City Council - Regular Meeting

Uh, good evening. I'm going to call the city council meeting to order on Monday uh, November 24th at 6:00. So, for the record, all uh, council members are present and including the vice mayor. Um, do I have a motion to adopt the agenda? But first, I do want to pull item 16B1 to up after item 10, which is before consent. Um, apparently the roundup um owners will be here present at 7 o'clock. So, might as well start the meeting out well. And if they're not here, we'll move it back until where it is. Any other changes? So moved. Second. All in favor? I

All right. Unanimous. Now we will Do we have any public comment for items on the close session item only? All right. No public comment. And now we'll go into close session. We'll be back at 7:00.

We'll call the city council meeting back to order and we have no actionable um report from our closed session item. And now will everybody please stand for the pledge of allegiance. 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. All right. So, next is item eight, public comments for items not on the agenda. Do we have any items for not on the agenda?

Yes, we do. We have uh public speaker James Sherio. Yeah, I have a concern about pedestrian safety on Lafayette Moraga Trail because I walk on the trail every day. Could you please um Oh, thank you. Yeah.

Yeah. I have Yeah, I have a concern about pedestrian safety on Lafayette Moraga Trail because I walk on the trail every day, especially from Stanley to our community center. Uh the kids, you know, they go like 30 miles per hour, whatever. You know, the with the big pat tires, you know, e ebikes, they just zoom through it. Today, I was walking, one kid was doing the wheelie right next to me. It's pretty dangerous, you know. They hit me, I'm gone. So this is not only affecting the pedestrians these, you know, these kids, they don't obey the rules like a stop sign. It's just like an ornamental sign. They just pass through it without even looking at the traffic. So it's affecting the uh you know the cross street traffic also. You know, it could hit somebody. I I I saw a very close call the other day cuz it is good just passing through it and it just there is no sight distance for the cross traffic. So my suggestion is do some deterren like a vehicle speed monitoring system solar powered. I mean it's just my suggestion you have one on from Campbell in the high school to the Lafayette like this way Maraga road there is one sign there you know speed limit so do some some baby steps uh it's it's not going to cost probably around $80,000 you know so you have a camera and the speed your speed limit you're violating the

so that's my suggestion So the cost is based on my experience you know I had a project on state highway conventional highway so at the time about 6 years ago one sign cost about you know $40,000 of course it was a 22 signs so now probably one sign probably around I would say 60 $70,000 this my suggestion to do some something because it just uh hope I'm wrong cuz this uh there's going to be an accident. It's going to happen. It's not a it's not an if question. It's going to be when question cuz we don't have any control. So, hope I am wrong.

Oh, thank you. Right. Any questions? No, thank you for your suggestion. It's always helpful to have somebody come up and and talk about something but offer a possible solution. So, appreciate that. Thank you. Uh-huh. Any other I have another speaker uh here uh Bel Moore.

Hi, good evening. I'm just here to introduce myself. I am about two less than two months into my position with PG&E and I've believe I've sent emails to all of you to introduce myself and of course have met with the city manager. I just wanted to make sure you know I'm your point of contact and uh certainly my email that I sent to you has my cell phone number. Uh feel free to reach out and it's really nice to see everybody. Thank you. Thank you for taking the time to come in and visit us personally. Appreciate that. I do have one speaker um on Zoom. It is uh Libby Henry. Um, go ahead, Miss Henry. Hi. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay. Um, hi everybody. Uh, I wanted to just speak tonight because I know it's not on the agenda. Um, I believe that Joanne um received this uh letter and packet from Susan Kersh from Catalyst. Um, and I hope that she forwarded it to all the city council members about plan Bay Area 2050. And I would urge all city council members to look at this. Um, Callus has prepared a sample letter. Uh, all um, uh, public comment um from from anyone is due by December 18th. on this egregious plan. They are, you know, just for an example, the population growth that they are projecting between now and 2050 is based on a 24% increase. And I think you all know that in reality and in fact that has not been the case. And there are several documentations that prove that this projection is way off. Um and uh I was just on a meeting earlier and the projection of how much tax money this would cost each and every person in the Bay Area should they go through with as planned would be $100,000 a year for every person that includes children that lives in the Bay Area. Um, so it's obviously a very ill-conceived uh plan.

Um, and we need to let MTC and Abag know that this shouldn't fly. And I know 101 cities in this jurisdiction in the um Bay Area jurisdiction have been sent this package. So, I hope that you will uh read it and respond, you know, respond to the MTC before December 18th. Um, and if you have any questions, you can always ask me. Thank you.

Um, Libby, just uh for the record, our next legislative um subcommittee, we are going to discuss it and bring something and we have time to bring it back at the next council meeting and send it in before the deadline. So yes, we are aware of it and we will be discussing it. Okay. But take a look at the you know what they did on catalyst. Uh thank you. They there's a good analysis and it breaks it down into simple you know. Yeah we will. We will we will Libby. I I promise. Appreciate this very much. Thanks. Thanks. All right. Any other? I have no other speakers. Okay. Great. So, we have the city manager update.

Thank you, mayor. This evening, it's a short update. Uh, as you probably have all seen, artist Rachel Pearls is putting the final touches on the new mural on the wall of Zara's Boutique in downtown. And there have been a few weather related delays, but uh we're hopeful that it will be completed by the end of the month or shortly thereafter. An official unveiling of the mural is scheduled for January the 26th and more details to follow. The engineering department just wants to alert people that uh we've hired a tree company to perform the tree removal portion of the school and topper lane project. Tree removals are being deliberately performed in the fall and winter ahead of construction also and also to mitigate any environmental concerns and restrictions associated with nesting birds. this is the time to do it. And finally, on behalf of city staff, we wish our council and the entire LA Lafayette community a very happy Thanksgiving. Thank you. Okay, so now we are going to move on. We pulled item 16B1 um about the proclamation honoring the Roundup Saloon on its 90 years of operation and recognizing it's the oldest continuously running business in Lafayette. We've moved it up to this point in the in the agenda and our city manager will introduce our owners. It gives me great pleasure to introduce Karen and Mike Johnson. they have been part of uh the roundup organization for many years and I've really truly done uh a tremendous job of keeping this iconic institution flourishing. So uh hand it

