and 11th at Empire Polo Club. We are excited for that for sure. I know you guys are as well. That's your music and my music, right? It's all EDM. We love that stuff. Bill told me to say that, by the way. Anyway, just wanted to kind of give some info on it just so you guys are aware in case you get some questions or if the community has some questions as well. So there's going to be about 80,000 people there for the two-day event. It is only two days, so it's only Saturday and Sunday. The gates open to the venue at about 3 o'clock. The parking lot opens at about 1. We will have some camping on Friday night as well. Just to kind of put you into perspective, for Coachella and Stagecoach, we usually have about 40,000 campers. So for this one, there's only going to be about 10 or 12,000, so significantly less. So the good thing about that is all the lots that were used for camping for Coachella and Stagecoach are now available for general parking. So the reason why I bring that up is we think traffic will be limited because there's going to be multiple entrances to get into parking for this event. So we should have those cars off the streets and into parking spots quicker than ever for sure. The campers come in on Friday. They don't come in until about noon on Friday. We're going to put them all into our toll booth area, which is where we do our searches for all the campers. That's going to happen at the northeast corner of 50th and Madison. A huge lot there, as you probably know. If we do have 2,500 to 4,500 cars come in, that lot can fit them all. And that's if they all come at 12 o'clock, which we know that's not gonna happen. So there's plenty of room inside the lot for these campers to wait and get off our streets, which is always a good thing as well. So that's a key for this festival for sure. They do get to go till 1 a.m. on Saturday, per our agreement with them, and midnight on Sunday. The first act starts at about 4.30. The lineup just came out, I think, yesterday or the day before. So as you know, they will be going right all the way up till 1 a.m. and midnight on Sunday. We have some road closures that are going to happen. We'll have some maps out with our marketing team soon to get that information out, but we will be closing Avenue 50 like we usually do during the April concerts between Monroe and Madison, and that's going to happen just for about three weeks starting September 29th, and we'll go until October 18th. So about three weeks for that closure will happen, and usually residents are probably used to it by now, but we know it's an inconvenience for them, so we want to let them know. We are going to do something a little bit different this year just for the show days as well. For safety and security, we are going to close Monroe between Avenue 50 and Avenue 52. There's a couple homes that are in there that we'll make sure they have passes to get in. The Plantation Golf Club is there. They're actually closed for overseeding, so that helps us for sure. And then the Palmdale Estates is on the south side of Monroe by closer to 52. And we've already talked to all those folks about it, and they're all on board and ready to go. We've held about 30-plus community meetings. I just wanted to show you our neighborhood and resident business plan that we present to Golden Voice and the team. And we also have a camping plan, a traffic plan, a safety plan, an EMS plan. There's tons of plans that they present, which we did last Tuesday. Just kind of go over everything that happens during the festival. So I just want to show this real quick. There you go. The purpose of our neighborhood plan is to lessen the impact of the 2026 Hedge Trip Festival on the communities, the neighbors, the businesses. And again, we've been meeting with all those. We've held 30 plus meetings with all them just to make sure they're aware of everything that's going on. Positive feedback from them as well. They're excited for the festival. They know it's going to be a moneymaker for the city, economic driver for sure. So we just have a quick little thing. It talks about what the meetings are, the HOAs that we talk about, the passes, the perimeter passes that will be needed for some of those roads that will be closed. And then we have noise management we talk about on decibel levels that we talk about with the community as well. You guys will know that this event is EDM music, so it will be heavy bass for most of the day on Saturday and Sunday. So I know that my phone will be ringing. So I'm ready for it, for sure. So just want to give you quick contacts, my name and email as well, but also the resident hotline. That's the biggest one right there. 760-391-4112 is a number that's available 24 hours, pretty much starting the Wednesday beforehand. And that's available for residents if they have any issues not getting to their house, can't get out of their business, things like that. We can help along with IPD and the traffic team that they have with Golden Voice and the security team we have in Golden Voice. It's going to be a great event.

and that's it for me so i'll be happy to answer any questions fantastic we're looking forward to another amazing concert another fantastic weekend and all the visitors that we get um council member do you have any comments any comments right council members yeah thank you for bringing us another great yes absolutely go ahead council member and i just want to take advantage of the opportunity because everybody's going to listen to understand that the agreement is

they are entitled to five concerts a year, which those will be no different than what we do for Coachella, what we do for Stagecoach. And it's good that you emphasize that under that agreement, on Friday and Saturday it's to one, and on Sunday it's to 12. So instead of, we're just shaving off one day, I mean, it would be great if we don't shave it off, but It's just nice to reinforce them. It's good for Golden Voice. They're a great partner. They've been really successful. They put us on the map, which is wonderful, but we still need to be responsible. And I'm glad that you pointed out the elderly community. I was worried how they would get, and Grace, you know how that goes. One day we're gonna be 80 ourselves, Jim, so. We have to be respectful to the elders, but they've learned to manage, you know, they've learned to manage. So if we just reemphasize that, obviously a lot of things have changed. To me, you said 80? 80,000. Yeah, that's a drop in the bucket, right? You know, we know that that's awesome. So I appreciate you reemphasizing that, but...

it's nice to be on the map but it's also nice to be responsible to our residents thank you absolutely thank you looking forward to it thank you so much thank you everybody all right thank you okay thank you so much some great presentations i'd like to move on to item 5.5 on presentation by chief brian tully on the alpr license plate reader cameras

Thank you, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem and Council. I'd like to produce or start with a little background on our ALPRs. I'll give you a little bit of history. I'll talk to you about what it is, what it isn't. I'll give you our policy and checks and balances. I'll go through some examples and then we'll go through an actual live demonstration towards the end. So let's get started. Maybe let's get started. There we go. Okay, so we took a look at ALPR cameras and we got our first camera in September of 2022. We evaluated the technology. We found that it was a beneficial tool to solving crime. So we went ahead and initially purchased a contract for 54 cameras in December 2023. And we followed up, we found some gaps in our areas where we weren't capturing some high crime areas. So we wanted to add another 27 cameras. So the city of Indio has 72 ALPR cameras currently. And like I said, it's an investigative tool. We use it to recover stolen vehicles, locate missing persons, support violent and property crime investigations, and also assist in amber and silver alerts. What is ALPRs? ALPRs recognize license plates. They gather facts about vehicles, not people. The alerts come to us for wanted vehicles. We use it to solve crime. It adheres to all California state laws. What it does capture, it captures the time, date and location of the observation. It is able to search partial plates and also vehicle attributes like descriptions of the vehicle itself. It takes snapshots and it's momentary observations as the vehicle passes the camera. What it is not, it's not facial recognition. It's not tied to personal identifiable information. Data is not stored beyond 30 days. It is not video. It does not perform mass surveillance. There is no biometric data, and biometric data is your race, height, weight, and personal features. It does not capture that. It does not continuously track vehicles. It does not reveal the driver's identity, and you'll see that later. It does not identify passengers, and it does not identify the activity of the vehicle before or after the observation. Oftentimes, people confuse these ALPR cameras with red light cameras. These red light cameras were actually video cameras that captured the driver in order for us to issue citations. The ALPR cameras generally capture the back of the vehicle, the license plate, and a description of the vehicle, not people inside the vehicle. The public nature of license plates, let's talk about that. They're designed to be publicly visible. Plates are exposed to public view. Vehicles are visible on public roads that are routinely observable. It's comparable to an officer visually observing vehicles in their daily activity and patrol duties. What does ALPR capture? Here's a picture itself of a vehicle and that was captured. Like I said, it captures date, time, and location. It captures the license plate. If the license plate is partial, we'll capture that, or if it's paper plate or no plate. Again, vehicle attributes like make, model, type, and color can be seen in this photograph. So a lot of legal conditions, what we do in Indio is we have a policy that only allows trained authorized users. It's for official use only. And we need to have reasonable suspicion that a crime has occurred in order to use this system. Or if there's a missing or lost person, we also use it in that purpose. There's no out of state sharing and there's an asterisk there because I'll talk about that a little later in our presentation. There's routine system audits. We do monthly audits and I have a lieutenant evaluate and review that. And it has a new feature where AI actually assists us in those audits. So it looks for patterns or connections within our data and brings and provides alerts for us to investigate further. Our policy also prohibits invasion of privacy, harassment, or intimidation, or for personal use. State law supports our policy. It requires training. It requires us to have training. It requires limitations and controls on access. It requires limitations on sharing. SB 54, as many of you know, ALPR information is collected are collected by California agencies, which all the agencies in California cannot share the data with federal immigration authorities or out-of-state agencies for immigration enforcement purposes. One of the things that the flock camera system did was lock the system down like in the beginning of last year so that agencies can't share outside or with federal agencies. So what are the Fourth Amendment considerations? We're constantly reviewing this and evaluating this with our attorneys. Federal and state courts across the country have upheld warrantless use of searches on fixed location ALPRs under the Fourth Amendment. The reasons are each observation record is a vehicle at a specific place ALPRs do not use facial recognition or store biometrics or identify the occupants inside the vehicle. License plates and vehicle exteriors are exposed to public view. Courts consider the system's actual scope, retention, and use. And of course, we will always continue to monitor federal and state courts to ensure our compliance. One thing to note about, there's a case, the Burger Box case is a prime example where we saw the exterior of the vehicle, but were unable to see the occupant. And therein lies the difficulty of the system or the limits of the system. So our policy is both internal and external access focused. It's limited to need to know or right to know. There are criminal penalties for unauthorized access. Training is provided to all employees. All queries are logged and audited. Agency controls with whom the data is stored, that's us. No sharing by the vendor is allowed. There is no outside state sharing only by subpoena or court order or a special request from the chief of police. If there is, let's say a murder vehicle that is in a different state and they notify us of that license plate, I will have my investigators run it through the system to ensure that our community is safe from that vehicle or the occupants of that vehicle. Yes, sir.

Chief, I'm going to ask a question on that note. So if you're saying a chief of police from Arizona calls you and says, hey, chief, there's a vehicle traveling your direction, can you run that plate to see if he's in your city? Is that something you're referring to?

Yes. When a significant crime occurs where the public safety is at risk, our community is at risk, I will consider that. The data integrity, yes, the data is stored in the cloud and it's CJIS compliant, which is a body that evaluates the security of law enforcement data. It's compliant with its transmission and storage. Amazon web surface is the cloud that is stored in it uses AES 256 bit encryption So it's encrypted from the time it leaves our department to the cloud and back again and by the way It's used by the federal government and National Security Agency. It is the standard there are a number of third-party vendors that are used throughout our profession, and we do store a number of databases in the cloud. Also, we store our databases with the state of California. We have our own in-house database storage. We have about 30 to 40 different databases that we use to investigate crime, and the ALPR system is just one of those investigative tools that we may use if a vehicle's involved. oftentimes let's say a firearms involved we will use a separate database to search for the firearm registered owner of that firearm or what the history of that firearm is also criminal history is is stored under another database and there's so many more like the dmv records cdl california driver's license records um restraining order records, we have a number of databases we use. So like I want to emphasize, this is one of the many databases we use to solve crime. Protecting privacy. So the photos and the data that's acquired by this system is owned by Indio Police Department. It's only stored for 30 days, then it's deleted. One of the unique things about this system, it takes the human bias out of crime solving by detecting objective data, license plates, and description of vehicles. All data is shared securely with AWS, the cloud, with end-to-end encryption. Search reasons are required for the audit trail. There's no facial recognition software in this system. There's no predictive policing, and predictive policing is predicting that crime may occur. It's only when crime has occurred that we can access this system. There's no personal information contained in this ALPR system. No names. We have to use a different database in order to acquire that information. It's not connected to registration data or third-party databases like Carfax and the DMV and those other databases that I've talked to you about. We also have a transparency portal that's available at indiopd.org that you can see our system, who we share with, who shares with us, and how we utilize our system on a regular basis, and it's updated daily. The uses, like I said, proactive real-time crime alerts. So once we enter the license plate into the system, it will give us an alert if it goes by one of our cameras. So we know that it's in our city and we know where to respond to. It's reactive as well. Our detectives, our investigators use it as a searchable database to locate the vehicle that is involved in crime. The benefits, real-time crime alerts, there is a definite deterrence. Criminals know how valuable this system is and it does decrease crime and I'll show you that in a minute. It solves crimes. Solves crimes already committed and there's regional coordination So yes, the system does speak to other agencies within the Coachella Valley and within the state of California Do we share with the entire state of California? No, we don't we share with about 317 different agencies. So there's a limit like there's no reason to share in Northern, California when we don't have our our community or criminals within our community going into those like oakland or what have you so we share with areas around the southern california area and central california and they are california state agencies and and municipalities here's some case studies and this is where the uh... the tool is part of a larger investigation process In this case, suspects were arrested in shooting at a dwelling. On January, 2023, the home was struck by gunfire. There was zero injuries reported in this incident, but there were 91 shell casings to the front of the residence. uh... there were multiple suspects that were arrested for gun violence related to this crime cars were used in this crime and we use the database in order to identify the cars that were involved in this crime another one suspect arrested in a homicide August 2024, officers responded to gunshots heard and the call was upgraded to an assault with a deadly weapon after reports of a male down and possible gunshot wounds. My officers responded that day and they tried to attempt life-saving measures to the victim, but he ultimately died from his injuries. Officers and detectives went to work and identified the suspect and the suspect vehicle shortly thereafter. and detectives were able to successfully locate and arrest that suspect in approximately six hours let me say that again approximately six hours so we know our community uh has a number of uh uh equipment we're self-employed uh people within our community that basically have all their tools in the back of their pickup trucks In this case, 12-20-24, officers responded to a report of grand theft. $4,500 worth of various tools were stolen from a bed of a parked vehicle. We utilized, again, ALPR identification investigative tool, and also issued a search warrant based upon that information to arrest the subject of that grand theft. So we do use it to obtain search warrants and solve crime. This one's a significant case here. Four suspects were arrested in homicide in November, 2025. Officers responded to reports of an adult male shot to the front of a residence. We had no evidence and the witnesses were not talking. Officers performed life-saving measures, but unfortunately, The victim succumbed to his injuries at the scene. Detectives quickly identified the suspect vehicle and shared the license plate information with surrounding agencies. Assisting agencies located the vehicle shortly after. Neighboring officers arrested the suspects, not IPD, but Palm Springs PD and Desert Hot Springs PD helped us in this case. Indio police detectives took custody and booked those suspects into county jail. That case was solved within a day. Let's take a look at online crimes and how does it solve cases with suspects preying upon people within the city of Indio that don't live here. Suspects arrested in a child sex crime and online predatory behavior October, 2024, undercover officer posted a content on social media website. A 38 year old man engaged with the officer believing he was speaking to a 13 year old girl. He did not live in our community. The suspect violated laws regarding child pornography possession and attempting to meet a minor for sexual activity. The technology used in this case, the investigator was able to utilize ALPR cameras across Southern California to track and locate this suspect. This suspect was apprehended in a different county for child sex crimes, and the case was filed with the district attorney's office. Yes, it does affect crime and it decreases crime. In the four years that Indio has used this technology, along with other technology, I can't attribute everything to the ALPR investigative tool, but take a look at aggravated assaults in light blue. It has significantly decreased in the time that we have had this tool. Also, rapes, have generally declined, and I believe rape, robbery as well, and homicides are stating about the same. But overall crime, violent crime, is being affected by utilizing this tool along with investigative techniques. Let me show you a little sample of this investigative tool incorporated in the law enforcement process and how we incorporate technology into solving crime.

This was a really horrific crime. The drive-by shooting killed a man. They gave a very generic description of the vehicle.

Now I'll be starting to enter the vehicle into our Flock Freeform. This crime could have taken years to solve. In the past, you know, something could take place and we'd have to wait for someone to come forward or something like that. And that could be days and weeks and months before we're able to act on it. Right now with Flock, we're able to act within minutes.

I just got an LPR hit on a homicide vehicle.

Can we get a drone launch? Within a matter of minutes, that vehicle was alerting in the city of Palm Springs.

The vehicles were not able to keep up. The drone, as a first responder, was able to keep eyes on.

This just makes us better. It makes us faster. It makes us more efficient.

Having someone else give us that play-by-play feels way more safe.

Kayla, we have eyes on the vehicle.

We were able to get behind the vehicle and conduct a traffic stop.

We got both guys in custody within 30 minutes of the murder taking place.

Technology really cuts through what you would consider the bias and it just gives you the facts.

This type of collaboration, having these type of tools from a neighboring city who can assist us was absolutely critical. Essentially tripled the size of our efforts.

It gives us a peace of mind.

