City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay, we are gonna start. This is the, so first we'll start with invocation, call to civil responsibility.

Mayor, do you wanna do a call to order? So I can do roll call?

Yes, let's do a roll call first.

All right.

That'll be good, right?

That will be good.

So we know who's here.

Just for the record. Council Member Bregman?

Here.

Council Member Nakanishi, Council Member Craig Hensley? Here. Mayor Pro Tem Hothi? Here. Mayor Upez?

Here.

Thank you.

All right, so now we're going to invite Pastor Sue from Vineyard Wood Church.

Yeah, would you join me in a word of prayer? Heavenly Father, I just want to thank you for our city. Thank you for Lodi and all the people that are a part of it. I ask you, Father, that you would give peace to our city, safety to our streets and our homes. And Lord, you know that we're a city that there are always need for more resources. So ask that you would supply the resources that are needed so that those streets can be safe, so that our kids can have schools, so that people in neighborhoods can gather together in parks, so that people who don't have resource can have places to live. Because Lord, every single person in Lodi matters. And so I ask that you would give wisdom to our council as they deal with things that are very challenging, decisions that affect many, many people, and that you would help all of us to remember that all of us as citizens of Lodi, that we all are in this together and we pull together. So Lord, I ask that you'd give us that kind of heart, that kind of spirit. So ask now, Lord, that you just bless this time, bless this meeting. In Jesus' name, amen.

Amen. So now we do the flag salute. All right, we have a couple of presentations. So first we'll start with a presentation for ALS Awareness Month. If we can invite Chief of Police Rick Garcia and Teresa Wilson to the podium.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Council, for allowing us to bring this proclamation forward. Today we have with us Teresa Wilson, whose family suffered a tragic loss to ALS, and we also have a retired police officer, Chuck Fromm's family here, Gina, his wife, and some family members who also lost Chuck to ALS. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, is a progressive fatal neurodegenerative disease that attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, making even the simplest movements such as walking, speaking, gesturing, difficult and whereas approximately 5,000 people in the United States are diagnosed with ALS each year and whereas ALS strikes people regardless of race, age, gender, ethnicity, or social status and currently has no known cause, means of prevention, or cure. Making diagnosis difficult and treatment particularly challenging and whereas finding the causes and cure for ALS prevent the disease from robbing hundreds of thousands of Americans of their dignity and lives. And whereas individuals diagnosed with ALS survive on average only two to five years from the time of diagnosis and Whereas ALS Awareness Month increases public understanding of the severe challenges faced by those living with ALS and acknowledges the profound impact this disease has not only on individuals, but also on their families and communities. And whereas ALS Awareness Month increases the public awareness of people with ALS ALS's dire circumstances and acknowledges the terrible impact this disease has not only on the person affected but on his or her family and their community. ALS Awareness Month also recognizes the research being done to eradicate this disease and encourages Americans to focus on their heart, health, and encourages them to get their families, friends, and communities involved. whereas ALS Awareness Month also recognizes the ongoing research efforts to eradicate this disease and encourages Americans to support these efforts and promote community involvement. Now, therefore, be it resolved that on behalf of Ramon Yep as mayor of the city of Lodi, we do hereby proclaim May 2026 as ALS Awareness Month in honor and remembrance of those who have lost their lives to this devastating disease, as well in support of the loved ones they leave behind. and that you know this was uh something we wanted to bring forward and and honor and um to recognize retired police officer chuck from who sadly lost the battle to als earlier just a couple months ago so we wanted to bring this forward and thank you for allowing us to do so and recognizing not only chuck but all of those affected by als as well so thank you

I would just like to take this moment to thank the entire Council and Mayor Yeves for the third year that I've been here to request this honor and this proclamation for all of the families and the community affected by the losses for ALS. And my sincerest condolences out to your family for your loss. And thank you very much for continuing to honor our community by recognizing May as ALS. awareness month. Thank you.

OK, so Mayor Pro Tem Hothi, and I would like to invite the Bobs as well to come up to the podium for the check presentation for the nonprofit.

So I think everybody knows the valuable work that Bob's does throughout our city, throughout the region. I grew up playing in various Bob's sports and gotten to know a few of the folks here on the board. And Salus Park also happens to be in my council district. And so I know this council, we've tried to put a lot of energy and support into building out the sports complex there. And of course, everyone knows about the lighting stuff that recently happened too. But Dawson here had reached out. because there's been some issues with the concession stand, and so he highlighted those. Doss, perhaps you or one of the board members could speak to some of the issues you highlighted, and then afterwards I'll give you the check.

Well, first off, just thank you, Vice Mayor Mike Yohoti, for your continued support of youth sports in our city. For those who may not be too familiar with BOBS, we're a longstanding nonprofit organization that offers youth sports to kids for an affordable price here in the city. One of the things that we're especially proud of is how affordable our registration fees are. And a big reason we're able to keep the cost so low is that over the years, Is because of the revenue generated from our concession stand at Salus Park. So we rely on it quite a bit. And so this donation will go towards a much needed restoration of the snack bar, which is both a huge investment back into our program, but also the families that we serve. Some of the things that we're going to be doing in the snack bar. We're going to three different phases to the project. The first phase will be putting epoxy down on the floor in the snack bar right now. It's just concrete, so very difficult to clean. And then we're going to put a three compartment sink in as well as an employee hand washing sink and then put a fan up on the ceiling for some better airflow in the snack bar. So that would be phase one and that's what this check is gonna be going towards. And because of support like this, we can continue offering quality use sports at the lowest possible cost for hopefully years to come.

so again again thank you very much uh vice mayor hothi for continuing to support the kids and the families in our community appreciate it thank you yep so on behalf of the entire council city of lodi uh you know this is a our contribution hopefully the first of many as we kind of continue to build out here i'll keep making my contributions by purchasing things at the stand and just appreciate everything you guys are doing

all right for the next item i'd like to invite council member bregman as well as the lodi chaplaincy association up to the podium you can't

No one hand this check to Chet, please. If you guys see him, please take it away. No, I'm just joking. These two guys, at least two out of the three, actually, I don't think we've met before.

Once before, all right. Nice to see you guys.

Gotcha. Well, anyways, I know these two young gents from Kiwanis. So those of you that don't know Kiwanis, Kiwanis is one of the many groups that we have in Loni to help our community and mess around a little bit and have some fun. So anyways, thank you for being here tonight. Thank you for what you do for our community on a regular basis. I think we have one of the biggest volunteer departments in our volunteer departments that help our police actually in the county. and you guys are gonna know more about it than I do, but all I can tell our community is we're absolutely grateful for you, and we're absolutely blessed to have you. Lodi is a place that's special, and you guys help keep it special, so thank you again, and if you guys would say a few words on behalf of others. Thank you.

Yes, thank you. Councilman Bregman. Certainly appreciate this. It's going to go for some much needed training that we need in order to assist our fire staff and our police staff and the community because we do all three. And it certainly will help in that way. Also, it will benefit by the different things that we provide for them. A lot of this stuff comes out of our own pocket or out of some other donations. So this is certainly a welcome donation to us. And yes, I know that you know Dan, Dan Lane here. He's been here for a while. We were lucky to get him. He's a retired sheriff. Deputy sheriff lieutenant and Scott delay. He's our newest. We do have 14 chaplains. Now we started out with four and we have 14 now to cover our police and fire and the community. So thank you so much. I do want to do it. Give a shout out to or a thank you to you sponsoring the Bobs by donating to them. I'm supposed to be there. My grandson is there at a playoff game. But they do an amazing job there for thousands of local kids, keeping them out of troubles, out of gangs, and that type of thing. So thank you for that, too.

Would I like to say something? Thank you, Cameron. I just want to let you know that there's another aspect to this that I think is critical to understanding the success of the chaplaincy program for the Lodi Police and Fire. And that's the fact that it's not just 14 chaplains. We have 14 congregations who support and sponsor us in our mission to serve this community. That means more than 11,000 people of faith stand with us in support of our actions for the city. It goes so far beyond just the individual chaplains. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to serve.

I just want to say thank you for the opportunity to give our officers peer support and look out for them on the ride alongs and everything else they do for our community. They are huge. There's something we need to get everybody involved in talking to them and making sure they're, you know, the community is comfortable with them. So if you see them, walk up to them, shake their hand. Thank them. But thank you for the opportunity.

And I actually have a correction to make because the first thank you I actually gave was towards the partners program and it's the chaplaincy. So I apologize. When I see Chet, Chet's involved in a lot, if you know what I mean. And then I see the group over there. So my apologies. And to the truth of it, you both do a lot. And all of you guys save lives just in different ways. I'm going to ask for something. Can we all come up to the podium? Anyone that served in any capacity of law enforcement at all, can you please join us at the stage, please? Come on up.

We're going to all do it. Yes, we do.

That's right now.

Oh, okay.

I really got this messed up now.

It's been a while since I had a few one of these. Nancy, let's do it right here really quick.

Gosh, I'm terrible.

All right.

They'll stay right there.

All right. Thank you. You guys want to join us now up here? All right. All right. OK. Yes. Yes, you cash this. Take it down. All right. And then we have the other one. All right.

Thank you. OK.

So I got this one, too. Can we give a round of applause to these gentlemen, too? That round of applause is definitely not for my presentation. I can say that much right now. And last but not least, our partners program and association. Again, what a fantastic group up here. And what's the current number of partners? Chief, do we know? About 37. And again, I think we spoke earlier, but the most we've ever had is somewhere around 60. It's higher? 73 total. And again, these are the individuals that you're going to see out on the street helping to alleviate all the work that our PD officers could be doing. But again, we want them to truly fight crime and again, go into those territories where it needs it most. So again, can we give a round of applause to these gentlemen and ladies up here? All right. And if you want to say a few words.

Yeah. So the partners program at the Lodi PD is giving back to the community. Every hour we spend is an hour that those guys can be on the street doing patrol stuff. So that's how I think about it. This particular check that we're getting from Cameron is going to go towards the purchase of a new pickup for our group. The one we have is 18 years old. It's got 130,000 miles on it. We use it for transporting food for the animal shelter, for instance. We haul out chairs and tables for our DUI checkpoints. It's an important part of our program. So I want to thank everybody for that. Appreciate it. So now we're gonna have every single partner come through and talk, so you might wanna get comfortable.