back to you. Great. Thank you. So we have this wonderful resolution and I I don't usually read these but um I will read this and then I would love to have you guys come up and say any comments and then get a photo of all of us. That would be amazing. So this proclamation reads, "The city of Lafayette, California, whereas the Roundup Saloon established in 1935, just after the end of Prohibition, stands at Lafayette as Lafayette's oldest continuously operating business. And whereas for 90 years, the Roundup has welcomed residents and visitors alike, serving as a gathering place where stories are shared, friendships are formed, and the spirit of community thrives. And whereas the saloon's origins trace back to the founder Lou Borgensani whose original hitching posts, water trough, and famous promise that every horse got a carrot and every rider got a beer reflect the character of early Lafayette. And whereas successive owners from Harry Costa and JW Johnny Kums to Bill McCabe, Mike Content and today's owners Karen Kushner and Mike Johnson each contributed to the Round Roundup's enduring identity as a welcoming hometown institution. And whereas the Roundup Saloon continues to preserve its historic charm from its shuffleboard table to its vintage decor offering a warm and familiar place for generations of Lafayette residents. Now therefore, be it resolved that on behalf of the Lafayette City Council, it is my pleasure to recognize and celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Roundup Saloon, honoring its rich history, its vibrant role in our community, and its continued legacy as a cornerstone of Lafayette life. Thank you so much. So, please, if you have anything to say, would love to hear from you. And just before to make it super official, I move approval of the proclamation.

Any second. All right. All in favor? I I thank you. Um we just wanted to say thank you so much. The city has been so supportive and helpful with u we've been owners now 22 years. Um so basically just thank you. Uh same thing. I just can't thank everybody for the support that you know from the city to the chamber to all the people that come, you know, year after year. And it's really, it's an honor to own that place and just a it enriches my heart to see people come in and just have a good time. That's what I love to say. You guys do it justice. Thank you so much for being the kind of owners that you are. Thank you.

Does anybody else have anything to say? All I will say is we were able to go to the roundup. Uh I think I think C manager was there um to to do a little picture because they were also members of the Lafia Chamber for 45 years and so it's a very you know it's a long-standing institution and um they're beloved and uh it's it's it's just it's great to have you guys. I agree with a lot of changes happening in Lafayette so everybody needs something that's just kind of reminds them of of how things used to be and uh the roundup is it. So thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Thank you. So can we take a picture? Oh, thank you. We'll see you later hopefully. Yeah.

Take care. Oh, thank you guys. Um, Madame Mayor, I I think we have a hand raised. I I don't know if they will. Will we take any public comment? I'll see. It's Libby again. I'm not sure if her hand is still raised or for this. Okay. So, is she's commenting or No. Yeah. No. So, we'll see. We'll see if Libby So, Libby can speak. Yeah. Um Hello. Can you hear me? Um yes. Is this on the roundup proclamation?

I know. And I wanted to say uh congratulations to M. I didn't know that Mike and Karen were going to be there and um they they've definitely been around Roundup for a long time and uh you know they've definitely added a lot more class to the Roundup. I sure wish they get rid of the old deer heads, but you know anyway and I also forgot to say happy Thanksgiving to everyone. Oh, thank you, Libby. And to you, too. All right, so we can close that item. Thank you. Um, on to the consent calendar. Any changes to consent or pull any items? Any member of the public want to pull any items on the consent calendar?

I don't think so. So, I'll move approval of the consent calendar. I'll second. All in favor? I.

Thank you. And now go to item 12A at old business with not Jonathan but yes go. All right. Uh good evening mayor and city council members. Uh John Warshaw, recreation manager. Uh Jonathan does send his apologies. He wasn't able to make tonight's meeting. Um, I'd like to provide a a summary of item 12A, which is an update on the synthetic uh infield uh turf feasibility at Buckeye Fields and the one-time uh rehabilitation package that we're that we are uh proposing. So, at the October 27th meeting, the city council approved the capital improvements for shared uh baseball and and softball use at Buckeye Fields to be compliant with the California Fair Play Act. So following that action, staff worked with our engineering staff as well as consultants to take a deeper look into uh what it would take to install synthetic uh infield at Buckeye since it is compatible with both ba baseball and also softball. And a couple of the key items that we that we learned is the uh required engineering design and bid process would take six to nine months with a 8 to 12 week uh construction timeline. Um, in addition, synthetic uh turf would need to be paired with uh the Buckeye patio and drainage project that we uh actually paused design for in uh 2023 due to lack of funding. So, when you factor in the full uh project scope, which includes the Buckeye patio and drainage upgrades, as well as design, engineering, um along with project management, the project uh total will exceed about $1.2

2 million. So, uh, given the overall scope in a in a absence of a dedicated funding source, synthetic turf at Buckeye remains a longer term capital project versus one that we could have ready for the 2026 season. So in the meantime, uh staff evaluated the the all four fields and taking into into account feedback that we've received from uh the user groups and we kind came up with a package of improvements um such as fixing uh grading issues on the infields across all the fields. uh sod replacement to address the transitions between the infield grass and sorry the infield and the outfield grass as well as that will also uh fix a lot of the uh uh dimension issues that we have with our infields currently which is present across all of our fields. um complete uh infield mix uh rehabilitation at uh upper community park as well as infield turf renovation at lower community park. So the the cost and specific items are kind of detailed in the staff report. Um but all these improvements would benefit both baseball and also softball. So, we currently have $140,000 in the ball um rehabilitation fund and staff is requesting authorization to release $85,680 which does include a 5% contingency amount in there to complete the uh re rehabilitation effort ahead of the uh 2026 season. So, thank you and happy to answer any questions.

