City Council - Regular Meeting

We're going to start, guys. This is a regular meeting from June 17, 2026, convening at 6.32 PM. Madam City Clerk, can you please do a roll call?

Councilmember Bregman?

Here.

Councilmember Nakanishi? Here. Councilmember Craig Hensley?

Here.

Mayor Pro Tem Houthi?

Here.

Mayor Yepez?

Here.

Thank you.

City Attorney, could you please introduce the closed session items?

Yes, you have three matters tonight. The first two matters are conference with legal counsel, existing litigation pursuant to government code section 54956.91. Those are the matter of Scott R. Carney versus City of Lodi, San Joaquin County Superior Court case number 3828. and Scott R. Carney versus City of Lodi, San Joaquin Superior Court case number 44713. The third matter is conference with legal counsel, anticipated litigation, significant exposure pursuant to California government code section 54956.92, one case.

Thank you so much. Is there any public comments on closed session items?

Mayor, I don't have any comment cards.

Seeing none, the council is adjourning to closed session at 6.33 p.m. All right, so the council is returning from closed session at 7.14 p.m. City Attorney, can you please report on closed session items? There's nothing to report this evening. All right, thank you so much. So we will move to the invocation. We invite Pastor Patrick to the podium. Well, Patrice, sorry, Patrice.

Let us bow our heads. Gracious Heavenly Father, we are gathering in this place to conduct business for the city of Lodi. I asked God for the gift of wisdom and clarity as they deliberate on the issues facing this city. Give the council members the ability to listen and to work together in unity, integrity, compassion and dedication. We pray all these things in your name. Amen.

Now we will do the flag salute.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

This is the regular meeting for June 17, 2026, convening at 7.15 PM. City Clerk, could you please do a roll call?

Council Member Bregman?

Here.

Council Member Nakanishi? Here. Council Member Craig Hensley? Here. Mayor Pro Tem Hothi? Here. Mayor Yepez? Here. Thank you. Okay. So mayor tonight we'll start with our presentations and we have four and the first one is for parks and recreation month the power of parks and recreation and i'd like to invite director JEREMY and the parks recreation cultural services department.

Good evening. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and thank you, members of the council, for recognizing that July is Parks and Rec Month. And so tonight we have our Parks and Rec Commissioner, Mike Karuba, as well as a few of our staff from the department. The proclamation for parks and recreation month, whereas parks and recreation is an integral part of communities throughout this country, including low die California. And whereas parks and recreation promotes health and wellness improving the physical and mental health of people who live near parks and whereas parks and recreation promotes time spent in nature. Which positively impacts mental health by increasing cognitive performance and well being and alleviating illnesses such as depression attention deficit disorders and alzheimer's. And whereas parks and recreation encourages physical activities by providing space for popular sports, hiking trails, swimming pools, and many other activities designed to promote active lifestyles. And whereas parks and recreation is a leading provider of healthy meals, nutrition, services, and education. And whereas parks and recreation programming and education activities such as out of school time programming, youth sports, and environmental education are critical to childhood development, and whereas parks and recreation increases a community's economic prosperity through increased property values, expansion of the local tax base, increased tourism, the attraction and retention of businesses, and crime reduction, and whereas parks and recreation is fundamental to the environmental well-being of our community. And whereas parks and recreation is essential and adaptable infrastructure that makes our communities resilient in the face of natural disasters and climate change. And whereas our parks and natural recreation areas ensure the ecological beauty of our community and provide a place for children and adults to connect with nature and recreate outdoors. whereas the U.S. House of Representatives has designated July as Parks and Recreation Month, and whereas Lodi, California recognizes the benefits derived from parks and recreation resources. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Ramon Upez, Mayor of the City of Lodi, does hereby designate the month of July 2026 as Park and Recreation Month in the City of Lodi, California. Thank you. Thank you so much.

And then, you know, we can see parks, obviously, you have a lot of support you made to show up. And thank you. Congratulations. Thank you.

Thank you. Commissioner Karuba would like to say just a couple of words.

Where's Karuba?

OK, well, just on behalf of the commission, many of whom could be here tonight, this council has been really supportive of Parker X in a way others haven't. Recently, we, Mayor Upez and Councilman Bregman, were at Zupo Field for the Junior Giants. and that beautiful facility is the direct result of your commitment to parking racks and i think you'll admit it was just an amazing amazing event see all these kids and it was very proud to have in that facility so thank you on behalf of the parker execution for all your support

Okay. Item B2 is the presentation of proclamation proclaiming June 6th, 2026 as California adopted Pet Day in Lodi. I'd like to invite up to the podium David Goad.

Thank you. Whereas thousands of dogs cats and other companion animals enter shelters and rescue organizations throughout California each year in need of safe loving and permanent homes. And whereas pet adoption provides animals with a second chance, while enriching the lives of individuals and families through companionship emotional support and improved well being. And whereas California adopt a pet day is a statewide initiative dedicated to promoting animal adoption raising awareness about shelter pet homelessness and encouraging responsible pet ownership. And whereas animal shelters rescue organizations like ours volunteers veterinarians and Community advocates work tirelessly to care for vulnerable animals and connect them with loving families. And whereas California Adopt a Pet Day helps reduce shelter overcrowding, supports animal welfare efforts, and inspires communities to consider adoption as the first option when seeking a pet. And whereas through public awareness, community engagement, and adoption opportunities, California Adopt a Pet Day highlights the importance of compassion, responsibility, and lifelong commitment to animals in need.

Now therefore, be it resolved that I, Ramon Yepez, do hereby declare June 6th, 2026 as California Adopt-A-Day in the city of Lodi and I invite everybody to adopt a pet and helping those organization by donating your time or funding, obviously. Sign on the 17th day of June 2026, thank you.

Thank you.

And now I will invite you guys to say a few words.

First of all, I can't.

She's been talking about rescue for so long that she's lost her voice. But she and I talked about this a lot. And you'll hear from Michelle Weeks a little bit later, too, about the importance of the animals in our community. Jane's been in rescue for over 25 years, serving the entire Central Valley, especially Lodi. We live not far here from downtown. And it's one of those jobs where you meet the worst in people and the best in people. And we celebrate the best in people, and those are the people who adopt, who foster dogs, who donate, who work tirelessly, the veterinarians, the shelter staff who are taken for granted and not loved the way they should be. And we appreciate Councilmember Bregman hosting a town hall just a couple of weeks ago. It was a standing room only room. That's because there's so many people who care about animals. And we appreciate you giving us the opportunity to speak. We look forward to the new animal shelter and respectfully ask that we continue to fund it, to support it, to be open enough to serve the community. And that's really one of the messages I'm gonna leave you all with today. There's three things you can do if you care about animals. Number one, spay and neuter your pets. because that's where the overpopulation problem begins. Number two is Commit to your pet as if it's a member of the family. And we get calls daily from owner surrenders, people who thought, oh, you know, maybe this dog is too much for us. So commit to an animal and go to reputable places like rescues and reputable breeders. If you go to a breeder, not the backyard breeders, don't perpetuate that problem. And finally, donate, adopt, and foster. And thank you again so much for this honor.

For item B3, which is our next presentation, it's a proclamation proclaiming the month of June 2026 as Pride Month in Lodi. And I would like to invite Jess Moreno from A New Lodi up to the podium. Mayor, I'll also note we have a public comment on this item. Okay. So once we present, I'll call up the public comment. Okay.

And as our board members make their way up here, just to pick up on the last proclamation, we actually had a pet adoption during the Pride event at Idle Bear. So through our event, one dog did find his forever home. So we were proud to partner with Lodi Animal Services for that event as well. Whereas the liberation movement for the LGBTQ plus community began with a riot on the night of June 28th, 1969 at the Stonewall Inn. Sorry if I get emotional. in New York City. There have been other movements such as the Mattachine Society in the past who fought against bigotry, but it was the Stonewall Riot that kicked off the modern movement for the LGBTQ plus rights. A fight that continues today. Accounts vary about what exactly happened that night, but what's clear is that this was the night the LGBTQ plus community decided to fight back. And whereas Stonewall inspired LGBTQ plus people worldwide to organize and fight for their rights, what started as a local bar riot turned into a global movement. Before Stonewall, it was illegal to exist as an LGBTQ plus person in most of the world. Since then, not only has the movement led to civil rights that were once thought impossible, but LGBTQ plus people have also made significant cultural and economic contributions to communities around the world, including in Lodi, California. And whereas the city of Lodi is proud of being an inclusive and welcoming home to all residents where we believe that everyone is entitled to dignity and respect. And whereas since 2021, a new Lodi has recognized and celebrated Pride through its annual Pride Festival. And whereas the 2026 Festival was celebrated on June 6th, drawing approximately 1,200 attendees along with over 40 vendors and performers to downtown Lodi. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Ramon Yepes, Mayor of the City of Lodi, does hereby proclaim June as Pride Month in honor of the LGBTQ plus community and the allies in the City of Lodi. Signed on the 17th day of June 2026. I would just like to thank the mayor and the council for this recognition. You know, there's a lot of people to thank. I just I just for me I just go back to the 1980s as a gay kid and load high. That was a tough time to grow up. I never thought something like this would happen in Lodi. And so it's meaningful. I just want you to know that this recognition is meaningful to the community. This recognition is important. We talk about Lodi being livable, lovable Lodi. I've grown up all my life hearing that phrase. um and proclamations recognition the fact that this is this was our fifth pride celebration in the city of lodi um really helps us live up to that ideal that we have that we've adopted for this city and it's been been the motto since i can remember the livable lovable lodi so i thank you thank you for this recognition um it's very heartfelt and it means a lot to to all of us on on the board and the community at large so thank you

And then Mr. Anderson, did you want to come up for your public comment?

Hi, Christopher Anderson. I am a resident of Lodi and one of the founding members of a new Lodi. So I'm really proud of all of you for making this happen. I've been on the front lines fighting for social justice for LGBTQAI plus folks. And for us to come this far in Lodi is just really phenomenal. So I applaud all of you. I applaud our audience. I applaud our community for making these steps forward.

to recognize some of the most marginalized people and to rise them up and love and honor them for who they are appreciate you all thank you mayor our last presentation of of the night is a presentation of recognition to our outgoing interim city manager Aaron Bush and I'd like to invite

And no, we have other stuff too. So there is more. There is more.

OK. So we know that you have almost 40

So I just want to say quick words. We have had a few city managers in the city of Lodi. It's not a surprise, right? But Aaron, in his three months that you've been here, right? Three months? Four months? Time passes fast. But you have done phenomenal. I tried to recruit you many times to take the full-time job. I failed. But as recent as last week. But really, of all the people that I have worked with, Aaron, you... having experience really shows like because you when i have us we don't agree on many things but we talk about it we talk about the issue we get to the resolution and that's where you see the experience there i'm grateful that you were here at this time and i hope you can continue helping us in some facility here in the city because you're not going to be the interim city manager from now on you're going to be the city manager emeritus of the city of lori which i don't think we have ever done that but

you're the first one and you'll be the first one so thank you you would like to say some words well thank you mr mayor vice mayor members of the council it truly has been an honor to uh be invited to come and and serve and help with you and your your goals and objectives um i i knew right away that this was a special opportunity because this is a unique and special place and so thank you for inviting me in to to be a part of that for just a short period of time but we did you know tackle a lot of different things. And I'm very grateful for that. You have an amazing dedicated staff that is very passionate about the challenges and the opportunities ahead of you. And so I think you're in good hands. And I know that the incoming city manager is very excited to be here and, and take a hold of the reins and do some great things for this wonderful community that obviously, you know, won a very important award recently, and I can see why. So thank you for the opportunity. And it's been a pleasure and thank you.

I'm just going to give a quick shout out to our public works department because they made that sign.

Not yet. Like you told me two days ago, until 7 AM on Monday. Yes, and I said you're the hook for the weekend still, so. Anyways, so we'll now go to the consent calendar. Madam City Clerk, can you please introduce the consent calendar?

Yes, Mayor, tonight we have, on the consent calendar, we have items C1 to C18. There are no changes or updates to the consent calendar, so we submit it as is for your review and approval.

Will any member of the council like to pull an item?

C1, C9, and C13 for comment.

OK. Let me see. I think I have another. Do you got all those, city clerk? Yes, OK. Any other item?