I just wanna say the partners, or what it says, partners to the Lodi Police, and what we do, frees up the sworn officers to go out there and take care of the violent crime and the other stuff that they do. We do traffic control at accidents and crime scenes and fires. We get called out at night and on the weekends. We patrol all the parks and schools and the downtown garage, which people say is not safe, but we have three patrols that patrol it every day. And so we really appreciate this check like Larry said it's going to a new pickup which we really need, so thank you very much.

All right. City Clerk, can you please introduce the consent calendar?

Mayor and Council, tonight on our consent calendar we have item C1 to C17. There's been no changes to the consent calendar, so we submit it as is for your review and approval.

All right. Any member of the Council would like to put an item for consent?

Mayor, C3, C8, C10 for comment.

Okay, anyone else? I would like to pull C5.

And Mayor, I just want to confirm all the items that were pulled were just for comment or questions only, no separate votes.

Maybe it's C5 for Super Bowl, depending on the question.

So then I'll let you go through and we'll figure it out at the end.

All right, let's start with the first item.

These are actually all related to each other in regards to what I think my primary topic is. What I have read in the past, and I know we're currently doing an update on it, is our city's procurement ordinance. And so how we handle purchasing, looking at putting out bids after a five-year contract period, for example, rather than going eight and 10 years on some of these. And then the other issue of local preference. This is a small business week. It's extremely important to me that we demonstrate leadership in patronizing our local and small businesses. And so I don't see any reason why I understand the low bid on capital. That's something that we're required to take a look at. But I would like to get some kind of an update from staff about where we are with our procurement process, our purchasing process. And indeed, are we highly prioritizing selection based on local preference? Even if it costs us a little bit more, that money stays here in Lodi, and it doesn't go somewhere else. So it's really important to me that we're looking at how those funds are spent, our taxpayers' funds, are spent in our own city. So I'm not necessarily looking for a big update right now. I just want to know what the process is for updating that procurement ordinance.

Sure. Thank you, Councilmember Craig-Hensley. I can give a small update. And if the finance department wants to chime in, they can do so. Our most recent finance committee meeting, we actually brought forth an item on the update to our purchasing policy. And that included the local preference incentive. So those drafts will come back to the Finance Committee. There was some discussion, but we discussed bringing it back to the next Finance Committee meeting. So those improvements are being made to the policy.

Okay, I appreciate hearing that because particularly we had a economic development meeting today. The ad hoc committee met and we discussed the importance of making sure that we were investing our dollars into our existing businesses so we can retain and expand those businesses first and foremost. I think this is a good start in that direction. I appreciate it. Will it come back to Council? Absolutely. Okay. All right.

And Council Member Craig-Hansley, I just want to make a note specifically on C3. So this item went out to bid years ago prior to my arrival, and the only reason I am bringing it back for just a one-year renewal is just due to limited resources in the city clerk's office currently to do an RFP. But that's the reason why I only did it for one year just to carry us through this short period of time. And then we'll be coming back for that. Thank you. I appreciate your welcome. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Okay. And maybe you can have a conversation with Christina or finance to make sure that the policies what you have in vision just so so before we bring it to cancel, maybe

I mean, I think if the opportunity is if it's gone to finance, it's coming to finance again. Yeah, I'd like to be able to take a look at that just because it is something that I've paid attention to for the last few years. So I really appreciate you guys working on it. And thank you so much. And there you go. It's in your lap, Jamie. So thank you.

Thank you. So I think it's mine, right? So see if I would like to... I understand what it is, what is explained of the staff report and everything.

Thank you, Mayor, for that question. Reimagined Housing on Main is our 22 South Main Street project that we brought to council a couple times over the last few years. It is going to be a 40-unit transitional housing project. We just had the ribbon cutting on the 29th of April. The county will be operating it. So they'll be responsible for determining eligibility and bringing the residents into the facility. So this is just the acceptance of the construction and rehabilitation that occurred. And so this is just the acceptance of that portion of the project.

And in the future, like now that we have the downtown specific plan and all those projects that we have, if we were to move it to some other location, will be that possible or not?

We do have a lease agreement with the county for a specified amount of time. It does have to remain based on their funding mechanism as well for a certain length of time. I don't know that time off the top of my head. I believe it's 20 years. It has to remain as a transitional housing project based on the funding that's going into it.

So we couldn't do anything in the span of 20 years then?

It has to remain de-restricted to that use.

Okay. But how about if we find another property somewhere else, can we do that?

That would probably be a question that we would have to bring to legal based on the grant resources that were utilized for that program.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right. Thanks. T.A. ?

Oh, it's all one package. I'm satisfied with the response, so thank you.

Okay, all right. So I would like still to vote separately on C-5 because I have said many times that I don't think this is the right project for Lodi, and I know it doesn't matter, but see, like even 20 lease, that we cannot even do anything in 20 years, that's just something that we're just signing on to something, so I don't believe in this, so I just want to vote separately.

okay so mayor did you want to vote on items c1 to c17 first yeah okay go ahead oh move to oh do you need to ask about anyone in the audience yes if there's anyone else that would like to pull any items or anybody in the audience would like to pull an item for discussion see none do we have any public comments

Okay, now we move to winter 10 emotion, I have one motion, I, I will move to approve all consent items minus C five go the short route second.

Okay, then it passes. So now we'll entertain a motion for C five I'll move to approve.

I moved to approve C five Second.

All right, and it passes. So now we're gonna move to public comments. City Clerk, do we have any public comments?

Yes, I have two comment cards for public comments on non-agenda items. And the first comment card I have is from Randy Stewart.

Thank you, Council, for giving me some time to talk. Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Randy Stewart. I don't know very much about politics, but I like to talk to people. And in doing so, I've come to realize that a lot of people either don't know how this city is ran, or they don't like the way the city is ran. So when I made my decision to try to effect change on how the city was run, I reached out to the city clerk's office for some information. I can tell you the city clerk's office was unable or unwilling to provide any information regarding the process of initiating change, specifically for the role of mayor. I've done all this since February, trying to get ahold of everybody, trying to figure out the steps to take. Now please understand I'm not trying to tarnish the name of the city clerk or her office, but I'm trying to communicate my frustrations at a city that does not seem to take the time to direct an individual in the proper procedure following the attempting to get involved and possibly initiate change. To that point, I have with me a letter to circulate a petition that I would like to file with the city clerk. I sincerely hope this meets the requirements. If I do not, I will start again. Would you like me to read this?

I think you can tell us about the subject of the petition so we know what it's about.

Okay, the notice of intent. Please accept this notice of intent to circulate a petition to change the charter of the city of Lodi regarding the position of mayor. A mayoral office in Lodi has a weak mayoral system. The mayoral seat is filled by within five elected members of the city of Lodi. The term of mayor is one year. January through December with the city council members holding a vote every November to elect a mayor for the following year. My amendment would change the city charter from a weak mayor to a strong mayor system. That would give the people of Lodi opportunity to vote for an individual of their choosing every four years. That's it.

Okay, I will turn to legal to answer that question.

I have a copy in legal also. I guess her name is Sherry.

It's public comment, so we can't respond.

So send the application against to city clerk office and we will reply with what will be the procedure to do the procedure.

So nobody here really knows what's going on, do they?

No, unfortunately, we cannot reply to you and we can hear your comments but we cannot reply because it's not agendized, this item.

So can I just submit it to the clerk right now?

Yes, and yeah, and then she can.

And then I've got one for the city attorney also.

Yes, thank you, yeah.

Yes, yes.

And I thank you very much for your time. Thank you so much, and we'll be in touch. All right, next speaker.

The next comment card I have is from Danny Stanley.

Council, thank you for the opportunity for me to come this evening and share with you the concern that my family and neighbors have. I'm Dan Stanley. I live at 1452 Arundel Court. That might sound familiar. My wife, Jan, and I have lived there in our home for 37 years. The reason I'm here tonight is because the Parks and Rec Commission said that I should come talk to the board, I mean to the city council, not really to them, even though we were invited to the meeting on April 7. On April 7, myself and several neighbors attended their meeting for the board and received a flyer in the mail inviting us to a meeting on which it stated, your voice matters. That's all it said. It didn't say mattered about what. And so I called the Parks and Recreation Department to find out what was on the agenda. And it took a while for somebody to be able to answer that question for me. And it came back that the question was lighting of the cricket field at Beckman Park. And Arundel Court sits adjacent to the park. I then went door to door to my neighbors. There's 18 homes on our neighborhood. Just asking them if they had received that flyer some said they did some didn't remember, but none had heard anything about lighting for the park. And so I mentioned to him what I had found out. And no one was really happy to hear that what how that would change the dynamics of our neighborhood. So once I explained what I had learned, not one person, again, as I said, thought it was a great idea. So I'm here tonight representing those 18 families. I actually talked to all my families. It was a great exercise in getting to know my neighbors better. So I appreciate that opportunity that came from that. So I put together a petition, and all of those homes signed off, stating that they are opposed to lighting of the cricket field. We're not opposed to cricket being played there, but we're opposed to what that impact would have on us, our neighborhood and community. You don't have to look that far. Just go across Ham Lane to Tokay High School. And that new sports field they put in back east of the football field, when I was at the meeting on April 7th, Steve very if I hopefully I'm saying that correctly, said that he gets a lot of calls about the lighting over there at that field. I don't know that has anything to do with the parks and rec department or not. But apparently he is aware or receives those calls. So I went over to the neighborhood myself and looked at those neighborhoods and just see how close those 70 foot light standards are close next to their backyards and they're quite high. When you look at them, it looks like they're right in their backyard. I can't imagine what that must be like when they use that facility. At Beckman Park, to my understanding, there was never a master plan that called for developing into a sports complex with lighting. And so while we support recreation in Lodi and are not opposed to the cricket being played as it is right now through daylight hours, We are opposed to turning our quiet neighborhood into an illuminated nighttime sports complex that will severely degrade our neighborhood quality of life. More importantly, it creates significant environmental impacts the city would not be able to legally ignore and have to check out. Just one example on the environmental is we have nesting owls and hawks back there in the southwest corner of the park. something that needs to be addressed with this. But here are just a few of the concerns that we have. One is increased activity in the neighborhood after the sun sets and potentially leading to crime. I don't say that just to make a statement, but we've experienced that in the past where we've had sporting events that took place at the park. One time it was a soccer tournament that took place and that same evening one of my neighbors suburban was stolen and it was later told to him by the police that some of these soccer games that were taking place throughout the city there was a group out of Modesto who had been doing this in different neighborhoods where they were playing at. So it doesn't mean that that's gonna happen with the cricket community, I'm not suggesting that, but I am suggesting that it does bring more people into our neighborhood.