Great. Thank you so much and and thank you for explaining taking over for Jonathan while he's not here. Not a problem. Do I have any questions? But

thank you. Uh that that makes makes a lot of sense and seems like it's a good use of uh use of the funds. There was a qu there's a kind of comment at the bottom of page three on the staff report which talks about how the you staff proposes the user groups which I'm assuming this means and love little league will resume responsibility for ongoing grass infield maintenance and long-term renovation. Have the leagues have they agreed to that or is that just a proposal? So typically the the leagues do um take care of pretty much the infield a part of their kind of daily um use of it. So, uh, Little League has indicated that they will be continuing to maintain, uh, the infield grasses at, uh, the currently the the two that have infield grass and LYA will also be, you know, helping with, you know, infield dirt prep as well as a little league, too. Yes. Okay. Thank you.

And Okay. Yeah. Just to segue off that question, um and not the staff report talks about bringing all fields up to a clean baseline. So the idea is to sort of bring them sort of up to snuff so to speak and then after that um we all kind we're operating off the same standard essentially for all the fields. Is that the the concept here? Yeah, the concept is to get them to a good starting spot. Um which will also in turn um help the user groups uh with the kind of their their core you know basically infield preparation, right? Um right now a lot of the infield dimensions across all the fields are are just inconsistent. Okay. So this should help facilitate ongoing maintenance. Yes, it definitely will. Yes.

Great. Thank you. Anything else? All right. Uh any public comment? Have no public comment. Okay. I we did float this by the user groups already and we heard back from both and they both are also in favor. Little League and Elmo were both. Yeah. We could ask Sure. John just to give a one minute report on what happened on Friday. Oh, that's right. You had another meeting on Friday.

Yeah. Um myself, Jesus Hernandez, which is the parks maintenance supervisor and also Jonathan. We uh met with both uh groups. Um both are supportive of uh the you know the proposal that we're setting forth. Each group does have kind of you know they have their uh the I think their facility wish list that you know that will kind of be evaluated between um Jonathan probably you know a commission and also between the two of them. Um but you know uh both groups are supportive of the kind of the actions that we're proposing.

Great. Thank you. Um so do I have a motion or any other comments or concerns? Go ahead. Yeah, I'll I'll move authorization of release of $85,680 from the Ballfield Rehabilitation Syncing Fund to support the payments um or the improvements shown in the staff report. Second. All in favor? I thank you. Thank you for the report and thank you guys for all the work. This was a lot of quick work and quick action by the park and recck department to kind of come up with the plan and and figure out all the the money involved. So, thank him. Make sure to tell Jonathan. I will. Thank you very much. Cool.

And Karen Mike, you guys don't have to stay for the meeting. We're No. All right. So, now we go on to item 13A at about the Park Theater.

Thank you, Mayor. Uh as we are all aware and quite excited about the park theater is undergoing renovation and because it's a project that will last upwards of 12 12 or 18 months uh and because it's such a constricted uh constrained site, the uh trust has requested the use of the uh front sidewalk and the uh parking spaces in front of the park theater for construction purposes and our codes require that uh any private development pay for the cost of using those facilities. However, the code also allows the city council to uh accept uh provide an exception to the payment of those fees as well as the encroachment permit issuance fee and the uh park theater trust has requested such relief from you. staff has looked at the code and we believe uh we can make the findings to uh grant this uh exception to the payment of fees. The monies collected would go uh the money saved would go directly towards the rehabilitation of the park theater. With that, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Mayor, I just want to um just disclose before we start um the the discussion. Um, so I am a non-compensated board member on the Park Theater Trust board. Um, which is nonprofit board. Um, and because of that and because it's for the benefit of the city, there is no conflict. I will be participating in the discussions and the vote and I've chatted with the city attorney and she's in agreement. Thank you for disclosing that. All right. Do we have any questions about the proposal? Yeah. Go ahead.

Just a general question, mayor. Thank you. for city manager because my understanding is that and this is before I was on the council but some four years ago the city um made a contribution towards the park theater trust of about a half a million or so. So we're already sort of an investor as it were in this project. Is that that is correct. Uh the the city did contribute 500,000 towards the purchase and rehabilitation of the park theater. Okay. Thank you.

All right. Do we have any public comment? Do any of you want to say anything? No. Okay. No. Hi. Got it. And nobody. Okay. Great. Thank you. Um, do we have a motion? Yeah. Wait, go ahead, please. If I I could make a comment. Make a quick comment. I I guess I want to I want to be careful about this being deemed as establishing a precedent

whereby the city kind of forgives these fees that are already in our um statute if you will. I think in this case in as much as we're already as a city invested in this project. So for us to sort of kick in 500,000 and then on in one year and then several years later take back 200,000 doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. So I think in effect this is I who knows what's in the future but in this case it seemed like this is kind of a unique situation which in my view would warrant us seeding to the request here.

In fact to follow up on that have we done this before for any project that you know of not that we're aware of. And so this is really unique. This is we are making a complete exception but we have to make all these findings which staff did a great job in making the findings. So appreciate that very much. Yes.

Yeah. I will just say again thanks to the the staff work on this because it it does carve out the basis for making this finding and is meant to it'll set a precedent but it's not going to set a broad precedent. So, with that, um, I'll move that the city council find the park theater renovation project accepted from the charges established by chapter 3-2 of the Lafayette Municipal Code pursuant to code section 3205B to C based upon a plan approved by the city engineer and on the basis that the project functions as a city sponsored activity that provides significant communitywide benefit.

I'll second that motion. Like all in favor? I thank you. Thank you. Of course. Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

All right. So item now 13 No. Yeah. 13B one. Thank you, mayor. I'm handling this for Andy who is out of town. The mayor and city staff have been attending a couple of meetings with Senator Grayson. he is uh really uh leading the efforts to uh on wildfire mitigation and wildfire prevention within his district. And uh as part of those discussions, he asked us at the last meeting if cities and and fire districts would submit to him a list of projects that um for wildfire mitigation. He wanted us to make sure that these were projects that were ongoing. So, and also that projects that could uh were coordinated with our fire agencies and uh Andy uh met with city staff uh with all the departments and has called a list of proposed projects. They are focused on uh brush clearing and tree removal in along major evacuation routes. Uh a concerted effort on Moraga road next year

and then a more a larger project for the following three years. In addition uh there are two other smaller projects. One of them is to create a pullout area on Spring Hill Road, which is one of our more vulnerable streets, to allow um cars to pull over if there's if emergency vehicles have to pass. And he worked with Mike Moran. They walk the this the road and the cost estimates do come within a contingency. And finally, the last uh request is uh to create something that I believe Marin County uh is has done, which is uh to uh to collect safety cones and barricades, things that one would need during an emergency to strategically place these materials in an enclosed container at different locations. s throughout the city because if there is a fire, uh uh we really don't have the time to wait for public works to drive those over. Um we still don't have the exact details about the aesthetics of the box, but we'll definitely work on that. Um but it's uh it's recommended as it's one of the best practices to get ready for an emergency. So, we ask that you approve these lists of projects and so that we can submit it to Senator Grayson's office before the December one deadline.