The community was truly grateful for how fast and how effective we were in solving their serious crime. At this time, I would like you to look to the screen. I have a Lieutenant Chris Shannon who will demonstrate the flock system to you and show you in live a live demonstration.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, Council, community, Chris Shannon, Lieutenant with NDO PD. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do a brief presentation of our actual flock system. We've seen all sorts of information, misinformation, disinformation, so we think it's good that the community can see what we're doing from the actual website. So when you log into FLOC, there's a disclaimer that comes up. It talks about immigration enforcement and reproductive care, and we're required to accept those terms in order to continue. Let me refresh this. I'm sorry. I had it really quick. Sorry. All right, there we go. So this is the homepage for our NDOPD administrators page for FLOC. So you'll see a lot of items along the top in our attempt to be quick with this. I'm gonna go over a couple important things. So under our insights tab, THIS GIVES US INFORMATION THAT WE USE TO IDENTIFY AND MONITOR HOW OFTEN OUR FLOCK IS BEING USED. THIS MONTH WE TYPICALLY HAVE AROUND ABOUT 10 AND A HALF TO 11 MILLION READS IN A MONTH. THIS MONTH IS HIGH PROBABLY WITH THE BEGINNING OF SCHOOL. SO WE'RE AT 12.3 MILLION VIEWS FOR THE LAST ROLLING 30 DAYS. Our officers and our personnel have conducted 952 searches, and those are individual searches. So what'll happen, and you'll see in a little while, we may look for a car, one, two, three, four. We don't get anything. We might hit refresh five minutes later. We might hit refresh. Each time we refresh it, that's considered a search in our administrative page. For our hot list hits, we have about 13,000. Sounds like a lot, but the overwhelming majority of our, flagged vehicles are stolen plates. People report their license plates stolen. They take the front plate off the front, put it on the back and never follow up. And every time that drives around the city, it'll be an alert. So that's our homepage for our dashboard there. There's more information up here. So our organizational audit. Chief talked about how we audit and what happens is every month on rolling 30 days I go through and I look at our system. We require a couple things for the Indio Police Department. We require a valid reason and a case number in order to conduct a search and flock. So what I do is I look at the plate that was searched, I go into our CAD system, make sure that they match. we ensure that our people are using Flock accordingly. And what Flock does over here under audit assistance is there's several things that AI, I think, picks up in Flock. Single user plate searches, searches beyond 30 day timeframe, multiple case numbers, and exclusive external searches and repeated narrow timeframes. So what happens is if we have a personnel member who is running a plate 40 times in a small amount of time, FLOC will pull it up and tell me that I need to look at that to make sure that whatever they're doing is within what we expect in our policy. So from time to time, those will show up, I'll go through them, monthly report, make sure everything's the way it should be. So if we go to our network audit, this is a quick snapshot of who has actually hit, quote unquote, our cameras. So every time you run a flock search, anything, any city you share with, including our own, and anybody that allows us access, it basically bounces off their cameras. So I'm not really searching whatever's in La Quinta, but since it's a shared network, When I put the plate in an NDO, it's going to check La Quinta as well. So when you see here California Highway Patrol, I have no idea if that's northern, southern California, but we do share with them. So if they entered a plate, whatever reason, it bounces off of ours. So this is our TOTAL VEHICLE VOLUME FOR THE TOTAL VEHICLE VOLUME FOR THE YEAR, IT'S RIGHT ON THE TOP YEAR, IT'S RIGHT ON THE TOP THERE. THERE. IT'S ABOUT 97 MILLION. IT'S ABOUT 97 MILLION. AND WHAT WE HAVE ON THIS GRAPH AND WHAT WE HAVE ON THIS GRAPH HERE IS IF I HOVER A DAY, IT HERE IS IF I HOVER A DAY, IT WILL TELL US HOW MANY VEHICLE WILL TELL US HOW MANY VEHICLE READS WE HAVE THAT DAY. READS WE HAVE THAT DAY. AND THAT'S HOWEVER, WHOEVER IS AND THAT'S HOWEVER, WHOEVER IS DRIVING THROUGH THE CITY. DRIVING THROUGH THE CITY. AND WHAT THAT DOES FOR US IS THAT AND WHAT THAT DOES FOR US IS THAT HELPS US SEE WHAT TIMES OF THE HELPS US SEE WHAT TIMES OF THE DAY AND WHAT DAY Where's my mouse here? So this is our unique vehicle volume. In a 30-day window, we're averaging about 750, 800,000 unique vehicles in the city of Indio. So what that means is if your vehicle hits 20 flock cameras, that total volume number that's so high compared to the unique vehicle, it's not going to count that 30 or 40 times in a day. So there's talk about our devices. We have 72, like the chief said. And what this does is this is our admin page. It gives us some background on if the cameras are working. If a flock is identified, maybe the camera broke, maybe something is obstructing the camera, the wind moved it. We get that from time to time. And then what they do is they come out and they check our camera and make sure everything's working the way that it should work. sharing is a big topic so our sharing page so this is ndopd this is the features that we have if we go to shared networks and this is how we monitor who's sharing so we have some agencies in there and some of them are reciprocal we share with them they share with us some are not some uh don't share with us but want our data. I don't know about Alameda, but if we pull this up, we have the right to turn them off at any time. All I gotta do is revoke their access and they're done. So we're monitoring the news, making sure that we're sharing our information with agencies that aren't having problems with flock. So something that comes up a lot is What does a search look like? So I'm going to do a search live here for everybody to see. And as you see a fence type, there's 27 of them. For the purposes of this demonstration, I'll just do alcohol. Earlier today, I opened a case number with our dispatch and our CAD. So I'm going to use that case number because it's required in order to search. search reason i'm just going to put city council and we have a couple options down here i'm going to go back 30 days to conduct this search so when we search for a plate and it hits this is what it looks like oh excuse me i didn't uh i missed this spot right there So this is one of our daytime patrol units, and we chose a daytime unit so you can see what's going on during the day. So if we search for our patrol unit 2386, it will tell us what camera it hit off of and what time it hit off of. One thing that's important to note As we go through here, you'll see this picture right here. Our license plate readers are designed to read the back plate. However, sometimes the front plate you can see. But as you can see, we have no idea who's driving that car. It's the middle of the day and you can't tell. That's the quality of the cameras that we have. More often than not, what you see is that it'll be the rear plate. And we can go through here several of them. It's the middle of the day, and here's another picture. They caught the front, but... There's a vehicle that has an alert on the plate. This is what the alerts show us. As I said earlier, a stolen plate is the overwhelming... most hits that we get in a month. Well, it just turned me off. I'm sorry about that. information that I had, number of searches. So this is unique searches. If we search for a plate 20 times, it only captures it once in 30 days. Hot list hits, similar number. Unique vehicles detected, similar number. And then if you want to know who we are receiving data from or sharing our data with, we have a whole list right here. As we have policies, and at the bottom we have attached our policy. I APOLOGIZE, THERE'S REALLY NOTHING ELSE TO SHOW YOU. I THINK YOU GUYS HAVE SEEN WHAT YOU NEED TO SEE. DO YOU GUYS HAVE ANY QUESTIONS?

Thank you very much, Chief and Lieutenant, for taking the time to run through the system with that level of detail. I appreciate it. Any comments before?

Yeah, you're welcome very much. One thing I wanted to just, in closing, I want to just remind everybody that it takes the community, it takes public trust, and we have to continually evaluate the system in order to ensure that it is used properly and effectively for our community.

Thank you. Council, any questions or comments? Council Member Dutron, no? Right ahead.

Thank you for the presentation, by the way. And for the 900 searches that you mentioned, that was for this month, right? The last rolling 30 days. It could be more tomorrow, less tomorrow. And is that searches from our police department to the database or from other people searching?

That's all ours. That's our information. Like I said, if we're looking for a car or we enter a car and we can't find it, we keep hitting the refresh button. Every time you hit it, it counts. Gotcha.

Thanks. uh thank you lieutenant and chief for your presentation i had the opportunity to go and see this at the police department so i appreciate you doing this for the public i have a couple of questions some are clarifications and i have one request as well um we watched the video it's a good video but there's a lot going on in that video that Flock doesn't have the capabilities to do, to show some drone footage. And so that's Palm Springs real-time intelligence. We don't have that. We have the Flock system that can assist in finding criminals. Just wanted to put that out there. I have one question that was posed to me before by a community member. Who determines the location where the cameras go?

What happens is when we went through the planning permitting as well, because all the cameras are permitted with the city, we had an internal discussion with our street crimes unit detectives. And then we met with FLOC because they don't move. So we want to make sure that we can get the right angle. That angle on that corner might not be good enough. This one might work better. With the heat, we have to worry about the heat. When the sun goes down, if it's pointed in a certain direction, is it going to wipe out the pitchers? So there's a collaborative discussion internally first and then with the vendor. Okay.

Another question. I've seen it out there that They'll show one vehicle that has 300 hits, and the perception is that there's officers sitting there searching 300 times. Can you speak on that as well?

Well, as you saw, the last 30 days, we've had 12 million hits. We don't have the time or the people to look at 12 million pictures. We just don't have the time to do it. We only... We'll put a plate in the system if it's involved in a crime or suspected of being involved in a crime, or if it's a missing person, silver alert, feather alert, amber alert, things like that. So if you're just driving down the street and you're not suspected of anything, we have no idea where you're going. We're not looking.

Okay. I have one more question and then just a request. You said that only trained authorized users have access to the system, correct? Right. Is that sworn personnel and non-sworn personnel or is it only sworn?

So we have sworn personnel and we have our dispatchers. We also have our crime analyst, our IT systems engineer, and we have one code enforcement employee who actually works in dispatch from time to time as needed. No other professional staff have access to the system.

And I just have one request. I appreciate the audit report that you do, and maybe the chief or yourself, you know, if you do that monthly, I think it would be a good idea to include the mayor with the report, whoever that mayor is at the time, just say, September, we did this audit. This is what we got. And the reason why I say that is if, For instance, Alameda, for example, if we take Alameda out of our system because they're having issues and a council member or mayor gets a call, why are we removing Alameda from the system? I think it would be a good idea for the mayor to have that idea of what's going on. So that's just a request that when you do the audit that the mayor is included in that as well.

Yes, sir, we can definitely do that. Yeah, appreciate it, thank you. I do have one last thing, Mayor, if I may. I'd like to invite the community for next, this coming Tuesday and Thursday to our public safety campus off of Bristol. We do have a presentation, a live presentation and more in-depth discussion if they would like from, I don't have my slides, but I think it's from three to four on Tuesday and four to five on Thursday.

Thank you, that's excellent. I attended, I went through that. And for anyone that's interested in the detail of the system, I would encourage you to go. It's very, very interesting. And it gives us a real look at how we're keeping you safe. Council Member Ortiz.

Yeah, I was also able to join our chief and lieutenant at the police station and watch how the process worked there. And I wanted to remind folks, because I think that's something we didn't talk about here, that when they search, there has to be a case number that's included, right? And so the license plate, is matched with the case number. And when you're auditing, those have to match up. That license plate has to be part of that investigation, right? Yes. And I know you mentioned the AI support in doing the auditing, but we're still doing manual audits of that information.

Absolutely. Lieutenant Shannon does the manual audit. It just assists in finding patterns, like unique patterns. So it kind of enhances his ability to locate data.

It's in addition to the manual.

Yes, it's in addition. Thank you.

Okay, I have several requests to speak. Thank you very, very much. The first request to speak is Andrew Figueroa. Please come to the front. And everyone has three minutes, a maximum of three minutes to speak.

All right, all right. Ready?

Yes. Hello, council members, mayors. I'm here speaking in support of the removal of all flock cameras in our city of Indio. Flock Safety is a private for-profit AI-powered company that uses cameras to scan features of our vehicles and puts them into a statewide database that anyone with access can track. This company has been seen time and time again to abuse its power in regards to the people and has a high error rate, according to Adelaide County, 30%. that has already led to many counties getting rid of the system completely. Many officials, government officials have been caught abusing this power as well. Many have been fired, some arrested for tracking exes or their loved ones, see what they're doing. And there's two instances that I'd like to point out. There's one in Texas where a deputy in Texas used 83,000 flock cameras to track a woman statewide This proving the fact that they can use statewide searches to make sure that she didn't have an abortion. They did check Texas, Illinois, and Washington, amongst others. And this has been proven. There's another one in San Diego, Hugo Parra, who was jailed for a month because flat camera pointed them out saying they were the perpetrator and they weren't. So I'd just like to ask, when you took the oath to serve the people, you took the oath to protect our privacy and uphold the laws, did you think about that when you took the flock contract? Whether it's falsely marking innocent people due to an error or having flocks pointed at homes near my own neighborhood in this valley, which I find I don't like, It's called, I stand here today to ask how much does our privacy cost? Are you willing to allow a company to sell our data and use surveillance to track all of us if wanted? Sorry. Oh, we stand up as many places have before. I hope that you take the time to explore the issues with Flock and hopefully use it as a way to make our valley a better place. And this goes for all AI-powered companies because there's also Axon and Flock, so it's just different things. I hope you guys look into it. Thank you and have a great day.

Thank you for your comments. OK. It's all right. All right, you guys. The next request to speak is Allison. And after Allison, there'll be Lorenzo Calderon. So hang tight there. Thank you. Welcome, Allison.

Hello, good afternoon. I appreciate the council requesting a presentation about FLOC, but I'm here to urge the council to take the, I think, the only reasonable next step and cut the FLOC contract and ban all AI-powered automated license plate readers, or also known as ALPRs. OVER 50 CITIES AND COUNTIES ACROSS THE COUNTRY HAVE BEGUN DOING JUST THIS, CANCELING FLOCK AND OTHER ALPR CONTRACTS LIKE OUR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA NEIGHBOR, THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES. AND IT'S FOR GOOD REASON AS THE PERSON BEFORE ME JUST noted with some of their examples, there are serious concerns about warrantless mass surveillance. And just to clarify that Cambridge defines mass surveillance as involving the active or passive collection of information about all members of society, which this falls under. and what all LAPRs do. There are also concerns about the unauthorized access to our private information by individuals and organizations that can track our daily routines without our consent, about the safety of our data with the third party organization, about the inaccuracy of the software itself that has led to wrongful stops and other issues, and just about the misuse of data in general. And I just want to mention that the difference between this database as it was referred to versus the databases in general is that this is real time data collection of our private information. That is not how these other databases that were mentioned ARE USED. AND WHAT I ALSO FAILED TO LEARN FROM TODAY'S PRESENTATION AND WHAT ACTUALLY SEEMED TO ME MORE LIKE A COMMERCIAL FOR ALPRS, IT'S ABOUT THE ACTUAL METRICS OF THE OVERALL EFFECTIVENESS OF ALPRS IN THE CITY OF INDIO. BUT I DID SEE SOME PRIVATE CITIZEN VEHICLES BECAUSE OF A QUICK MISTAKE just pointing to like the vulnerability of the system. I also want to remind folks that correlation does not prove causation. These case studies and data are great, but there is not actual evidence that I saw today about the direct correlation with clock and arrest because the other support was mentioned and that's not counted for in what we saw today. SO WHERE IS THE ACTUAL DATA THAT CONTIFIES THE BENEFICIAL RETURN ON INVESTMENTS ON THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS OF CONTRACT FOR THE SYSTEM? I DIDN'T HEAR THAT TODAY AND ACTUALLY I HAVE SIGNIFICANTLY MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS. WHY ARE WE TAKING $12 MILLION PHOTOS AND HOSTING THAT EVEN FOR 30 DAYS WHEN WE'RE ONLY ACCESSING IT ABOUT 900 TIMES FOR WHATEVER SEARCHES WERE THERE SO I'LL JUST END WITH WE DO NOT WANT FLOCK AND OTHER LAPRS IN INDIO AND I THINK WE SHOULD PROTECT THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY AND PROTECT OUR PERSONAL DATA AND I'D LIKE TO REQUEST THE COUNCIL TO END THE CONTRACT WITH FLOCK AND BAN ANY FUTURE LAPR CONTRACTS AND I HOPE TO SEE THAT ON FUTURE AGENDAS THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME

After that is Jonathan Becerra.

Good afternoon, members of the City Council and Indio. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak today. I want to begin by saying that I care about public safety. I want our neighborhoods to be safe. I want stolen vehicles recovered, serious crimes investigated, and our families protected. But I also believe that public safety and privacy should not be opposites. We should be able to have both. Today, Indio has 72 flock automatic license plate reader cameras. In February of 2025, the city council approved 27 additional cameras at a cost of $321,735, bringing the total to 72 cameras. The city also reported that the program would inquire ongoing public funding. And that raises an important question to me. Is this the best use of public resources? Could those resources instead support additional officers, community policing, better lighting, infrastructures, youth programs, and other investments that directly benefit the people who live here? But my concern isn't only about money. It's about what happens when powerful technology is misused. Just recently, ABC7 reported on a case in San Jose where a police officer was fired after allegedly using flock data improperly. According to the police department, the officer accessed information about a vehicle and shared its location with a relative who was involved in a domestic violence case. That information was then allegedly used to locate the person who had reported the abuse. That case is important because it reminds us of something fundamental. Even when technology is created for legitimate law enforcement purposes, the people who have access to it still have to use that access responsibly. So my question is, it's not simply can we track this information, but should we? Thank you.