C9, then. Has the public been offered a chance to pull items yet? Not yet. Not yet? Not yet.

So we will go with council, and then we'll ask the public if they would like to pull an item.

So just those three items from Councilmember Craig-Hensley?

OK. Then let's start with the first one.

On see when I just want to make a note. It's the minutes from the meeting, and I had asked to receive information regarding the difference between revenue received in the past from the business license tax versus revenue now received from business licenses. So that's an outstanding item for all council to receive. And then I had also asked if I could receive information relative, and I mean the financial reports regarding the library's investment fund, the Board of Trustees fund, and any auditing that the library has done of their investments. So that would be the only things I'm still looking for. Thank you. Thank you. OK. C9, I am to C9. Oh, Chief Garcia provided me some information on this, but I just want to underscore and understand, and I think this will be when we pull together our new procurement purchasing policy. But we have purchased vehicles. from four police patrol vehicles outside of even San Joaquin County going to Folsom Lake Ford and Winter Chevrolet based on an agreement we do have relative with the state that we can operate under. I think I really want to better understand if we don't have fleet services available in this city and I am 100% going to continuously talk about the importance of supporting buying local because those sales tax come back to us, help increase our revenues, and give business to our local businesses. So I know we'll be coming in July, I believe, with a purchasing policy.

Yeah, the Finance Committee actually just sent over some recommendations.

OK, good. So just putting that on the agenda for that purpose. And then lastly, road condition assessment, item C-13. I know I appreciated very much Mr. Nathan's list of what we're going to be looking at for road paving projects. I just want to be consistent with the fact, and this was mentioned by Mr. Lindsay when he was on as city manager, We need a complete road condition assessment report and not just driven by neighbors complaining about potholes, which I respect that. But when we look at it in comparison to other alleyway street paving projects, where is the greatest need? The alleyways had a great assessment completed of it. So that was extremely helpful. I'd like to know that we have that same level of analysis done for streets citywide so that we really understand that we're getting the worst ones first.

Yeah, so we did. Council did allocate some funds last year for for the roadway analysis. We put it on RFP. We selected a consultant. They've actually done them almost all the field work already. And then per their process, they switch inspectors and they do 10% of double checking of the other people's works just as a QA QC. And so that'll be wrapping up real shortly. And then we will be presenting that that report to council.

Thank you, Mr. Nathan. Sometimes we just don't know what's going on behind the scenes, so that's, that's my reason for asking the question. Thank you for that work. That, that's it. May I, may I come in and listen?

Nathan, I, um, I'm waiting.

You painted it, that, didn't you, right? Yeah, there was a stri, striping project that touched up a lot of the painting. Yeah, very beautiful.

I was, um, thank you. Thank you for continuing to paint most of those roadway. Thank you.

Thank you so much, and that was all the items. Okay, so now I'm gonna ask the public if they would like to pull an item from consent. Jim? Yes, can you, thank you.

Hello, my name's Jason Penninger, I'm with West Coast Arborist, and I'd like to pull item C-15 from the consent calendar.

Okay, let's hear let's discuss now.

Okay. Thank you, Mayor and Council. I'd like to take this opportunity to explain. My name is Jason pinninger. I'm the operations manager with West Coast arborist. I've been the manager I'm currently the vice president, but I was a manager here in 2005 when we originally were awarded this contract. I'm here today to respectfully request the delay in awarding this contract. There are several concerns that warrant further evaluation before moving forward. First and foremost, the proposed contractor lacks the experience with tree management software required for this work. Elite Maintenance has never completed a comprehensive municipal GIS tree inventory of this size or scope. This was a minimum requirement for this project. Additionally, their closest office and crews are located over an hour away, I believe in the city of Ceres. West Coast Arborist currently maintains the trees and inventory for the City of Ceres since 2012. This raises legitimate concerns about emergency response times, especially during high traffic or inclement weather. Over the past five years, our team has successfully completed over 90 after hours emergency calls for the City of Lodi. Including responses during major weather events and these seem to be happening on a more frequent basis in Northern California. WC has the ability to mobilize over 100 crews. From our local offices in Stockton, Sacramento, the San Joaquin Valley and the Bay Area if needed. Timely response is critical to maintaining public safety and protecting city assets. I have. Um, currently I have 15 employees, uh, that live, uh, that reside in the City of Lodi. I have three full-time foremen with their fully equipped trucks that live and own homes in the City of Lodi. And I also have a, uh, a branch manager, a nursery manager that owns a home here in Lodi. Lodi's Urban Forest is valued at over $42 million, and that's a conservative estimate. This is significant public asset that requires proven experience and capabilities. The proposed contractor has not previously managed a project of this size or complexity, and would be undertaking this as their first effort at this scale. And I don't believe it's in the community's best interest to serve as a trial case. West Coast Arborist is proudly partnered with the City of Lodi for more than 20 years now. During that time, we've worked closely with staff, city staff, local nonprofits, and the community, supporting Tree Lodi at Arbor Day events, the annual hospice Christmas tree lighting since 2006, and the ongoing training programs with city staff and their partners. I respectfully propose extending the current contract to allow staff the time needed to fully evaluate the lowest bidder's qualifications and actual capabilities. I believe they were rushed. Under California law, contracts must be awarded to the most responsive and responsible bidder, not simply the lowest price. there was a 10% difference in cost. Experience is proven. Performance matters, especially when managing an asset of this importance. I thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you so much for your comment. So I have a question for the city manager and city attorney. Can we delay on this item for the next meeting? You certainly could continue the matter if you chose to. OK, so that's an option. OK, thank you. So we invite, I think, Councilwoman Craig is first, and then Mayor Prater-Mahoty.

So I noted that this initial contract term, Mr. Nathan, is for two years, and then two optional. We've done that in the past so that it gives us an opportunity to evaluate the work of the firm that's working with us, I would assume. Is there any other specific provision in the contract where we did not feel the performance was up to what the expectations were or what was presented in the proposal that we would have an option out on that agreement?

That one I don't know what the specifics are. I do know that there are clauses in there that allow that to us, and then we'd have to at that point rebate it if that was determined, but there are clauses in there. I just don't have those specific ones memorized because that's not something we deal with too often.

Okay. I am... I have said this before, and I have to be consistent. I do not believe in evergreen contracts. I do not support a contract with one business for 20 some years unless there's a very valid reason for it. To my earlier point about I'd like to support local businesses. We did put this proposal out there was a response to it. I do hear what we're being told relative to meeting the response of the responsiveness and responsibility. I do understand we tend to look at low bids on capital projects. So I understand that as well. I don't know that they were rushed in the review of this. But I do have to support staff if they felt that this was the best option at the time for the bid and that it was responsive. It's kind of like time will tell in that. And if we have a way out of it, then I'd be more comfortable just moving forward. It's not a three-year. It's only a two-year contract, which we do a lot of three-year contracts. So any other thoughts of council? I mean, I'm open one way or the other.

I just would be curious as to the reason for switching the contract. Was it simply the 10%?

No, so since I've been here about 13 and a half years, we've put this contract out to bid four times. I've managed the first probably two and a half of them. The first three times we put it out to bid, West Coast Arborist was the low bidder. They were awarded it. They've had it since that time. So that was the 2013 was the first one I put out. Over those three contracts, the city has those contracts were ultimately valued at about $5 million. Um, per Council's direction in our purchasing policy. Once we hit five years, we've been putting it out to bid. So this one that we're currently in is a two point, eight, two point, eight, five million dollar contract since two thousand and twenty one. So this is the end of the fifth year, which is why we put it back out to bid this being the fourth time, and They were not the low bidder. As part of our standard process, when we open the bids, the term is apparent low bidder. And so that's based on no research at first. They're the low bidder. And then after that, you go back and you verify that they meet all the conditions of the requirement to our satisfaction and that if they have subs, that none of them have their license revoked or they don't have their license revoked, that type of thing. We have a whole checklist of things we do for that type of stuff. So yeah, that probably has to answer your question, but I don't know if that asked or brought up any more.

Do you have any sense of where the employees come from? Are they local employees? Because this new finance policy, I don't know when that's going to come before us, but I believe there is something related to 10%, a differential. I don't know.

In terms of local?

We're changing. We're in the process. The Finance Committee made some recommendations for preference for local bidders, and I believe the differential is roughly 10%, if I'm correct.

Correct?

It's a 5%. 5%. So, yes.

It's usually related to sales tax and business license, and it's typically quite modest. 5% is pretty typical, 5% or 6%.

Do we have comparative cities that this low bidder has done before?

So as part of our staff's verification, they called a number of cities, they found a number of like council awards. The agencies that they do work for is Fresno Unified School District, Merced County School District, City of Roseville, Sierra Resource Conservation District, City of Shafter, City of Clovis, Kern County, Sanger Unified School District, San Joaquin Irrigation District, and Stanislaus Transit Authority. So those are those are the 11 that our staff verified and our requirements didn't require that many. But that's what our staff verified.

Does that sound correct to West Coast as well?

Sir? Sir? I'm so sorry, but residents online can't hear you. If you can come up to the podium. My apologies. No worries.

several of the agencies that were mentioned by Mr. Nathan. We are currently the maintenance provider for those agencies. They do landscape in those agencies. They have never completed in a city municipal tree maintenance contract in its entirety, not even for a year. So I believe that Lodi is going to be their first. And I don't think that cost savings is there. We actually lowered our price from five years ago by 10%. And what Elite did was they lowered They went 20% below our price from 2021. And the numbers don't make sense. Thank you for your comment.

Councilwoman Craig.

I just, in order to be fair in all of this, Mr. Nathan, have you had any performance concerns with West Coast Harvest?

No, the opposite. West Coast has been great. Like I said, I managed their contract for the first, I don't know, eight years I was here probably, and they've been fantastic. Couldn't say a bad thing about the service we've had from them. When we had the storms in 2021 and also the New Year's of 22-23, they were fantastic.

If we did continue this, what would you do other than maybe addressing the comments that have been made tonight? I mean, what would you do?

So from staff's perspective, we weren't rushed. We did verify everything that we felt we needed to verify on meeting the requirements of our bid. Our staff observed that Elite's databases that they have for, I think it was at least two agencies, they showed us that they had it, and that it meets the requirements that we need it for. There's I mean, from from staff's perspective, we we validated that we feel they meet the requirements of the bid specs, I think, for sake of you know, we have a lot of items today in the agenda, and I will be.

I would like to move this item to the next meeting, so we can get more information about it. If you guys are in agreement with that, and then in winter is our next city council meeting in 2 weeks, or

It's July 1, but to the council member's point, I would ask if there's something specific that you would like us to look into tonight so that we make sure that we're not wasting that two-week time period and missing what you're looking for. That would be helpful.

I mean, if they already have tree contracts with these other cities, not landscape contracts, that would definitely be something to know. Is Lodi going to be the first?

We can absolutely verify that.

I have a question.

Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, go ahead.

So they say that they provided tree management software. I've requested this from staff. I have not received any information as to what cities they have provided municipal tree inventory, GIS software, or asset management. I have not received anything. I would love to see what cities they have provided the service for.

I would just ask one thing. You mentioned the fact that you've done the tree lighting. You've done some other things for nonprofit organizations working with tree load. I think that does need to be factored in. We've done that with WM in the past. So it would be important to know a little bit more about the value of those services on top.

in in most cities that have a you know a 16 000 tree you you have 16 or 18 000 trees in your inventory with valued at over 42 million it normally goes to the best qualified not just the lowest better elite maintenance also bid against us most recently in the city of roseville one of their one of their references, we've been the tree maintenance contractor in the city of Roseville for 20 years and are currently set to renew and we were ranked number one and Elite was ranked number six. And they did not consider price, they just looked at qualifications.

Do you guys have any more questions?

If I were to make a choice today, my favorite would be this company because they've been in Lodi for a long time. We have not had complaints about trees, so looking at it, my personal bias would be to get the Who is the company? West Coast.

That way, I think it will be prudent to continue this item so then council members can have conversation with the city manager, city attorney, and all of those things. Yeah, Mr. City Manager?

Yes, thank you. So I think that two weeks happens fast because to get back to you, it's really one week. And so I think the takeaway for us tonight is that we will verify some of the claims that were brought up tonight and confirm those. I appreciate the comments about the additional City of Lodi. But if I'm not mistaken, that is not included in the in the score sheet, if you will, for the contract. And so I'm certainly not discounting that. But, you know, from our perspective, we're looking at it per the terms of the contract. And so in that regard, I think we can certainly focus on verifying what was shared tonight and then come back to the council with confirmation that, you know, we did or we did not You know, confirm that.