Great. Thank you. Any questions? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, I spoke with Andy today, but I forgot to ask him, are these in order of priority? Are we to submit them in order of priority? No, they were u a we did not prioritize them. Okay, thank you. I did have a question about the aesthetics of the box because I can imagine that would be depending how big this box is. If it's carrying contain cones that seems pretty small, but it's containing all the barricade things that could be kind of large.

Yeah, it it as I understand it uh it does not include the major the the concrete or the orange barricades. They are more uh stop signs, cones, things that can be quickly laid out to make an intersection or four-way stop, for example. Because I was wondering if the um if the the mount included the uh 17 copies of all those materials, but I guess if just cones or whatever, that's probably relatively uh relatively inexpensive. Exactly.

And then a question maybe it's to this group. So um are we aware of that the Spring Hill neighborhood can be kind of active and vocal on stuff? Do you know do they do you have any idea if they're would be they would like the uh the the speak to Paul or anything? I am I don't know. I can follow up with him. They they are so ahead on all the fire stuff. I cannot imagine that there that there's be push back on this one. Yeah. Perfect. Thank you.

Um yeah, this is fabulous. This is really really great and appreciate the opportunity that senators given. Um did did they give any kind of ballpark like ask for half a million and we'll consider or No. Uh they did not. I don't think they gave us a range. No. I suspect the fire districts are going to ask for a whole lot more. Okay. So this is a good ask. We didn't ask for too little. Don't think Yeah, because smart signals are still coming. Right. And that would be the other piece, but that's already in progress. Right.

Right. Um, so I had one other thing that kind of that I know we've talked about, haven't really done is, you know, on fire days is to have no parking zones. And I don't know if that is something that we need to ask money for because that's we just pay for it internally and that's why maybe it didn't hit the list, but it is something that people have kind of talked about. If if the council wishes we can con we can get an estimate and add it to the list. I uh I I mayor, are you talking about the evacuation routes or throughout the city?

Evacuation routes specifically because I think that would have to involve signs and stuff like other cities have done that, right? They has done that. But is Arinda's just on evacuation routes or they have it on I think they have it on other streets as well. I think that's something we should, you know, maybe look in. Yeah. see if there's room preparedness can look at it. Right. This is a red flag. No parking restriction. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We have that in the safety element. And I think we'll need signs for those. So, yeah. Uh the city attorney was just saying we would need signage, right? That's what I'm think is an expense. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

So, actually follow I'm intrigued that the fact that Confire is probably asking for stuff as well. Do we know if they're asking for anything this could benefit us or do are they asking for things that are just like I we don't know yet. Okay. Because it' be good to see and or the other question I had which I forgot to ask was like do can we get like a letter the question was is Confire doing stuff that is going to benefit us also? Do we are we aware of what they're asking for or do we think they're just asking for things outside of like city jurisdictions? Unfortunately, we haven't heard back from Confire. They were Andy was in touch with them. Uh I suspect it's going to be shaded fuel breaks or something on the larger scale. I'm sure it will benefit us indirectly. Exactly.

The other question is is it good to get a letter of support from Confire for these things or does that really matter? It was all one thing. We're all It's going Andy is going to coordinate with fire marshall Bachmann. Yeah. We're going to share our information with him on the subject of uh the signs and I don't know whether I can get an estimate by Monday which is the deadline. Oh, is the deadline for the Okay. Well, then that's fine then. Yeah, that means no. Well, but it would also be hard to ask for funding for something that we haven't yet created the or the ordinance for and all this stuff, right? So, well, maybe that's the next year.

I guess that brings up another question for these boxes near intersections. Do we have any regulation that we need to watch out for in placing these? I I did talk to Andy about this aesthetics. So, uh there are 17 locations. Mike and Aziz helped Andy identify the locations. They're all on public property. Okay.

Um and uh public works provided the um the pricing. I'm sure they'll take sight distance and other things into consideration. Um, but this is of all the projects, this is the one we know the least about right now because of the aesthetics. I mean, I'm particularly sensitive about adding stuff on our roads, but they could also be artistic or Yeah, I I can see I was thinking rapture public art committee. I was thinking that too, actually. Yes. Yeah,

this could work. Yeah, if we're gonna I'm okay with sending it in this order, but if I were to prioritize and I put that one first, that just seems like a brilliant idea to preposition all those things out there. That's totally fair. Yeah, I love the road for those thing too, right? I'm sure Andy could probably if if he was asked by Grayson to prioritize them, I'm sure he could also do a fine job. Yeah, I passed that on to Andy. Yeah, especially given the deadlines.

All right, so do we have any more questions or go to public comment? All right, public comment. No public comment. No public comment. All right. So, do we have a motion? Can I take a quick comment? I just want to I think we've all said this in different ways, but I really want to thank Senator Grayson. Oh, yes. For this leadership in trying to engage with his constituencies for fire safety, which is just a huge check plus, certainly in my book, you know, the state's got some real financial issues going in the next fiscal year. So, you know, even if we get a one or two things, that's to me is just a huge win. But you never get anything unless you ask for it. So, so right and and bundling for asking us

and bundling it as part of a trailer bill because it's so well packaged and thought through. Yeah. Is great. So, I support this. All right. So, do I have a motion to or do we need anything which is authorizing staff motion? Okay. Motion to authorize staff. Al so moved. Second. Second. All in favor? I thank you. Great. Um All right. Okay. So, we're on to council commission reports. Does anybody have a report? I'd like to bring up something if I could just to start.