So thank you for your time. Thank you for your time. And then on my... And does it have your contact information, that piece of paper, so we can contact you? OK, perfect. All right, we will contact you. Thank you. Next item.

Mayor, that's all the public comment cards I have, but you're welcome to open it up to anyone in chambers.

I will welcome any public comments at this moment. Seeing none, I will move to council comments and non-agenda items.

I have a comment.

Okay, go ahead, sir.

I mentioned earlier, and we just had an economic development meeting. We're talking a little bit about this. It is small business month during small business week. A number of us city staff, thanks to the city staff who participated in it, as well as chamber Participants some of our county staff participated and Council, so we did some walks on kelvin lane and the various shopping centers and I say it just was extremely helpful we got to hear what some of the concerns and issues were. Even to the point where we were able to have some of our planning staff help follow up with those small business owners so it's just something I think that we need to keep in mind that, again, you know, we need to support those local businesses so that they not only survive but they thrive, and it was a great opportunity to hear a lot about. Some of the concerns and there was actually a couple of great stories. There is a charter school over there in Bella Terra Shopping Center that is doing gangbusters. They're expanding. They're finding that people are coming from all over the area to bring their kids to those to that school. looking for additional space so there's opportunity even with institutions like that for building on the success that they're having to our local economy so really good appreciate Louise pulling that together for all of us working with the chamber to make that happen just a couple of other thank-yous I heard from residents over across from Lodi Lake and Laurel in regards to the signage that PD has put up chief thank you it's making a difference to them. It's not often we get a long note saying thank you for doing something out there. So thank you to your team and putting that together and brainstorming that solution. I also wanted to see if we can get a quick update, Ms. Jaramay, on what I continue to receive emails about and that's the nature area and the demise of some of the animals there. I know you've had Fish and Wildlife out there. Can you give us just a kind of a brief update on what the findings have been?

Sure. We have been working with Fish and Wildlife, UC Davis, and we had a sampling of the deer tested. And basically the results have come back as natural processes. So we have responded to the Sentinel on some media inquiries and we have updated our website with this information. What they recommend is that we educate the public on ensuring that we are not feeding the deer out there, because that. lends itself to overpopulation of the deer. And so if any kind of disease is found in one deer, it's gonna jump to the rest of the population. And so when we're feeding them food that's not part of their natural habitat, deer are going to multiply in there and it's not really kind of a healthy environment so we're working on signage too we're working on updating our signage our website's been updated and we're watching it and we're working with um pd as well animal control i appreciate that update um and i think just one of the last comments that i will make is i'm sure we're all very aware of the tragic deaths that occurred at the highway 99 harney lane

underpass there and just so that folks are aware we we are actually through Measure K money from the county state we have made that a priority project it actually is tied to our SOI area and expansion plans for the future in that area so that we can ease up on congestion and create a more a safer, more workable space. But it is what it is right now, and it's been that way for many years. And just to remind everybody, please be careful at that area. It goes from three lanes down to two lanes, and we have to be cognizant of the fact that there is a lot of truck traffic that comes on and off that particular interchange area. i don't want to see that tragedy occur particularly with one of our residents and i don't know anything about the victims but it's just a horrendous situation and something i just want to commit that we will work aggressively on fixing in the future so thank you mr mayor thank you any more comments from the council

I've not been there for some time. I've never seen, do not feed the deer. Are you going to plan to put that sign up to some place?

Yes, we're updating the signage. There is signage, but you may not, there's a lot of information on the park rule sign.

It's a small place that don't feed deer.

Right, so we're working with the Friends of Lodi Lake to make sure the sign has all of the information that it needs to have on it and that it's more visible to the public. Thank you, that's all. Thank you.

I thought I saw you feeding the deer. I'll be a son of a gun. I do have a few items, if that's all right, Mr. Mayor. Number one, data centers. We did have a conversation, an item on the agenda two weeks ago. I did get enough public comments to say that the general community is against it, so I'm against it. I will not be pushing that forward. One thing that did come out of these conversations is a question for our connection points at White Slough. So for instance, the fact is still there of we have 100 acres out there and it is developable land, and a long-term lease, obviously not for data center, but for some other type of company that could pay a high price for a lease, may be a good option for a revenue source for the city. So I think it would be prudent to still look into that. And then the other question too is, Once we do have our hydrogen center one day, and we hopefully have that partnership with PG&E, we're still gonna need a connection point to supply electricity to them. So there's a few things that still should be checked into as far as future development in that area goes. Those would be my comments on that. And then the second item, I ended up getting a fiance and a dog in the same weekend. The dog is actually a rescue. I found him on Facebook. His name is Rip, R-I-P. And he is a big German Shepherd. On any case, I had actually gotten a few different comments from individuals about cats dogs spay and neutering and everything else, and I don't think we've actually had a town hall based upon. Those types of programs, the city offers or any updates, so I will be hosting as a council member a small town hall at the Chamber of Commerce building on June. Third, if five o'clock the police chief will be there, our public works director Sean will be there, and then I have a veterinarian Doc Turner will also be there so. Anyways, would love it if you can join me, and if you have any interest in getting educated on what the city's up to and some of those county and city partnerships so. Thank you very much. Those are my comments.

Any more comments from Council? Seeing none, we'll move to a regular calendar. C1? I mean, G1, sorry.

G1, yes. G1 is to receive and file the city's annual comprehensive financial report for fiscal year 2425 by LSLLLP, and I'll turn it over to our accounting manager, Chia Lor, and she will introduce the item.

Good evening, Mayor Gibhaz, Mayor Pogholti, and members of the council. I'm pleased to introduce Christian Towns and Jamie Lamber with LSL here with us tonight to provide you with an overview of the fiscal year 25 financial audit. And they are available to answer any questions you may have following the presentation. With that, I will turn it over to Christian and Jamie. Good evening, everybody.

Let me see if I can get my videos not on. Can you hear me okay? Any echoing or anything coming in?

Yes, we can hear you.

It's just going to take me one moment. Okay, now you can share your screen.

Okay, I think we're up and running. Everybody hear us okay? See us okay?

Yes, we do.

Okay, well, we'll get started. So I'm Christian Towns. I'm a partner on the engagement here at LSL. I've worked with the City of Lodi now the last couple of years.

And I'm Jamie Lambert. I'm a senior manager and this was my first year on the audit.

Thank you, Jamie. I was trying to mess with the audio a little bit there. So we want to thank you for this opportunity to present with you tonight and also thank Chia and her team. The audit always is a big undertaking. We're issuing a little bit earlier than we did in the past year as well. So we're continuing to see improvements in the city to get back on track. Let me see if I can share. Jamie, are you sharing right now?

No, I'm not.