Thank you so much.

I'll make a motion for consent calendar minus C. I will second them.

Thank you.

So.

I just want to make sure that there is no motion on C-15. It is just to continue. The direction is to continue. And then Mayor Pro Tem Hothi motioned and Mayor Yepez seconded. And I will start the votes now.

All right, and it passes. So now we're going to move to non-agenda items. Do we have any public comments?

Yes, Mayor. I do have one comment card.

Madam City Clerk, do we not have to swear in C-18, Ms. Milton and Ms. Gonzalez-St. Clair?

No. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough opportunity to give them notification that they're going to be on the agenda tonight. So they are not here, as far as I'm aware.

No, Nancy's here.

Oh, you are here.

OK. Yeah, so let's do that.

I will say Ms. Milton is a reappointment, so she's already on the library board.

Before you go, would you like to say a few words? Would you like to say a few words?

Um, thank you so much for, um, choosing me to be on the library trustees. Um, I really love the library. Uh, when I first started reading, I was nine. And, um, the library changed my life. It really did. I just, all I did was read, and then I started reading poetry. So I believe libraries are extremely important to our community. So thank you.

Thank you so much for, as you know, I have shared with you in the interview that the library is one of the things that I value the most of the city. So I know that it's going to be in good hands with you. So thank you for stepping up and taking care of something that I love so much. Thank you. All right, so now public comments.

Yes, Mayor, I just wanted to give a quick update. I didn't realize I didn't see the cards that were here. But I do have multiple comment cards for C 15. So for those that submitted comment cards for C 15, I will send your comment card and your contact information to public works so that when the contract come backs to comes back to council, you'll be notified.

So thanks so much.

For public comments on non-agenda items uh the first comment card I have is from Michelle Weeks.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council members. I wanted to thank Cameron Bregman for arranging the spanuter meeting that we had a few weeks ago. I'm here tonight as a resident and someone who fosters dogs and follows shelter outcomes closely. Over time, I have personally stepped in to help dogs when there wasn't enough options available. I've taken dogs off the streets. I've worked to find homes. I've partnered with rescues that were full and even help sponsor dogs and contribute financially so rescues could say yes to more animals. I have probably already this month given $1,000 to help dogs in our community. I'm speaking tonight because I believe animal services deserves attention during the budget discussions. Animal service is often viewed as expensive, but prevention and support can reduce costs over time. Accessible spay and neuter programs, vaccination clinics, owner support, resources, education, adequate staffing can all help reduce intake and keep more animals out of crisis. Right now, too much of the burden falls on volunteers, fosters, rescues, and residents to fill the gaps. Many of us continue to step up because we care, but community goodwill alone cannot be the plan. I'm asking the city council to consider whether additional resources can be directed toward animal services and prevention-focused programs, and to ask what investments today can improve outcomes for both animals and residents in the future. Again, prevention is great. Parvo and distemper is big in our community. And to save one dog, it could go anywhere from a couple thousand to $10,000 to help a dog with parvo or distemper that can be helped with vaccinations. I always say too, it's a little bit easier to help place a dog that's healthy. If strays are left on the streets, they end up coming and getting hit by cars or far worse. They're getting hurt in the encampments. and that is also costing people, whether it be the city or rescues, tens of thousands of dollars to help dogs that have been hit by cars or far worse. Thank you for your consideration and time.

Thank you for your comment. Next comment.

The next comment card I have is from Alex Salafaris.

Hello my name is Alex Oliferis. I'll talk more about the data centers later because I didn't know it was on the agenda item but it's going to be on later. i hope most of you do consider uh staying afterwards for the data centers this issue has brought up to the public not knowing what it is when you start researching it there's a lot of negative nefarious stuff going on there are communities out there that are being um They put these data centers in, their water, especially farmers, don't have water. Their electrical bills go high. The pollution, the noise from these data centers are huge. And some of them are in residential areas. And there are a lot of complaints. And Erin Brockovich has come out. She's a famous attorney that sued PG&E back in the 90s, 80s and 90s. She made a movie. Erin Brockovich, she actually came to Stockton close to 10 years ago because water in Stockton, well, it's not all that great. But long story short, she has gone into this fight because there is secrecy revolving about these data centers that all of you ought to know. And you better stick around and speak up and speak out. But regarding the pets in the east side, there's a lot of pets out there. Try to spay or neuter a cat these days. It's expensive. For a lot of the residents in the east side, I could tell you a lot of them don't do that because of the cost. I mean, I have. We have three cats. A lot of stray cats out there, including roosters. You know, I tried to call animal control and they're like, well, do you know the address? You're like, it's like trying to like play, you know, guessing with which house has that rooster. And it's happening in the east side. Kind of irritating. But, you know, it's like... Um, like I said a while back, there are people that immigrate to this area, they don't speak good English, they don't read a lot, and we should have information available to them saying there's no roosters allowed in the city. You could have one or two chickens, I don't know what the policy is. Um and so forth. But there ought to be a grant for spay and neuter. I think city alone. I used to have that back in the 2000 tens and then all of a sudden the money is not there. And I think Supervisor Steve Ding is trying to do something about it. Um to bring back that issue because there's a lot of straight cats and I don't need that dogs. I mean I'm walking around the neighborhood and there's like two or three stray dogs and I don't know if they're friendly or not. And most people that I know that do walking around the east side have to carry a stick because you don't know if this dog is gonna attack you. And there's been attacks in the city of Lodi by stray dogs. So, uh, yeah, it's a big issue.

Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next item. I mean, next comment. Sorry.

The next comment card I have is from Jim Miller.

Good evening. I was waiting for the green light to come on. There it is. Good evening, honorable mayor, vice mayor, council members. My name is Jim Miller, and I'm the vice president of Race Communications. We're your new fiber optic telephone company that is coming to Lodi. We'll be delivering fiber optics straight to the homes and offering some of the highest speeds in the state to your local residents and businesses. We're excited about this project. Tonight, I just wanted to give you guys a quick update on where we are status wise. We have been working closely with low die electric and Jeff and his staff over the last year, as well as public works and Sean and his staff and we're excited that we're far enough along in the permitting process that we're able to kick off construction starting next month. Obviously with the 4th of July coming up, we won't start during that week. We'll probably start a week or so after the 4th. But with that, I wanted to update the council members on our process of how we communicate with the residents. So one is coming here tonight in a public forum and letting them know that construction is going to be kicking off and the company has raised communications that's doing it. and they can reach out to us through our website at race.com for additional information on that or questions and concerns. But in the neighborhoods that we're gonna be rolling out the construction process, which is starting on the east side of Lodi, Letters will be going out to them here shortly and explaining the process of what's going to be taking place, who the company is. All the race employees will have race safety vests or clothes on with race IDs. Our contractors run trucks that say contractor authorized by race communication. So it's very clear who's working out there. And at the same time, because we are a licensed utility we operate in the public utilities mints, as well as the public right of ways. We have to call and have other utilities identified before we go and do our construction and so in that process there's. whether paint for the power or the water or sewer and flags that are marked in people's yards. And we want to make sure that people understand that's not graffiti. That is because as the utility, you have to identify your underground utilities. So that's explained in the letter reference back to our website to where they can watch videos and so forth on it. With that being the case, we try to direct everything into race because once it comes into our company, we operate in what's called a ticket world. We create trouble tickets and we're able to track it from start to finish. And so we wanna make sure that we address everyone's concerns within the city. And we'll have a local project manager that will be assigned to your city, working with city staff as well as the residents when any of those concerns come in. As we get construction kicked off 72 hours, three days before we will start door tagging. So we have actually built over 50 different cities throughout the state of California. And in doing so, we never say we know it all. We continually learn and continually grow and adapt and change our communication methods to the unique cities that we operate in. And so we've got a series of door tags that go out because our goal is never to get 100% communication to the public because we know that's an impossible goal. But we try to hit in the high 90s. We know that sometimes people see letters and they throw it away out of the mailbox. We know that door tags go on the door and maybe the kids come home first see it and it gets thrown away and the rest of the residents don't hear about what's taking place. So now we do a multiple series of these door tags with that same information that allows them to know who's going to be operated in their neighborhood. But the main reason I'm here tonight is as council members, you guys operate and live in your neighborhoods with these residents and constituents. And we want to make sure that when they come to you, that you know how to direct them back to race communication and know what's going on within your neighborhood. So that's our main concern is the communication. Construction is construction. If you've ever built a house, the building phase is never the fun phase. It's moving into the brand new, exciting house. That's the fun phase. It's the same with us. We do a great job at construction. But when we finally get to be an operator, that's when the city is going to love the services and the residents are going to love the services. With this kickoff of the project, we're hoping for starting services on the east side. either in late Q3 or early Q4, depending on how construction goes and whether if we have a lot of rain in the fall. But with that, I just wanted to thank you guys and thank your staff. You have an amazing staff. I'm sure you guys already know it. The interim city manager mentioned it as well. We've loved working with your staff and look forward to the continued relationships that we have.

Mr. Mayor, if we can just make sure that whatever information, the packet you're putting together for residents, that council gets a copy. I mean, I may get a copy. I live on the east side, so maybe I'll see it first, as does the mayor. But it would be great just to have this as the information that we're providing to your residents.

Absolutely. I will get that over to staff so that they can forward you an electronic copy of it so you have everything.

Thank you. I was going to ask the same thing. It's good. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Any other questions?

No. So make sure that you leave the information with the city clerk so we can get information.

I'll email you a copy of the electronics.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

The last comment card I have for non agenda items is Gordon and I am so sorry I'm going to mispronounce your last name. Thank you.

Good evening. I'm Gordon Schmeier, Vice President Emeritus from Tree Lodi. I'm sorry our west coast avarice have mostly departed, but Tree Lodi has been partnering with a number of city organizations, the last event was arbor day at legion park and we had the mayor there with a proclamation and a number of other non-profits joined us for the event and it never fails that west coast arborist answers our requests to join us for volunteer activities and so i i just wanted to thank them and let you know that they do valuable things that might be not be in the contract i think the other thing that we need to understand is Tree Lodi and West Coast Arborists are in the same business. Tree Lodi takes care of little trees, West Coast Arborists when they're old. But the city of Lodi is just in the news about having one of the great small communities on the West Coast. Those things don't happen accidentally. You know that. And when you have quality professional people volunteering and participating in the community, I think that's to be cherished. West Coast Arborist, I believe, mentioned that they had worked for the city for 20 years. That has value and obviously there's competition but here we have a track record that is the envy of most communities and it is an organization that we're able to work with and certainly I would hope that the city council supports the new contract for them. Any other questions for me?

No, thank you for your comment.

Okay, thank you.

Mayor, that's all the comment cards I have, and I don't see anyone from the public online, but you're welcome to call into the audience.

So I would like to invite the public if anyone wants to say a public comment. A non-agenda item? Seeing none, I will move to non-agenda items from council. Dr. Nakanishi?

I'd like to commend two people. Our city manager, thank you so much for the good job you've done three, three, for three months. In the last two, in, in this year, we're gonna have four city managers. And we've been lucky because we got some excellent interim city managers. Thank you. First of all, I wanna thank you for what you've done. And Jennifer Ryan, there's a s- notice that you're gonna be going tomorrow, is that right?

Not quite tomorrow, but yes.

Well, I can't make it to the reception. I wanna acknowledge your work in a homeless situation. You're the, uh, unsung hero. If it wasn't for you, we wouldn't be in the situation we are right now, controlled homelessness. I think we, we, we, we got the, uh, title, the smallest, smallest city, or greatest smallest city. they look at homelessness too. I think if it wasn't for the homeless con- this control, we would not have got this. Jennifer, I commend you and you're, you're unsung hero, people who don't know who you are, but those of us who've been here know the great job you've done. We're gonna miss you.

Thank you, Councilmember. Thank you, Councilmember Nakanishi. I will just note that I have immensely enjoyed my time here and the support of staff city leadership Council has been immensely great, especially in what not going to be a council member not going to she had mentioned. Any housing and homelessness issues, I think we are leading the force and a lot of those areas, and so I just appreciate everybody's support here, thank you, thank you.