Um, as we all know, we had uh a couple more burglaries since we last met unfortunately um in the in our downtown uh downtown area. Um I think Zunies and I think Zunies was was since we last met and um and several others. And we we had a uh we I know several of you attended the Zoom meeting, but I just want to kind of give you a little bit of backstory because it's pretty amazing, right? The Zouri's break-in happened on Saturday or Friday night into Saturday and you know talking with the chamber we decided, you know, we wanted to kind of get the word out to businesses about some safety tips because it seemed like some of the businesses were you know there's some basic stuff that all businesses should do to kind of keep themselves safe. And this was on so Sunday night, you know, we sent the word out to the chief asking if he would be willing to participate. He said yes. I think Sunday night, May, Monday morning, Kathy Sergees sent out a um because we wanted something to give out to the the businesses. She sent out this brochure that uh that the police had had passed had created several years ago. Um the chamber took it, went to Minute Man. They had 140 of them printed out within eight hours. I think on Tuesday morning, uh it was there was what's Tuesday morning? Yeah. uh our city manager Narup and I and Matt Peas the ch president president of the chamber and Judy from the crime prevention commission got together a bunch of chamber staff we distributed these to 140 businesses throughout downtown all up and down Mount Diablo so they all had this inviting them to the zoom call and I know many of you were on the zoom call as well so thank you very much but this is an incredible quick turnaround I mean this is semi 72 hours after the break and we were like talking to the businesses and giving them tips and everything so uh want to thank I think Minan and the chamber in particular did a really outstanding job as well as of course the police having this on hand being able ble to do it. So, I just want to recognize that um that effort to get that out before the Thanksgiving week.

Um I also want to do a um a quick shout out uh that um on Veterans Day we had the Tree of Hope lightning ceremony and the mayor spoke of that and she did a great job and uh it was really nice. I think honoring um being able to honor the veterans as well as hospice and what it does and lighting up uh Lafayette Circle is a terrific. It looks great and kind of a nice way to kind of kick off the holiday season.

Thank you. Anybody else? No. Move on. All right. We'll go on to item 16B2 where we have another proclamation recognizing Barb Barbara Papini as a 2025 Dawn Jenkins Service Award. I have this proclamation signed and she has been a really wonderful resident of Lafayette and she gets the 2025 Don Jenkins Service Award recipient. So, thank you so much to uh Barbara. Any questions, comments, any public comment? No. Thank you. Um, do you have a motion to uh approve the proclamation?

I'll make a motion to approve the proclamation recognizing Barbara uh Pini as the 2025 Don Jenkins Service Award recipient for exceptional service to older adults in our community. Second. All in favor? I I thank you. Now I'll go to item item C1. Um there's a legislative committee meeting that we had and our committee leader will take this one.

Right. So we have three items from the legislative committee. Um the first relates to the polluters pay climate super fund bill which is SB 687 and AB uh 1243. Uh was submitted earlier in this uh the first year of the legislative session. Uh passed through the uh Senate Environmental Committee became a two-year bill in effect. it was sort of held at judiciary and as I understand it from talking to our lobbyist at Towns and Associates. The bill will be up at the Senate Judiciary Committee in January. If it passes through that, it goes to Senate Appropriations. If it passes through that, it just goes through the normal process that a bill would go through. uh if it it gets stopped at either judiciary or appropriations,

the author or authors can resubmit the bill or maybe they might want to modify it, but they in effect have two bites at the apple uh because it's a two-year bill. So, um we had a pretty extensive discussion about this concluded that kind of taking towns and opinion, which is to basically watch this seemed to be the most prudent. It's a very complex bill and has some really big numbers behind it. I think um that just bear some better understanding which is one reason why we decided to basically take I not recommend taking a position on it but basically follow this bill and see where it might go because this bill could come back in January even.

Great. Thank you. So that was we have Was that the only one? Oh, that's right. That was the only one that we took any action on. Oh, there's three. This was three. Yeah. So, and this I'm kind of speaking very broadly here because we've got a a write out from our lobbyist towns and public affairs. Yes. All right. Thank you. Does anybody have any questions? Yeah. Go ahead.

Yeah. You mentioned that the complexity was one of the reasons to hold back. I mean, how large a part of that was holding was the reason for doing it and how do you expect to resolve the complexity? That's question one. Yeah. And I'll I assume that um Casey's not on the line tonight. No, he's not.

Okay. So, I have a question. Um this is going to be facing the next committees in January and that's a critical time for this bill. I realize it can be reintroduced, but then it has to go back through these things again. So my question is would endorsements now or was was there any discussion of whether endorsements now would help the bill meet the January 2026 deadlines that is getting through judiciary and finance?

Well I think that um question is does it move the needle with respect to Senate judiciary and appropriations? Yeah. And and just I'm asking these questions because I'm generally in favor of this supporting this. So I'm just, you know, trying to get a sense of what they what what's at stake here in terms of

Yeah. And I and I think I could maybe speak to the issues I had, which is that um that there are some likely very large numbers behind this bill. I kind of went to the Senate staff report from the environmental quality committee to see what their writeup was on the bill when it was heard back in April. They do reference and this is in some of the other materials that two other states approve something like this, Vermont and New York. In New York's case, the um amount asked or rather to be paid by the quote polluters was 75 million, but the Senate staff report noted that the estimate was that the real number was probably something like 150 billion. Um, and so there's nothing in the bill or the supporting materials that gets to what the number might be for California. I thought about it. Well, California is roughly twice the population in New York. Something our gross domestic product is at least 50% 50% higher than New York. Our climate issues might be greater conceivably given the wildfires we've had relative to New York. Of course, they have other things going on. But it seemed to me that if it was 150 billion for New York, California's case, it could be twice that