Thank you for your time. All right. Everyone, I appreciate everyone's excitement, but I would ask that you maintain and respect the sanctity of this council, city council, please. Mr. Becerra.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, Council. I won't bore you with a bunch of statistics or examples. I think it is clear that myself and a lot of committee members are very at least skeptical of the FLOC program. For transparency purpose, I am running for city council, but then I'm here as a committee member and organizer for the city of Indio. I'm hearing this everywhere I go. Besides housing itself, FLOC is on top of everyone's mind in a way that is very concerning to someone like me. I think in the examples we heard in the presentation I agree with the previous community member that we didn't see a longitudinal graph that showed how much crime has, you know, effectively been decreased by this. We saw little lines that we're supposed to get correlation from, but we only saw three anecdotal examples. And when I'm in, you know, I'm not an educated police officer or a public servant, but even in college when I'm doing presentations, your professor tells you don't use case studies unless it's a last resort if you want to prove a longitudinal point. So I think that it's fair for our community members to get more accurate and more macro data in terms of flock and its efficacy in here in the city of Indio. Also, I really want to say it was notable to see that quick mistake quickly kind of just show people's personal innovation. I know it was a mistake, but it was a great example. I want to echo what the committee member said of what happens when you're using such powerful technology, such great technology, and little mistakes can happen. And I want to really emphasize that when mistakes are made, moving too fast, poor people are hurt, queer people are hurt, people of color are hurt, immigrants are hurt. You know, so like a lot of the most negative effects of some technologies like this aren't going to be felt by majority people in this room. But it is important for us to really codify a lot of the protections I think are necessary. So on top of stopping and canceling the fall contract, I think we need to codify privacy and privacy rights in the city of Indio beyond that, making sure we ban AI facial recognition, make sure we ban corporate mass surveillance in the city of Indio to make sure that you know, yes, we can all say and have it given that our chief and the council members here are good human people who are gonna respect the rights of others. But future councils, future chiefs, we need to make sure we codify our privacy rights when it comes to how they are engaged with by technology and AI. We need to make sure those rights are codified into ordinance here in the city. And I think that's gonna be a better step beyond just canceling the FLOG contract. We need to make sure that future generations understand that their rights and privacy are protected in the city of Indio. So I really hope you guys consider that. Thank you.

Okay, we have we have someone on zoom. City Clerk, do we want to bring them up now? Yes. And after that zoom, Tyler Peterson will be up.

We'll bring the comments.

Hello. Hi, city council, can you hear me?

Yes, we can. Hi, yes. Go ahead.

So my name is Patrick Lucero and thank you for also having this approval for Zoom meetings about what's in the agenda. But I do want to just reiterate and repeat and voice as the other residents of Indio that we should be putting more effort into different types of community outreach instead of having to help out of what we can use as the technology as we just banned the AI data centers, which is also concluded into this type of realm, just like a sub branch of it. So thank you for advising for a PowerPoint. But then also because of that PowerPoint, that needs to be more specified investigation of why are we having this usage happening? Why is this happening for India? um just like as someone from palm desert they were just like a uber driver and they got raided from uh police because they were investigated as the stolen vehicle when it wasn't even the right vehicle it was just the brand the type of vehicle and he was a victim of flawed cameras so just want to reach out there and thank you for your time and can't wait for the next one thank you thank you for your comments next person tyler peterson

And after Tyler, Katie Arias.

Good evening, counsel. My name is Ty and I'm a resident of Indio. And I was hoping to hear from an attorney today because the flock contract seems to tell a different story. Now stop me if I tell a lie. No society that is built for the people to thrive includes mass surveillance. No society that is set up for the people to succeed includes corporate monetary incentives for incarceration. Flock security camera systems are a tool for mass surveillance based on the fact that it could follow only the car on the hot list. Yet it snaps a picture of everyone to the tune of 70 million images per day. I wonder how many data centers we could save if it only did the job you're paying it to do, which is solve crimes. Speaking of solving crimes, 28,000 cameras in Atlanta and their crime clearance rates did not budge. In fact, the homicide clearance rate dropped by 5%. Flock safety cameras have been referred to as a Netflix for stalkers. because the software is so vulnerable to hackers. A tech-savvy predator could know the routine of you and your children. Mass surveillance is a $200 billion industry, and that's bad news for privacy because profits come before people in America. There are countless ways that our data is already being weaponized against us, and we are expected to believe that this will be different. They are using our data to charge us more and pay us less. They're buying it, marking it up, and selling it like street dealers. City after city is canceling their flood contracts because they realize that they have been lied to. San Francisco found 1.6 million unauthorized searches done by federal agencies, including ICE and CBP. Mountain View, California, 600,000. Have they searched our database? We don't know because the subscriber can only see their own searches. They cannot see if Flock did any searches. And this is by design. Indio's safeguards do not apply to the corporation, to Flock. They have no guardrails and our data is their data. And they have called us terrorists for wanting transparency, excuse me. Our data is not safe and therefore we are not safe. The flock contract states that they can give away our data if they have a good faith belief that it's necessary. And they can make any updates to the software without our permission, which could be something even more invasive, such as facial recognition and phone tracking. The subscription model leaves the subscriber at the mercy of the non-negotiable updated terms of service. The contract shields the corporation from accountability and offers zero protections for the people or their data. Contracting with Flock is providing a valuable tool to a federal government who is kidnapping our brothers and sisters and sending them off to for-profit torture camps. That's what we're feeding with this infrastructure. If you provide...

Sir, your three minutes are up.

Yes, RAS?

Katie? Oh, there she is, perfect. And after Katie, it is? We're at the end. Thank you.

Hi, Indio City Council. I'm here to say that these ALPR and flock cameras are marketed to us as a way to help prevent crime. And my question is, I mean, don't we already use this tagline for cops already? Indiopd has a budget of over $46 million, and that's from the Indiopd's website. And as a community member, it honestly leaves a foul taste in my mouth to know their budget, and yet they're saying they still need this technology to give them assistance in whatever crime that they're solving. I'm here to say that we already have hundreds of flock cameras in the desert, over 100. And we don't need more. The city of Indio doesn't and shouldn't make space for them. I'm asking my council. If you guys are considering this kind of technology that's marketed as something that's going to help solve crime, can we instead look at the disparities in the city that create said crime? We don't have enough affordable housing. The city of Indio opens its doors to tourists, but it truly feels like it continuously leaves its residents behind. We need public resources, cooling centers, affordable housing. We need to build a future we feel safe in. And as a resident of Indio, I say get Flock out of Indio because it doesn't make me feel safer. No matter what's presented by the people trying to sell this to our community, which is Flock and Indio PD, bottom line is that it's mass surveillance and that is that.

Thank you for your comments.

Thank everyone for taking the time to speak. I appreciate that very much. There's one more. We got one more? Okay. Please speak, I'm not, AMB?

My name is Ash and my family has lived here in Indio for seven years. And in the presentation, it was shared that there are routine monthly audits. And so if the city is complying with state and city policy, there should be no issue in having those audits be made public. There's other cities that have done that for the public to review, especially when there's this talks of having trust. well i don't trust that the city is using using apologies can i reclaim time no i'm sorry my phone has a life of its own well anyways um The data that is being used here is being reviewed by AI. There are so many cases where these cameras are making false flags, leading to illegal detainment of people, especially many black and brown folks who are already over-policed and are at the front lines of the surveillance state. There are many communities organizing against flock and surveillance, and it is clear that these cameras don't operate momentarily, but 24-7. And so they track and capture much more than what is being shared in this presentation. And your alarm is still going off, which is really upsetting. And so it's not fair to compare these cameras to officers on patrol when there's 74 cameras operating 24 seven being analyzed by AI and shared to at least 317 agencies. it is said this tech is made to make communities safer but who gets to define what safe is because 24-hour surveillance of me and every person who comes through the city and lives in the city without warrant or reason is not safe that is creating the foundations to criminalize people that is the intention of this technology at the end of the day and again it is really infuriating that your alarm is still going off and you chose not to allow me to reclaim my time And so it just shows that you don't really care with what people have to say here right now. And ultimately I stand with folks in their ask of getting flock out of the city and Regardless, the community deserves to know what the uses of these cameras have been. So I think those audits, having them public to the community is really important and final demand, get them out of here.

Thank you.

And turn off your alarm.

Thank everyone once again for your comments. They are well received and they are heard. Okay, are there any other comments online or on Zoom or in any other manner? There are none. Okay, thank you. Again, thank everyone for their time and their comments. I'd like to go to item six. Welcome back to the Youth Advisory Council.

Good evening, Madam Mayor Holmes, and council members, and those of you in the audience today. My name is Aria Orantes, and I'm this year's Youth Advisory Council Mayor. I'm currently a senior at Shadow Hills High School. A fun fact about me is that post high school, I plan on majoring in neuroscience. I'd also like to introduce the YAC board and members for the 2026 to 2027 school year. First, Yereti Magana is this year's YAC Mayor Pro Tem. She's also a senior at Shadow Hills High School, and a fun fact about her is she plans on majoring in biopharmaceutical sciences within the pre-med pathway, and hopefully at her dream school, Stanford. Next, Jimena Murillo is our YAC treasurer. She is a senior at Indio High School, and a fun fact about her is she plans on majoring in political science, hopefully at her dream school, UC Berkeley. Next, our YAC Secretary, Mia Thompson, is a sophomore at Shadow Hills High School, and she likes to go backpacking. Our last member is our publicist, Javi Martinez, who I know got a good photo of my peers and I before the meeting because he has a passion for photography. Now for this year's YAG members. Alexis Mesa is a senior at Indio High School. And her fun fact is that she wants to major in music to become an educator. Isabella Urbano is a sophomore at Indio High School. And her fun fact is she likes to draw. Emma Gutierrez is a sophomore at Shadow Hills High School and she likes to draw as well. Nylea Felix is a senior at Indio High School and her post high school plans are to go to college and become a radiologist technician specializing in MRIs. Izzy Atacama is a junior at Shadow Hills High School, and her fun fact is that she was a sergeant in ROTC. Lizbeth Lorenzo is a junior at Indio High School, and her fun fact is that she likes to sing. Gianna Mandujano is a junior at Indio, and her fun fact is that she loves to play water polo. Freddie Moran is a senior at Indio High School, and his fun fact is that he's a pianist. Eva Urias is a junior at Shadow Hills High School, and her fun fact is that she does dance. Alondra Juarez is a senior at Shadow Hills High School, and her fun fact is that after high school, she plans to major in political science. Danica Rodriguez is a junior at Indio High School, and she loves to cook and bake. Julian Garcia is a senior at Indio High School, and her fun fact is that she does theater. In total, five board members and 12 amazing members. We're so excited for this year. In fact, before this meeting, we got started with our involvement with the city. To begin my report, this past Saturday on September 12th, we volunteered at the Viva Indio event, where we had a table for children and families to enjoy customizing piñatas filled with candies. We had so much fun at our first event, and our members interested in the medical field got to talk with Councilmember Oscar Ortiz. YAC member Lizbeth had the opportunity to sing with the mariachi, and we got some group pictures at the end. Upcoming events on our calendar are our YAC meeting next Wednesday, and we also plan to be at the State of the City on October 1st. Lastly, this year we'd like to try something new and highlight one member at every meeting. Today I'd like to highlight the story of a member I mentioned earlier, Freddie Moran, which coincidentally today is his 18th birthday. He recently received some unexpected and unfortunate news that his grandfather is diagnosed with myeloma cancer. Myeloma is a blood cancer that forms in plasma cells, a type of white blood cell, and is found in the bone marrow. Despite this challenging time within his family, Freddy shows up for his community and successfully juggles activities such as marching band, being a pianist at COD, environmental club vice president, and a tutor for students at IHS. His achievements are being placed on the dean's list at COD while being a high school student, helping the community, and taking advanced coursework. His success is evident in his 3.5 GPA. We're incredibly proud and grateful for Freddie's dedication and his ability to continuously show up for himself and those around him. We're asking that if anyone is interested in donating to his Grandpa's GoFundMe, to please visit the link in the bio of indio underscore yak on Instagram. Thank you, and that completes my report.

That's fantastic. Thank you so very much. It's so nice to see and meet all of you. I look forward to hearing about everything you do in the coming year. Thank you. Welcome. Okay, yes. Okay, next item is item number seven, city manager reports and information.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and members of Council. I have several updates tonight. For all of our Indio Water customers, you now have an additional convenient location to pay your water bill right here at City Hall in the lobby. So come on down, visit our new City Hall, and you can pay your water bill here. You can still pay over at the corporate yard. Also, you can pay online at indio.org. Also, I want to announce that we're going to have a grand opening for Indio Business Connect Center. We'll be celebrating its official ribbon cutting on September 28th at 3 p.m. That's Monday, September 28th, right across the parking lot here. The Indio Business Connect Center will also be hosting a business resource fair on Thursday, October 29th. Save that date for our business community. We'll have more information coming out on social media and our website. Also want to recognize that this is September and is National Preparedness Month. So visit indio.org or follow the City of Indio on social media and get tips and reminders on how to stay prepared and sign up for emergency alerts. We're also planning a presentation on disaster preparedness at our next City Council meeting for all the community. Also our Indio Police Department will be hosting a car seat clinic on Saturday, September 26th from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. at I-10 Toyota at the I-10 Auto Mall on Varner Road. IID is also giving away eligible residents the opportunity to receive a free shade tree through their Tree for All program. More information can be found by following the City of Indio on social media or going to the IID.com website. And just for all of those folks that are getting hungry already, the Tamale Festival is coming in December, and we're still accepting vendors for that. So go to our www.IndioInternationalTamaleFestival.com for more information and to apply to be a vendor and join us on those days in the first weekend of December. and also i'd like to announce that our state of the city as mentioned by our youth advisory council is sold out so it is thursday october 1st at the coachella valley history museum at 5 30 and all those have signed up look forward to seeing you there and that is my report well that's quite the report there's lots going on in the city no no shortage of activities and events thank you so much

The next item is item number eight, City Council Conflict of Interest Disclosure. Does anyone have any conflict of interest on this agenda besides me? Okay. I have a conflict of interest on item 10.12 and 10.13, and that is because I own a business, therefore financial interest within 500 feet of that particular topic. So I will be either removing myself or recusing myself in some fashion from those two items. THE NEXT ITEM, ITEM NUMBER NINE, CITY COUNCIL REPORT ON MEETINGS ATTENDED FOR GOVERNMENT CODE SECTION 53232.3D.

Well, lots going on. I had the privilege on the August 21st, we didn't meet, and obviously I was able to meet and have invited to the Consulate of Mexico San Bernardino that represents Riverside County and San Bernardino. The Mexican Council had celebrated 96 years of service to both counties. It was really nice to have Dr. Salvador Pasti, the current consulate who's there. He has a five-year commitment assigned by the President of Mexico to represent. There's many consulates throughout the United States, but this one's important to us because the Mexican community, the Spanish community that comes from Mexico, that is their way of communication, their needs, those that are here that are and so forth, but it's a relationship because of the population of our city. We've had this relationship for quite a while. I know that Council Member Ortiz has also communicated with them, at least to my knowledge, and then Glenn Miller, but it's the relationships. It was nice to be there with several other dignitaries from both counties, and the interesting part that they didn't realize is we have something in common. When that consulate was established in 1930, the city of India was incorporated. So I told them we have something in common that hopefully the relationships we have is great. And they also participate in events and activities that they come to the city of India. And obviously they love Coachella Festival and Stagecoach, but everything else that our city does and they plan to do more. August 22nd, I attended the Elks Lodge of Indio, another well-known, long-established organization with over 900 members. They had Thanksgiving in August. Thanksgiving in August to raising funds to keeping their opportunity to continue to support the city of Indio and surrounding areas with scholarships and grants. The Irish are a big supporter with the annual pancake breakfast for our canine program for the Police Department, but they do go beyond that. They also have scholarships for students, continued education, and obviously our local programs from some of our non-profits. So it was a really nice evening. September the 2nd, they had the ribbon-cutting of the RCOE facility, that brand new conference center at the corner at the southeast corner of Dr. Carrion and Calhoun. It's a great addition. All of you from council were there. It's amazing what that will provide to our community. It's also a really good improvement of that area because that was a lot that was vacant for a very long time. and it benefited not the surrounding neighborhoods and whatnot, but what they're gonna bring is more opportunity for education, presentations, conference, networking. It's a great and something that maybe we are able to use as another location for what we wanna do for the city. So my hat is off to the Department of Ed for the County of Riverside for doing that investment. The other thing that was really good, locally in Southern California with all the Texas Roadhouse, I should say, they were able to do for their third year that they've been here, and the current owner of that, That restaurant is a franchise owner, a homegrown person from Indio. So it's really nice that he's not only the proprietor of the establishment, but he's getting involved. And it was a tip-up opportunity for our police department and our local agencies here to support. So that was great. It was a really good event. I had the opportunity because I sit on the Coachella Valley Conservation Commission and so does Mayor Elaine Holmes. And I thought it was important that our development community and whatnot was really looking at a local development mitigation fee from a Nexus study. Our building industry was concerned because of how that would impact them. And obviously we received a report that was informative. I was talking to the mayor about it. And the interest was, is how is this going to impact development? I mean, their whole purpose and what we do is obviously to protect our desert, our desert, beautiful desert and what it provides. But there's also concern about development and how it impacts our desert areas. So... the building industry did come with a good presentation of how they felt about it, but I wanted my representation and obviously with Mayor Holmes is the commission decided to kind of do a little bit more study into it, kind of really break it down as to how it impacts everybody. The other great thing that I think that was really great to brag about was not because it was September 11th, which is a very special time in our country for what happened, but the privilege that this council and the prior council that we've had in the last 10 years contributed to finally recognizing a memorial to recognize what happened in 9-11. So we have a nice beautiful art piece that our Arts Commission, our Community Service Commission and staff put together. It's there on Miles Avenue Park, right next to the Coachella History Museum. And next to that is our Future Veterans Memorial that's being built, thanks to the council for doing that. Those are just some things that we should all be proud of. Today, I had the opportunity for the council. I attended the Greater Coachella Valley Chamber. They had a business networking at the Trilogy Clubhouse. There was about 40 members of our local business from Indio and our neighbors, but it was nice to them to talk about what we've been doing at Indio. A lot of them use, believe it or not, the lights. Of course, they love the restaurant. But it was really nice to see that, you know, all our hard work does not go unrecognized. And it was really nice to see that. And my last announcement is National Night Out will be coming up on Tuesday, October the 6th. Our city police department, like many other public agencies, there's two dates that that national recognition is done. The one is in August, the first Tuesday. We can't have that event because it's so hot. So the second date is always the first Tuesday of October. So I welcome that the community come out. And also not only that, because it's public safety, learn from some of the things that were presented today by our police department and maybe interact and work with our public safety to learn more than what we just learned about what was presented tonight. And that is my report, Mayor.