I can go ahead and let me pull up my screen. Okay, that should be coming through. Okay, so we'll go over the scope of the engagement. We've been engaged to perform the financial statement audit and the single audit of your federal awards. The financial statement audit was performed under generally accepted auditing standards, which provides your baseline. So reasonable assurance that statements are free from material misstatement. And then we have an additional layer that goes into play because of the city. I mean, that's government auditing standards, otherwise known as yellow book. That adds additional layers because of the public sector requirements beyond your general accepted auditing standards. And what that includes is some compliance testing with laws, regulations, and grant agreements that could materially affect the financial statements, stricter auditor independence requirements than private sector standards, additional reporting on internal controls, and compliance to ensure transparency over public funds. And then we have your single audit, which is under uniform guidance, and that covers your federal award programs for any entities that expend $750,000 or more in federal awards for a single fiscal year. Just worth noting that going forward into 26, fiscal year audit, that will have been increased to $1 million in expenditures in a single fiscal year. So, within the scope of your engagement, our work was conducted in two main phases. We have your interim field work, which took place in late July, early August of 25. In that field work, we examined your internal controls for operating effectiveness, and we interview staff. With those activities focusing on your internal controls and some preliminary procedures, we then develop our risk assessment. And that risk assessment is what drives our year-end field work. So if we know any areas maybe where there's some additional best practices that could be implemented that may increase the risk, which would cause additional testing or more in-depth testing at year-end. Or if they're that are typically lower risk, we perform different procedures. Our procedures consist of many different things, but primarily analytic procedures, substantive testing, where we test the details of individual transactions. I mean, that's all performed during our year end field work. So taking those risk assessments and implementing during your end field work, we performed that field work in the middle of December through the middle of January of 2026. That included detailed testing of account balances and transactions, some compliance testing with laws, regulations, grant agreements, and contracts, your single audit testing, and then any other audit procedures that came up during that time as well. It's also worth noting that the audit, we don't test every single transaction. You know, that would take an exceptionally long time. So we take that risk-based approach and we apply sampling methodology, and then we go through and we perform our testing in that manner. So some results of the audit, we issued an unmodified or clean opinion on both the general fund and the streets fund, meaning that those statements are fairly presented without any material misstatements noted. For the other major funds, the governmental and the business type activities, We issued a modified opinion. This is directly related though, to the pension information that was had been previously posted into the pension system. It's a continued modification from fiscal year 24, and it is anticipated that this will fall off through timing of the pension system utilization of that information. And due to the delays in the timing of pension reporting. Other than that, those funds had unmodified opinions. We also issued a report on internal control and compliance, which identified repeat deficiencies in internal controls from fiscal year 24, although that's not abnormal considering the timing of issuance of the fiscal year 24 statements due to turnover within the city and other complexities that had arose, and then the completion of the fiscal year 25 field work. So the city is continually actively working towards remedying these deficiencies, and it is anticipated you would see a decrease in those for the fiscal year 26 audit. On the federal compliance side, we issued an unmodified opinion. The city is in overall compliance with major federal program requirements for the programs that we had audited. We did note two instances of noncompliance related to delays in financial reporting. And that's just the city hadn't issued by the March 31st deadline to the federal audit clearing house and then complete schedule a federal expenditures to begin on it. And that was primarily related to our activity. Both of those things are expected to be remedied as well, going into fiscal year 26 through work with with Chia and her team. And then the timing is getting back on track for the city. We identify no going concern doubts, which means the city's ability to continue operations is not in question. And we also have no evidence of fraud, waste, or abuse during the fiscal year through the completion of our audit test work. Again, we have been tested every transaction. We've just applied those risk-based sampling approaches. Additionally, we had no disagreements with city management regarding the application of accounting principles. We encountered no difficulties in conducting our audit. The team was great to work with and very responsive. And then with significant estimates used by management in the financial statements, we determined that those were reasonable with the exception of that modification specific only to pension activity previously noted, which includes the evaluation and implementation of GASB 1 for compensated absences. So that brings us into some changes from fiscal year 24, the largest one being the implementation of GASB statement 101 on your compensated absences. results in a negative $1 million restatement to the beginning of that position. It's important to note that this was required to be implemented by the city, by all municipalities, no later than your fiscal year 25 financial statements. So this wasn't something that you had to choose whether or not to implement. To give a little bit of background on what it is, GASB 101 establishes a single unified model for recognizing all types of compensated absences, so vacation, sick leave, PTO, similar benefits, rather than treating them each as a separate type. It also lowers the probability threshold from probable to more likely than not, so meaning anything greater than 50% likelihood would be considered an incorporated, and it typically results in larger reported liabilities, especially for sick leave, Even leave forfeited at termination may require a liability if historical patterns show that the employees are likely to use it during their employment. Liabilities are measured using employee pay rates as of the financial statement date, plus applicable salary related costs. So having listed some of those things out, it can kind of show the significant amount of time that the city management would have had to put in to evaluate and implement these changes and coordinate across departments. This data will need to be maintained annually going forward. So it's just additional things that your department has to pick up and maintain to make sure appropriately reported each year. And then secondly, the city identified errors in its capital improvement project balances during the fiscal year 25 audit. So those were items that were previously capitalized that did not meet the criteria, resulting in another negative million-dollar restatement. Both restatements are detailed further in Note 18 of your financial statements for additional reference there. Some overall financial highlights. Your net position grew by nearly $30 million, reaching $457.5 million. Some of those impacts were total assets increasing over 3%, driven largely by $14 million increase in capital assets. So that shows the continued investment in the city and infrastructure and other capital related items. On the liability side, total liabilities decreased by nearly $7 million, including an almost $12 million reduction in long-term liabilities, which are impacted as well by your decreases in pension liability and your OPEB liability. So your net pension liability declined by about $4 million, net OPEB liability declined by a little over $1 million. Both of those are positive trends. It's also worth noting that some of the activity within pension and OPEB, those also are seen to sometimes significantly fluctuate from one year over the next due to contribution factors, market fluctuations as well. And then with that, we open it up to any questions.

Okay, I will open it for council questions. First we'll start from Mr. Nakanishi and then Lisa.

Is this the annual audit by auditor? Is this report from our department? Because I see here that Aaron has signed it, right? This is the stuff and stuff. We used to have an audit every year signed by an auditor that says, hey, you've done everything well. Is this that same audit we're talking about?

Yes, it is.

But then, the difference is, our city manager signed this, right? The other auditors, it's been, the auditors signed this. This is, they gave a statement that said, the city's been doing okay, and so forth, so forth, so forth, and auditors sent a report to us showing that you audited the material, not, am I, am I missing something?

No, um, that letter is in the financial report, so it's part of that book you have there. It's included.

This big book right here?

Yes.

So your name's here.

The auditor's name is there, yes.

Thank you. You're welcome.

just a couple questions I'd note just the phrasing of the sentence on page nine it talks about taxes and it lists the numerous taxes it lists the business license the business license no longer tax it's a fee so it's just I want to clarify that because that we took a huge hit financially on on that and it would be useful for me to know how much we have received this past year in the audit for business licenses versus past years when we had a business license tax. I think that's kind of important for us to understand. So I don't need the answer at this moment, but I would like to get a response to that if you have it.

Absolutely.

Okay, thank you. The other thing on capital assets, do we factor in buildings that are under construction? For example, we've got an animal shelter that is going to be completed fairly soon. That's quite a significant investment. Same thing with the access center. Do we factor in those properties to our current capital assets?

It is included in the construction in progress category in the capital asset schedule.

I think it's note, let's see.

Yeah, I noticed it says an increase in construction in progress projects. I just wasn't sure if that's taken into consideration. Yes, it is.

Once it's completed and accepted, then that's when we move it, place it into service. That's when we start depreciating on it.

So right now, it's not really factored in because we haven't valued it to its final value. Completion correct? Yes, it's that'll probably go up next year. Yes, I think the last question is because I'm not really seeing it in the audit, but it is a question that I have that again. Maybe staff can get back to me. It's my understanding that the public library has an investment fund. And I don't know if that's captured in our auditing, in our budget. It is a separate entity in some way. So I'm just looking at how that funding is tracked and if that's a separate audit process through the board trustees of the library.

We it's in a separate trust account so it's not part of our part of the balance the net position balance here okay it's excluded because it's restricted.

Do so it's not included in the audit no okay so who's responsible for auditing that.

But we do reconcile their bank account on a monthly basis, but it's not counted towards the city's funds or net position.

So we have no responsibility for auditing how the funds are spent that we give to the library?

I'm not sure about that. I see our library director was here. I don't know if Jenny, could you possibly answer that? They may have separate agreements about auditing. Okay.

Is it on? Okay, good evening. I am not exactly sure which fund you're talking about. Are you talking about the Board of Trustees fund with the Bank of Stockton?

That could be the case. I know I've been to the meeting and there's been discussion about investment funds. And some of them through, I don't want to say Merrill Lynch, through another investment entity.

Phillips Financial here in town is the manager of the Friends, I'm sorry, the Board of Trustees. Board of Trustees Fund? Yes. And is that audited? Not that i'm aware of. They get a financial statement every month. It comes to the library. It's in the board packets for the Board of Trustees. I'm not aware that they've drawn anything down on it since i've been here. I haven't requested any funding from it.

Okay, I just kind of I know that fund exists. I just a little concerned about our liabilities.

We can look into that. The Board of Trustees may have bylaws that they have to do audits on their financial statements, but we can confirm that.

I appreciate it. Thank you very much. Thank you. That's it. I don't have any other questions.

Any more comments from Council? One last question I forgot. Last year, we did this financial statement, and nothing was said about the forensic audit we did, right? Nothing was said about that. And that floored me. Nothing was written about that. And I'm asking, why was it not in the report? Forensic audit we did, right? Nothing about that amount was said in the report. Why was that?

No, that's that was a separate audit from our.

I would say that's correct. We haven't actually been engaged for the forensic audit.

I'm sorry. Repeat that answer.

Muted. Can you hear me OK? Having all kinds of fun with my audio over here. So for the forensic audit, that wasn't something that LSL was engaged for. I believe that was obtained through engagement with another firm.

Yes, I know. I understand that. But why wasn't it caught in your annual audit? Why was not that reported someplace? I see. So you're asking why we didn't come across maybe some of the theme. I didn't know that until we had the first audit, right? And we found that item. My question as a city council, a council member, I thought that's a report that should be here, but it's not because of why.

So we did know several material weaknesses in the 24 audit. Those would be within the scope of the audit we performed. Again, that comes down to those risk-based approaches and the sampling procedures. With the forensic audit, that takes much more detail into certain transaction cycles to a level that wouldn't fall within the scope of the detail of an overarching financial statement audit.

Thank you. I understand that. Now, my question is, what else is not in here that you get reported to us? Is there anything else that we don't get reported on, we don't report on issues of the balance sheet? Because if you have a company, that stuff should be in here, you know?

Now, this is everything that the LSL has been engaged to perform is what you have received as part of the financial statement report and as part of a single audit and internal control findings.

I think you're saying that this is what legally we have to do. This is here, right? Not beyond that. Is that what you're saying?

Correct, yes.

Is that what you're saying? You're doing your job and this usually way is done, right?

Yes, I believe I'm answering that correctly.

I mean, the only maybe added information is there are two different things. So I think your point is why didn't we add it in here?

No, no. Why didn't I know? I didn't know that.

Can we print that again and send it to the council members, the other audit, and, you know, like in hard copy, give it to all of us in hard copy? Okay.

Yes.

We'll get it in hard copy.

You satisfied my question. Thank you.

Any more comments from Council? Seeing none, I'm going to move to comments from the public. Madam City Clerk, do we have any public comments? I will invite the public to speak on this item. Seeing none, this is not an action item, right? So we don't need to vote on it, right? So, okay. So let's move on to the next item. Okay.

Thank you.

OK, so the next item on the regular calendar is G2, which is to receive a presentation regarding fiscal year 2026-2027 enterprise, special revenue, and capital outlay. And I'll turn it over to our budget manager, Janelle Baker, to give that presentation.