I just make a note that that. Other duties as assigned that took you deeply into project management is why she's leaving us. So don't undervalue other duties as assigned because it can lead to a new career path for you. So congratulations on that, and I wish you well. Thank you very much. I just wanted to give a couple of updates on things. It was a really busy couple of weeks. I want to credit the United Way of San Joaquin County for pulling together our Lodi Alliance of Nonprofits, all of those who have come to us looking for funding support. They got a good 2 h of training on building their own capacity in fundraising, which is exactly what I wanted to see, because I want them to leverage those dollars that we provide them with to get an even greater return on that investment. Also, I want to thank Chief. for pulling together the Youth Academy and the graduation. 23 young people, I think, graduated from the program this year, and I hope to see it next year again. We may have some cadets coming out of that graduation effort. They were pretty gung-ho. So, Chief, thanks to you and your officers for that program. I also got to participate, Lisa Hill is here, in Laura DeForest Gordon Day proclamation representing the mayor and I think it was a terrific event and appreciate you pulling that effort together. Another piece of information at the last San Joaquin Regional Rail Commission meeting, we approved a CRISI grant to go in for the Planning and design of the new load I station, which will be out on highway 12 so we're making first efforts to get funding for that project. And also, I want to note, I met with the load I independent lodging association did I get it right Scott yes okay. I think it's really important, and I have followed up with city manager on this. We do apparently need to look at an ordinance to update what is existing in place relative to the Registration, I guess I would start with for those B and B's, Airbnb's that are advertising on VRBO and Airbnb that they actually must get a business license and they must self report. I think there's an estimate of somewhere between 40 maybe high end 50% of the independent lodgers that are not reporting and it is self reporting. So we need to make sure that they are paying their fair share in the tourism tax. And I look forward to hopefully seeing that come to council in the next month or so.

All righty. Well, I had a meeting with Mr. Peter Ragsdale last week. And for those of you that don't know, he runs the Housing Authority for San Joaquin County. And we currently have one project with him near . Sounds like that's still going through. And for the last couple of years, he's been gaining funding through the proper channels. It sounds like they're going to be breaking ground sometime mid next year. So again, for senior housing, that's a great opportunity. I know we have some of our inner city action folk here tonight. Thank you for being here. No? Oh my gosh. Outreach ministries, I apologize. I'll hear that later. On any case, it's important when we're talking about the homelessness problem because, again, our seniors are starting to build up at the center. And so the question is, how do we have a long-term solution for that? And realistically, when the shelter is built, we're going to get one good shot to get a lot of these individuals from the center into senior housing and ensure that the center is going to have Lodi individuals and not individuals necessarily from the county. So Lodi first in that matter. The second item is the Employee Association Party, I would call it, Association Picnic, thank you. How many individuals were there, do you think, Olivia, 200? I'd say about 200. Great event. And again, we have our fire and police officers. And thank you for your service. You put your lives on the line each and every day. I also believe that there's multiple ways to serve. And so again, for any individual in the city that served, just like Jennifer Ryan. Jennifer, thank you for your service. Again, thank you to you all. I know a lot of times in city council, we're very focused on efficiency and again, becoming better each and every day, which we should, but again, you guys get a lot of that Brent force to you. So again, today I just wanna say thank you. Thank you for what you do. Thank you for the times that you try and you do well and you're not actually rewarded for it. It doesn't always go unnoticed and keep on doing the hard work and one day you will be noticed. Um so that's it just wanted to say thank you and actually I did see our interim city manager um Mr. Aaron there and the reason why he's city manager is because we were all under a hot metal tent with which was probably about 100 degrees and I see this guy bringing his own chairs in the shade underneath a tree about 30 degrees you know colder so anyways he deserves the seat um and thank you for all the employees that helped put it on this Saturday. Thank you.

Any other comments from council? Seeing none, I actually would like if, well, I have a question for Councilman Bregman, if he would like to pull his item, G3. So no or yes? I would like to make a statement on it. I don't know if it's what you think it is, but. Oh, I want it if, okay, so we'll not pull it, so we'll continue. For sake of efficiency, okay. Right, so we'll continue with this regular calendar.

Okay. So moving on to our public hearings, we have three tonight. On the agenda, the first public hearing is to consider a resolution adopting final engineers annual levy report for Lodi Consolidated Landscape Maintenance Assessment District number 2003-1, fiscal year 2026-27 and ordering the levy and collection of assessments. And I'll turn it over to our interim public works director, Sean Nathan, for the presentation.

Thank you. Let's pull that up real quick. So this comes every year. So it should look familiar. It's also really short. So once we get it up and running, we . Perfect. so the city's landscape maintenance district overview there's 16 zones that were added between 2003 and 2008. three of the zones were removed in 2014 as part of a citywide general benefit analysis they call it and then generally they include landscaping street park which trees and or masonry walls And the annual assessment on the properties in these areas varies from $18.35 per year to $55.05 per year. And then as part of the landscape assessment district, we're required to provide this engineer's report each year. Here's a quick map showing where all those zones are most of them. I mean, they were all developed within that timeframe. So that's kind of the general reason for the location zone 710 and 12 were removed from that 2014 general benefit analysis. Here's a breakdown of the budget. So you can see the majority of the cost comes from the actual landscape maintenance of those areas. And then we have other funds that are added to for street tree maintenance and masonry wall maintenance. And those kind of build up until, unfortunately, when someone runs into one of the walls in those areas and we have to replace them. And then also those street trees get trimmed on a cycle, maybe every five, six years. And so the same thing, that builds up to pay for that. And then there's costs for a consultant to prepare the report. One thing I would like to highlight on here is that we're keeping the assessment the same. It's the same that it was for a while now. And the reason is prior to the benefit analysis in 2014, we had built up a pretty good surplus of the cost that was for that maintenance in case There was some problem. You could cover that. After that assessment, that surplus was what we would call a little excessive. So we've used that surplus to supplement this so we didn't have to raise any rates for the past probably 10 years until that surplus got down to a reasonable number, which it's about there now. So I would anticipate starting to increase the rates next year. Here's a breakdown of how much each zone pays per year. Obviously, they're same last year and this year, because we're keeping them the same. And any questions?

Thank you so much. That was a good presentation, just six slides. So does Council have any clarifying questions for staff? Seeing none, I will open the public hearing at 8.28 PM. Madam City Clerk, do we have any comments on this item?

I have no cards.

No? Okay. I would like to invite anyone for the public if they would like to speak on this item. Seeing none, I will close the public hearing at 8.29. Oh, yeah, I have a comment from Dr. Nakanishi before we close it.

This is a routine thing we do, maintenance. No big deal. I mean, we have to do it.

Okay. So now I will close the public hearing at 8.29 p.m. Any last council comment? I will entertain a motion.

Move to approve. Second.

All right. And it passes. So next item.

The next item on our public hearing calendar is to consider adopting resolution setting pre-approved engineering news record adjustment index for wastewater rates for residential, commercial, and industrial customers. And I'll turn it over to Public Works Management Analyst Rebecca Arita to provide that presentation.

All right. Good evening, Mayor and Council members. Like Sean said, I'm sure you guys are used to this annual presentation little look familiar. We're here tonight to conduct a public hearing to consider setting pre approved wastewater rates. And start off with a little background proposition to 18 process was conducted in 2024 where Council adopted a five year schedule of read adjustments. 2024 was the first year of adjustments, with the subsequent annual adjustments based on an nr indexing and capped at a maximum of 5%.

It should have been the same as mine.

And staff also utilizes a financial model to analyze any proposed rate adjustments we bring to you, and this model is updated frequently. Tonight's recommendation is a 2.6% increase for fiscal year 26-27. The 2026 E&R annual index change was 2.6%, and staff is recommending an increased set at that 2.6%. And again, these were pre-approved increases from the January 17th, 2024 council action, but historically staff has brought these annual adjustment requests back to council for their consideration. And this next slide just provides you with a summary of past rate increases in wastewater showing the Prop 218 max adjustment approved each year, the ENR index and the actual rate adjustment approved. And just to make a note again the 2024 adjustment wasn't in our base that was our restructuring as a part of the process and not based on the in our. And with this slide we're just showing the comparison of the current rates to the proposed rates based on the 2.6 recommended increase under the usage based rates, you will see the monthly usage charge of $3 and 23 cents per. CCF increased by eight cents to $3 and 31 cents the three quarter inch meter monthly charge of $30 and 45 cents would increase by 79 cents to 3124. and just showing what a typical bill calculated at nine CCFs would be. And that's an increase of $1.51. And here's just the comparison of the local jurisdictions around us, showing kind of where we stand as one of the lower end. But to point out that all the cities are on flat rate except for Lodi for wastewater usage charges. Know that's a lot of information right here, but this is pulled from our financial model and shows the plan projects through 2030. With an expense totaling around $41 million over that time period and each year I just like to point out that, keeping up with the small incremental increases each year. we've been able to cash fund very large very expensive projects, namely the electrical building on a white slew was around 16 total million. And tonight's recommended action is to adopt a resolution setting pre approved engineering news record adjustment index for usage based and flat wastewater rates for residential commercial and industrial customers and the rate adjustment would take effect July 1 of 2026.

Okay, thank you so much for the presentation does cancel have any clarifying questions for stuff. Councilwoman Craig.

Just one. When we made this agreement originally, it was up to 5%. Is that tied, and is the engineering rate record tied to the CPI? Is that kind of the equivalent?

So the ENR, that's the engineer news record, and that's the publication that does the cost index. Okay. So our pre-approved was 5% or the ENR difference, whichever is lower.

Okay. That's what I wanted to clarify. Thank you.

Any other questions? Seeing none, I will open the public hearing at 8.34 PM. Do we have any public comments? OK. I would like to invite anyone in the public if they would like to make a comment. Seeing none. Oh, yeah. Go ahead.

I think it's important to always consider the consumers out there that, or the residents out there struggling right now, the high gas prices, food costs, everything is high. So, I mean, for me, I vote against it, but I understand the whole common thing is, oh, we gotta reconstruct this and this and that. We shouldn't compare other cities to their cost. We should be proud of having, you know, lower cost. But I do understand we got to replace pipes and all that kind of stuff, because I don't know how old these wastewater pipes are. And if you look in a wet in the east side or various parts of the city, you're dealing with very old pipes. So I don't I don't know if these The cost is adjustment is going to construct for these projects or we're using this money to do something else that I think that's my main concern, but I urge you to vote now because people are struggling, you could you could see it in the restaurants people are cutting back. And and.

that's it. Thank you so much for your comment, do we have any more comments. Seeing none, I will close the public hearing at 8.35. Any last comments from council? Dr. Nakanisha.

Infrastructure. I've always asked about infrastructure. My understanding is the fee you're paying is paying also for revamped old infrastructure at a certain rate. Sean, can you give us what rate where the pipes, how much we're replacing each year?

I can't give you actual specifics on that, but we do the feed, then the model does have all that in it as far as all the replacing. We don't tend to replace a lot of pipes. We do TV them and based on their quality, we line them. That's what we found to be a really cost-effective method so we don't have to tear up the whole road above it, pull it out. The liners that go in there, depending on the size, they might be a quarter inch thick or half inch thick, and it's basically a whole new pipe inside of it. And so right now, we currently have phase 11 of our wastewater rehabilitation project that is lining a bunch of pipes, not as we speak, but currently. And so that's one of the infrastructure projects. We also have stuff out at our, our treatment plant, uh, pump station, stuff like that. So we have it all over, but, um, a big cost is associated with keeping our old infrastructure current so, uh, we minimize the chance of having, like, major problems.

As a sitting council member, our job is to be sure that we're not spending overly, right? We also have expenses, so you've gotta raise rates. If you don't raise rates, then what happens? Who pays for the, uh, expenses? and the environmentally it comes out to people can't afford it, then my question to you, Sean, is if people can't afford water and so where can they go to?

Uh, I think there are programs for, uh, low income, uh, as far as utility assistance. I don't know the specifics of those and I apologize, um, but I think, I think we do have programs for that and electric utility does, um, so. Thank you.

Yes, you've answered my question.