That's quite the report. Thank you very much, Council Member. I'm just going to go to Council Member Oscar Ortiz.

Thank you, Mayor. I wanted to start off by sharing that we continue to hear very concerning reports coming out of our immigration detention centers. Department of Homeland Security report recently revealed small cages where immigrants were held, which they called calming areas, but looked about the size of a dog kennel. And there also continue to be reports of serious medical neglect, even with cancer patients and pregnant women. I want to thank our council for their support in further pursuing legal action to get the transparency we've been asking for for the past nine months. And thank you to our staff as well for getting our files ready, which we'll be sending to Attorney General Rob Bonta's office this week. At the end of August, I also flew out to San Francisco to the California Supreme Court, where I was a plaintiff in a case regarding the voting ballots that were seized by Sheriff Chad Bianco. I was represented by the UCLA Voting Rights Project. And they made the case to the Supreme Court that voting ballots cannot be treated like regular evidence, and the right procedures need to be followed for investigating vote counts. For example, counting ballots is a public process where both parties, journalists and the public, are welcome to be witnesses. But the Sheriff's Department has admitted to counting these ballots with their workers in private. We hope to hear some good news from the Supreme Court soon to get these ballots back in the hands of those legally allowed and trained to handle them. On August 26, we honored Corporal Hunter Lopez, who we lost to an attack during the evacuation in Afghanistan in 2021. I was able to attend the memorial run at Shadow Hills High School and the ceremony at La Quinta Civic Center Park. Last week, I attended the 9-11 Memorial at Miles Park to unveil our new Memorial. Thank you to our staff for their great work on the Memorial and on that event. I also attended another 9-11 Memorial with our partners at the American Legion here in Indio. This past weekend, I attended our Viva Indio event and had the chance to hang out with our new youth advisory council who were hosting an arts and crafts booth there. We got to talk about what they want to major in in college and what careers are thinking of. And I just wanted to thank them and our staff for that event. It was a really hot and humid day and everyone was out there working away and keeping things going for our community. So thank you very much. And lastly, I attended the Riverside County of Education ribbon cutting for their new conference center here in Indio, as Mr. Withron mentioned. And I wanted to thank them for bringing this new resource for our school districts so that they can have a large space to gather and share ideas and work together to improve our opportunities for our students and for our schools. That's all I have. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Council Member Miller.

Madam Mayor, all my commissions were dark as most of all of ours were, but I want to highlight just a couple. And I think a lot of these events we were all at Together 1 was the Riverside County office of education, the new Indio conference center, which would be a great asset not only to our students and our teachers, but also the community. They've offered that up for other agencies and groups to be able to use as a conference center to have more gatherings here, which is. desperately needed and the first one that they're actually going to have it on is the student of the month for all the senior students at all the high schools they're going to have their breakfast there instead of that fantasy spring so that's going to be their first test run of actually having students and community together so that's a great opportunity I want to thank you for the Greater Coachella Valley Chamber of Commerce, the all mayor, tribal leaders and the county supervisor talked about what was important to them, asked them questions about what's going on in the city and how they're handling things and where we look forward to working as a region. That's what makes this Coachella Valley so great is we all work together to make it a better place to live. And the mayor represented us very well on answering the questions that what India is doing to be a part of that. So thank you, Mayor, for your leadership on that. And then the last, I think, is the 9-11 remembrance ceremony. Our staff did a great job. We have our veterans there. Thank all of them. Our police and fire department were there in force to recognize all those that lost their lives, especially the ones that actually ran into the buildings before they went down and how it affected so many people, not only then the wars that pursued after that, but also the cancers and other illnesses that happened to a lot of the people there that were just there trying to get out of the way. So it's sad to see that, but it's nice to have that 9-11 piece there, the beam that was put up and recognized. Our arts commission and our city did a great job of putting that together. and putting that up there, and right next to it, as Mr. Guitron said, is our new memorial park for our veterans. So we'll be issuing that and opening that up hopefully very shortly. And then one thing I was especially able to do, a lot of the elected leaders from the different cities went to Temple Isaiah. They had a special 9-11 event there for the 25th year. anniversary of 9-11 and was able to represent the city of Indio at the temple as they were when a lot of the other events were there. So my thanks to them. And Madam Mayor, that's all. Thank you.

Thank you so much for that. Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you and good evening. In the interest of time, I'm going to try to culminate these and be pretty fast. We have some pretty important topics to tackle. So I did attend the September 11th memorial and Riverside County Office of Education grand opening, and also a ribbon cutting for West Cali cuts here in the city of Indio. I'm very brief in those, but they're very important. And I want to thank everyone who had a hand, staff, the community, the artists, and everyone who recognized these important events and dates. I also attended the do the right thing ceremony in Palm Springs that recognizes young people throughout the Coachella Valley for their positive choices, leadership, and accomplishments. I want to thank Terry Cutover and our new Palm Springs Police Chief, Chief Kyle Stern, who's taken over for Chief Mills and congratulations to Chief Andy Mills on his graduate, retirement, I'm sorry. And also thank you to Attorney Walter Clark for all that they do for our students and recognizing the great accomplishments that a lot of our students are, are gaining in our valley. And we have one student from the city of Indio that was recognized from Amistad High School. So congratulations to him. I did have one committee meeting. I had the homelessness committee meeting this morning where I was voted by my peers to stay as the chair for the fifth year of that committee. We had a great presentation by the Torres Martinez Tribe on their tiny homes that they have on their reservation. I have to commend them. I think it's a model for what our Valley could do, not only for unsheltered individuals, but for transitional housing, for student housing, and also for affordable housing. So if you get a chance to look online, whether through Coachella Valley Association of Governments or Torres Martinez Tribe, look at their tiny home builders that they have for their unsheltered community. They did a really great job. of doing that and bringing the resources together to make that happen. So congratulations to Torres Martinez. I also, there's also a item on there, actually, excuse me, not an item. I'll share a couple of things that we got out of this meeting. So, you know, as the chair of the homelessness committee, I take on sheltered individuals and homeless prevention very personal. So oftentimes I'm out in the community by myself doing outreach. I don't encourage folks to do that by themselves. However, sometimes I happen to be out there. And so sometimes when I'm out there, I encounter certain issues. And one of the issues I encounter is when you try to get into a shelter or get some sort of resources, you do need some sort of identification. As we know, sometimes when people are chronically homeless, they do not have documentation to identify who they are. So I asked the committee to work with the executive committee and maybe even our local state elected officials to work with the California Department of motor vehicles to get some sort of temporary ID portal where if we're out doing outreach at midnight under a bridge and someone needs identification, DMV is not open, right? So you can't get identification at that time. So we're trying to get some sort of temporary ID portal through motor vehicles where we could identify someone, unspot, get them into a shelter, and then follow up when DMVs open or get them appointment to DMV because that's a big issue we have with unsheltered individuals of not having documentation. You can't get resources if we don't know who someone is and we can't house some people if we don't know who they are. correct so um that's one of the things that i i requested and another thing is a centralized location for criteria of clients to get services so sometimes you encounter individuals on the street who may have a certain criteria where they can't get into the rescue mission or they can't get into martha's or they have a pet that they want to take care of So we're working with the county and coming up with a centralized hub where you could put that criteria in and it'll direct you to the certain services that we have. And so I just want to show recognition to Riverside County office. It's bogging my mind right now. It's been a long day. No, not education, but it was another one. Crisis. It was a crisis resource. I was able to get someone in. So the services are there. The resources in our valley is there. One of the difficult things is where are they at? How do we find them? And what service do I need? Is it 211? Do I call the number 211? Is it Martha's Village and Kitchen? So we need a centralized location so our clients get those services. So that's something that the homelessness committee is working on. And that concludes my report, Madam Mayor.

Thank you so much. Yes. A lot of great things. We are all very, very involved in this community. I'll go through as briefly as possible. Also attended Riverside County Office of Education. And I think the reason that that building is so important is it just represents team building, collaboration, and the ability for people to meet and get together, our teachers, our educators, to look at ways that we can better educate and engage our kids. I attended along with staff, the Almastad community meeting. We're looking at a grant for sustainability. And so being able to talk to some of the folks that came out in the neighborhood to understand what their needs were, whether it was solar, a lot of folks still had the old single pane windows, and there was just their houses were just not energy efficient. And so we learned a little bit about what the issues were and what the need is. And we'll take that information when we apply for our grant. Attended the ribbon cutting at West Cali Cuts again. So many businesses are coming to Indio and opening up shop. We're friendly. We look to find different ways to support our businesses. And it was really great to have them open up in our community. I attended coffee with Kelly, so that's with the superintendent and that's a really great opportunity to talk with again the superintendent and some of the kids. It was at Johnson Elementary and there's nothing more fun than going to an elementary school the first week of school and seeing all the kids and all the parents drop their kids off and the kids are just so excited and energized about going to school, about all the different things that they do. And of course, you know, resource, recess, it's an elementary school. and they were very excited, but really a great show of a number of people at this elementary school there to support our kids. Same thing, Tip a Cop at Texas Roadhouse, and that really was for a good cause, a very, very good cause. The Coachella Valley Conservation Commission, We were taking a lot of time in trying to understand. We do desire to conserve our lands here in the desert, but that has to mix and blend with our construction and our goals for development, and that will be a process. 9-11 event, I think that's just so, the memorial is so important to me to make sure that we remember to honor and to memorialize And right next to that, of course, is the veterans soon to be the veterans monument there so that we can reflect all generations can learn and reflect on what has happened and what has gone before us. Let's see, what else? Just a couple of quick things. Viva India was fun. Yeah, it was a little hot out there, but it's always great. Music was great. The food is great. I mean, it just doesn't get any better than that. So for any of you that haven't come to any of our events, Second Saturdays, you know, there's music or a festival. Tamale Festival, there is something, there is more than one thing going on in the city every month for families. A couple of important things with respect to the Coachella Valley Association of Governments, the Transportation Commission. Let's see, $1.25 million grant from the Mountains Conservancy for a shade on the CV link. So what that means is that there's going to be a whole lot of trees planted. And I think that's the net of that conversation. Anytime we can plant trees, and the city has planted, gosh, several hundred, and we're going to plant several hundred more. And in this case, this 1.2 million was for a lot of shade on CB Lincoln, other areas, right-of-way areas. Also, some dollars were allocated for the Avenue 50 widening on Jefferson to Jackson Street. That program, $2.6 million. And then we talked about... We talked about how to better, you know, as our population grows and more people come to our desert, you know, there's always issues with streets. And the question came up is do they always have to be widened? Or can we restripe? Can we look at alternate ways to have a better flow of traffic without just going across, tearing up the streets, and widening the streets? and that's one of the conversations that we had there. And is Kim Hardy here? She's president of Coachella Animal Network, and I promised if she wasn't here I would read that. She just had an animal clinic. She is forever out there trying to find fosters for the stray animals. to try to make sure that the underserved can spay and neuter and get their vaccinations. So real quick, I will give you her synopsis. A clinic this weekend, five homeless dogs, and by homeless meaning attached to someone homeless. Thank you to Martha's Village for understanding the need for people to have dogs or animals in their life with them when they're going through this transition. They did the spayed or neutered five homeless dogs that were in our areas. And 62 pets were sterilized and 186 pet owners for vaccines and pets and microchips for pets. So trying, she's trying really hard, kudos to Kim Hardy for trying really hard to manage the animal population and to really provide an affordable avenue for people to keep their pets healthy. And the All-Mayor Luncheon was really terrific. It's just always such a privilege to be a part of that. It was really an outstanding event. And that ends my my presentation for meetings attended in council reports. Item number 10, consent calendar. Does anyone wish to pull anything on the consent calendar? Okay, go right ahead. Is anybody else before you? No, okay, go right ahead.

I had asked in discussion with the city manager that we pull item 10-7, more of an informational. because it deals with something that's always a topic with our community regarding our roads and streets. And it's on the item and it was brief. I know the city manager was gonna inform Director Tim Wessel to make sure. It should be very brief. We all get discussions about what's the status on our streets, what does this mean?

is there we go we're going to have our principal engineer don reno address that item i thought you looked short for tim i just

Yeah, real quick, item 10-7 is the safety action plan that is, we actually got a grant for $500,000 from the federal government. And basically what they do is look at safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, all modes of transportation in a holistic way. So it's not just making the road safer, it's making, using, whatever tools in toolbox, but what this grant funds is the community outreach. There's a huge community outreach component to that, which will include safety walk audits at local schools, community feedback via surveys online, also in person. and also, you know, reflecting all the different master plans that we have in the city and put it all into one comprehensive document. So, you know, taking our newly revised general plan, our CFROTS to school master plan, various pedestrian and bike safety master plans that we have, and it does it in a comprehensive way, reaching out to the community, not only working with staff and our public safety, but it also gives the opportunity for the community to provide feedback to the city, to direct how we prioritize safety regarding transportation in the city. And then the nice thing about this is, With all that feedback, they do prioritize a list of projects that is recommended for the city to tackle. And then we use this document to apply for grants and leverage our successes in past grants to get more funds to fix our streets, look at traffic safety, speeding, and just kind of do it in a holistic way of taking account

all the different modes of transportation so great information yeah i just can we make sure that we as part of that conversation include any different types of road uh bumps that could be available for different i i keep getting that question everywhere so just making sure that we have that as part of that overall conversation

Yeah, usually you'll see this happen throughout, I think several of the cities in the Coachella Valley are all doing their comprehensive safety master plan, but it does include a component as far as traffic calming toolboxes. So it will evaluate the different types of measures that a city could use for um traffic calming and um you know those will be a part of the final document that would eventually return to the city council for approval okay thank you yep madame if i could real quick yeah does that include roundabouts also right and that is that part of our discussion i i actually think they work very well in slowing down traffic if they're done right the Typically, yes. We've all seen the ones in La Quinta, so that will be a part of the discussion. If that's a priority to the council or the community, we could definitely have them, I guess, flush that out a lot more as far as possible uses in the city and then what we're trying to accomplish on those corridors in our city. Thank you.

Well, Don, I appreciate the details because that's a common thing in our growing cities is our streets and traffic calming because some of our older streets that some of the things were challenged with the day wasn't looked at then as things change. And also looking at some of the technology of LED lighting that's now permitted around stop signs to give awareness. So whatever the traffic team from the police department and you folks in engineering and public works, I'm glad that this will make, but public is constantly coming up, so I appreciate it.

Yeah, definitely. I know we all hear the same thing. Safety, you know, the good news is our residents out there, we are all concerned about safety, safety of our kids around the areas where there's schools or parks. And so I'm really looking forward to the results of that.

Yeah, and one thing I want to add, it is safe routes for all, so it also includes a component of our, I guess, seniors or not only children, but all age ranges from, you know, womb to tomb, like everything in between. Terrific.

Yeah. That's good to hear. That's great. Anything we can do to make our city safer. That's excellent. Thank you very much.

Thank you all.

Does anyone else wish to pull anything?

No, but I'll be happy to make a motion except to consent calendar as presented, noting that 10-12 and 10-13, the mayor has abstained on those items.

I'll second that. Go ahead and vote. Okay, next are administrative items. Motion passes, by the way, 5-0. I'm going to hand this over to our Mayor Pro Tem to handle the administrative items.

Okay, so we'll move on to administrative items. Item 11.1 is resolution number 10606, establishing the citywide sponsorship, acceptance, and recognition policy. Who will be handling this?

Thank you, Mayor Pro Temp. Just committee. I was going to handle this one. Okay.