Well, good evening, Maria Pez, Mayor Pro Tem Hothi, and the members of council. I'm here tonight to present the fiscal year 27 enterprise and special revenue funds budget. But really quick before I do that, I wanted to let you know that you got the draft budget books tonight. And I realize that usually we try to get it to you a week early, but since the setup of this, how the presentations are this year, Unfortunately, we just didn't have enough time. We were actually making changes to the projection as of yesterday. So I do want you to take the next 2 weeks to review the departments that we are going over tonight. I will have this presentation ready in at our next Council meeting. So if there's any questions that come up, We can reference this presentation again that night, and then obviously department heads will be here for any help. So I do want to say also that the budget book is a labor of love. I want to thank my analysts who have been working late nights, early mornings and weekends to get it to you tonight. So Thank you from the bottom of my heart to you all. So with that, this is the fiscal year twenty seven budget, which covers the period that will end on June thirtieth of two thousand and twenty seven, or begin on July first two thousand and twenty six, and end on the July or June three of twenty seven. This year's presentation will follow the same format as last year. I will begin with an overview of the proposed fiscal year 27 budget projections, and then I'll pause between each fund presentation to allow council the opportunity to ask questions directly of department heads and staff. So I'll start with the enterprise fund overview. The city of Lodi has four enterprise funds. An enterprise fund is a self-supporting government fund that sells services to the public for a fee and acts like a standalone business. They are financed with funds that are secured solely on the net revenues from fees charged for services and cannot be shared between funds. This allows enterprise funds to solely support their own operations, including salary, benefits, supplies, services, and capital projects and equipment. So the first fund presented is electric utility. So each fund, and I will just say this once, so we don't have to say this every fund, but each fund has a fund balance table like this one. So I will detail it in this slide and then quickly run through it for the remaining funds. So this table shows the change in fund balance over three fiscal years. Starting in the middle column of the table is the fiscal year 25 actuals. Then to the right, the current fiscal year 26 estimated actuals, which are based off of mid-year projections. And the last column is the fiscal year 27 budget. So the fiscal year 26 and 27 numbers are estimated and projected and can change throughout the year based on council action. However, these numbers are what the departments have estimated for the end of fiscal year 26, which has a little over a month left. and fiscal year 27 budgeted based on their projected needs for next fiscal year. So moving from the top down, you'll see the beginning fund balance, the revenues and expenditures for each fiscal year, the net difference of the revenues and expenditures, the restricted cash balance, which applies to some funds, The ending cash balance and then at the bottom of the cash balance as a percentage of expenses. This percentage is important as a check against the funds reserve requirements as outlined in the budget and fiscal policies. So specific to the electric utility, it has a starting estimated fund balance in fiscal year 27 of over 38.5 million with revenues at 99.7 million and expenditures that are a little over 104.7 million. This gives an ending fund balance of a little over $33.5 million or a 113% cash balance. And I just want to note that EU tracks their fund balance on a cash basis and does not include outstanding revenue. So any outstanding bills or invoices are not included in their cash balance.

Before we, can we go back to the previous slide? Yeah. So why, what is the difference between the reserve target is going down, but if you put a lot of percentage, why is that? And the reserve target is going down from 143% to 130 to 111.

Oh, because their expenditures are exceeding their revenues. And a lot of times this can be because of capital projects or just additional expenses that they think will be over their revenue. And we're going to go over some of those revenues and expenses on the next slide so that you can see what they're what year over year they're going over and under.

Okay and like do they project the next year's budget year is 27-28 to follow that trend too of or no?

Well I will say that they do not have any rate increases planned until 2030. So I can refer to Jeff the Director of EU to highlight if there's any the projection for 28 because I do not have that. But I know they do.

Yeah. Thank you, Mary. So real quick, the percent of reserve target is impacted not only by whether there's surplus or deficit spending annually, but are forecasted energy needs and how much money we have to have in reserve to cover energy transactions annually. So as we forecast out load growth, the amount of money we have to hold in reserve will naturally increase based on the market power purchases that we're doing. We do forecast, obviously, a deficit for fiscal year 26-27. We do not forecast an annual deficit in fiscal year 28 nor 29. And then in fiscal year 30, we do. And as Janelle had mentioned, we are looking at a series of small potential rate increases starting potentially in fiscal year 29, 30, and 31. OK.

Thank you. That answered my question.

Okay, so here are the revenue highlights so revenues are projected to be approximately 924,000 lower than fiscal year 26 estimate actuals. One time funding is projected to decrease by approximately 1.2 million primarily due to the completion of low carbon fuel standard funding for the EV master plan deployment. And the receipt of one time FEMA grant reimbursements and fiscal year 26 reimbursable charges are projected to increase by approximately 520,000 due to higher shared project costs associated with the joint pole Program. through NCJPA and increased work for others activity. Interest earnings are projected to increase by approximately 351,000. Customer charges are projected to increase by approximately 170,000 due to anticipated increases in customers usage, not because of rate increases. Inter-friend credits are projected to increase by approximately 90,000, primarily related to operational credits associated with discount assistance programs. Revenue from the sale of city property is projected to increase by approximately 40,000 due to an anticipated vehicle replacement sales during fiscal year 27. And then again, like I mentioned, I just wanted to note on this slide that there are no rate adjustments for fiscal year 27 planned. Okay, so the expenses are projected to be approximately 145,000 higher than fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. The increase is primarily driven by higher personnel costs due to approved MOU agreements, increased power supply expenses, and expanded public benefit programs. Salaries and benefits are projected increased by 972,000. Power supply costs are projected to increase by approximately $662,000 as a result of slightly higher anticipated energy consumption and increased transmission access charges. So these costs are expected to decrease by approximately 50% once the 230 kV transmission projects becomes operational and eliminates low voltage access charges. Public goods projects and customer rebate programs are projected to increase by approximately 850,000 major program areas include continued support for the access Center downtown holiday lighting sponsorships funding support for CB ID nonprofit discount program and the expansion of the DIY commercial lighting program and EV rebate initiatives. So this is expenditure highlights that are continued. Transfers to the general fund for cost of services and the payment in lieu of tax contributions or pilot are projected to increase by approximately 416,000 compared to fiscal year 26. Professional services expenditures are projected to decrease by approximately 160,000 due to the reduction of one-time consulting and contractual service agreements. Capital projects and vehicle expenditures are projected to decrease by approximately 2.6 million. Planned projects and replacement schedules are based on the LEU 10-year capital improvement program forecast. And in addition, fiscal year 27 projections assume that any unspent project appropriations from fiscal year 26 will continue to move forward into the new fiscal year. And just to preface that for all of the slides for the funds, this any approved capital improvement funds that are not used in the current fiscal year will automatically roll to the next until the completion of the project, and that is in the budget policy. So next is a list of the capital projects that you is requested approval for fiscal year 27 this is new CIP funding with the largest request for the 2030 2030 kV overhead maintenance project. Then the continued funding for the 12 kV overhead underground projects ongoing work for others substation relay modernization and other small smaller project funding requests. And then here's a list of us vehicle and equipment request the largest purchases are a replacement foreman truck. To all electric metering bands replacing to fuel powered bands and a substation supervisor track that is a replacement for current vehicle, so the total requests for those are $360,000. And then here's the list to use equipment requests. The largest purchases are a new meter test board, two new cable reels and other smaller equipment needs. The equipment needs for fiscal year 27 total 117,000. So with that, this is the last overview slide for electric utilities. So I will pause for any questions regarding their 27 budget and Jeff is here to field any questions.

We'll start with Councilwoman Craig-Hensley.

Thank you. Mr. Bergheimer, are we not leasing our poles to race for their broadband service that we're now being provided? Is that a revenue generating item in this budget or not?

uh so we we do anticipate once race starts the deployment of their facilities which actually could be as early as this month that we'll start seeing lease revenue they'll start paying as they attach to the polls so they don't currently have any attachments but the multi-year plan is for them to attach to almost all six thousand of the polls within the city

So have we budgeted that in or anticipating for it, or how are we handling that?

We have not budgeted that in this fiscal year. We like to be a little bit conservative, but overall, the total annual lease revenue might come out between $120,000 and maybe $145,000 once their deployment is complete. So in fiscal year 27-28, you'll likely see an increase in lease revenue around $140,000 if they've completed the citywide deployment.

Will we have any additional expenses tied to that or not?

We do not. So RACE actually pays for any additional engineering or construction modification that's required based upon the physical impact of their deployment on our facilities.

okay um in terms of the vehicle replacement with electric vehicles are we under a mandate from the state then to basically replace any of our diesel vehicles with electric from here on in

It's not necessarily a direct mandate to replace diesel vehicles, the municipal fleet mandate is is still in some form or another intact so as we replace vehicles, we have to have a certain percentage of our fleet moving toward a zero emission blend as we go forward the low hanging fruit. for utilities to meet those regulatory requirements are to purchase all electric light duty vehicles such as the metering vans or the light duty pickups it is still very very difficult and almost cost prohibitive to find the big bucket trucks the cranes the flatbeds that are zero emission vehicles that we can afford is that something we're going to have to anticipate down the road or are we going to try and keep it to the There's still a lot of discussion between industry and the regulators. I think they understand that if there's not the vehicles available for us to purchase that meet our operational needs and are not a million dollars apiece, there's quite a bit of understanding at the regulatory level to keep delaying and hopefully the manufacturers catch up and there are more products for them to offer for us to consider purchasing.

Okay, thank you.

That's it. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mr. McAnish.

Educate me franchise fees from AT&T and they get broadband, we're going to increase our, did they pay you or did they pay the city?

So the lease fees for the electric utility poles come back to the enterprise fund, the electric utility.

Yeah. And what do they pay right? What does AT&T pay right now?

So we're part of the Joint Poll Association, which basically means we have probably 85 or 90% of the polls within the city are jointly owned right now. It's not necessarily a direct payment to the city. It's whenever we have to go and maintain and inspect and replace those polls because they're end of life or they're damaged. We submit a reimbursement agreement to the joint poll agency and then we actually get reimbursed a significant amount of our cost.

Thank you, appreciate that.

Any more comments from council? I actually have a question for you, Jeff. Can we go back to the slide where we have the different programs that EU has? So maybe you can go on each one and tell me what they're about, those programs. No, I think, where was the project? Go back to the other slide. I think the last one is the one that I'm not very familiar with, the expansion of commercial lighting programs and eBay rebates.