Simple comments. A tree that stays healthy prevents disease prevention is everything. So for instance, we're not just approving race just to approve them just because we want our departments to have millions in their funds. These funds go to, again, make much needed repairs and improvements to our system. And so one thing I asked Charlie Swimley while he was here three years ago is, what can we do now? What dollar can we spend now so that rate payers in 10 and 20 years from now look back at Lodi and say, look at this we have the cheapest rates now but you have to pay your dues somewhere there's no free lunch and so it's either you pay now and you actually make interest on paying now or you pay later and you pay dearly so again we have a lot of rate increases each year for each department but it's not meaningless there's a reason for it so but i do appreciate your comments alex every single time we do a rate increase we should be looking at him and taking him serious joanne mounts One said to somebody, it's a tuna can. Okay. And it is, it's a tuna can assembly. So thank you.

Um, anyways, uh, any more comments from council, uh, with the 10 emotion now move to approve second. And it passes. Next item.

The next item on our public hearings is a public hearing pursuant to Government Code Section 3502.3 to receive a report on the status of vacancies and recruitment and retention efforts. And I'll turn it over to our Human Resources Manager, James Peavy, for the presentation.

Good evening. A state law requires that staff present the status of its vacancies and recruitment and retention efforts and identify any necessary changes to policies, procedures, and recruitment activities if appropriate. Um, and if vacancies was in a single bargaining unit meter exceed 20% of the authorized full time positions in that bargaining unit, the city must provide additional information during such a public hearing. I'm very happy to report tonight that as of June 10th, the city's vacancy rate citywide is 7.6% and the vacancy rate for each bargaining group as well below the 20%. Um, and then if do we have the slide available? Great, thank you. So the next slide will show the first chart, which will show our current vacancies as of June 10, 2026. And it breaks it down by the different units, the vacant positions, the vacancy rates within each of those units, and of course, the total citywide vacancy rate of the low 7.6%. And then also in the next slide, please. Thank you. This is actually a very detailed breakdown of the current vacancies that we have that show the positions showing such things as the pay ranges and where those vacant positions are receiving their funding from. And as our vacancy rate is so low, the city is not currently proposing any wide city changes to its policies, procedures, and recruitment activities. And throughout the year, human resources staff focuses on making any changes when obstacles are identified. And staff has highlighted three activities which it has implemented throughout the year and what it continues to. The first is which was each recruitment. City Council Chambers and HR staff works with the hiring managers to review and if needed to update classification specifications to ensure that the competencies and minimum qualifications are appropriately reflected. Secondly, city staff closely monitors recruitment best practices. And third, myself, with the help of human resources staff, we monitor vacancies to see if there's any trends and spikes in vacancies, or if we see any predictions that we can make regarding any future vacancies. So based on the aforementioned, staff recommends that council receive this report.

Thank you. Okay. We have a few comments from cancel and we will start from that side to this side. So first, I can't recommend and then mayor protein.

Yes. I don't know if our police chief can speak to this, but I thought we didn't have as many vacancies as we're showing.

Sorry, I'm not trying to hide or anything. It's just hot in here and I started feeling really anxious. So I think he said it was June 10th, right? Yeah, since then we have hired a couple. So we have one, so we're down to five. We have another officer starting on the 22nd, which will put us down to four. So we're down four. As of the 22nd, we will be down four, I should say.

All right, thank you.

Mm-hmm.

I have a question just about how these vacancies are reflected as far as cost savings are concerned in the budget.

Well, we're not taking into account any cost savings for these vacancies in the budget proposed tonight. However, if we did want to budget any cost savings, I would recommend minimizing the amount of fund balance that we are contributing to the salary and benefit projections as a way to minimize that effect on our fund balance for the MOUs going forward.

What's our average for the city for vacancies over the last, say, five years? I don't have that information now, but I can get that information for you. That would be good in the sense of Mikey's point on the budget.

Yeah, I love that this bill passed in the state because I found in my six years up here that sometimes there are funding shortfalls. And all of a sudden, we hear about some staff savings. And so there's more transparency as far as this is concerned. But I would just be curious as to what the overall amount, it is that this is impacting or not currently impacting the budget as far as these vacancies are concerned. So we have a full financial picture, you know, as we move forward.

Mr. Mayor, I just want to echo that because I'm really, it's mostly the general fund items because that's the area in which we have the greatest need. I do have a question. The very bottom management analyst conf, Who houses that position, Mr. Peavy?

Board of Trustees Meeting, the management analyst confidential. That's in human resources.

Okay, thank you. That's helpful now. So yeah, I would. I mean, the breakdown is here in terms of the potential general fund impact. Since the chief is indicated, they have done some hires and may even be interviewing the same thing with Chief Johnson. up-to-date list of what positions, and I'm particularly interested in the general fund positions, are vacant yet to be filled.

And also to share with council, I'm happy to announce that a management analyst confidential position, that individual will start in two weeks. We have made an offer. The person has accepted it, so that vacancy will be filled.

Okay, so if we can get a really current up-to-date list, that would be great.

Should we be making the motion to postpone this item, Mr. Mayor?

No, I think we need to open the public hearing still. So any more comments from council?

It's just a comment. Yes. If I'm correct, in the past, we kept vacancies open to balance our budget. If I had a former... City Manager, I would ask that question, right? But that's my understanding. Over the years, we kept vacancies open. That, that's how we balance the budget. Am I right or wrong?

Well, I couldn't tell you what the practice has been here, but I can share with you that that is a technique that some jurisdictions use. I would just offer to you that, and we'll probably talk a little bit more about it when we get to the budget item itself. I think there's a unique opportunity here that with your new incoming city manager and some new department heads that are coming in that will be able to evaluate You know the vacancies and the needs and you know the organizational structure within their respective departments that there might be an opportunity to look at these for efficiency sakes and so forth but I can also tell you that some of these remain vacant because Some of these positions are more challenging than others to fill. And it's not for a lack of trying, but there's just some challenges out there with some of these. And then also, we are now getting to full staff in HR, which is gonna be very helpful to go ahead have more resources to put towards these efforts of filling some of these vacancies. So we appreciate council's patience with this, but these are things that we're definitely continuing to be actively and pursuing, because I can tell you that these are the positions that were already funded. and as we shared with you during the budget presentations earlier in the process there was much more requests from other departments for new positions to you know keep up with the workload demands that we are not putting forward as part of this year's budget so we appreciate The opportunity to evaluate these as we go forward. Um, but I will tell you that there, you know, I've heard from probably every one of the department heads that, you know, wins my turn. And so, you know, it's it's not for lack of trying. So But we can certainly give the council an update on the positions. But I would ask that you would move forward with the item tonight because we do need that to comply with the law. And as Mr. Peavy pointed out, we are in compliance with the requirements of the law. We're well under that requirement. And there is no real need to. modify the city's policies and procedures in this regard. But I appreciate the comments, and we'll come back with the best updated list to date as we can give you.

Thank you.

Thank you so much. So now I will open the public hearing at 8.50 PM. City Clerk, do we have any public comments? No. All right. No cards. No cards. OK. So now I will invite anyone in presence to speak on this item. Seeing none, I will close the public hearing at 8.50 p.m. And then any council comments?

I would just agree with the city manager. I think that I'm just looking for an updated current list. I'm not looking to continue this or delay a vote on this. I think it's just I appreciated the detail in getting by department and the cost associated with each of those positions. It does factor into our budget discussion later on. It's important for us to be informed about that. And I do agree, Mr. City Manager, as we get new directors coming on. And as we just discussed in the special meeting we had on growth management, we may need certain skill sets in those positions that may or may not be in those positions right now. So we'll look forward to the new directors, the new city manager. identifying opportunities relative to staffing. And I'm confident that we'll have that type of assessment information once they've been on for a number of months. So unless there's any other comments, I would move to approve.

All right, and it passes. Next item.

The next item starts our regular calendar. And the first one we have tonight is to receive temporary access and emergency shelter quarterly update, construction update and adopt a resolution authorizing the interim city manager or designee to execute an agreement with Outreach Ministries International for operation of the Lodi Access Center and emergency shelter. And I'll turn it over to our neighborhood services manager, Jennifer Ryan for the presentation.

Mayor mayor pro tem and members of city council, thank you for having us tonight, I do apologize mine's not as quick as the rest of that have gone forth this. afternoon, but there is about 19 slides, because we do have several topics that we're going over they're just all kind of linked together, so I tried to put it together in a comprehensive one PowerPoint presentation. So we're here tonight to provide an update on access center construction, an update on temporary access center, which will include budget status overview, comments from Outreach Ministries International, which includes demographics and statistics, the treated success story and service gaps. And then we will be here to request to adopt a resolution authorizing interim city manager or designee to execute negotiated operator agreement. So the access center construction update, I think a picture is worth a thousand words. So I wanted to provide some pictures of what's going on on the inside of the building. If you drive by 710 North Sacramento Street, there's quite a bit going on on the outside. Every day you kind of drive by, there's more and more walls up. They're getting all the mechanicals in. They're getting drywall up now. So we've even worked a couple Saturdays just to catch up on some of the time that we've lost due to other items in regards to environmental and weather. And so we are making good progress on the inside. And mind you, these pictures were from a week ago, and it looks even different now looking at it. So if you get a chance to drive by, go ahead and take a look. And then so just providing a construction budget and schedule update the original contract amount was 9,866,433 the original change order authority was 600,000 additional change order 30 was 1.5 million added for a total of almost 12 million. Currently, we have executed 1.7 million change order authority which leaves approximately 300,000 remaining. And with that, we do anticipate that based on the last change order that just went through through May, that October 12, 2026 is the construction timeline. Obviously, everything can change as we move forward with the project, but we do have a roof on the building walls going up. So the huge factor of any type of weather interruptions or anything like that has already been resolved with those. With that, if there's any questions on the construction piece, I'll go ahead and open for those now. And then if not, we'll go into temporary access center quarterly update.

So, Ms. Ryan, can you go back to the last slide? Yeah. So those were the change orders were just the most recent was just time related, not dollars? Or was there a combination in that May 2026 change order?

Actually, the most recent change order was actually a credit of about $9,000 just because of the fact that every time if we make an adjustment, when they submit Like material items or anything like that. Sometimes there's an adjustments and costing in regards to that or if we're changing to simplify a design or something like that. A lot of times things happen on site.

So that's where we actually had a little bit of a credit on this last change order, but it was that as well as the extension to October 12 Okay, so the $310,000 it remains is what we would anticipate for any future change order allowance and Yes, it would be. Okay, thank you. Oh, I'm sorry, just one follow up on that. If we don't spend the 310,000 through some miracle, would that could that go into operating or are we losing it?

So if we didn't expend that $300,000 towards construction, there are always Furnishings fixtures and so it's called ffne that we could put those dollar amounts into To be able to fully maximize those dollars because it is a use it or lose it by december 31st 2026 because the majority of those are tied to either The allocation from the county arpa dollars or the city arpa dollars as well So it we would want to expend it in that capacity, but we have the ability to do that um We also have a potential future CDBG project to finish out the parking lot in that area. So if we had sufficient funds, it's potential that we could start that project as well. So we have ideas on how to expand that if we need to.

Thanks so much. So then we'll continue with the presentation.

And with that we'll go to the temporary access Center quarterly update, this is our regular quarterly update that we come through so we've hit quarter one and two of the new program year and with that. We are seeing that through April 30 2026 for two quarters is 472,627 so it's approximately $78,000 average monthly invoice. I will say that Omi does a good job of being diligent with their funding sources. We give them regular updates on where their budget's at as well. And with that, they're coming under the average monthly cost for the total contract amount of $1.1 million. As you can see, a lot of it goes into staffing because it does take a lot to staff an operation that's 24-7. And then the rest of the larger costs go into meal and service delivery. So with that, we do have a pit count update demographics and statistics. So this year's pit count reported 1468 sheltered individuals and 1838 unsheltered individuals. And so just to explain the point time count, a lot of times it gets those numbers get combined together. So the shelter point time count counts anybody that's in a shelter that reports in the HMIS, which is the Homeless Management Information System database. And the unsheltered count is actually conducted by individuals and volunteers and city and county staff, outreach workers, nonprofit organizations go out one day at the end of January and make a visual count of individuals experiencing homelessness. And then the CoC has contracted with Asr, who is our is the consultant to actually pull all that data and information together. They have a specific methodology that they determine based on the visual count. They determine that final count number. With that, within San Joaquin County, we are demonstrating that there is a decrease by approximately 47%, and preliminary numbers just with the COC that's been shared, Lodi is right in that range as well. So we are seeing a significant improvement and impact based on the services that are being provided in our community. we're pretty close to where we were at in 2019. So that's where we are making a difference through these services that are being provided and it's being recognized throughout the county. With that, as mentioned a little bit earlier by Council Member Bregman, we are seeing a large influx of the senior population. So you see here there's 78 individuals age 55 to 61, 71 individuals age 62 or older. That is a large demographic that is in our HMIS system within Lodi that is of the senior population. Demographic and so that is something that is consistently worked with with staff and outreach ministries and other nonprofits to seek resources to assist with that. With that I will invite. Jason catherine and Johnny conference up to the podium. I should have recognized that. Yes. So we did just go to the COC board meeting last week, and we asked that exact question. They were supposed to get the preliminary draft this week, and then they said probably by end of June. We would be expecting to have the final numbers presented. This is a delay that we've already seen, though, so I could see that it may go into the first part of July as well. But as soon as we receive the final numbers, we'll be sure to share that with city management and get that out to city council.