or more. There's just no way of knowing. There's nothing in the write up supporting the bill that indicates what the number is. So if it's I figured, okay, if it's 250 billion, just putting just down a number because that's roughly what if you took New York's number multiplied by how much bigger our GDP is relative to New York. That means that the first year one it's you pay 10 the uh the polluters would pay 20 would pay 10%. So that's 25 billion year 1 and in all subsequent years it's it's 10% of the remainder which is about 11 12 billion a year. So to put that in context, California adopted a cap and trade system which is also discussed later on in the town writeup was established as a bipartisan measure under Governor Schwarzenegger. That amount is roughly 4 billion a year. So what we're talking about with this measure could be on an annual basis three times that. Uh in the first year it would be um I guess about four or five times that. And again we don't know the numbers. I'm just kind of like spitballing here. But again just if if you take New York it's like one data point and always the danger is you take two points you create a line. But uh you look at that the California numbers ought to be bigger than New York. they're going to be big and um one of the concerns I had was not knowing what the financial implications were is significant was something of this magnitude and the other part of it is that um there has I would think has to be some sort of an impact on consumers whether you're paying for electricity gas or gasoline and I've had some conversations one of the local supporters of this because there is a state entity the division of petroleum market oversight which creat ated in recent regulation having to do when gas prices spiked was an initiative by Governor Nuome in the legislature, but

their job has really been more to sort of monitor uh what's going on with the refineries because there's a case of some refineries shut down and there was a spike in um the cost for refined g refined petroleum products. So, this board oversees that to to try to ensure that if the refinery shuts down, they've got adequate inventory. And there was something in there about um a maximum gross refining margin which really doesn't speak to this bill at all. So I think that there's a really open question as to how much of the financial implication gets passed on to consumers. Um the advocates of the bill in their letters have said there wouldn't be. But when you're talking on the order of one year one 25 billion years thereafter say 12ish billion again my rough numbers I don't see how you could just make that assumption. So my concern was that unless we had better figures from the proponents as to what this actually means, the cost implications are huge. And in an environment where now everybody from our president on down is talking about affordability um in a state where we have the highest uh electricity rates in the in the continental United States were twice the national average and our gas prices I haven't double checked this are among the highest if not the highest of the continental United States.

That's a lot to potentially pass on to consumers. So that was my caution. This is like I'm kind of a numbers guy. I have no feel for what the numbers are here except that they are uh in the B's, billions, and uh likely multiples of what we're doing for cap and trade right now, which is a system that we adopted to try to help mitigate climate impact and encourage polluters or cl carbon emitters, I should say, to to improve their behavior. We have that now. Uh you could argue whether that's enough, but we have that now. This is trying to go back in time to sort of remedy the past damage that was caused, which is I think fair and legitimate. But I look at that and think, well, in some respects, even though I have we bought we have two electric vehicles and solar on our roof, I contributed to the problem because I consumed carbon over the last 30 odd years. We all did. So I I kind of think I I I have all these questions from this bill that I think are just needed to be a lot better analyzed I think before at least at least I feel comfortable supporting it. So the idea of like let's take a wait and see if we can get better information on this which is something that seemed intuitively to me to make sense.

Okay. It was it was a long conversation. Yeah. I I did not I did not mean to get into the discussion. I let me come back to the the question. Is there any sense of whether endorsements now would help the bill meet the January deadline? Casey did not seem to indicate that. That's I was there too. He he didn't think that our weighing in now because I was thinking how about a support in um concept or something. Support in concept. was exactly what I brought up. And he's like, you know, no, I mean, it really needs to go through these hurdles to get more so we can figure it out a little bit more before you guys probably should weigh in

and but I but I do want to follow this. We're we're on this and we're very interested. I will follow up on Jim's comments when we come back from public comments. Sure. Any public comment? No, I see a no. Okay, then. All right. Well, um I I see the the capp trade as being entirely different. Capp trade um is the market for the emitters, right?

Uh it is not for the the the producers and the suppliers. I mean that this goes to the those who produce and supply uh the product that results in the CO2. The other one is among the emitters who are buying the product and using it and they're manufacturing and trying to encourage them to use less or to use it in a productive way. So I see whatever monetary gain comes from that to be completely separate from what's trying to accomplish here which is trying to get those who uh have been over the last century and more uh producing these uh fossil fuels and supplying them to the market. and um not to the same extent as the tobacco industry uh but dealing in misinformation and um other techniques to try to perpetuate uh their the market for their product. So I see this as being something that's uh desirable to do and I think that a city like ours in Morag and Arinda as we're situated where we are bearing the brunt of climate change in the form of increased uh danger of wildfire that this would be something that would be that we would take a a great uh interest in. So uh as you were describing it I wrote down can we approve this in concept? Can we support in concept say we're we're we want to get more information but you know we're we support we in concept we support it but we need more information. I mean if we were to

we can do that. We can do that. That's where I would be.

I have to admit so I'm actually much more sympathetic the other way. I should admit I mean I think conceptually I I actually am I'm very concerned. I do not trust the whole uh let's let's find them a lot of money and don't pass it on the consumers. I just think that they're they're just the companies are too good at this. And I just I I like the the hold back only because I'd like to see some numbers. I'd like to see what is it going to mean to the average person's um gas tank fill up. You know, I just feel like it's just like we're already I believe in the in the um East Bay Times on Sunday, they were comparing our the average price of a gallon of gas in the country, which is 336 and our and California, which is 482 or something like that. I mean, it's just like we're already 50% higher, I think. And so, I just would need to see that. I would just need to understand kind of what it needs to do because I just don't want to I just feel like if we we if we we find them, they're just going to there's that there's only one place to get the money. It's from the people buying their product, you know? So that that that was my my big concern. And it's just such a weird it's such a big bill with no numbers. I mean how how in the world can you I mean conceptually yes. I I guess I would support it. But it's like you have to know the numbers before you can really like uh do it one way or the other. So I guess I would look forward to getting the numbers which it sounds like January, February, March is when they're going to be kind of susing all that out. Or are we going to get numbers then? I don't know. I I talked to Casey um Elliot, our lobbyist, and he said it might might be possible in appropriations that there might be some way to sus that out. I mean, the focus of the Senate and Assembly appropriations committee is more like what's the impact on the state,

but they'd need to sort of figure out they have to get some markers on that. It would seem one would think the the bill does talk about having CalPA do a initiated study. The the time frames in the bill are really rapid. I mean, by the time they the study is supposed to be out per this bill, I'd be surprised if they actually got the RFP out. Yeah. But nonetheless, um maybe there's something out of appropriations. I don't know about you this year. Okay. Any comments? I always like data to make decisions and so I think I would be happy to uh to wait and see. All right. So, but thank you. But but we are going to be watching this one.