Sure. And in fact, we have our key account manager, if Justine Delgado wants to get into the weeds. But effectively, these are programs where a couple years ago, the electric utility had a predefined energy efficiency set of rebates. So replacing lighting with LEDs. There were certain programs based on refrigeration or energy efficiency upgrades around windows. After a couple of years, we started to see less and less of the money we had set aside for those rebates being used because a lot of the early adopters and a lot of the low hanging fruit, so to speak, had already taken advantage of those programs. And we opened up a do it yourself commercial lighting incentive program where commercial customers can come to us with basically customizable project proposals. And if the funding is available, we can actually grant them a little more leeway with what they can use those funds for. The electrical vehicle rebates, so we do have rebates available to purchase electric vehicles, purchase used electric vehicles. We have rebates available for the electric vehicle charging installations and to kind of offset the hardware cost for that. The funding for the CB ID nonprofit discount. That was actually an item that Council has just recently modified at the request of Council member Craig Hensley to basically allow certain nonprofit accounts to receive a rebate or a discount. I should say on their electric costs. The downtown holiday lighting sponsorship for the last couple years. The electric utility has been contributing to. the installation of the lighting during the downtown corridor for the holiday season. And we're actually putting aside a significant larger chunk of money this year to potentially help build out a permanent set of lighting fixtures that would stay up year round rather than go up for a couple months and come down. And then we've been supporting the access center and the costs associated with that ongoing up to this point.

Thank you. I think we're ready to the next section.

Okay, now we move on to the next enterprise fund, the Water Utility Fund. The Water Utility Fund is projected to begin fiscal year 26-27 with an estimated starting fund balance of approximately 19.7 million. Projected revenues total approximately 17.8 million, while projected expenses are 15.5 million. Based on these projections, the fund is anticipated to end fiscal year 27 with an estimated fund balance of approximately 22 million. representing an estimated 144% cash reserve balance. I also want to note that this year, the budget presentation separately identifies the restricted PCE TCE settlement funds within the fiscal year 26 fund balance. This adjustment is intended to provide council and the public with a clear representation of the water utilities operationally available fund balance and unrestricted financial position. So that's that 26 million at the bottom of 26. So here's the revenue highlights. They're projected to be approximately $1.3 million higher than the fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Inter-fund transfers are projected to increase by approximately $1.28 million, primarily related to planned operational and capital funding allocations. Customer account revenues are projected to increase modestly by approximately $7,000 based on current service and account activity trends. Water meter installation revenue is projected to decrease by approximately 225,000 due to lower anticipated installation activity compared to prior fiscal years. Developer impact fee revenue is projected to increase by approximately 11,000 based on development activity and other revenue categories are projected to increase by approximately 53,000 due to anticipated operational reimbursements and miscellaneous revenue activity. Expenses are projected to be approximately 15.7 million lower than fiscal year 26 estimated actuals, primarily due to capital project expenditures currently housed in fiscal year 26. Salaries and benefits are projected to increase by approximately 158,000 due to labor, the MOU negotiations. Transfers out are projected to increase by approximately 1.5 million to support planned operational and capital funding allocations. Vehicle and equipment expenditures are projected to decrease by $20,000. Supplies and services are projected to increase by 169,000. And capital project and equipment expenditures are projected to decrease by 17 million. But again, this is all of their capital is housed in 26 right now and any unspent funds will roll into the fiscal year 27 budget. So the following water utility capital and operational projects are proposed for fiscal year 27 and they total 275,000 so PC etc oversight for 125,000 and it's included for ongoing oversight monitoring and coordination activities. Water project planning for 25,000 and the funding is proposed for preliminary planning evaluation development of future water system improvement projects. Water taps and main replacement for 125,000 and it's included for ongoing water system maintenance, including service taps and replacement of aging water means. to support system reliability and infrastructure integrity.

If I may ask, is the PCE, is that the same testing and or issue that we had with the Guild Cleaners facility? Or is that completely separate?

Oh yeah, that's similar.

Okay, and is there any available funds that we can use through that old lawsuit since we're, and I guess what I'm asking is PCE, is that something that's supposed to be state tested every single year?

so we do have a couple different accounts set up because we do have a couple of different settlements each one kind of has their own criteria the one in particular across here we do have money set aside from the rates account on contamination and we still have a balance in there available to cover that which is what we're using for the mitigation over there each one of those are real specific on what level of testing they have. For that particular one, we have a closeout procedure that is approved by the state. So once the project's done, there is a series of like one to two years where we'll go monitor the air quality. And then as the state sees lower and lower amounts, they'll require less frequent testing and eventually allow us to stop testing over there.

OK. How much longer till we are able to stop testing?

that's gonna be up to the state as the process go through. My guess would be one to two years for over here.

Gotcha, thank you.

All right, so we're moving to vehicles and equipment purchases. They total 110,000. They include a full-size EV truck and this is included for replace, or the funding is included for the replacement or addition of full-size electric vehicle truck to support water utility field operations. And then the aluminum utility bed is included and it's to support operational service needs and equipment functionality. So with that overview of water, if you have any questions, the interim public works director Sean Nathan is here to answer those for you.

Any comments from Council? None, then we'll move to the next section. Okay.

So we're staying with Public Works. Now we're moving into the wastewater utility. The wastewater utility fund has a starting estimated fund balance of in fiscal year 26 of a little over 17 million with revenues over 21, I'm sorry. Oh yes, that's right, sorry. Of 21.2 million and expenditures at 21.7 million. This gives an ending fund balance of a little over 17 million or 78% cash balance. Revenues are projected to be approximately 804,000 higher than the fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Intrafund transfers are projected to increase by approximately 1 million, primarily related to planned operational and capital funding allocations. Development impact fee revenue is projected to decrease by approximately 108,000 due to lower anticipated development activity compared to the current fiscal year. Customer account revenue is projected to remain relatively flat, so it's $90. Other fee revenue is projected to decrease by approximately 86,000 due to lower anticipated miscellaneous service and operational fee activity.

I've got a question. Mr. Nathan, the $1 million Interfund transfers in capital,

Yeah, quick explanation on that. It's the same as the water fund. You didn't ask on that one, so I let it go. In prior years, every year, kind of towards the end of the year, we'd move over impact fee money from impact fee to a different account, both within water though. And so this is the first year that we've been asked to budget that specifically instead of just kind of doing it in the background. So it's showing up and you'll see it on the revenue and the expenditures. It offsets because it's a transfer out of one into one, but that's the big chunk of that.

All right, thank you. And I just want to add to that. I did ask for this because we did it in the year-end cleanup, and I just feel like for transparency reasons, budgeting it and having you vote on it and approve it at the beginning of the year is a better way to show it.

Doesn't give us a surprise at the end of the year. Yes, I don't like surprises. I don't either, so thank you.

Okay, expenses are projected to be approximately 12.7 million lower than the fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Salaries and benefits are projected to increase by approximately 209,000 due to labor or the MOU adjustments. Supplies, materials and services are projected to decrease by approximately 202,000. Transfers out are projected to increase by approximately 713,000, and again to support planned operational and capital funding allocations. And then capital projects and equipment expenditures are going to be 13.97 million higher, and that again is due to the role. So there are also two staffing requests included in fiscal year 27, the proposed budget. The first is the senior storekeeper. So the wastewater water division currently relies on one senior storekeeper to maintain all water and wastewater inventory operations. So as the city has continued to grow, the volume and complexity of inventory management responsibilities have exceeded the current staffing capacity. So staff is recommending the addition of one senior storekeeper position to maintain service levels and support operational demands. And then the second is actually a reclass. And the public works administrative manager reclassification staff is proposing the reclassification of the current public works management analyst position to an administrative manager. The expanded responsibilities of the position include highly complex administrative, operational and financial oversight functions. include significant involvement in utility rate modeling development, budget preparation, financial reporting, and most of this is happening within the water and wastewater utilities. So this reclassification for the department, it better aligns the position with what the work they're doing. So in actually this position with sense they're doing most of their activity in the water wastewater utilities we're moving it out of the with the reclassification moving out of general fund and into the water. They are doing personnel transfers now, but that was a recommendation of the department. And then also HR will need time to conduct the reclassification study so any reclassification that you do approve through the budgeting process. HR will do a study to make sure that they are meeting the qualifications for the reclassification. So it'll take time, but if you approve this, they will retro back any pay to the July 1st date.

Just a follow up on that, Mr Nathan, how many people how many staff actually are paid out of the general fund, I mean I find this very promising it moves it over into the. elect or the water wastewater fund but.

yeah it's kind of a net zero right now it's just that positions housed in general fund and but then. as they spend, like Janelle mentioned, most of their time on water, wastewater, that just gets transferred like every quarter. And so it's a little cleaner from our perspective because it lowers the transfer outs and then kind of budgets it more in line with where that money's spent. So net zero to the general fund, but it's cleaner.

All right, thank you. I was going to try and quickly look at how many positions are in general fund, but they're commingled. So next, the capital projects for wastewater, they total 1.43 million approximately. The first one is a wastewater project planning for 25,000, and this is included for preliminary planning, evaluation, and development of future wastewater system improvement projects and operational needs. The wastewater treatment plant pavement replacement at wastewater treatment plan to improve long term infrastructure reliability and then upgrading the blowers at the wastewater treatment plant for $750,000. And then here are the vehicle requests. So the vehicle requests, they total 1.16 million. So they want an EV van for 150,000, and it's gonna support utility operations. A boom truck for 400,000, which again, it's proposed replacement for a purchase of boom truck necessary to support operations and operational activities. Two half ton trucks, and these are used for daily field operations and maintenance activities. And then a street sweeper is proposed for their placement, and then obviously this is used to support system maintenance, roadway cleanliness, and stormwater protection efforts. So again, I'll pause here if council has any questions.

Any questions?

Councilwoman correct just on the street sweeper didn't we contract out the services.

So right now we have one section that that we do in house and then all the new development has been contracted out so anything starting with rose gate that's developed in like 2014 2015 that's all part of the contract area and then everything prior to that is done in house in house okay how old's our street sweeper. Uh, Lance, do you know how old our street sweeper is? I, I don't know. If it's like some of our other vehicles, it's, you know, they were due for replacement, you know, a decade ago, but... A few years ago?

I thought, I thought we were talking about buying one. Did that not happen?