The county registrar must be counting them.

Oh, sorry about that added a Y.

If I could just ask one more, relative to the demographics, how many veterans? Do we have a demographic number on veterans that are part of that mix?

Yes, we can provide that to you. It's all documented in the HMIS system.

Okay, thank you. Thank you. And then go ahead.

Okay.

Good evening Council once again it's a great opportunity for us to be here with you, and we want to thank you for your continued support at the load access Center our mission continues to be to transition people from the streets of load I into permanent housing. Before we go any further, I just want to echo everybody's thanks to Jennifer she's been like such an incredible partner for us and just an incredible support to help us. learn this and to be able to become experts at helping people in this project that we're continuing to do if you guys look at the the first slide that talks about the number of people that we've been able to help in this previous quarter i've been here many times now giving you updates and These numbers have not changed. Every single month, every single quarter, our percentages are exactly the same. We have worked hard to create a reproducible process to help people get off the streets, and we're seeing the success. If you were to go into the Lodi Access Center July 1st, 2026, and you were to look around the room, you would see about 46 beds on a nightly basis. Out of those 46 beds, if you come back at the end of the month, a third of those people are going to be gone because we've helped to transition them into jobs, into housing, and into rehabilitation programs. Our numbers are 30% month after month after month after month. We are very excited about the new permanent access center. We're going to go up from 46 beds a night to 60 beds if we don't go into overflow. A five year contract with 60 beds a night at a 30% transition rate equals over 1000 people over a five year period of time. That's a lot of people. And that's the consistency that we're seeing month after month after month. We have all the we have all the confidence in this process that we've created because of our tree to success. If you look on the slide, the Number of people that we have been able to help in the first 18 months is 257 transitions of 228 unique individuals. That means some of these people we've helped them get jobs, some of them we've helped them get jobs and housing, but there's been 228 individuals that have families, that have names, that have history, that have stories, and those people's lives have been changed. We just heard the point in time count amazing 40 over 40 47% drop in homelessness that's because this is working if we do not fund this permanent access Center those numbers are just going to skyrocket back to where they were when we took over. Less than two years ago. We're excited about our tree to success. This is the reproducible process that we presented to you in our very first Council presentation and every month we fine tune it more and more and more. This is something that we believe addresses every key need that an individual that comes through our doors has and many of these things we have been able to collaborate with other agencies and with other organizations and other nonprofits that are trying to do the same thing that we're doing. And the collaboration that we're seeing and the resources that are being shared, I believe, is unmatched. We're seeing this success because there's truly a group of people that care coming together to make the difference. And I don't want to belabor the statistics to you guys, but there is one statistic that's not showing up on there that you will see next time we report. About three months ago, we were able to bring on additional staff to begin helping our workforce development program. This is something that we've been doing on a small scale since day one, but we're really seeing a lot of momentum with it right now. Just this last month in the month of May, we were able to help 15 of our clients get joy get jobs this last month we're seeing more collaboration from the business community more openness from the business community in their just their approach to us and we're seeing great success in that and so a workforce development program is something that we're very very excited about because we believe that in order for somebody to And homelessness permanently, they're going to have to have a job. And so we're working on that really hard. The last slide I want to show you is just a typical success story of a nameless man. But he represents a real man that we know very well. He came in as a client to the access center. He was also a client of Hope Harbor next door. We've been able to collaborate with Salvation Army so many times in so many different ways. And through our efforts together, he was able to gain his Class A truck driver's license. And he found a career in Sacramento. We were able to help him get there. And not only is he working in Sacramento, but he's also become the house manager of a sober living home in Sacramento. And he's continuing to thrive and he's continuing to succeed in his recovery. and his success. And this is just a snippet of many, many, many, many stories that we could share with you tonight of entire families that are being changed as a result of the investment that the city of Lodi is making in the Lodi Access Center. The other thing is it's been spoken of many times tonight, so I don't want to belabor the point, but we do have almost 40% of our clients are seniors. And so we're very excited about what Councilmember Bregman was talking about, the opening up of more senior units, because it's a huge need that we need to address. And that's all I have. So if you have any questions for Johnny or I.

I'm just making a comment. I'm very impressed with your report. Thank you guys. Thank you for doing a good job.

I'll echo that. No questions. Just a thank you. Thank you from our community. Thank you from City Council.

You guys can go ahead and have a seat. Okay, now we are moving on to access center operator agreement. So first, I want to say a huge thank you. A lot of people went into this process. Obviously, when we went through a request for proposal process, we had an evaluation committee from the community that kind of started down this process. We had a successful award by City Council backing Outreach Ministries International. But the one thing we did request was the allowability to negotiate the agreement. And so with that, that also included bringing in our other partners, our county partners have been an integral part of this process because we are looking for Cal and medical reimbursements, and we wanted to make sure that there was no duplication of services or anything like that. I'll talk about that more in the future slides. This is just kind of the thank you initiation. But I just want to thank the County Board of Supervisors, Supervisor Ding. We also have Nicole Gearing in the audience. And just really a lot of the health care services staff, which includes Genevieve Valentine, Sasha Jackson, Joan Singson, Ahad Youssef, Matt Garber from the county perspective, and each and every one of them have reviewed a lot of the enhanced case management scope of services, and we all agreed on it before we added it into the agreement. So I just want to thank them for their time. It was a lot of back and forth in regard to that. And then With that we do want to also go into the services included that outreach ministries will be providing. If you saw your agenda packet their whole rfp was also attached, because that is kind of the services that are agreed to, we did. dial it into a scope of work that was about three or four pages, in addition to that, to just kind of summarize that whole rfp but essentially they will be providing services for the 24 seven low barrier shelter. which includes intake shelter operations safety security case management housing navigation workforce development and stabilization. is a very short summary of what they provide there's an extensive list of other things that are included. But with that the terms include the proposed agreement term is five years, however, continuation of services will remain contingent upon the availability of funding. in the event sufficient funding is no longer available the city may initiate reduction of scope or a structured ramp down of services upon 60 days written notice and allow operational uh transition planning and coordination of client transitions and continuity of care this would be our absolute last resort obviously that would not be something we would want to do um and with that how much money do we have left so we do have sufficient funds for the first year of operations so until what date It would be November of 2027. And then with that, we are working diligently, not only as staff to apply for grant opportunities, there is actually a large grant opportunity that we're going to be submitting within the next few days here, which could provide a good extended portion of funding if awarded, but we are also planning for contingency funding allowabilities, not only with connection with outreach ministries, for fundraising opportunities and donations, but also looking at expanding our reach much larger to foundational support and other community resources as well, because as demonstrated, this project has shown that it's successful in transitioning individuals off the streets, and we want to make sure we give it the best foot forward To do that, and with that all my really came alongside us with this negotiation process. When the rfp was submitted, it was at just over 1.8 million dollars, and they reduced it over $200,000 to come in line with what the available resources for the city services were. And part of that was tied to the San Joaquin county coordination, so we really defined roles and responsibility to avoid duplication of services, but also to maximize allowable reimbursements. there's been conversations of not only providing enhanced case management, but also potentially all my taking on medical respite in the future as they dive into this, which has a much larger reimbursement capability. So those are additional items that we're looking at, we do anticipate that. This first six months to a year will give us a better idea of what those reimbursements could look like to better project for future revenues moving into the future. So already talked a little bit about the coming down to the $200,000 in the CalAIM offset, but also just that OMI is pursuing a charitable support and they've actually already started that process. So they have already accounted for a certain number in their budget and as part of the agreement they are to report on that to the city as well be to be able to account for those resources that are coming in and potentially bank anything over than what was projected in their budget into a future year because as we know grant resources have deadlines to expend so we'd want to expend those first before we utilize certain resources that didn't have the same timeline to expend So year one, the budget is $1.6 million. The funds that will be utilized as homeless housing assistance and prevention, we have rounds four and five. We do anticipate a future round of HHAP coming down the pipeline in the next year. So the city would be applied for that as well. We also have permanent local housing allocation dollars and the last of any ARPA dollars we'd want to spend that as well. There are sufficient resources within the other grant resources that do not expire December 31st that will get us through that 2027 timeframe on that. And I will note that permanent local housing allocation actually doesn't expire for like three years, and so that would be the last one expanded, so if we were able to utilize other sources, first we would do those and keep that for maybe another program here allowable. We did. No, in the agreement similar to their temp, the temp facility of performance and accountability monthly invoicing audit and budget monitoring occurs monthly reporting as part of the invoice submission and that's kind of similar to what this quarterly report that we just presented that data is given to staff on a monthly basis. Staff also meets with them every 2 weeks to just check in on how operations are going, but just any needs or anything like that. So that's a regular check in point. All the monthly reports will demonstrate program housing and workforce outcomes, and quarterly updates will continue to City Council to make sure that the Council is aware of how the progress is going moving forward. With that, we recommend that city council authorize the interim city manager or designee to execute a five-year agreement with an option to extend for additional five years term with Outreach Ministries International for operation of Lodi Access Center and emergency shelter. I know that was a lot of information in a short period of time. That took months to gather on our end. So if you have any questions, we are open for that. OMI is in the audience. We also have county staff in the audience as well to assist with any questions or thoughts.

I don't see your question, Councilwoman Gregg, but I think you pressed about then, right? So you have a question.

On our transitional housing project, is there a relationship between the Access Center and opportunities for transitional housing? I think the funding is coming from Medi-Cal. Is that what it is?

Sasha's actually in the audience, and she's actually over that program from the county. So I believe it's Bridge, but I don't want to speak on their behalf for their funding mechanism for the program for Main Street.

See, there's a good reason you came.

She's the expert in the room.

Good afternoon. What was the question again?

I'm looking for the relationship between the Access Center and opportunities for Access Center residents to transition to the transitional housing. So is there a relationship there?

So yeah, so the transitional housing, which is the reimagined on Lodi, our goal is for those individuals that are in the Lodi Access Center to get connected to the single room occupancy for interim housing and then get connected to permanent housing.

OK. And then how do they end up qualifying? Is there a waiting list? Is there a prioritization because of the fact that county is involved with both of those sites?

At this time, it's not a wait list. But individuals, they do need to qualify for behavioral health services. So they get connected to services. And then we also have a referral process internally that their case manager would do. So if they're coming from Lodi, they would be connected to our Lodi clinic here. Their case managers will fill the referral. The referral gets triaged by my team, and then we place those individuals at the single room occupancy. They also get case management by behavioral health services, which supports them with the psychiatry as well as identifying permanent placement.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, we should get any other question from Council.

Jennifer, would you be able to go over other entities that are actually giving funding towards this item? My understanding is we are getting some type of Medi-Cal funding and county funding towards it.

So as far as this goes, we are working and I don't want to put it out there because they're the ones that earned it. But outreach ministries has actually been working really close with getting medical billing approval. And they were actually just approved, I think, just last week to be able to become a medical biller. They probably won't to their own harm, but it is a very difficult process to be able to get certified to be able to build those services. And a lot of operators are still trying to figure that piece out and have not gone through that process yet. So they are already taking that first step towards that. So we did account for some of those dollars as offset into the operator agreement, recognizing that within the first six months or so we're probably going to have a better idea what those reimbursements are going to look like, because unfortunately it's an unknown now until we we are able to actually start being able to build those services because there's specific services that are billable. probably in the second quarterly update once the permanent center is open, we'll be able to give a better reflection of what those reimbursements are actually looking like and will really help project what the need for that next year's budget is going to look like.