Yeah. Yeah. I know. For sure. And because I think there's enough people Yeah. here and in our community that have very strong feelings about this. Yeah. When is the next meeting? The list. Uh this is not on. This will have to wait until after those other meetings. And we don't know when those other meetings are yet. Right. Appropriations and judiciary. Oh, well, I was getting the sense that perhaps we could get more information on on what the bill, what's in the bill and what people have said in the hearings about impact on consumers. That seems to be the key. Yeah, that was one of the questions I had for a lobbyist and uh today and um he said really that at this point we're not going to get anything till January.

Um they're kind of on hiatus there. We got some senators like our our senator trying to move stuff along, but there's not. Matter of fact, uh the Senate prom hasn't even named the new committee chairs yet. So, we don't even know who's chairing judiciary at this point. So, that's kind of where we are with the state senate right now. It's not going to be till January before you see see things happening on this, I think. Okay. To be realistic. Okay. Okay. So, are we good with the recommendations that we have the no action? Well, I'm going to abstain. Okay. On the vote. Yeah. I'm not going to vote for Are we Are we voting or we just are you just reporting?

Yeah. It's It would be good to have a vote. I think so, too. It seems like it would be good to vote. So, um So, the recommendation came back as a no action. So, do we have Yeah. So, I I guess it's a motion. So, I'll move that um the council endorse the legislative committee's recommendation of no action with respect to Senate Bill 684. I'll second that. All right. All in favor? I Thank you. And I'll be in no and and and no. Okay, great. Thank you. So, one of our rare split votes and it's, you know, it's okay. Well done. It's okay. All right. So item C 16C2.

Yeah, Laranda Legislative Coalition. I I can just tee this up and perhaps pass this to our city manager and mayor. Uh but this follows on a prior council action to join in tandem with our neighbors in Arinda and Moraga to see if we could sort of team up for sort of a common approach to issues of common concern. And so there's a really detailed write up in here um of the uh the framework for that. um with the legislative coalition focusing on transportation and infrastructure, disaster preparedness, wildfire readiness, accessible property insurance, housing and fiscal sustainability, which are all like the good themes of local government here. And then behind that, we have our legislative platform. So the idea was to see if we could move it along continuing with the council's direction from the prior meeting. And maybe with that, I'll stop and refer to our city manager and mayor who were involved in some of these discussions with our colleagues in our neighboring towns.

I' I'd just like to add that city council approved the framework. Moraga w will consider it in January. Okay, great. Thank you. Yeah, that was basically it. We we think that we'll keep Lafayette the way we organized it right now with a a subcommittee and then come back to council um at least for now until we kind of work through this process. A question or least

question. So it was good. No, I thought it was great. Um one question I kind of there's only you know we have housing and there's only one fairly tepid comment about Reena and the whole that whole process. I kind of didn't know if we would have lamarinda would have had wanted to have a little more about uh the whole process reform and you know it was such a kind of a a mess last year. It's actually not a bad idea. You know line all that kind of stuff. Yeah, that was in our our goals for the year to work with Arinda and Moraga um on the next cycle getting ahead of the arena. Um it might be late to alter this one because Arinda already proved it. Uh I can always float the idea. I mean this is not something that's controversial. It everyone has a problem.

No, we've all we've all been kind of tortured tortured. So uh there's lots of opportunities for improvement. There may already be stuff going in through the I'm sure there is already going through that we can endorse but just a thought. So no. Okay. The other one I'm sorry the one other one I was just wondering about which made us our own thing is um you know we're all struggling with ebikes. This was a public comment today and you know I mean I I've been endorsing well whatever Danville is doing or whatever we should kind of follow that but man I would just love some statewide ebike regulations to kind of get us out of this get us out of this morass and have it be more so I'm just wondering if we could be pushing for that because that would just kind of give us a lot of air cover and when people couldn't go you know to next town over and buy something or whatever that the state could kind of put in some stuff. So that was just a thought.

There already are some actions right through Danville there's a coalition. There is no Daniel's doing a good job. Right. We have just a bullet in the uh Lamarinda uh framework. It says increase safety for all users of roadways including vehicles, ebikes, pedestrians. It doesn't get no one does cover it specific than that. Okay. I would just I just think that would be a big help because we're all going to be strike makes no sense for us to have hundreds of individual conversations about this. I don't know. But that that was otherwise I thought it was a great framework. Okay. Any other questions?

Yeah. Which page is that on? Certainly it's page two. Uh let me double check that. No, let me page one. Page one. Yeah, the two bullets are very close to each other. The third bullet. Oh, okay. I see. Yep. Okay. Okay. Yeah, I was looking for it in the transportation section. Um, it's on page there's like under related topics conversation on page nine. So, I I didn't know if that was but yeah, that's kind of that's the only place I found it, but Yep. Okay. Thank you.

Great. Thank you. Um, any other questions? No. Any public comment? Do have one question. Oh, please. One more, please. Um I didn't understand one on page four of legislative platform. It is public health and safety number two. Is it uh Lafayette? Lafayette. Uh it must be in Lafayette. Yeah. Yeah. Lafayette. Yeah. Okay. If you can flag that for us. The next ledge committee will be updating our framework in January. So, please do let us know what it is. Oh, I just didn't understand what it was. Oh, okay.

That's all. It looks like it's a COVID era thing. It says opposing legislation that constrains the ability of local counties or cities during public health emergencies to make determinations regarding closures based on local conditions. It probably was a COVID, but I need to go back to see why we kept it rather than removing it. Okay. Okay. But thank you for that. Right. Thank you. All right. Any other? Yes, I would I'll take a motion. Thank you.