I don't know. I know we talked about a CNG one at one point, because we could get a grant for part of it. But those we kind of were awarded the grant, we went down that road, and they just weren't available, kind of like the EV stuff where the just the markets way behind the money that's there for it.

So I'm just kind of curious what the lifespan of a street sweeper is.

We can get that to you.

Okay, thank you.

All right, can we go back to the slide where it has the ratios and the same question that I asked Jeff, can Mr. Nathan answer that, why it's kind of fluctuating? I know it's capital projects and things like that, but maybe you can talk about that a little bit.

I can. Making a note so I don't forget the street sweeper. Yeah, so... So what happens is a lot of our capital projects they get budgeted out they might be in a fiscal year but is we don't have

we don't have the funding lined up yet to cover those zero emission bus requirements. So that is something that we are needing to work on. So we wanna make sure we don't get to a fiscal cliff like other transit agencies. So we wanna make sure we're.

Especially the planters and the trees. Those trees are very big for those planters and some of them need to be removed and replanted over a period of time. Some of them need to have the curb and gutter fixed so those areas drain. Some of them have lights that need to be fixed up. that's a big chunk of money that comes out of that same pot of money.

And then just to know community development's reserve target is 50% of their annual operating expenses. So revenues are projected approximately 1.64 lower than fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Building and permit fee revenues are projected to decrease by approximately 144,000. Operating transfers in are projected to decrease by approximately 1.5 million and again that's because of the one time funding for the comprehensive plan. Expenses are projected to be approximately $2.8 million lower than fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Salary and benefits are projected to increase by approximately $410,000, and this is due to the MOU agreements and the request for a new position and a reclass. Supplies, materials, and services are projected to decrease by approximately $234,000. insurance costs are projected to increase by 39,000 based on updated liability and operational insurance allocations transfers out are projected to decrease by approximately 1.5 and again that has to do with turning the comprehensive plan into a capital project. And capital expenditures are projected to decrease by 1.5 as well. So that's kind of that double expense that I'm talking about that's in their fund balance. So both of those will decrease transfers out and capital expenditures. So there's two position requests. One is a new admin assistant to assist the building division with administrative needs. And they currently do not have an admin staff, so they're requesting because they need that extra help. And then the other is a reclass of an admin analyst to a management analyst due to the current incumbent doing work at a higher level, more at the management analyst level than the admin analyst. This is the same as the other reclass that I explained that HR will need time to conduct the reclassification study. So it will take time to actually, HR ensuring that they do meet the qualifications of a management analyst. But with that time, their pay would be retroed back if they meet the qualifications to July 1st to 26th. So with that, the interim community development director, Cindy Marsh, is here to answer any questions.

Dr. Nakanishi?

Yeah. Simple question. Building permits decreasing in revenue, is that a trend? I've always thought it's going to be increasing.

We have projected a slight increase due to decrease in single family permits, however, we generally project fairly conservatively each year. So if you look back at the prior two years and fiscal year 25 and 24 we did project lower and then we received permit applications that came in later in the year. and then we ended up with a positive. So that could change if we get multifamily projects. We have two or three of those in the pipeline. So for example, one large multifamily project could be a quarter of a million dollar increase in fees. So we do see a slight decrease in single family permits at this time.

Thank you.

Appreciate it. Yes.

Any more comments from Council? Okay, I do have a comment. So piggybacking on that question, well, because we don't have more land right to develop single homes. So I think in the next few years as we expand and we grow, we'll have those fees in there. But so my question is about the budget. So We approve, like long time ago, some fund to do the general plan update, right? So that's in your reserve funds is where it is?

Correct. So when Janelle was referring to that 1.5 million that we're shifting into a capital project, that is that 1.5. So that was for the general plan to issue a request for proposals. And we're hoping that once the new city manager is on board, we can move forward with that.

Okay. And like if we decided to do something different, like maybe doing like just areas of the general plan instead of spending the whole time doing the whole thing, can we use the money to another uses on the department? Like, for example, getting new technology, doing the premise department more efficient, things like that. Is that something that we can use with those funds or they're restrictive to that?

It's my understanding those funds were specifically allocated for the general plan update. The general plan update includes analysis for the sphere of influence areas and potential that are existing, and then potential expansion of the sphere of influence. So it would include the updated MSR municipal services review and looking at future sphere of influence areas. the general plan has not been comprehensively updated since 2010 we did update the housing element with the housing element the safety element and the conservation element and then a new environmental justice element so all the remaining elements of the general plan there are probably about seven or eight more that have not been updated so those still do need to be updated along with the studies if we did want to increase the sphere of influence in the future Those plans would take part with that whole study. So other technology upgrades generally come from other areas of our budget. We do have a technology fee that we do collect with planning applications, and we're looking at including that technology fee for planning applications in the future. But generally that 1.5 would be allocated specific to the general plan update.

And if we, so this is more a question for legal, if we wanna pre-purpose that amount, what will be the process to do that? Like if we just gonna do sections that will require the $1.2 million is what it was?

1.5. 1.5. Right, and it would depend on the funding source. So if the funding source is unrestricted, your council would have full authority to reallocate it to wherever you desired. If it was a restricted source, you would have to limit it to things that are appropriate for that source. And within the, I don't know if this is the case in this particular thing, but usually there are funds that come through permit fees for updating general plans. So some of the funds may be in that restricted pot. But otherwise, if they're, like I said, if they're general funds, you can do with them what you wish.

Did you know if they were general funds?

They are not general funds. They are from permit fees.

Okay, so in that case if they're part of the Community development kind of fun, so they can be used just to update specific areas right and then also can they be used to hire consultants or or people things like that to technology by software or things like that.

Well, it depends. If the fee is charged to create a fund for periodic updates of the general plan, often in the building permit, there will be what we call a general plan update fee that's within the building permit fee. That fund is limited, or the money in that fund is limited to the expenses related to that general plan update. That could include staff time, that could include consultant fees, and also whatever studies are necessary to provide evidence for your council's decisions on policy in the general plan update.

Okay. Do you know by any chance if that was the case?

All of the studies that would be included. So the RFP is a request for proposals, would be to hire a consultant to do all of those studies and look at the general plan updates of the elements that were not updated with the housing element. Again, that has not been comprehensively updated since 2010. So the general plan is kind of the blueprint for the city. It has elements in it that include the land use element, transportation, We look at updates to fire stations, safety, police, emergency exit routes. So it's more than just a focused land planning document. It's looking at the city as a whole. We're looking at how do fees support new developments. So, for example, CFDs or different fee structures. So for parks, for example, if We're looking at, you know, development in new parks. There's a park section in there. So there's a lot of different pieces to the general plan. It's not really just a mapping exercise. It's a several hundred page document with elements that address almost touches every department within the city.

Yeah, just you know, my question is that yeah, we definitely need to do the general plan at some point. But my question is, Right now, what we want to look at is transportation and growth and efficiencies within the community development department, because that's not a surprise. It's a problem child, right? Community development, everybody complains about that. So in the meanwhile, we need to find a way to fix this. So then if we have $1.5 million, why wouldn't use that to that? So that's my question, where it's coming from. So if that's possible, then I want to explore that. Yeah.

Sure, we do have other areas of our budget that we do use for technology and are making those improvements daily. We've made a lot of progress in streamlining and doing a lot of the with our new community development Cbo chief building official that joined us about 9 months ago has been making a lot of progress. And towards that end, but those are kind of on a different different track funding wise than this general plan money that was allocated I think about a year and a half ago the 1.5 by Council and our budget. About a year and a half to yeah.

I just want to I think what i'm hearing you ask and maybe i'm wrong, but I want to let you know, there is an account specific. to the general plan update. And it's a fee that is collected with the permits. So as soon as they take permit money, there is a charge code. And that portion of the permit goes into a comprehensive plan account. But I will say, last time I looked, I don't remember the number off the top of my head. But that account did not hold anything near $1.5 million. So I would, and it is sitting in their fund balance, because it is part of the CDD fund. I can get that number, just so you know, like that amount will go towards this comprehensive plan, but it's not gonna cover the entire cost. So there's...

so there is a restricted account for that it's pretty small yeah we adopted an amendment to our planning fees last year to add a percentage we collect for both general fund for future it'll probably take 10 20 years to get enough money in there to update a general plan sorry not general fund but general plan and then we also have a technology fee percentage that we're collecting too

Yeah, yeah, we just follow. I will follow up with the city manager to explore those ideas for the future. So thank you. And I have a question from the Councilwoman. Great.

I'm just going to follow up on on your comments, Mr. Mayor, because I do think there are elements of our general plan that need to be updated. I question whether the entire thing needs to be updated, and that's based on best presentations and discussions I've had with other consultants and other cities that are really looking at specific areas. I think land use is obviously one we need to do circulation slash transportation is one we need to take a look at. So to your point, Mr. Mayor, I do think that we can and probably should have a special session where we can go over that once we get our new city manager on board and discuss where the greatest need is right now. And to your point on the areas of annexation and the SOI, obviously land use and transportation play a big role. So it could be that we look at those elements, updating those elements first, and then just accomplish it rather than one big chunk, do bits and pieces, just like we did the housing element. So I would like to see us do a discussion, have a special session on the process forward for that. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. So we'll move to the next item.