Thank you. Any other questions from council?

Just a follow-up. When we ended up doing a town hall on the issue of homelessness, Each department identified over the years what expenditures they had related to that community. So is that something we can continue to get on an annual basis? Because I think that was extremely helpful for people to understand that through various other departments, we're providing services and assistance to that community, and it has a dollar value associated with it. So just a note that I'd like to see that

those calculations done you know mid-year would be great to give us a sense of what we're investing because we are investing city resources into the project we will definitely make note of that because that is a good statistic to be able to share that information especially once the permanent facility opens and to be able to kind of see what that progression look like looks like especially once we have additional bed space available that'll be much more important as well if medical respite is able to be put into place because I think that'll be a key identifier with the hospitals. And if that helps offset some of those occurrences that they're seeing as well, being able to place an individual that would normally maybe have to require to stay in the hospital because they don't have someone clean, safe environment to be able to stay in. So I think that would be a good statistic as we move into the permanent center and kind of seeing how those things adjust and the costs going into them. Thank you.

Okay, seeing no more comments, we're going to move to public comments.

Mayor, I do have one comment card from Lisa Myers Hill. Is it Mayors Hill? Okay.

Mayor Yepez, council members, I'm here tonight to thank you and the council members from the last five years for your foresight and your political courage in supporting the creation of the Lodi Access Center. Everyone in this room understands that you have to weigh many factors when you're making these decisions. I would also like to publicly thank the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors for their support of Lodi and of the Access Center in finding creative means to both help offset costs and bring much needed services to the city. It is evident that your faith in the project has proven to be a wise investment. We need only to think back five years ago when a visit to our downtown meant you were forced to bear witness to human suffering and its physical symptoms on our streets at a level most of us had not seen before in our city. I often avoided it altogether, seriously, either because it was emotionally just too disturbing or because I did not feel safe. And that has changed for America's favorite small town. The partnership between Salvation Army Lodi Corps, Hope Harbor Family Services Center, and the Lodi Access Center is something that we all can be proud of. I want to close by saying that when we help even one person transition out of being unsheltered, we don't just help that one individual. Unsheltered people are mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters. Everyone in their life is touched and that ripples into our larger community. The success of the Lodi Access Center demonstrates what can happen when local government, nonprofit organizations, and community partners work together towards a common goal. Thank you, all of you, sincerely for believing in that vision and helping to make Lodi a stronger, safer, and more compassionate community.

Thank you for your comment.

Mayor, that's the only comment card I have, but you're welcome to open it up.

Yeah, I will welcome any comment at this moment about this item that we're discussing right now. Seeing none, I will go back to council comments. Any last council comments? Dr. Nakanisha? Is that you?

He's an incognito.

I do want to ask you, Steve, I know Steve for a long time. You know, the cities don't have funds to take your social services, right? And we're doing it, we're doing this extra. We've got funds and so forth, but to carry it on, we need funds. Do you anticipate the state to give money to the counties and the cities for homeless in the future?

I'd appreciate you asking me what the winning lottery numbers are this coming week. It would be easier. We are. We're going to go through some tough economic times. I don't know what to count on from the state from the feds. We've got realignment of HR. One funding, you know, as you know, the county of San Joaquin County right now is in great. A balanced budget. We've been fiscally very conservative. We just passed our budget Tuesday. That being said, I'm very in tune to where the city of Lodi is. And we are already, I think, one step ahead having discussions about the what ifs. What if we are short on funds? How do we do this? We're having discussions about the clinic. We're having discussions about alternative destinations and who would fund those processes. But at the same time, recognizing the overwhelming success that Johnny and his team have delivered and I think shocked a lot of people. Thank you. Jennifer, phenomenal job. I tried to hire but they said we didn't have any money. So anyway, we're going to stay in close contact and we're going to figure this out together because it has made a drastic difference.

Thank you.

All right. I just I do have a question. So the so then the money is going to run out by November, right? 2026. We don't raise any money. And after that is going to be 1.8 or 1.6. Which one was it? Sorry.

So the temp contract goes through October of 2026. And then this would take effect as soon as that one ended, which would be October 23rd, that this would take effect. And then we have The first year of operations for that. And then we would be continuing over this next year to try to secure resources to fund that next year of operation.

And what happened if when they try to is less than the 1.8 if it's let's say there's only 500. What does the contract has anything to say about that? What happened that case?

yeah so there is a disclaimer in the agreement which we put into a lot of our service agreements that should funding not become available that there is an opportunity for the city to work with the operator to potentially reduce services to within available resources or if worst case were to happen to ramp down services with a 60-day transition period because the last thing we would want would be for individuals to not have the opportunity to transition to other locations but that's why we are working closely with not only the operator but our county partners and our community partners to make sure that we can continue to secure those resources to try to keep this moving forward

Yeah, I know that that's important because like we all know we are going to the economy is not going to be very well. So I you know, we we can wish that we can raise money, but you know, I'm a realist and what is going to happen is that in November when I'm sitting on that side, because I'm not going to be mayor, I'm going to be sitting on that side, we're going to come back here and we're not going to have money. So what I'm trying to have exit the strategies for the city that is not going to come out of general fund of the city at that point because I have had conversations with other agencies, and they were under the impression that we are going to pay when that happens. And I had to disabuse them of that idea. So I just want to make clear that we all understand that. But yeah, with that, I will entertain a motion.

Move to approve the contract with Outreach Ministries International.

Second.

All right, and it passes next item.

The next item on the regular calendar is to adopt a resolution approving the fiscal year 2026-27 financial plan and budget approving the fiscal year 2026-27 appropriation spending limit approving new job classifications and reclass studies for the for requested positions approving the budget and fiscal policies approving the investment policy and approving the annual GAN spending limit. And I'll turn it over to our budget manager, Janelle Baker, to give this presentation.

All right. Good evening again, Mayor Yepez, Mayor Pro Tem Houthi, and council members. Tonight, staff is recommending adoption of the fiscal year 2026-27 citywide budget. This budget reflects months of collaboration between departments with a commitment to maintaining essential services. So just as a reminder, on May 6th, staff presented the general fund budget challenges. On May 20th, we presented the enterprise and special fund budgets along with their associated capital improvement programs. And on June 3rd, the general fund budget associated with capital and replacement funds and the five-year forecast. This evening's presentation is intended to summarize the overall citywide budget, review the key budget items, and discuss the minor changes that are recommended by staff. With that, I'll begin with a brief overview of the recommended fiscal year 26-27 citywide budget. So this is the overview. Tonight's presentation will focus on the additional information requested by council during the budget study sessions, the proposed updates to the recommended budget, and the actions required for budget adoption. We'll also review the capital improvement plan, citywide expenditure summary, appropriation spending limit, And several policy overviews before concluding with staffs recommendation at recommended actions if needed, I have also available that information from the prior special budget meetings for reference during this Council discussion. So this is additional requested information. This is the overview of the Measure L expenditure history. So since implementation, expenditures have expanded from approximately 650,000 in fiscal year 18-19 to a proposed 9.2 million in fiscal year 26-27, reflecting how essential Measure L revenue is for supporting city programs and services. The city utilizes HDL companies as a consulting firm specializing in sales tax analysis to develop measure all sales tax projections. HDL reviews historical revenue trends taxpayer level reporting data economic forecasts and local development activity to provide revenue estimates used in the city's budget development. and long-term financial planning. So tax challenges were provided by staff to council and they were viewed on the May 6th meeting that were specific to the sales tax overview. So, although measure all revenues are accounted for within the overall general fund budget, they are tracked separately through a dedicated organizational unit. To provide transparency and accountability this structure allows the city to clearly identify measure all revenues and expenditures and demonstrate that funds are being used for specific purposes. Measure L supports both general fund and special fund operations and services. So while the 2006-27 proposed budget reflects a decrease in expenditures compared to fiscal year 25-26 estimated actuals, the fiscal year 25-26 amount includes mid-year appropriations for labor agreement salary and benefit adjustments. So the public safety continues to represent the largest use of Measure L funding. Combined police and fire expenditures account for approximately 7.9 million, or over 83% of the fiscal year 26-27 proposed Measure L budget. So while four police officer positions were shifted from Measure L funding to the general fund as part of the fiscal year 27 budget balancing strategy, all existing police officer positions remain fully funded through either Measure L or general fund resources. Measure L funding has also provided ongoing support for parks and recreation. Beginning in fiscal year 21, an annual Measure L support for parks has generally exceeded one million and has funded recreation programs, park maintenance, and community facilities. So although in fiscal year 27, allocation is lower than recent years, Measure L continues to provide substantial support for these services to assist in balancing the Measure L budget. The annual contribution of parks capital was shifted to general fund for fiscal year. Twenty-seven library services have also benefited from measure L. Funding since twenty-one. They have supported both the library operations and a dedicated library position that is housed in measure L. Street maintenance funding was introduced in fiscal year 21 and continues through fiscal year 27. So it's partially supporting the salary of one streets worker. And overall, the expenditure history demonstrates that measure all revenues have been consistently directed towards funding dedicated to public safety while also supporting recreation, streets, and library services. So on the next slide, this is a percentage breakdown of the same information. And police and fire services have consistently accounted for approximately 80 to 90% of the total measure all expenditures and fiscal in the current fiscal year 26 police represented 49.9% of expenditures and fire 33.7 resulting a combined public safety investment of 83.6. And parks funding has increased from approximately 2% in 21 to 11.9 and fiscal year 26. And similarly library operations and the dedicated library position have grown from less than 1% of expenditures in 21 to 4% combined in fiscal year 26. So the bar graph on the top is a better visual of the continued support of police in blue fire and red parks in green library and my brain and bright blue and Gray and streets and non departmental in yellow and purple. So next we're gonna turn to updates from the budget book presentation. So minor changes that happened in the budget. The primary update is in Public Works in the general fund, their general fund account. And it is the reassignment of the public works management analyst position from the general fund to the water and wastewater funds. As a result, both the positions based salary and the associated reclassification costs have been removed from general fund budget, reducing the amount of general fund balance required to support the position. In addition, personnel transfer recoveries from the enterprise funds have increased with engineering facility divisions to more accurately reflect the services provided to those operations. These adjustments improve cost recovery and provide a more accurate representation of the general funds actual service obligations. And then, due to the reassignment of the public works management analyst position and the personnel transfers the general funds reliance on general fund balance was reduced, so the. programmed general fund fund balance it was decreased from 4.3 million to 3.9 million and not improve the city's overall fiscal position while maintaining current service levels. Another update from the budget book that we did present at the end of last meeting general fund meeting was a transit has balanced their 27 budget by programming additional revenue from Tda allocations. This has resulted as a result. The previously projected operating deficit has been eliminated, and the fiscal year 27 transit budget is now balanced. So the Tda revenues were increased by a total 1.3 million of this amount. 554,000 was allocated to capital activities, and 741 was allocated to transit operations. So now we're going to turn to the position request. Staff has listed the fiscal year 27 staffing recommendations to reflect the changes discussed during the budget review process. As presented during the study sessions, the proposed budget does not include any new general fund positions. However, several new positions and reclassifications are recommended within enterprise and special funds where ongoing revenues are available to support the additional staffing needs. These include the senior storekeeper for water-based water, transportation coordinator for transit, and admin assistant for community development building division. Reclass studies will be conducted for a public works administrative manager, management analyst, and senior engineering technician. The new position requests are intended to address operational demands, regulatory requirements, service delivery needs, and workload increases identified by departments. The proposed reclassifications recognize changes in responsibilities, organizational needs, and efforts to maintain competitiveness within the labor markets. So the following table summarizes the new positions and reclassifications for fiscal year 27. This is the individual capital improvement program projects that were presented during the budget study sessions are included in detail in the draft fiscal year 27 budget book. This slide provides a summary of the proposed capital expenditures by fund and highlights the city's continued investment in infrastructure, public facilities, utilities, transportation, parks and community improvements. The amounts shown represent new fiscal year 27 project appropriations only. Existing appropriations for multi-year projects that remain active at the end of fiscal year 26 will be carried forward through the year-end closed process and added to the fiscal year 27 budget. Okay, so this slide is an overview of the city wide expenditures, the first table summarizes the proposed fiscal year 27 general fund expenditures by department which totals approximately 96.2 million. As discussed throughout the budget study sessions the fiscal year 27 general fund budget was developed in a constrained fiscal environment with expenditure growth continuing to outpace revenue growth. But overall, the proposed fiscal year 27 general fund budget balances available resources with community service expectations and continues funding for the city's core operational needs. The second table summarized the proposed fiscal year 27 expenditures for the city's enterprise and special funds, which total approximately $206.1 million. Unlike the general fund, most of these funds are supported by dedicated revenues, user fees, assessments, grants, and other restricted funding sources that are used to support specific programs and services.