Jessica Mediano, Marketing and Public Information Officer. Hello, Council. I am here to discuss the adoption of resolution number 10606, establishing a citywide sponsorship acceptance and recognition policy, approving a short-form sponsorship agreement, and delegating authority to the city manager to accept and document sponsorships. So essentially what we're here today is the city does not have a formal policy for our sponsorships. This is ones that we would be receiving primarily for events. As we continue to expand the city's events, this includes State of the City, the upcoming Tamale Festival, and a variety of other events. THIS WOULD OUTLINE AND PUT TOGETHER THE FORMAL POLICY OF WHAT TYPES OF SPONSORSHIPS AND THE ENTITIES OR BUSINESSES THAT WOULD BE PERMITTED TO DO SPONSORSHIP ACTIVITY WITH THE CITY AS WELL AS OUTLINE THAT THESE WOULD BE FOR SPONSORSHIPS UP TO $75,000 PERMITTED FOR THE CITY MANAGER TO EXECUTE AND ANYTHING OVER THAT OR ANYTHING THAT WOULD OUTLINE, YOU KNOW, A LARGE SIGNIFICANT SPONSORSHIP WOULD STILL COME BEFORE COUNCIL. Right now, we have the short-form sponsorship agreement presented that would support this, so if you have any questions, I'm here to answer them.

Do we have any questions of Jessica?

Not of staff, but of Jonathan, if I could. Johnson, I know the $75,000 is your threshold of what you can able to do. Would we be having money put aside there, estimates of what we would do, sponsorship? Obviously, some come in between, but when you're talking $40,000, $45,000, usually we budget that. Would that be budgeted beforehand in a certain amount, and then you would take it from that? Or would it be just items that you're looking at that we'd approve in advance?

uh thank you councilmember miller what we would attempt to do with our annual budget is when we're planning something like the tamale festival city we would budget our estimate of revenue that we would get in sponsorship so if we were doing an event we were thinking that the event was going to cost maybe 200 000 we would say that you know we were anticipating maybe a hundred thousand dollars and different revenue sources or we would outline that you know we would have a title sponsor opportunity at x amount of dollars and then other sponsorship tiered from there so this policy helps us outline that and also gives a a clear guide to those who were willing to sponsor about what their benefits with partnering with the city of india is

Because I know most of them, we usually have an advance and like the tomorrow festival and the other ones. And if we do change sponsorships or we do change and bring something in, if it's under seventy five thousand dollars, would you be able to prove it or would that be something that came back to the city? Because we had that opportunity when we had KSQ wanted to talk to us about possibly taking over the Hispanic festival that was in the city of Coachella for many years. and sponsor with them, would that be something that would come to the council or would that be something you would approve if it was decided that it was something we wanted to do?

Yeah, so this policy specifically is to receive sponsorship. Right. If people are paying the city of Indio as a sponsor for one of our events. Right. I think you're discussing opportunities for us to sponsor different events.

It goes both ways. I mean, so if we had one where we're just gonna bring the sponsorship in, would it be also a product of one of the ones we're doing at the same time?

Yeah, possibly. We would try to outline, as we do with our community grants, a certain dollar amount for sponsorships, and then kind of look at it and try to plan our year from there.

Okay, thank you. Okay.

Council Member Guthrow?

Okay.

Okay. Do we have any public comment on this?

This is administrative items. Administrative? No?

Okay. So we can turn it into a motion. Okay.

Go ahead. I'll let you finish this one.

Do I hear a motion? Yeah. Delegating authority to the city manager or designee to accept and execute sponsorship agreements consistent with this policy.

Do I hear a second? Thank you.

I'll second.

All right. Let's go ahead and vote.

It's not coming up on the screen. It's not coming up?

No, not yet at least.

Do we want to do a roll call for this one? There it goes. No?

No, present.

Give me one minute.

We're waiting on Oscar.

Nature was calling. Everyone should take a three-minute recess. I'm just afraid to let the audience go. Why don't I just go?

ROLL CALL. I THINK WE NEED TO DO ROLL CALL.

OKAY THEN. OKAY.

THANK YOU. MOTION PASSES. MOTION PASSES UNANIMOUSLY. THANK YOU VERY, VERY MUCH. I TELL YOU WHAT, WHY DON'T WE TAKE AFTER WE'LL DO 11.2 AND 11.3 AND THEN WE'LL TAKE A QUICK BREAK. Really quick, 11.2, next administrative item, receive a presentation and obtain City Council direction regarding the evaluation of the annual regulatory fee for cost recovery pursuant to ordinance number 1780, section 123.36. Ruby, Director of Finance.

Good evening, Madam Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, City Council, Ruby Walla, Director of Finance for the City of Indio. This evening, I have a presentation to go over cannabis fees as an overview in response to the comments received in the prior City Council meeting, as well as City Council direction for staff to come back with an overview of our fees that we charge for cannabis activity. So as we get started, I wanted to start with an overview THE OVERVIEW OF THE OPERATING PERMIT TIMELINE FOR THE CITY OF INDIO IN IMPLEMENTING CANNABIS ACTIVITIES WITHIN THE CITY. SO JULY 26, 2023, PERMITS WERE ISSUED, FIVE PERMITS ALLOWED WERE ISSUED TO ALL OPERATORS. IN CONNECTION WITH THAT, permit that allowed them to operate and engage in cannabis activity from that effective date through December of 2024 on a calendar year basis. In connection with that permit, it also required that each operator enter into a community benefit agreement. Those agreements were executed between the periods of September 2023 through December 2023. And then we had our first operator, the first of five operators come into operation Q1 of 2024, with all five operators in the City of Video operating quarter three of 2025. In connection with that, as you can tell, we had operators in 2024 and those fully operating in 2025. And in between that period, giving credit to our community development department, specifically planning, working on a process on renewals. As the cannabis operators are required to file an annual regulatory permit to continue those operations. And tied to that permit are conditions that are also tied within the cannabis community benefit agreement that's in place. So working with HDL, the team did get a process in place, and that didn't go live and fully implemented until January 26. So there was a gap from the time the original permit expired at December 31, 2024. The team was getting the renewal process in place, which was executed in January 2026. So we went on a moving forward basis. We did not look back to 2025. So there was a period of what you would consider of a waiver for not implementing a process at that time. And we went on a going forward basis and we actually started renewals this year and charging for the calendar year 2026 permit. Now, talking about the renewal fees, I wanted to share what was presented to City Council at that time. Fees were adopted August 17th, 2022, again, prior to permits being issued, all part of the formation. Those fees, primarily the initial application, which were beyond the five applicants, which they then entered into that process, the application process for selection, It was required at application to pay $10,856. And renewal is actually at 23,000 currently. So in connection with that, we have the annual regulatory permit and application fee, and then other fees that each operator is responsible for is the standard business license to operate within the city. There's also a 6% community benefit fee payment and a 1% benefit payment, which we'll talk a little bit more in detail in the future slide. So again, recapping on the annual regulatory fee, what's presented on this slide is what was presented in August 17, 2027, to show where the city of Indio fell in comparison to the annual regulatory fee. So this actually was a wide scale of various cities throughout California that were surveyed, and you can see where Indio falls kind of in line there. We did do a current survey, but that was only surveying our neighboring cities that actually allow for cannabis activity. And you'll see there is a variance there. We did meet with our partners at HDL currently, and they showed a similar... a schedule to us which you still see the range of as low as eight thousand to over a hundred thousand um because they have a different makeup and how what rolls into those fees and so as far as the retail fee so this is where i was talking about the RETAIL FEE, THE COMMUNITY BENEFIT PAYMENT FEE, WHICH IS DIFFERENT BETWEEN INDIO AND THE REST OF THE NEIGHBORING CITIES IS THAT IT IS A COMMUNITY BENEFIT FEE, A NEGOTIATED FEE. WE DID NOT GO TO THE VOTER POPULATION FOR A VOTER APPROVED TAX. AND THAT IS SOMETHING THAT I FOUND AS WE SURVEYED We are similar to the county. County has a public benefit fee as well. It's not an administered tax. It's also negotiated. However, our structure is a little different than Riverside County in that regard. They charge by the square footage. And this is a comparison strictly on retail as that's what our allowed uses are, storefront retail. SO THIS IS A STRAIGHT COMPARISON THERE, WHERE OTHER CITIES MAY PROVIDE CULTIVATION, MANUFACTURING, AND SO ON AND SO FORTH. SO WE WANTED TO JUST KIND OF GIVE AN EXAMPLE AND DO A COMPARISON OF HOW INDIO OPERATES. AS YOU WILL NOTICE, ALL OUR NEIGHBORING CITIES, MAJORITY ARE ALL VOTER APPROVED. THEY DO HAVE CAPS RANGING FROM 10% TO 15%. Currently, they are all 5% of gross receipts in comparison to our regular 6% of gross receipts. We allow for monthly reporting, no less than quarterly, and the others are doing monthly. So that is the comparison and the difference between ours and the city of Indio and other cities. We do have an additional 1% that is an annual 1% that is not remitted to the city. That is during compliance review for renewal that they have either provided an additional 1% contribution to the community and that's written within the negotiated agreement and all agreements followed the same structure.

Sorry, Ruby. So you're saying in the other cities, Does the 5% include that 1% or does not include that?

No, it does not. It's just 5%. They have the flexibility to change that driven by council. Council may change that percentage by resolution. Recently, some cities started at 10% that I saw in my review. And as recent as 24 and 2025, they have reduced that to 5%. And it looked like that was the trend at that time. Okay, thank you. Yes.

I HAD A QUESTION. JUST CLARIFICATION. SO YOU MENTIONED THIS IS COMMUNITY BENEFIT AND THAT'S WHAT WE CHARGED WAS TOTAL 7%, CORRECT? WITH COMMUNITY BENEFIT AND ADDITIONAL BENEFITS AND THEN THE OTHER CITIES ARE ALL VOTER APPROVED SO THOSE WENT OUT FOR VOTE, CORRECT?

CORRECT.

OKAY. AND IF WE WERE TO CHANGE THIS OR ENTERTAIN THIS IN A LATER TIME, THAT WOULD BE BY RESOLUTION?

so this specifically you would amend the agreements because these are individual negotiated agreements with each operator which they as they went moved through the application process the this agreement was part of that process and this is what they agreed upon in terms of the the conditions for operating cannabis within the city of india okay thank you for the clarification So most recently, as I stated, the significant increase was the introduction of the renewal process and the renewal fee, which is approximately $23,000 that we are currently charging the operators at time of renewal on an annual basis. And with that process, it comes with a review of the conditions. And this I'm providing as this was what was provided in August, 2022, is this is all the categories and all the work that was assumed to roll up and the work that was necessary to administer the program. You talk about code enforcement, legal review, staff time, and so forth. All of these are assumptions, right? So this is a new program coming into the city, taking the expertise of HDL. This is all based on time as most of our Fees are drafted and we prepare a nexus study because this is driven to recapture cost recovery. So that's why the formulation is as such. However, what I want to highlight here is that this is at the discretion of the City Council. These fees were approved by resolution. And there is opportunity at this point for staff to go back and evaluate the renewal regulatory fee to determine what is the cost of the program. We have staff that have gone through the renewal process. We have administered it for, since 2023 when they first went into operation. So we think there is opportunity here to reduce the fee. Our consultant agrees and we'll factor in new rates, new hourly rates, new staff hours as appropriate to see if we can have the proper fee for cost recovery. So to recap, the ordinance in place that governs cannabis activity is Ordinance 1780, otherwise known as Title 11, Chapter 123. And this 123 has the renewal requirement, which also has where it IS TO COVER THE COST OF PROCESSING. SO I BRING THAT TO YOUR ATTENTION. AND THEN THE 123.36 IS JUST THE REQUIREMENT AND AGAIN CAN BE AMENDED BY CITY COUNCIL IF THEY SO CHOOSE AND THEREFORE THESE FEES WERE ADOPTED BY RESOLUTION JUST TO REITERATE THAT AND AGAIN BASED ON ASSUMPTIONS. So what is staff recommending is that you provide staff direction in terms of to reevaluate, do a new nexus study and based on actual data now that we are now actually administering the program. And that concludes my report and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you. Very comprehensive. Does anyone have any questions? If not, we're good. Do I hear a motion? What? So, that's a recommendation if you...

So, Ruby, we're not going to give them any relief now is what you're saying. We're going to draft, go back, look at the hours it takes us and come up with a cost that we believe that will be more conducive to either less or more than $23,000 based on the information we give. How does the other cities I mean, I mean, they seem like they're streamlined it at 12,000 or 5,000 or 8,000. How are they able to be able to cut the cost? And that is it was something that they did by resolution because obviously. That straight up number doesn't usually work. They just pick the number. How do we come up with that to give them relief? And when we do that, how do we look at seeing where they are actually financially to make sure that what they're getting relief for is conducive to how much they're making in terms of, you know, can they pay it? Is everyone current paid all their debts right now?

So currently, we have one operator that's currently outstanding. We have four of five renewals issued. Again, of one operator that is currently outstanding, that actually puts that renewal permit on hold. And so therefore, we have not issued And that was because it's conditioned upon the, that's a condition of the current permit and of renewal. In terms of relief and payments moving forward, these are the fees that are in place and by resolution. AND THOSE WOULD BE THE FEES THAT WE WOULD CONTINUE TO ASSESS MOVING FORWARD UNTIL WE HAVE A NEW NEXUS STUDY. THAT WOULD BE MY RECOMMENDATION ON COST RECOVERY. IT IS AT THE DISCRETION OF CITY COUNCIL AS WHAT YOU SO WISH TO DO WITH THE FEE. SIMILAR TO OTHER AGENCIES, THEY HAVE MADE DECISIONS. AGAIN, I DIDN'T SPEAK TO EACH INDIVIDUAL, THERE'S A LOT OF INFORMATION AVAILABLE ONLINE, BUT SOME OF THE ACTION THAT THEY DID TAKE, MAYBE IT BE RETAIL, MAYBE IT BE MANUFACTURING, YOU KNOW, SOME CITIES ARE MORE SATURATED THAN OTHERS, INDO RESTRICTED IT TO FIVE. SO I THINK IT WAS TO, YOU KNOW, THERE ARE STRATEGIES, I'M ASSUMING IT TO HELP THAT BUSINESS COMMUNITY. But council can also decide to waive it if they so wish and say they don't want a charge regulatory fee. We do have four operators that are all operators have paid that fee now. And a next study would just say, what is cost recovery? And I think it is feasible for the city to do a cost recovery analysis to then get reimbursed for the administration of this program.

Let me finish Ben real quick. I want them to be successful, but also at the same time, how much money are they bringing in to the actual city? Throughout the recovery fee, the 5% or 6% plus the one, which we don't see that they give to either nonprofits or civic. How much money does actually the 6% bring us in with the five dispensaries?

So approximately right now within the for the last 26 year, we actually recovered about six hundred and fifty thousand in in community benefit payments.

So it is quite a quite a bit of money. And that's what I was looking at, how we could look at how successful they are based on what they're bringing in, because I know they need to do delivery. They're looking at doing delivery and other stuff, but it is a good amount of money. And the reason we did it was controversial when first it was three to vote. And it was because we had all the other cities that had cannabis allowed. There was no state laws to stop anybody from transporting it into our city. And my place of where I live at Heritage Palms, it's a 55 and older community. We had quite a few people delivering it that had their own transponders. So we had all these other cities bringing it into our city where the money was going back to there. And that's one of the reasons we decided to bring in the locations into the city of Indio. And 600,000 is a good amount of money.

Correct. And just to add to that, Council did give direction at that time as well as 1% of that 6% is then reallocated. The Coachella Valley History Museum is a beneficiary of that. So we into Indio Performing Arts. uh india public arts and then at that time was the iedc in terms of that is retained currently by the general fund so there was a strategy there proposed and which we have been administering as well

Yes, sir. I just think that obviously I'm looking at it as a business and I see a business or businesses that are coming to us like any other business and they're trying to obviously keep above water. Businesses change, challenges come up. I just think that we just need to reevaluate it. I mean, they brought it up to us. You're giving us an avenue to deal with it. So I think we should probably evaluate it. Once our facts are before us, then we'll have to make that call. And I think that if there is a path to do that now, as long as our finance director and the city manager, obviously, they're gonna have to look at what that evaluation looks like at the best interest of the city. But there's the businesses that are coming that have spoken a specific line of business, I think we need to evaluate. There's also some, this is not for discussion now, but there's some clarity things that have been expressed to me by some of these businesses. And I think the city manager and his staff can evaluate that beyond this. But I think we at least need to evaluate it because it was brought up to us, like the rest of our businesses in the community are constantly seeking what can we do to make it better.

Okay, before we do a motion, I do have a request to speak. Kenneth Churchill.