OK. So now we're going to move into Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Services, which I'm just going to say I'm going to call Parks because it is. Past my bedtime. Parks, Christina. OK, so before I begin the parks presentation, I want to note that parks will also be discussed as part of the general fund presentation on June 3. During that presentation, we'll provide additional detail regarding the level of general fund support provided to parks, as well as a reduction and adjustments made within the fiscal year 27 budget. in order to assist in balancing both the general fund and the parks fund budget. Parks has a starting estimated fund balance in fiscal year 27 of a little over 2.8 million. with revenues at $10.3 million and expenditures at $10.3 million. Parks has a restricted fund balance of $874,000, bringing their unreserved ending fund balance to $2 million, or 19% cash balance. And I just want to note, Parks' reserved target is 16% of annual non-general fund transfer revenue, putting it above the target in fiscal year 27, barely. So revenues are projected to be approximately $670,000 higher than fiscal year 26 estimated actuals. Operating transfers in are projected to increase by approximately $727,000 to support ongoing operational and program funding needs. These transfers are all general fund dollars, just for your information. Program fees and rental fee revenues are projected to decrease by approximately $57,000 due to updated Participation estimates and facility rental activity projections, so the revenue breakdown on the bottom table and again we'll go into more information at the next Council meeting. It shows the contribution of general fund revenue compared to the budget, the department generated revenue so general fund is providing 77% of the department's revenue overall. Expenses are projected to be approximately $319,000 higher than fiscal year 26. Salaries and benefits are projected to increase by approximately 375,000 due to the new MOUs. Supplies and services expenditures are projected to decrease by approximately 17,000. Insurance costs are projected to increase by approximately 53,000 and that's our updated liability insurance And then operating transfers out are projected to decrease by approximately 91,000. And I should correct what I just said. We don't have any updated liability. We are self-insured, but that is what the actuary, it includes our citywide distribution of what the actuarial calls for for our general liability fund. OK, so the next six slides are the parks maintenance overview. The tables will show the list of maintenance needs for Hutchins Street Square, parks restrooms, playground replacement, and parks maintenance staffing shortage. I want to note that these tables are included in the fiscal year 27 budget book with narration on the state of the funding and needs. So I know it's small on here. I'm going to have an overview slide, so I'll probably kind of breeze through these. I hope that the public had this presentation, but they will, like I said, be in the budget book, and the link for the budget book will be live tomorrow for the public to be able to see these lists more clear. So the first slide lists Hutchins Street Square maintenance projects that have been deferred due to funding constraints. The table lists the projects on the left, the last year they were performed, the replacement date, cost, and useful life in years. The required annual contribution needed and what the underfunded amount is to date, the first slide includes the hutchins street square interior and theater and then the list continue to the next slides. So here's the hutchins street square pool hutchins street square exterior and the maintenance and auto shop. The final Hutchins Street Square slide includes the rental rooms and equipment and the underfunded total to date is almost $8.8 million. The next table is laid out the same and is specific to the parks restrooms. The yellow section is for projects already past due for maintenance. The underfunded total is $4 million. This table displays the playground maintenance list that is underfunded by $5.7 million. And this table has been presented in the past, so it shouldn't be anything new. And again, this is also in the budget book. But the full-time employee deficit that Parks is currently experiencing in the total FT deficit is 11.2 at an annual cost of almost 1.6 million. And this amount has been updated with the fiscal year 27 current salary rates. So this is the summary, the last of the last five slides. So the fiscal year 26 shortage for all of the projects and personnel listed in, or fiscal year 27 listed in is 2.5 million with a past due status amount of 18.1 million with an annual shortage of 5.51 million needed for revenue So every year we should be at least putting in around $5.5 million to keep current with these costs. And $400,000 is what parks is putting into capital this year. And our parks director tonight, our city manager, is here to answer any questions that you may have on the parks budget.

Any question from council? Councilman McAnish.

Two questions. Is this budget presented to the Parks Commission? Do they go over this? Do they go over this like we're doing right now?

We talk about the budget at each Parks and Rec Commission.

They are aware of... You don't go through this like we're doing right here?

These specific slides, we have not gone over them.

You've answered my question. Second question. This is for information only.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, we have the park culture system. Do you have, do you take data about who's from the city and the county and elsewhere? Do you, are you having data on, on that? On, like in a parks program, right? How many people are from the city, the county, and elsewhere? I, I, I want to know if you take, if you have data on that.

If we have data on, I'm sorry, what, what are you asking?

Who, who, who participates in these programs?

Oh, on our participants?

Yeah, mainly in the parks, yeah.

We can get that information.

Well, you don't have that. You don't look at that at all, do you?

Well, it depends on the programs. So, I mean, we've got senior programs. We've got sports programs.

Christina, it's right. I'm not asking. If you had data, if it's not, don't get the data from me.

Okay. Thank you.

But I think it would be good to share it.

Sure. We can put together data on who uses our programs. Yeah. Yes.

Councilwoman Gregg?

Ms. Germain, I know it's not broken down into details, other than you've got park restrooms. But when you get to, let me reference, I've got no page number in here, PRC maintenance, the playgrounds, that's what it is. So when I'm looking at... it's just playground replacement right just the equipment and the surfaces you're not talking about other major improvements outside of that because everything else is just maintenance cutting the law and all of that right correct these are just so it's as is replacement it's not an upgrade it's just making sure we're meeting ada there's a lot of this ada for some of these older parks no these are the equipment is bad and we need the equipment's bad but we would put in equipment that would meet ada

At the time that we saw, which is there may be some amenities that need to be or some Ada improvements that may need to be made, depending on when we installed the playgrounds.

Okay. And I know you and I talked about a sponsorship program that would be available. Will that idea come to Council, because I know it's at Parks Commission right now, right?

the parks and commission did the parks and rec commission did approve the sponsorship package at the last commission meeting okay um with a few revisions so once those revisions are made we are changing kind of the format of it and then it will be released we can share it with the council all right that would be great okay it's always

Any more questions see none so actually i'm reporting on a meeting that I had today about the pool and Blakely is that a part of the list that we should show or does not in the list that the poor replacement.

These. know. no it's not okay it is not included these are just specific to certain schedules that we have okay yes so all of those items that i provided you on certain improvements that need to be made at blakely are not included in these four different lists okay okay good that's that was all my questions thank you so we'll move on to the next item

OK, library is the last but not least. I also want to add the note to this, like I did. Parks is that they are heavily tied to the general fund. So there will be more information on the June 3rd meeting. And so this is just a quick overview as a special fund. The library has a starting estimated fund balance in fiscal year 27 of almost 1.9 million, with revenues at 1.9 million and expenditures at 2.1. The library has a restricted fund balance of 267,000, which has to do with PARs, bringing its unreserved ending fund balance to 1.4 or 73% cash balance. And again there's a note on here the library's reserve target is 16% of the annual non general fund transfer revenue putting them well above their target and, as we did in fiscal year 26 and I just want to remind Council in the public. As we did in fiscal year 26 the comprehensive library review recommended a strategic underfunding of library of $100,000 per year to draw down on fund balance that comprises of general fund dollars. But this year it's 200,000 and the reason is because there is a special space We're finding a space study for the library, which is a special request so. And it was discussed, because we did have to do cost cutting measures for general fund and and since that's an additional larger ask we we agreed to fund it but it's also coming out of fun balance. So revenues are projected to be approximately 243,000 higher. Operating transfers are in are projected to increase by approximately 271,000 to support ongoing operational and maintenance needs fees grants and donation revenues are projected to decrease by approximately 28,000. And most of that decreases because they did have a one time donation last year. The revenue breakdown on the bottom table shows the contribution of general fund revenue compared to the department generated revenue so general fund is providing 98% of the department's revenue overall. So expenses are projected to be approximately 212 higher than fiscal year 26 salaries and benefits are projected to increase by 79,000 due to the new mo use salaries and services expenditures are projected increased by 124,000. And that does include the $100,000 for the space planning. And then our insurance costs, like I told you, the general liability actuarial and contribution from the every fund increased in their portion is 14,000. Transfers out are projected to decrease slightly by approximately 4,900. And most likely this is because either they didn't, they have one less computer that they're, They have to transfer out funds to the IT fund, but it's very minimal. So with that, the library director, Jenny Fontanilla, is in the audience if you have any questions about library.

Any questions from council?

I don't have two questions. I knew what the city gave to the library to sustain revenue. How much is that? I missed the figures.

So the general fund contribution to library is $1.9 million, and the revenue that library is projecting for fiscal year 27 is $34,000. So general fund is contributing 98% of their revenue.

Is that the amount that we've been getting over many years or so, $1.9 million?

Yeah, I mean, you started not accepting, and I can let you answer, not accepting fees and fines for quite a few years now, but general funds always made contributions, but it's obviously become larger when those fees and fines have gone away.

Right there, thank you.

I've asked this question before. We subsidize library. The county has library and they have their own library. We don't have it. Do we get any money from the county? Have you tried to get money from the county? And what other cities have their own libraries besides Lodi?

There's cities throughout the state of California that have their own libraries.

In Santa Monica County?

Lodi is the only one in San Joaquin County.

Thank you.

Any more comments from Council.

If I could, Mr Mayor, the funds that come from friends of the library and the library foundation do they expand those directly for capital improvements or for book purchases or does it come into the library budget. It does not come into the library, so they expand those directly for you and then give whatever that purchases to the library.

Yes, the Friends fund our programs, so when we have outside programmers come in to do various activities and our supplies, and the Foundation is more for capital improvement. Okay, all right, thank you.

So for, this is more like a question for research for later. I would like to know what would be the impact for having the library open when the city's closed, like on Fridays? Because it's, so what would be the, how much money do we need to accomplish that, yeah?

I am actively working on restructuring the hours with the board, so we are open on closed Fridays. Some adjustments, the hope is that we can do it with what we currently have. It would potentially expand hours. We're only open for four hours on Sundays currently, so we could redistribute those during the week.

Okay, that would be good. Thank you.

You're welcome. Just to note, Mr. Mayor, I think when that Fridays becomes important is when we need a cooling center. And so it is something I'm going to continually talk about because of the fact that we need places for people to go who don't have air conditioning in the library's perfect location. And I know we've been closed on Fridays in the past, even when the temperatures are 110 degrees and so it's my desire to be looking at that as just at least an opportunity depending how long it takes us to open on fridays just for regular business would be would be great so i'm hoping for sooner rather than later okay thank you very much

All right. Seeing no more comments, I think we are done with the presentation.

So I just want to thank staff and department heads for all of their efforts on the budget this year. And again, as you all are reviewing your budget book, if you have any questions, you can reach out. But then also at the next council meeting when we have general fund, I will have this slide deck available if you want to go back and reference anything.

Okay. Thank you so much. City Clerk, do we have any public comments? Okay. So now I will open it to the public if you would like to comment on anything on this item. I see none. And it is informational, so I will adjourn the meeting at 10 p.m.