Okay. I I'll move adoption of the Linda legislative framework as amended. Second. All right. All in favor? I I thank you. Thank you for staff and Casey and all the other cities for putting this together. It should be great. Should be really good moving forward. All right. So, in the 2025 legislative end of session review 16C3 and

I'll just reference that Townson prepared a pretty extensive uh digest or recap of uh the 2025 legislative session. There's some interesting items in here. Um so it's basically uh they presented it along with in the back we've got the various bills we were tracking at different points. Um I think the highlight not low light for us was SB79. But um there's a lot of stuff going on in the legislature this year and I think it's helpful for our city to have a committee to help track all this because keeping an eye out on what's going on in Sacramento is important.

Any questions? Just a comment. Go ahead. Um, thank you for all that you're doing to try to make sense of of what these bills are up to as they pass through a really complicated process. Yes. I think it helps having um a lobbyist in Sacramento who knows I mean was chatting with him and you know he was at some event and former speaker and mayor of Sacramento Daryl Steinberg was there. It's all a small community up there. Yeah. So it really helps to have someone on boots on the ground. So it's big big plus for us. All right. Any public comment on that one?

Nope. Okay. Great. So, we receive and file. Thank you. All right. So, now we get to go to the fun ones. All right. So, um this is um Mayor Candell, Vice Mayor Andur sixth amendment to the city manager employment agreement with Nup Svatza, our city manager. So, we met with um her on uh oh gosh, what day was that? that last week. Yes. Sorry, it's just so many things going on right now. Um and with the recommendation that the council had come with in order to give um Narub a 5% raise, you know, it'll be backdated back to to start of the fiscal year and to give her her um annual report and thank her for her amazing service to our city.

Thank you. So we have the six and then we had to create we had to get the fifth amendment and then also add the new sixth amendment that reflects um the change of salary. So have any questions? Any public comment? Any comments from anybody here? Yes, I would love to comment. I just think um we're so fortunate to have Nup heading us up and I think I mentioned this in our internal meeting. I mean we are such a young council right now, right? Unusually for Lafayette, right? and we need Thank you.

Yeah. You know, present company definitely included. And so I think just having, you know, somebody with a lot of experience and steady hand is is so helpful um that uh it just I just makes us work much so much better because we're all kind of we're all trying to still figure things out and at least I am. And so I it's very very much appreciated. Yeah. I was just uh reflecting generally how for a city, a small town of 26,000 people, we're really lucky to have someone the abilities of NAROP heading up our our team as city manager. And we're lucky in each of our senior positions. Yes.

In the city. I mean, imagine this. We're a small city and we have these very talented individuals as our assistant city managers, our public works planning. It's just it's just amazing. Yes, we are very fortunate. So, thank you.

If I could, I want to piggyback on what Vice Mayor Andury said, which is like I think back on my 34 years in public finance, working with scores of people in public management, city managers, finance managers all the way up and down the line. and we are very fortunate to have you all with this community. I think that Lafayette is so well served and anytime I talk to someone about well they ask me how it's going I said we're it's we got a great council and we have great public management and I and it's when you have that working together which I think this city does we do we can do really great things. So, um, just a thank you to you as city manager, Tracy, to you as well and Mala and really the whole team that you work with, um, for making the city a great place to live and, um, it's been a a real pleasure and, um, I really want to say thank you all.

Well, I just like to also say thank you. Thank you so much, Narup. I I think I've always found that working with any member, every member of the city staff has always just been such a pleasure. Everyone is just so so smart and um really happy to be working on behalf of residents and I'm sure that that um comes from the top. Thank you. All right. Thank you. So, do I have a motion? Okay. With that, I'll move that the council authorize the mayor to execute the attached sixth amendment to the city manager employment agreement with Narup Servatza. I'll second. Thank you. All right. All in favor? I

enthusiastic I. Thank you. Thank you. And I just do want to thank you from the bottom of my heart and say it it's because of you. It wouldn't be we wouldn't be here if this was not a collaborative relationship. So, thank you. Thank you. And our last is a letter from George Fagoni resigning from the Emergency Preparedness Commission. Uh we do accept it and regret with regret and thank he thank you so much for 13 years of volunteer service on the emergency preparness commission. All right. Do you have a com? Yeah,

please. So, so as the uh council leazison to the emerging preparedness committee, I I wanted to say a few things on behalf of George to thank him um picking back what the mayor said in that um the when you serve as a commissioner and I think in this community which I think almost all of us have a different away from the council um it's a labor of love and you're doing something for the community in these specialized areas and uh I talked several times with the chair of the commit uh of the commission Duncan Sabbert who kind of passed on some really remarkable things that George did working with Duncan, which is, and I didn't know this before, but I have this app on my phone from Genesis, this company that basically shows you every single evacuation area in the state of California. In my case, I'm Lafayette. That's all started with Duncan and George doing the work to define evacuation zones in the city of Lafayette. So that all began with a local effort. I think they expanded it to Arinda. It got picked up by a company called Zone Haven and Zone Haven sort of expanded it taking that same logic of like how do you define evacuation zones and then Janice sort of picked it up from there. So on this map, on this app I should say, this entire state is covered with evacuation zones, which is the channel by which evacuation notices go out to almost every community in the state of California. It kind of started here, which is mind-blowing to me. And it just made me think, wow, this is an effort of two commissioners in the city of Lafayette to try to come up with something to address an issue here. And that grew and grew and grew. It's sort of like out of the tiny acorn a mighty oak groves and that's what George did working with Duncan. So I I think we all owe him just a real debt of gratitude and appreciation. Um he leaves the

commission I think probably better than he found it and we'll have a new person coming on board at some point. But uh it just like goes to show that one individual in a smallish community like ours can do things that have a humongous ripple effect and that's what he did. So I really So I don't know George if you're watching but thank you. Your service to Lafayette is so much appreciated.

Well thank you for sharing. That is an incredible story. Um any other comments? Do we have any public comment? So again thank you so much um George and and also Duncan especially for the all all the work that you've done. And now lastly, we'll adjourn and um in honor of the roundup