Good evening, Council, and thank you, Ruby. I do think that was a very thorough presentation. I just want to speak on behalf of myself, owner of West Coast Cannabis Club, and the other operators within the city, and just highlight that these fees Obviously not the only elevated cost of doing business that we have as cannabis operators our rent is more our insurance is more we have a typically a $20 minimum wage as businesses Everything that we do cost a little bit extra specifically with the HDL fee My impression is that the reason that it's so elevated here in the city of Indio is because we pay a third party company to basically do a redundancy of what the state already does in enforcement. And so cities like Palm Desert that don't have a fee, DHS that don't have a fee, they rely on the state to enforce these regulations that they already have to do. We already have to do background checks with the state. We already have to go through all of these hurdles to make sure that these things are happening. And then it's happening again at the city level. And so we have to remember that I know it's not the city's fault that the state charges us as much as they do, but they do. We're over 30% taxes if you conclude our 7% community benefits as businesses. And so even if I do a million and a half dollars as a business and I'm going to share my P&L with every single one of you, I'm barely breaking even and that's if I'm able to pay all my taxes on time because if I don't pay my taxes on time, if they are a day late, I am charged a 25% fee right off the bat and then added interest on top of it. So for the first eight months that I was in business when I started in the middle of summer, I was losing $20,000 a month and I'm expected to just find that money to give it back to the city and because at one point i was told if you don't pay this renewal fee we're shutting you down if you don't pay these taxes by this day we're shutting you down and it just creates a really difficult cycle and i'm telling you our goal is to try to put more money back into this community not and to not go out of business you guys know i'm the board chair for friends of the children here locally i'm on the board of coachella valley history museum i spend as much time and money as i can trying to make an impact inside of this community And right now, I'm just feeling quite overwhelmed by the amount of expenses. Like you said, $600,000. That's not including the 8.7% sales tax that we're already paying and the $23,000 that we're having to pay as a renewal. That $23,000 renewal fee is more than a quarterly benefit payment for most of these businesses. Most of these businesses are paying $15,000 a quarter on that 7%, and their renewal fee is $23,000. And so, you know, I guess what we're asking is remove the third party, set a fee that is fair for the city, and let that go back to the city staff or the people who actually have to do something, or nobody at all. Because, frankly, our renewal process...

pleasure of the council i agree with the nexus study you know i think in every fee that we have we try to do our best to make sure that neither the customer is overpaying or the taxpayer is overpaying on their end too so i agree with that study it's been a couple of years so let's look at it and see where we're at and and where to move forward from there.

Yeah, and I agree with it as well. You know, when we pass this ordinance, one of the things I would say is I want this to be treated like a normal business. Well, you know, it's not treated like a normal business. Look at the taxes, look how much they're regulated from the state and local level. And how do we expect our local businesses to thrive if we're having all these fees pushed upon them? and how can we make them better how can we make them more successful is it um i know it was mentioned earlier delivery you know we have delivery um is it lounges right um we we constantly uh um support some of our young folks and um other societies that you know want us to mitigate secondhand smoke so do we give folks a place where they can consume somewhere responsible so how can we make our businesses thrive and even with the the seven percent you know I understand that it's community benefit so what does that look like you know if we were able to come back in and reduce it and kind of be in uniform with other valley cities what does it look like you know what is it where are we going to draw back because $600,000 going to community benefit sounds like a really good thing, but that's a $600,000 tax on a business, right? Or businesses, I should say. So I'm looking forward to seeing this come back and how we could make them be successful.

Madam Mayor. Yes, sir. What kind of time, Ruby, what kind of timeframe are we looking at? Obviously they're looking for relief. Would we go backwards in that? And I agree with them kind of on the double looking into it to their overview, but we do have to have some oversight just like we do any of our other businesses. And we can't, you know, it's in the city of India. We got to make sure they follow the rules and regulations that we have in place. But are we talking two months to get this done three months? Because they're looking at some kind of relief. I don't want this to go on drag on because we're only three months from the next year to start this thing over again.

Right. As long as we get direction, I believe we can capture it within two months. As we're getting ready to gear up for the 2027 renewal, we could time it so that we can get that in place and in queue for the 2027 renewal. So we can work with HDL. We did meet with them. We are under contract with them on an as-needed basis. So they are available. We did debrief on this as far as to get me a prize in terms of, you know, historically what happened with this fee and where we're at today. But I think we can reasonably get that accomplished because we actually have the study, right? We have the... foundation for it of how we got here. Now we just have to go and look at update current rates, right? Because hourly rates today versus 2022, the staff time. So it'll be how we look at that. And there are opportunities and at high level, we identify that this is the area specifically that we know that we can reduce the fee. It seems to be evident. And again, because the city did their best effort moving forward to implement this program. And again, these were the best assumptions at that time, unknowing of what it would actually look like. So this was the action and the way it was presented to city council at that time. And I believe presented in the most honest and upfront and transparent way. But yeah, I think there is opportunity now because we're in it and we can put real dollars and real staff time in correlation with it to have true cost recovery.

Madam Mayor. Yes. I'd like to make a motion.

Thank you. As I say, we do need to study this and we do need a motion.

I'd like to make a motion based on the recommendations that's been presented to us by Director Ruby Wall about doing this analysis and to do it within the time period that she just explained and to come back to the Council with that completed report. Absolutely.

Okay. Do I hear a second? Okay, terrific. Let's go ahead and vote. Okay. Motion passes unanimously. So we will be taking a look and a hard look and seeing where we can fine tune. Thank you. We have one more administrative and then we'll take a break. So 11.3, interim urgency ordinance numbers, 1848 and 1849, adoption of two interim urgency ordinances, each effective immediately upon a four-fifths vote relating to accessory massage and massage establishments and tattoo, body art, and piercing establishments. Thank you for bringing this forward, staff. City Attorney.

THANK YOU MAYOR STEPHEN GRAHAM PACIFICO YOUR CITY ATTORNEY OVER THE LAST FEW MEETINGS WE'VE HAD A FEW INDIVIDUALS WHO HAVE ATTEMPTED TO OPEN BUSINESSES IN THE CITY OF INDIO COME TO CITY COUNCIL MEETINGS AND EXPRESS CONCERNS ABOUT HOW THE INDIO UNIFIED DEVELOPMENT CODE WAS BEING APPLIED TO THESE TWO SERVICE BUSINESS TYPES SPECIFICALLY ACCESSORY MASSAGE as well as body art or tattoo studios. I want to be really clear, accessory massage means that it is a secondary use at an existing primary use. Currently, accessory massage is only allowed at medical facilities, essentially. So that would prohibit resorts, sports clubs, and the other types of day spas, the other types of places that you would typically expect TO SEE THAT TYPE OF ACCESSORY USE. ON THE TATTOO BODY ART AND PIERCING THERE WERE A SIGNIFICANT NUMBER OF LOCATIONAL RESTRICTIONS THAT WHEN TAKEN TOGETHER DRAMATICALLY REDUCED THE AVAILABLE LOCATIONS WITHIN THE CITY OF INDIO THAT THESE COULD I REVIEWED THE RECENT CHANGES IN BOTH STATE LAW AND FEDERAL LAW ON BOTH OF THESE TOPICS. WHEN THESE ORDINANCES WERE ORIGINALLY DRAFTED, CITY OF INDIO HAS BEEN AROUND A LONG TIME, THE LAWS HAVE CHANGED. WHEN THESE WERE ORIGINALLY DRAFTED, THEY WERE TYPICALLY SEEN AS NUISANCE TYPE USES, BUT OVER THE LAST 10 TO 15 YEARS, AS THE STATE HAS GONE TOWARDS REGULATING THE HEALTH AND SAFETY SIDE OF THIS MORE. THEY ARE TREATED UNDER CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLES AS ESSENTIALLY ANY OTHER PERSONAL CARE TYPE USE LIKE A NAIL SALON OR A BARBERSHOP. SO WE HAD BEGUN THE PROCESS AFTER HEARING THOSE INDIVIDUALS COME TO THE MEETING OF DRAFTING THE REVISIONS TO THE UNIFIED DEVELOPMENT CODE AS WELL AS THE INDIO MUNICIPAL CODE. I INFORMED THE MAYOR AS WE'RE TALKING ABOUT FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS THAT THE DRAFTS WERE PREPARED BUT BECAUSE THESE INVOLVED CHANGES TO THE DEVELOPMENT CODE, THE REGULAR PROCESS FOR THEM ON REGULAR ORDER WOULD BE TO SEND IT TO THE PLANNING COMMISSION FOR A NOTICED PUBLIC HEARING WITH 20 DAYS NOTICE, FOLLOWED BY A NOTICED PUBLIC HEARING AT THE CITY COUNCIL WITH 10 DAYS NOTICE, FOLLOWED BY A SECOND READING, FOLLOWED BY 30 DAYS BEFORE IT GOES INTO EFFECT. THE MAYOR FELT THAT THIS APPEARED TO BE RELATIVELY NONCONTROVERSIAL WHEN ORIGINALLY THE COUNCIL HAD DISCUSSED IT. AND THERE WASN'T NECESSARILY A NEED TO DELAY THOSE BUSINESSES AND OTHER BUSINESSES THE OPPORTUNITY TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF PERHAPS A MORE APPROPRIATE REGULATORY STRUCTURE. the regulations do focus more heavily on the operational side of these facilities now so if you look at the tattoo and body art there are significant number of regulations regarding needles regarding lighting regarding entrances and things like that which are the more appropriate types of regulations for these uses as opposed to 10 DIFFERENT DISTANCE REQUIREMENTS THAT ONE MAY NEED TO HAVE. I'M HAPPY TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS THAT THE COUNCIL HAS SPECIFICALLY ABOUT THE ORDINANCES, BUT THE REQUEST IS TO TAKE VOTES ON THE INTERIM ORDINANCES, WHICH DO REQUIRE A FOUR FIFTHS VOTE IN ORDER TO PASS. THOSE WOULD GO INTO EFFECT IMMEDIATELY. THE ADDITIONAL REQUEST IS THAT THE COUNCIL DIRECT STAFF TO BRING THESE IDENTICAL ORDINANCES TO THE PLANNING COMMISSION. for their review they may have some additions or changes that they want you to consider but ultimately we would bring those through the regular process you'd have the public hearing for the City Council and whatever you end up approving would supersede these we don't anticipate there being a lot of changes through that process this was relatively technical exercise but of course I can't predict the future Mayor and Council.

Thank you, thank you. I have some thoughts on it, but I will let Council Member Guttron speak.

I'm sorry, I just have two questions because one was brought to me by folks that had questions, I guess. So number one, these establishments as they are permitted, does it include distance from schools? Does it include from churches? That's what was asked of me. I say, don't know, I'm gonna have to leave up to our staff.

Understood. THE LOCATIONAL RESTRICTIONS ARE PUTTING THEM IN COMMERCIAL AREAS. TYPICALLY WE DON'T HAVE SCHOOLS OR CHURCHES IN COMMERCIAL AREAS NOW. I DID TAKE OUT THE DISTANCE-BASED RESTRICTION ON THEM AS THE MORE OF THOSE WE ADDED, THE FEWER AVAILABLE PARCELS THERE WERE TO ENGAGE IN IT. Additionally, on the tattoo side, there is some ninth circuit case law protecting this type of use under first amendment principles that I wanted to make sure that we were following best practices on. But to answer your question, no, However, one of the things that we did add was restrictions on lighting, signage, how it can be viewed from the exterior of the property. So I think we address probably the perceived nuisance concerns in a different way.

And the second question was, will this affect any current cases that have been currently under review by either police or other public agencies?

THAT'S AN EXCELLENT QUESTION. THESE WOULD GO INTO EFFECT IMMEDIATELY. THESE WOULD BE THE STANDARDS THAT WE APPLY FOR THOSE APPLICATIONS. THEY GENERALLY SPEAKING WOULD NOT AFFECT THE VALIDITY OF ANY APPLICANT. ADDITIONALLY, AS FAR AS THE OPERATIONAL REQUIREMENTS GO, THINGS LIKE ENSURING CLEAN NEEDLES AND THINGS LIKE THAT, IT GIVES EXISTING BUSINESSES 180 DAYS TO GET THEMSELVES IN FULL COMPLIANCE. WE UNDERSTAND THERE MAY BE A COST ASSOCIATED WITH THAT, A REVIEW OF THE ORDINANCE. SO WE DID TAKE SPECIAL CARE THAT WE ARE NOT GOING TO UPSET THE APPLE CART. WE'RE TRYING TO BE BUSINESS FRIENDLY. WE'RE NOT TRYING TO THROW IN ROADBLOCKS FOR ANYBODY.

And I think the reason the question came up is seeing what a few of our other cities always incur on a regular basis where they go through the process and that's not what they're really doing. I think that was the concern from what's happened in the other Valley cities.

All right, thank you for your time. Any other comments? Go right ahead.

So I'm fine with the tattoo and the body piercing thing. I'm more worried about the massage itself. It's one of the things we we've limited because of certain reasons for illegal activity, from human trafficking to other things. But what gives us The where thought when somebody says a day spot, you know, when you're talking massage in the facial, they do stretches. If you have one of these nice spas that comes in, they usually do all kinds of wellness, anything from weight loss to facials, massages, wellness. techniques that they might do for anything else it could be stretching and could be saunas whatever it is it's a it's a wellness package and it's used like a spa you would see at the the resort maybe at the kinta resort or one of the other ones what we've always tried to get away with just the regular spas where somebody comes in and says we're a day spa and we have this and it becomes a nuisance if that becomes the case how do we regulate it to make sure that it is that process. It is part of a larger business, not just straight up massages. And secondly, if we do do that, how will police have the wherewithal to be able to stop it? Or how do we stop them to regulate them if they're not following the rules? Because we can't just let it go on, especially if there's illegal activity, if it's something from human trafficking or worse. we've got to be able to shut it down. The police have to have the tools to be able to shut it down to make sure that it doesn't become a nuisance for 80, 60, 120 days, whatever it takes us to really go through the courts and get it done.

That's an excellent question, Councilmember. I drafted the ordinance using experience and shutting down those exact type of uses through my career including one just last year in another jurisdiction so if you look at page 751 of the backup it includes the objective accessory use criteria so we don't just say it has to be an accessory use and then we all wonder what does that mean right so first it has to have a primary use IT HAS TO HAVE CONTINUOUS NONMASSAGE SERVICE. SO THEY CAN NEVER OFFER MASSAGE WHEN THEY'RE NOT OFFERING THE OTHER PRIMARY SERVICES. GROSS FLOOR AREA, THE AGGREGATE FLOOR AREA DEVOTED TO MASSAGE CAN BE NO MORE THAN 25% OF THE AREA ALLOWED. THAT COMPORTS ROUGHLY WITH OTHER JURISDICTIONS WHEN I'VE LOOKED. I'VE SEEN 20 TO 30% USED. SO WE WENT WITH 25 RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE. BUT OBVIOUSLY THERE'S SOME ROOM THERE. TREATMENT ROOMS SO IF THERE ARE INDIVIDUAL ROOMS MASSAGE CAN OCCUR IN NO MORE THAN 40% OF THEM AND IN ANY CASE NO MORE THAN FOUR TOTAL SO IT REALLY KEEPS THAT LIMITED SO THAT WE'RE NOT LOOKING AT A LARGE OPERATION. IT NEEDS TO HAVE A SHARED ENTRANCE AND RECEPTION WITH THE MASSAGE USE AND THE OTHER USES THAT ARE IN THE BUILDING SO YOU DON'T HAVE A SEPARATE DOOR JUST FOR THE MASSAGE. IT CANNOT HAVE ANY KIND OF INDEPENDENT OPERATION SO WHEN YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT IT'S PART OF A PACKAGE THAT THAT'S WHAT WE'RE WE'RE GETTING TO THERE SIGNAGE THE WORD MASSAGE OR ANY VARIANT CAN BE NO MORE THAN 25 OF THE TOTAL COPY AREA OF ANY SIGN THEY HAVE IN TOTAL SO NO GIANT sign says massage but then a little thing under it says day spa right um advertising um there's a state uh business professions code on this so we just specifically reference it and then to the human trafficking portion um the biggest issue and telltale that i've seen is um individuals sleeping or living at the facility that's usually our biggest clue that there's a human trafficking issue there so we explicitly call it out if that's something we find the enforcement path is we have all the normal enforcement tools available to us the most effective i found is immediate revocation of their business license and then if that doesn't work then we go in and seek an injunction okay thank you all right any other comments or questions before i wave it weigh in

I think you did a good job on this and you know the goal is this is to prohibit illicit activity and also support some of our local small businesses that might have one massage seat or one massage table that is open from eight to three not at night or not in locations that our zoning precludes right so that's the goal of doing this and also to regulate it you know our police do a good job of investigating crimes in our city and we expect the same of any illicit activity whether it's massage or not but massage therapy is recognized as a health care uh professional today um i can't say that was in the past so it's massage therapy it's not uh the typical or what you would think as a massage power you know so um you know if there's no no further um i'd like to recommend a motion to pass this i'd like to just have a second here because because i think you know as we look at wellness and opportunities for wellness massage is a part of that understand the need for regulation

I also understand that there are places where you can get a therapeutic massage in La Quinta and in Palm Desert and beyond. And I think we're missing out on the ability to have that kind of wellness. We talk about we're going to kick off a wellness function next month here in the city of Indio. So to have a massage as one of the offerings in a in a facility where you're doing nails or whatever and to have that physical therapy component of it I think is important to the city of Indio and I think I have similar concerns. I'm very aware of the potential for the concerns but we're not talking about night spas or night massage or just a place that is solely massage, but as part of an overall wellness package. And I think that's just very important to have as an additional menu item here in our community. As you said, our police department has their eyes out. We all do for things that are illegal, illicit, and just plain distasteful and inappropriate. And I'd like to keep the dollars here in Indio. There are so many folks, there are so many people that go out of the city for a physical therapy type massage. And I'd like to have several of the business owners that work here in the city be able to offer it here. So go ahead, next.

Steven, could you talk a little bit about the signage change as well? I thought that was a good portion of that new recommendation.

Right, so just going back to the signage requirement, it says neither the word massage nor any variant translation, pictorial representation of massage shall constitute more than 25% of the copy area of any sign, window sign or exterior display, nor shall it be a prominent element in any such sign or display. THIS PARAGRAPH IS A STANDARD OF SUBORDINATION AND DOES NOT AUTHORIZE A CITY TO PROHIBIT TRUTHFUL IDENTIFICATION OF LAWFULLY OFFERED SERVICES. SO THAT'S A LITTLE FIRST AMENDMENT SAVING CLAUSE I PUT IN THERE. BUT ESSENTIALLY WHAT WE'RE DOING IS WE'RE ENSURING THAT THIS IS ACTUALLY AN ACCESSORY USE. AND IN MY EXPERIENCE ON THE ENFORCEMENT SIDE, IT IS VERY easy to immediately identify whether it is or is not but the objective criteria are included in there for the purposes of effective code enforcement

Excellent. Okay.

And I appreciate that because it was just like the cannabis thing. That's one of the things I didn't want. I don't want the big signs, green plus signs. I want it to be treated like a regular business, the same as massage. So I appreciate that. We don't want no big signs. And now that we want a professional spa massage therapy services in our city. So mayor.

Okay. Go right ahead. I hear a motion.

Yeah, I'd like to make a motion to pass the interim urgency ordinance number 1848 and 1849, adoption of two interim urgency ordinance effective immediately upon forfeits vote relating to accessory massage and massage establishment and tattoo body art and piercing establishments. I'll second that.

Okay, let's go ahead and vote. Okay, motion passes unanimously. Okay. And on that note, thank you everyone. On that note, let's take, what is it? It's let's literally a five, no more than a 10 minute. I'm going to start banging the gavel here at, at eight 35, but we need a 10 minute break to stretch and use the facility. So let's go ahead and do that. All of us. And we'll be back at eight 35. Come on guys and girls, ladies. But it goes staff presentation, applicant presentation, questions from council, and then the public hearing. That's what I was told to do.

Your mic is up.

Let me get this on there. Thank you, everyone, for coming back. I was so excited that for the massage and tattoo and whatnot that it passed. I neglected. I had four requests to speak. Nicole Bench, Ginger Clark. Carrie Schaff and Lynette Ochoa. And so I would like to give the four of you the opportunity to come up to speak if you still would like to. That was totally my fault. They all left. They're all gone. All right. Well, on behalf of them, congratulations. So now. We're going to move on item number 12, which is public hearings. And the first one is 12.1, resolution numbers 10607, 10608, and 10609. Recommendation from the Planning Commission of the City Council to approve planning review discretionary CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT TO ALLOW THREE DRIVE THROUGH FACILITIES AS THREE LIMITED LAND USES AND TENTATIVE TRACK MAT NUMBER 39527 FOR THE GRAND MARKETPLACE PHASE TWO PROJECT LOCATED AT THE SOUTHWEST CORNER OF HIGHWAY 111 AND RUBIEDOU. MR. GOMEZ.

Hi, good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and members of the City Council. The item before you, 12.1, is the Indio Grand Marketplace, phase two, and I do have a presentation, if we could pull that up. Oh, this is the applicant's presentation, if we could get the PowerPoint. Perfect, thank you. So like I mentioned, the item before you is item 12.1, and it is for case number, let me go back really quick. It's case number Plan PRD 26-0025, Plan CUP 26-0010, and Plan TPM 26-0015. Just a quick background on the project. On May 28, 2025, which was just about a year ago, the Planning Commission did approve the Phase 1 for the project, which consisted of two commercial retail service buildings on approximately 1.1 acres. Phase 1 of the approval is currently under construction, and if you have driven past Highway 111, you've seen that construction is well underway. on august 12th of this year of 2026 the planning commission approved the recommendation to city council to approve the india grand market phase two and just for clarification or as a note for reference um when we when i say project in phases i'm referring to construction phases and it's not the project being faced um or piece mailed So the project site is located south of Highway 111 and it's located between Monroe Street and Rubidoux. As part of the application, the applicant has submitted a tentative parcel map number 39527 to subdivide 6.68 acres. Originally it was comprised of three legal parcels and they're subdividing it into seven parcels and one remainder lot. Highlighted in the presentation or on the map is the three pads that are gonna be as part of phase two. So the planning review discretionary application includes the overall site design, the architecture of the three commercial pads, vehicular and pedestrian circulation, the parking and landscaping. The applicant has also submitted a master sign plan for review as part of this phase. So the proposed site plan as shown is comprised of a 3,500 square foot quick service restaurant with a drive-through facility and also on pad two is a 3,400 square foot drive-through facility and on pad three is a 3,390 square foot financial institution with a drive-up facility. So these are the proposed elevations. The applicant has prepared a presentation and he will go over that in more detail, but this is just to show that the proposed buildings have similar contemporary architecture with varied roof lines. They have decorative material and coordinating building colors and then they have different finishes. So they have the stucco, they have some they have fiber cement and they also have some stone veneers. Here's the proposed color and materials board for the project and when the applicant does their presentation, they will go into more detail of how those are incorporated into each of the buildings. As part of the request, they also submitted a coordinated master sign plan. The sign plan meets the requirements of section 3.11 of the Highway 111 corridor specific plan for private signage. The only deviation that they requested was a 10% increase to the tenant wall sign as shown here on this figure. The proposed landscape plan incorporates several shade trees throughout the project site and it's located within parking areas and also pedestrian walkways. As part of this application, there's also a conditional use permit to allow the three drive-through facilities, which comprises of the two quick-serve restaurants and the one financial institution, and they are also allowed as limited land uses. So one thing to note is that for sub-area 18, they have used up all of the four limited land uses for this area. So staff has reviewed the project and they find it to be consistent with the general plan 2040, the higher 111 corridor specific plan, the unified development code and the subdivision map act. The project was reviewed pursuant to CEQA guidelines section 15183. It's a project consistent with a community plan, general planner zoning, and with the application of the relevant conditions of approval, the project is recommended to be approved. So tonight the action for the City Council is to approve the Planning Commission recommendation to approve resolution number 10607, 10608, and 10609. for the planning review discretionary, the application, the conditional use permit, and the tentative track map 93527 for the Indiagrand marketplace phase two, and also determine that the project is consistent with CEQA pursuant to CEQA guidelines section 15183. That concludes my staff report. I'm here to answer any questions, and so is the applicant if you have any questions for staff.

that thank you before i bring the applicant up do we have any questions for staff okay i'd like to invite the applicant welcome thank you mayor members of the city council my name is brent mcmanigal pleased to be here tonight representing the hagen company and the owner of this facility i can get the PowerPoint that I presented. With me, while they're loading that, with me tonight are members of the Hagen Company's team, led by the chairman and CEO, Mr. Hagen, the executive vice president, Mr. Hagen, Alexander Hagen IV, the president and CEO, Mr. Don Kelly, the Executive Vice President of Leasing, Greg Bradbury, and the Senior Vice President of Construction and Design, Shaheen Shrivani. And we can answer any questions that you have. As I said, and as staff said, we want to thank staff and the Planning Commission for all of their work on this project as we brought it forward. This is a continuation of the redevelopment of the Indio Marketplace, a long-awaited project by both the Hagen Company, who spent a lot of time and effort bringing it to here, as well as the city and staff.

So if I get this.

So. As staff indicated, the Planning Commission has recommended approval for the three standalone buildings, which I'll go into a little bit more detail as we go forward. We want to thank, again, Planning Commission for working with us and with staff to revise one of the conditions related to the trees. We know that there was concern about the palm trees with the phase one. we want to have and have always planned to have a cohesive landscaping as well as building facades around there in accordance with the highway 111 specific plan but those trees in phase one unfortunately due to the undergrounding of utilities that were required by iid could not be saved But they will be replaced. And in phase two, we will be removing one of the entranceways along the eastern property line. Between the main entrance and Rubidoux, we are removing that secondary entrance, which is also right now lined by date palm trees, approximately 20 of them. Those will be reused within the property and the landscaping. So we hope not to have to destroy any more trees, but we'll be reusing them. Along that line, again, a cohesive design and landscaping is what we're presenting and what we will have out there and what was approved by the Planning Commission. This is a rendering of the streetscape of Phase 2. And as staff mentioned, Phase 1 is well under construction. And we're hoping to get that completed after the first of the year. We have the site plan here that shows the buildings in yellow that staff had as a close-up. And then just to the west or to the left are the two buildings that are under construction for phase one right now. Here's a breakdown of the phases. The light blue is on the upper right-hand corner is the current phase that we're talking about right now. The purple are the two buildings that are currently being constructed as part of phase one of the construction. And then they're completing the remodel, the extra remodel of the Harbor Freight. Phase three will be the, once phase one is completed and the last tenant within the Indio Mall is relocated into the new retail buildings, then the retail mall section between the two anchor buildings will be demolished as part of phase three. So here's a picture of phase one under construction. You can see that the buildings have been vertically, and they're working on some of the interior walls, and then we'll start under the finishings. Another close up of the site plan i won't go into more detail unless you have any questions but uh three quick serve restaurants that we hope to get under construction very quickly after we get our plans and after this approval i'm going to go through these it's been a long night for all of us here's our some renderings of the trees that we plan to put in the landscaping plans Again, these will be solidified through the final permitting process with staff and also future tenants. Pad one is a quick serve restaurant. The staff indicated it will have articulation and materials throughout all four sides that have been made the requirements of the specific plan and also have been approved by staff and the planning commission. These buildings will have modern earth tones that go with the desert environment and also, consistent with the requirements, will have drought-tolerant landscaping. Pad 3 here, it will be a financial bank with a drive-through facility. Getting to the Color Materials Board, staff said we have some stacked stone veneer. We have some smooth textures. We have stucco, a balance and blend of colors and materials. And with that, I can take any questions. We thank you tonight and we appreciate your support.

Thank you very much. Most excellent. This is a long time coming. We look forward to it. Any questions? Any comments? I just, it does look great. I just have a question just because I couldn't see quite close enough. So for the drive-throughs, the drive-through will be, I know how you guys do things, but allow me to ask the question. The drive-through will be camouflaged.

Yes. Okay. The staff required a short wall. to hide not only the cars, but also the headlights and the combination of berms so that they are camouflaged and hidden.

That's fantastic. This will be great. Thank you very, very much. You're welcome. No one has any questions. I appreciate that. Okay. At this point, thank you, Mr. Hagan. At this point, I would like to open the public hearing. Public hearing is open. Does anyone wish to speak? Jonathan, you may come up.

Good evening, Council, Madam Mayor. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. I just want to echo some personal disappointment in this project. I have always wanted the Indio Mall to be finished by now, of course, but when this project was first proposed to us back, I don't know, maybe six, seven, eight years ago, I remember there was a presentation there, like towards before FIFA, and we were told this was going to be like the river and going to have housing attached to it, and now it seems like we're just settling for more fast food. And I appreciate... what beauty this will bring to a public street that needs it, but we have enough fast food, we have enough drive-throughs, and we don't have enough housing. And I'll leave it there because this development as is right now does not meet the needs of the district I live in, which is District 4, or the residents of Indua overall. I trust that you guys are trying your best, but this project does not meet those needs, thank you.

Okay this before close a public hearing as anyone else wish to speak. I see no one I'm going to close a public hearing what it is what is I'm sorry. Please Al open up the public hearing again.

My friend.

Hello no. To see you I haven't seen you for about 2 months.

Well,

After you, not, well, not you guys. After the city of India threw me out of there, in been 35 years now, I guess it's been time for something to happen. Whatever happened, we're not supposed to have any dry truth in that area, but I get me started. When I get the dry truth, that's not supposed to happen, but it's better than what it is right now. So I guess everybody wins.

Thank you for your comments.

all right now the public hearing is going once going twice all right public hearing is closed what is the pleasure of the council i'll make a motion to approve resolution number 10607 10608 10609 approving the grand marketplace phase two project including planning review document Discretionary application number PLANPRD26-0025 with the master sign plan conditional use permit application number PLANCUP26-0010 and tentative track map number 39527 and determine that the project is within the scope of the environmental analysts previously prepared pursuant to CEQA guidelines section. 15183. Do I hear a second?

I'll second that.

Great. Let's vote. Passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. Now, item number 12.2. Public hearing to consider denial or approval of the Oasis at Indio project. Final environmental impact report, general plan amendments, specific plan, and supersession of existing plans, zone map amendment, development agreement, and financing tentative parcel map for approximately 183 acres north of Interstate 10 south of Avenue 42, east of the Thousand Palm Stormwater Channel and west of Monroe Street. Mr. Halverson.

Yes, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of the council, thank you very much. Brian Halverson, Director of Community Development. We'll go ahead and put up the presentation that I would like to do. I have a presentation as well as the applicant as well.

Yep.

couple housekeeping items there are some for the public who's interested there are copies of the EIR in the back as well as one or two copies of the specific plan that's before you this evening and the applicant also has some information that they put in the back of the room too on some of the highlights of the project So I just want to start off by explaining the project a little bit and the various components of the oasis at Indio. So this is a proposed mixed use project on 183 acres, just as the mayor specified, southwest corner of Avenue 42 in Monroe. That site is currently vacant and the property is currently in an area of the city's general plan that we call the Avenue 42 corridor. You can see it highlighted there on the map. And this really is an area that the city is envisioning more employment, more housing, and it's really a primary corridor to be developed. THIS IS THE SITE. IT'S COMPOSED OF ABOUT SEVEN EXISTING LOTS OUT THERE. IT'S ALSO OVERLAYED BY A COUPLE EXISTING PROJECT MASTER PLANS. ONE IS THE GATEWAY-SPECIFIC PLAN THERE ON THE WESTERN SIDE AS WELL AS THE CLINTON FREEWAY BUSINESS PARK. THIS EVENING, DEPENDING ON HOW THIS ITEM GOES, THOSE PROJECT MASTER PLANS WOULD NEED TO BE REMOVED FROM THE SITE. YOU CAN SEE THAT IT'S A LARGE SITE, 183 ACRES. So I'm just gonna go through some of the components because there are several. First, the proposal to amend the general plan, land use element, as well as the mobility element. Right now, the existing general plan is mixed use and regional commercial. THE SPECIFIC PLAN DESIGNATION WOULD ALLOW THE SPECIFIC PLAN TO CONTROL IN REGARDS TO THE FUTURE REGULATIONS INSIDE OF THE UDC. THE GENERAL PLAN MOBILITY AMENDMENT BEFORE YOU THIS EVENING IS TO REMOVE A SMALL PORTION OF A ROAD THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN AN EXTENSION OF CLINTON STREET, BUT YOU'LL SEE IT WHEN I SHOW SOME DRAWINGS LATER IN MY PRESENTATION, THAT STREET WOULDN'T BE NEEDED BECAUSE IT WOULD BE A PRIVATE DRIVEWAY THAT WOULD ALLOW CIRCULATION AND ALLOW ACCESS TO A FUTURE RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT. THAT'S JUST A MAP THAT JUST GRAPHICALLY SHOWS WHERE THAT SEGMENT IS PROPOSED TO BE DELETED FROM THE MOBILITY ELEMENT. THE ZONING IS REGIONAL COMMERCIAL AND MIXED USE NEIGHBORHOOD MUN AND MIXED USE SPECIFIC PLAN AND IT WOULD JUST BE COMPLETELY PROPOSED TO JUST AGAIN TO HAVE THE SPECIFIC PLAN CONTROL AND IT WOULD BE MIXED USE SPECIFIC PLAN. So the Waste Specific Plan, what is it? It is a document that establishes the land uses and the development regulations, also implementation strategies. For example, future projects that come to the Planning Commission would need to be looked at. You're not necessarily approving a specific project tonight, so there would be future implementation that would need to be adhered to through this plan. It also customizes the planning standards and review procedures. So instead of using UDC, the applicant has proposed different types of standards that would cater to a mixed-use project that could go on this property eventually. It also addresses infrastructure. We'll talk about in a little while public services, utilities that would be needed to support these future land uses on the property. So also the land uses would be contained within this plan. There are a host of different uses that could be proposed in the future. There's also performance standards, signage, including a potential, if it was, how the applicant wanted to move forward, a digital sign could be an option and is described inside this specific plan, as well as architecture and landscaping standards and guidelines are contained within the specific plan. And of course, the additional entitlements and phasing that I talked about with the administration of the plan. So the specific plan, I'm not gonna go over all of it, but I'm gonna highlight components of it. For example, on this drawing, it does show how the area is divided up into several mixed use areas. Planning area one two and three and then an industrial area as well planning area you'll see in a future Site for a new substation that would be a three acre site set aside so if when future projects come in they would those regulations for those specific planning areas would apply to those projects and Built into the specific plan, there is a little bit of flexibility when it comes to kind of streamlining projects. An administrative review, which would be at the director level, would allow smaller residential projects up to 100 dwelling units, commercial projects up to 10,000 square feet, and also industrial projects up to 100,000 square feet would be at administrative level. Everything else would still go to the Planning Commission. So what's been analyzed as part of the environment impact report and what's shown in this specific plan is a development potential, and that's essentially what it is. 3,200 approximately dwelling units could be attached, could be detached, approximately 20,000 square feet of commercial, and the big number, the 1.8 million industrial square feet. So this specific plan also divides the area up into a couple illustrative site plans, because again, you're not necessarily reviewing a project per se, you're reviewing a framework, you're reviewing potential outcomes on the property one day. For example, if you look at this, I'm only gonna show two. But if you see this one, you'll see two large industrial buildings on the south side, closer to the 10, and then south of Avenue 42, you see attached multifamily housing, two different styles of attached multifamily housing, as well as off to the east, you can see several different pads. Some of them are drive-through pads, kind of like what you approved this evening. There's also a potential for a hotel as well, and also a grocery store. Oh, there we go. So another conceptual layout of containing the specific plan, it would be the industrial component is broken up into multiple buildings. They don't necessarily have to be attached or detached, but this is another iteration of how a project could potentially be laid out on the site with a future entitlement. You also see some additional pads off to the east in planning area three and planning area two. Those are all commercial pads and similar uses as I specified earlier. And then of course, a slightly different layout, but essentially the same for the dwelling units. So I wanted to go over a few of these and go through them quickly. But as part of the specific plan, certain improvements would need to be done on the property. For example, you'll see along Avenue 42, there would need to do improvements to that, half section improvements. There would be a private driveway eventually, like I mentioned earlier, for the residential component. New signal at Avenue 42 in Clinton. And actually, it's technically not Clinton. It'll be a private driveway. New improvements, I already mentioned on Avenue 42, new private driveways, new private roads. You can see for the industrial component, that yellow road would be a separate road for a future industrial project. That would be... a separate entry and exit. It wouldn't mix in with the commercial and the residential project, as well as additional improvements along Monroe Street as well. So this is for vehicle traffic. A big component, but it's not necessarily part of this project, but I know that it's very important and it's absolutely essential in the terms of this project moving forward is the Monroe Bridge. We've talked about it a lot. I just wanted to bring it up on the screen because without the Monroe Bridge expansion, this OASIS project cannot happen. The traffic study, the environmental impact report is all dependent on this increased expansion of the Monroe Bridge. So I'm not going to read all of it. And most of this has been talked about a lot. For example, the construction start, a lot of us are excited that it's going to start in 2027, approximately two years to build it. And some of the costs that are associated with that, additional lanes, there's going to be additional... There's gonna be bike improvements as well, like a cycle track. So all of those things are integral to the OASIS project. So the non-vehicular traffic, for example, you see the Class 4 cycle track along Avenue 42, as well as along Monroe. You also see new proposed sidewalks, signalized crosswalks. You'll see trails that are proposed in the residential area, in the mixed-use areas. You'll also see a new Class 1 bike path in the future as well. So a lot of improvements as part of this project. Not gonna get too much into the final fiscal analysis, but that is a requirement in order to do the specific plan was to do a fiscal analysis. It's been attached to your staff report. And the applicant has a good job of estimating the fiscal impacts that build out the one time and ongoing impacts, economic impacts in regards to construction and ongoing employment as well. And when they do their presentation, they're gonna get into this a little more detail. So also what's before the City Council tonight is a financial parcel map. So essentially what it is, it's not a typical tentative map. It's a map that's allowing them to create the lots for financing purposes. They can sell them, but they can't build on those lots. This is a general layout of what that would be. It's a total of four lots. There is some right-of-way dedication as well, but they range anywhere from, you can see on the screen, four acres all the way up to 99 acres, both commercial, industrial, and residential lots, but for finance purposes. So on the map, it says not for construction. So another element that the council's considering tonight is an oasis development agreement. Myself and the city manager worked very closely with the applicant to make sure that Indio is getting some benefits from the project. For example, affordable housing, a 3.5 million contribution to the Monroe Street Interstate 10 bridge, which is one of the reasons why I wanted to bring it up. drainage easements, three acres of parkland, a public safety contribution in the terms of a police substation that would go in one of those commercial buildings one day, an inline tenant, also annual payments to the public safety CFD, a medical clinic tenant as part of that commercial component of the future project, as well as an annual job fair where the goal is to hire Indio residents. So it's a big document, and I know that the city has been working on it for quite a while, but it's the EIR. I'm gonna quickly summarize some components of the EIR for you tonight. And I wanted to re-emphasize, which I did earlier, how the EIR was structured to look at these two scenarios. So there's a maximum build-out scenario and there's a second scenario, which is a little bit lesser intense. But you can see it ranges from anywhere from 3,200 multifamily units to 1,200. anywhere from 20 000 square feet of commercial to 71 000 square feet the industrial component 1.8 million would remain the same in both of those scenarios that was reviewed as part of the eir so we went through the normal required process which is public review back in 2024 we posted the eir to the website back in may of this year we're required as part of this project to certify that EIR prior to approval to the specific plan. And all of the impacts that were analyzed as part of this environmental review could be mitigated except for two. So those two include greenhouse gas emissions and air quality. And I just want to emphasize one thing because I think it's very important with very large projects. It's extremely common and difficult to mitigate these types of impacts for larger projects. We are a car centric society and there's a lot of cars with commercial projects and even industrial projects. So I just wanted to emphasize that this is common and also a statement of overriding considerations as well.

And let me just go on to the next.

So also required to do a mitigation monitoring reporting program. We have 34 mitigation measures, as well as the program helps for future projects because we're required to make sure those are implemented, those mitigation measures, and it's attached to your council resolution as well. Oops, so I can go back. So just a summary of why we need to do the statement of our considerations. It is a balance of benefits. So the city is trying to strike a balance between the specific economic, legal, social, technological, or other benefits of the project that outweigh the unavoidable environmental impacts. So that would be the greenhouse gases and the air quality. So some of the projects or some of the benefits of the project are, I've already mentioned, there are many of them, including A LOT OF THEM ARE FROM AN ECONOMIC STANDPOINT. THE APPLICANT AND THEIR PRESENTATION WELL TALK ABOUT THE PUBLIC OUTREACH. THERE WAS TONS AND TONS OF PUBLIC OUTREACH FOR THIS PROJECT. THIS PROJECT HAS ACTUALLY BEEN WORKED ON BY THE CITY FOR THREE YEARS. SO THERE HAS BEEN A LOT OF TIME TO REACH OUT TO SOME OF THE SURROUNDING COMMUNITIES THAT I KNOW WILL SPEAK TONIGHT. There's been a lot of time for staff to talk to the community, take emails and phone calls. There's been a lot of outreach, more than six town hall meetings. There's been a planning commission consultation meeting as far back as 2024. There's been email notifications. There's been ongoing engagement with the community. So after staff has reviewed this project, we can say that it is consistent with the general plan. It's also consistent with the Avenue 42 corridor sub area vision and key strategies that are contained in the general plan 2040. And the required specific findings for general plan consistency can be made as well. So the Planning Commission did review this project back in May and June. On a 3-2 vote, the project on May 27th, 2026, by a 3-2 vote, the Planning Commission did recommend denial, and those findings for denial are summarized in the Resolution 2141 as part of your staff report. Now tonight, we are gonna be recommending two options for this project because following the denial, the applicant did make some changes to the specific plan that warranted two options for the council to approve. Now those changes were minor, but they are changes that were as a result of listening to the community and listening to the commission as well. So I'm gonna just go through some of those changes that were in your staff report. They did add some additional employment opportunities, essentially different land uses are contained in there. For example, there's entertainment, there's ag uses, there's more tech uses that have been added to the specific plan as kind of a myriad of examples of uses that a future development could use in a project. ALSO REDUCED THE BUILDING HEIGHTS. SO ONE OF THE THINGS THAT WE HEARD FROM THE COMMUNITY, WERE FROM THE COMMISSION, IS THAT THE PROJECT IS TOO BIG. SO THE DESTRUCT COMPONENT IS TOO BIG, TOO TALL. SO THERE IS GOING TO BE A REDUCTION IN HEIGHT FROM 100 FEET TO 65 FEET. SO THAT'S REFLECTED IN THE SPECIFIC PLAN THAT YOU HAVE THIS EVENING. THERE IS A SMALL ALLOWANCE FOR VARIANCE UP TO 10% THOUGH ON THAT HEIGHT. Also increased setbacks in landscaping along the Interstate 10. So the frontage along the 10 has an increased setback from 10 feet to 35 feet. So that's another one of the changes. In addition to landscaping, the overall landscaping from 10 to 15%. And additional trees would be built in that area that's just on the south side of the project, just north of the 10. and improved industrial design guidelines. So there's guidelines for both the residential component of the specific plan as well as the industrial component. So specifically there's been improvement for the industrial design guidelines, site design, building articulation, treatment and massing. So because the specific plan has been amended and there's been improvements, we wanted to give the council two options this evening for this project. One for denial and one for approval. So option one is for denial to adopt resolution 10610, denying the OASIS and NDO project consistent with the planning commission's recommendation and based on the city council's independent findings set forth in the resolution. Option two is an option for approval. So there are several resolutions. There's also the ordinance that would allow the council to consider approval of the project tonight. Here's the other two ordinances for approving the zoning, a development agreement that I explained, as well as the finance tentative map as well. So that does conclude my presentation of the project, the specific plan and all the components that go with it. I am available to answer any questions at this time.

Thank you. That was a great and comprehensive presentation. Does anyone here on council have questions for staff?

I have one question. If you could go back to the slide with the traffic. One of the earlier slides.

I'll put it back up here.

you talking about the site plans yeah it was one of the it was showing avenue 42 and monroe the improvements that okay you could that one right there i i didn't see okay let me see between Atlanta and Showcase Parkway, both. Okay, two to four lanes. That's what I was looking at on Avenue 42. Is that what that is you're talking about right there? So on Avenue 42 from Monroe. This is the bridge, yeah. Okay, I'm talking down Monroe from Avenue 42 down to Jefferson. Where are the road improvements there? Right now it's currently, what, two lanes?

Are you talking about Varner?

Yeah. Yeah, so where it goes to Avenue 42, turns into Varner, yeah.

So Monroe would be widened to accommodate this project. And not only that, they're actually going to need to dedicate part of their project for that widening of the actual Monroe, not the bridge part that goes along.

I'm referring to when you're headed north and you turn left onto Barner. Where Avenue 42 turns into Varner. For 42? Yes.

Yeah, so they would have to basically do half of the road. They would need to improve half of 42. So remember on the north side, which is not part of this project, when anything on the north of Avenue 42 comes in, then that developer, that project would have to do the other half of Avenue 42. Correct.

Okay. So it just does the bottom half, so to speak.

Full frontage improvements, but facing this project for the specific plan. This side, for the middle of the?

Right, from the, yeah. Okay. So it'll still, on the right-hand side, go down to one lane. And so will that, excuse me, I didn't mean.

No, no, that's fine, that's fine, that's what I was asking.

From the median to the project parameters, so that would be improved to two lanes?

I believe so, we do have the traffic consultant as well that could talk about some of the improvements, but I think I also have, I can go back.

It says new improvements along Avenue 42, half section.

There's the half section.

So I guess I'm just, what does that mean then? I guess is a bigger question.

It just means half the road. They wouldn't be responsible for improving the full width of the road.

I understand that.

So it would only be half section. What are they? Center median.

So it stays at one lane, so we're talking no improvements to Avenue 42?

I don't actually believe that it is, because there's going to be a turning lane, and there's also going to be a future signal. But we can certainly bring up our city engineer that can elaborate a little bit more on that.

Thank you. Mayor, council members, to answer your question, the ultimate section for 42 will be four lanes, two in each direction.

Okay.

And the applicant as part of the project would be required to complete the westbound two lanes and an additional lane westbound with the landscape median.

Excellent. Thank you. You're welcome.

Real quickly, so when you're talking, how far down, just to the end of the project, so as it goes through? Along the entirety of the frontage. So, yeah, because that's one thing we have to really look at is going four lanes all the way from eventually Jefferson all the way to Monroe.

Absolutely.

That's what I'm saying. Just clarification. I know you said it's going to be four lanes, but does this project require it to be four lanes, or that's going to be in the future? Are they still required to do half section, and then whatever develops on the other side is required to do the other section? correct the project would only do their frontage improvements that's what that's what i'm asking

on that same question would they wait till the other side develops so they can you know both pitch in half to that road or are they just going to do that front the timing would be the factor to consider right so if they came before whatever develops on the north side then they would be doing just their frontage and make sure that there's one westbound lane and if the other project on the north side came before them they would do the same okay the north side is an organic farm so i'm not sure how soon

Okay. Yes, sir. Since we have Juan Raya here, I wanted to cover the traffic. There's still other things I want to see discussed based on comments. And right now, my question is just traffic because we have the privilege of having you here. Initially, it was brought to my attention, I might be corrected, and I'm going to depend on that. So, Avenue 42 was always scheduled to be four lanes before anybody was in this room. I know that for a fact. but they're waiting for development to improve it. That's always been a standard practice in anything we do. Yes, the north side is an organic farm, but it is scheduled for commercial development if it ever comes. The only reason it's still farming is because the current farming opportunities there with the landowner, but that'll go because technically where we're at now was at one time part of farming anyways. So my thing is from the traffic, I remember in sitting in a meeting or it was discussed to me that there would be an additional road paralleling I-10 on this property for traffic to go west. It eventually would end up meeting up with 42. Or did I misunderstand that?

Yeah, that's never been in our general plan mobility element.

Do you feel if that was even discussed would pull away from the traffic at Monroe and 42 to pushing traffic westbound?

No, that was never contemplated. If anything, it's to the east of Monroe where you have that extension of Showcase, but not west of Monroe.

So we're culversacking that center road that's there that adds up across the street, because that shoots all the way down now because of development all the way to Jackson. So it connects Jackson Street to Monroe Street.

Correct.

But then it's just going to dead end on the far. Does it make sense with your expertise to move that traffic continued all the way to 42 on the west end?

The only thing with that, it would be, Merging and combining all the truck traffic with your typical vehicular, that was the intent of the layout is to accommodate just the truck traffic from the industrial buildings.

But it cul-de-sacs there, but it doesn't continue on.

Correct, it does not continue, correct.

Does it, with your expertise, does that even make sense? Again, I'm thinking logic, but logic doesn't come up reality.

No, I think, and that's one of the, I believe that's one of the concerns is the truck traffic, right? And the way it's set up, it, they would feed the I-10 freeway directly instead of sending them to Avenue 42, Barnard, down Jefferson, which would create other concerns. So I think that's the benefit of the way it's laid out that you contain the truck traffic to Monroe and the Monroe interchange. Okay.

All right. Thank you. Okay. All right. So any other questions of staff before I invite the applicant up to present? No. Thank you. Brian. Would the applicant like to come up?

Did you load the presentation? Thank you. So, good evening, Honorable Mayor Holmes, Honorable Mayor Pro Tem, and members of council. I'm John Crump, and on behalf of BH Properties, I'm here to present the Oasis at Indio. Tonight, we are proposing, among other things, a specific plan and development agreement to provide a roadmap and a vision to create a dynamic mixed use project that will create a destination where Indio residents will be able to live, work, and play. But first, let me step back and introduce my firm BH Properties. BH, sorry, got ahead of myself. So BH Properties, we're a family-owned business. We're California-based. We've got over a 30-year track record. We're long-term stewards, and we're community-focused. We're 120 people working to create good places where people gather and create value which is inherently good for us. By the way, we have no outside investors, so no one's pressuring us to cut corners or do fast kind of turnarounds. I want to show you a couple of things that we've been working on recently in the industrial arena. This top one is a community eye store that we bought. It's an old Sears warehouse. We bought it. We spent a ton of money fixing it up. Today, it's a retail and distribution outlet for Ashley Furniture. We bought this industrial asset in Austin, Texas. And what do we do? We put in Austin Pickle Ranch. It is now a community gathering spot where people play pickle, they have fun hanging out with each other, they have dinner. They've also added an outdoor court where it's televised professional games, and most recently, sand beach volleyball, where actually University of Texas plays as well. Here's an example that we did recently in San Francisco in Fisherman's Wharf, a dilapidated building that we have revitalized and have now opened it up. And there's pictures with Mayor Lurie very happy with what that's become. Here's an example that we did recently in Seattle. We took an old moribund mall that's right down the street from Pike's Place Market, we put in a 70 foot video screen and this became a gathering place recently for the World Cup with over 7,000 local residents there, seeing the game, enjoying the game free of charge. We're also very philanthropic. We do a lot in our local communities. We're based in Los Angeles and we've put students with scholarships that are underserved and underprivileged We've given students scholarships to get medical assistant degrees. We've put money towards underserved communities to get mobile cancer prevention screening. We've also been active out here as well at Coachella Valley Rescue Mission and Fine Regional Food Bank. We've assembled a best in class team. You can see in the first two rows here, all these people have been working on this project for several years. We've been working on this project for four years. We actually bought the first 100 acres back in 2013. We assembled the other pieces in 2022 and the zoning at the time and the planning for it didn't make sense. This is all, Outreach of coming together to get a good plan for the city and community We've talked to a lot of people in the community in the valley finding out what is needed what are people's wants We've had all kinds of meetings with the public shadow hills In the upper left-hand corner, those are all the wishes that everyone had when we went through 2024 planning. What do you want to see?