Before you move on to the next slide, can you go back? Yes. So this one in the item that says the streets, what is that in title? Because it's only like 70,000.

That is the partial streets worker that is housed in measure L. So since we lump measure L into the general fund budget, that is one of the categories that gets funded in general fund. It's the decimal. OK. So the next slide is the overview of the GAN appropriations spending limits. And the GAN is established by Article 8 of the California Constitution and places a limit on the amount of tax proceeds that local governments may appropriate each fiscal year. The limit is adjusted annually based on changes in population and inflation and is intended to control the growth of government spending funded by tax revenues. So for the fiscal year 27, the city's appropriations spending limit increased from 156 million to 164 million. The increase is based on the state provided adjustment factors, which include a population factor of almost 1% growth and an inflation factor of almost 1.05, resulting in a combined adjustment factor of 1.048 or approximately 4.8%. So applying these factors to the prior year's limit generated an annual increase of 7.5 million, bringing the city's fiscal year 27 appropriations spending limit to 164 million. And the city's appropriations remain well below the calculated spending limit. Okay, so California Government Code Section 53646 recommends that local agencies annually review their investment policies and submit them to the legislative body for consideration. So accordingly, the City of Lodi investment policy is included in the Council packet presented to the City Council for review and approval. Staff is not recommending any changes to the investment policy at this time. The policy remains consistent with the city's investment objectives of safety, liquidity, and yield, while providing internal control procedures designed to safeguard public funds from loss, misappropriation, speculation, and fraud. Also, the policy continues to adhere with the requirements of California Government Code Sections 53600 through 53692, which govern the investments of local agency funds. So in addition, the city's budget and fiscal policies provide a framework for responsible financial management and guide the development, adoption, and administration of the annual budget. These policies establish principles related to budgeting, reserves, debt management, capital planning, expenditure controls, and long-term financial sustainability. The budget and fiscal policies were comprehensively reviewed and updated as part of the fiscal year 2526 meteor budget review process. And we're subsequently adopted by the City Council so since that adoption at mid year staff has reviewed the policies and determine that no additional revisions are necessary at this time. The policy continues to reflect current best practices organizational priorities and the city's financial management objectives. So given that recent comprehensive review and adoption of the policy, we are recommending actually pushing the next review to the fiscal year 28-29 annual budget. However, just like mid-year, the policies can be brought back to council for review and amendment at any time should operational, regulatory, or fiscal conditions warrant revisions or at the direction of city council. So although we are going to make it mandatory we come back for fiscal year 29 review, we can bring it back at any time if there's anything to change.

Are we able to get a quick just update from our finance committee on our investment policy if there is any good information to give? Janelle, are we able to give that update?

Yeah, I mean, really, our policy is really it's mirroring the state guidelines for the investment and prudent investment of our funds. Obviously, the well, not obviously, but the state does not allow the city to get into any risky or high yield investment. type of products, just so that it protects taxpayer dollars. So really, again, our investment policy, we did have our current vendor, Wells Fargo, who holds most of our investments, review it. And it's almost to the letter. I mean, it is to the letter following the state mandates. Thank you. No problem. Okay, as part of the budget adoption process, the city is required to adopt a publicly available salary schedule in accordance with the employee Public Employees Pension Reform Act or PEPRA and CalPERS regulations. The salary schedule is presented in two ways in the budget book by salary amount and by position title. The salary schedule is also posted on the City of Lodi website under the human resources page. And then, in addition, government code section 54953 C three requires public disclosure of local agency executive compensation prior to final action by the City Council. So the adoption of the salary schedules as posted in the budget book and on the city website and the execution of compensation information presented on the following slide. satisfy these statutory requirements and ensure the city remains in compliance with applicable state laws and regulations. So here is the slide that has the city executive compensation information as required by government code 54953 C three. Okay. So with that overview. The recommended actions are, as part of tonight's budget adoption, staff is recommending approval of the following actions. Adoption of the fiscal year 26-27 citywide budget totaling $302,351,060. Adoption of the city's appropriations spending limit, commonly referred to as GAN, in the amount of $164 million $49,380 for the general fund. Approval of a net increase of three positions citywide to support operational needs and enterprise and special funds. Adoption of the fiscal year 27 capital improvement plan, which includes over 10 million in new capital project appropriations and establishes the city's plan infrastructure investments for the coming fiscal year. Adoption of the fiscal year 27 investment policy with no recommended changes from the current policy. Adoption of fiscal year 27 budget and fiscal policies. Adoption of the city's salary schedules and acknowledgement of the executive compensation information presented satisfying the requirements of PEPRA and government code 54953C3. So these actions collectively establish the city's operating capital financial management and compliance of framework for fiscal year 27. And in addition to what you're going to review and approve after this, we are also recommending ongoing quarterly budget reports to council to monitor the current year budget to actuals and monitor current budget assumptions. So with that, any questions or comments?

Thank you so much. First of all, I like that you guys now have pages, pages on the top. So we know where we are in the position. So thank you, Aaron, for that. You will leave something here in the city. So we'll move it to council comments. Councilwoman Craig.

Mr. Mayor, might I ask if we might do public comment first? I'd like to kind of hear from the public before I make any comments.

Yeah, no, I think that would be good. Madam City Clerk, do we have any public comments on this item?

I do not have any comment cards for G2.

Okay. I just double checked.

Oh, actually, yes, you do. Yes, I do.

For once, I used a comment card.

Yes. It was hidden under the rest.

And for the first time, I'm bringing notes. Council, thank you. Janelle, thank you for 850 page budget. Incredible amount of work. I'm gonna start with something positive. Shout out to Wes Ray and Visit Lodi. Not only did he rally the troops and give us national recognition with America's favorite small town, That actually has serious financial implications. We generate about $300 million a year in tourist revenues. This is a huge marketing opportunity for us. So there is, we don't know what that's gonna be, but we need to exploit that across the board. The budget. A lot of data. I can see your guys' faces going through this stuff. It's just, you glaze over. It is a lot of detail. Here's my summary that I can derive from this. You are running at a deficit of 5 million a year. After you cut about 7 million a year out of your budgets, I'm assuming. It was put in the budget for a reason. That $7 million is really added to $5 million. You're running at a $12 million deficit. Because you're not doing the things that you're supposed to be doing. And that $5 million deficit. Guess what? You're wiping out your reserves. In five years. There's only there's only one way a business goes out of business. You run out of cash. You're wiping out your savings, so I when I look at this, I kind of took a simplified view of the budget, which is this is a cash flow problem, right? You are spending more money than you're making. Now your first reaction would be when we've got to stop spending. You've been doing that for years. It's creating a huge problem for you guys. This this when I see you guys us, the citizens of Lodi, it's creating a huge problem for us. Because we are going to have a financial crisis that we're not going to be able to deal with. Soon soon. The deferred maintenance that I talked about last time. It's going to bite us. We are, as Supervisor Ding said, we're not heading into really good territory in the future. We're gonna have some financial difficulties in the future. So we're at a critical junction right now. You've heard the phrase of the best time to buy real estate is 20 years ago. The second best time is right now. The best time to solve this financial crisis was a decade ago. It's too late for that. There's strong action needs to be taken now. So we can look at this doom and gloom while it's the end of the world. Or I like to use this phrase, opportunity to excel. We have a challenge. And when I say we, it starts with council. And it's going to require some pretty deep analysis and some common sense decision making and some hard, hard decisions. Because these are not going to be politically palatable. I think you need to execute on three planning horizons simultaneously. You need to be doing stuff today for 10 to 20 years down stream. And those are things like annexation. Introducing new industry into town. Getting higher paying jobs. That's not quick. That is not easy. You can't wait 10 years for that. You gotta work on that now. Medium term five years. Infill business retention critical. You guys know when we lose business here, it makes a huge difference to us huge. An enhancement of existing resources. You heard me talk about quiet zone. We have an underutilized resource called Sacramento St. Existing buildings, great real estate. We got a horn that gets blown every 10 minutes and just wipes out that quality real estate for you in terms of good businesses that you can put there and a good tax base you can put there. I think Mike Collins wants to put an Airbnb on the second floor of his building. Can you imagine actually staying there, trying to stay there at night with that kind of noise pollution going on? And in short term, cost mitigation, cost sharing with government agencies. I love the fact that Steve Ding is a great partner with us. And there's a huge opportunity there. They're having rough times. We're having rough times. Your budget's $300 million. Their budget's $3 billion. Something that could be a rounding error to them could actually significantly enhance our financial situation, particularly related things like access center, right? And while he feels like he has no money, he has more money than we've got. So there's an opportunity to kind of partner on some certain things. Revenue resources. Cannabis tax. No brainer. This is not a moral discussion. This is not a legal discussion. This is everything needs to be on the table. Like if you have free money, you take that free money. Just do it. Lobbying. Mikey has made this point many, many times. We have $70,000. I don't think it's enough. It's a return on investment question there. Like how much money do you want to put in for how many dollars out? I think $70,000 is a great start, but we need an RFP. We actually need to hire people. We need to execute against these things. Asset monetization. Lisa makes his point all the time. We have resources in town, real estate resources in town, that we need to look at and figure out how we can generate revenue from those resources instead of looking at them as cost centers. Advertising sales actually Mike Collins actually suggested the other day. And then you're getting into areas. This is where you guys are gonna take it in the head utility rates. You cannot run a business where cost keep going up and your prices stay the same. It's effective what you're doing. You have escalators based on CPI. That is not your inflation rate. You have real costs that go up at the city at a higher rate than CPI. You need to re baseline that thing and figure out where those utility rates are coming in. The reason I know that. Is because you're not making significant investments in your infrastructure. You're asking staff to cut things that are fundamental to the future of the business. If they had the budget that they would get through those utility rates, they would do those actions period. So what that is exactly, I don't know, but when I look at the budget, it stands out loud and clear. And the last five letter word you don't want to hear is taxes. Significantly under the limits is what we're spending. Right? $150 $160 million limit. I'm not saying go there. Um, we were, uh, I'm sure somebody somebody's probably gonna try to shoot me as I walk out of this building. However, we all as citizens, we need to pay our fair share. So, um, and that is going to be painful conversation. And that's going to require some political will. And some of you guys might lose your jobs, but you need you need to do this for the long term of the city. I hope everything I just said was no duh. I hope all of you thought, of course, that's exactly what we're doing. That's exactly what we're gonna do. Nobody needs to come and tell me that. This is my job and I understand it. Thank you.

All right, thank you for your comment. Next comment.

Yeah, well, ditto. You said a lot of what I was going to say. But one of the things that I keep hearing repeatedly from businesses and folks who would like to come into our community is that the permitting process is driving them away and keeping them from getting here. So if we're gonna develop new revenue sources, if we're gonna develop businesses, we really have to take a look at that process because it's actually not allowing the current businesses to grow the way they'd like, and it's actually keeping other businesses from coming in. So it's something we need to look at as a city and as a community. Raising revenues is always the third rail of politics. We know that. It's gonna be a challenge. No one's gonna be excited about raising their taxes, but they're gonna be less excited when our infrastructure starts falling apart. So either we pay now or we're gonna pay tenfold in the future. Thank you.

Thank you for coming. Next comment.

Mayor, you pass members of Council City staff. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I think you know a lot of good points have already been made. I think what I would like to say is that what I see is that there's going to be constraints on staff's ability to really to maintain the level of service and operation that they already have. But and we want to have some transformative things happen in this community. Scott identified some. I think you'll hear some more ideas tonight. So if if there's a limit on what we can do in terms of our current resources, and we're not going to be able to go out and seek outside resources. we have to look internally into the community and identify where those resources lie and leverage them i think there's a lot of of knowledge there's a lot of uh you know the volunteerism in this community is incredible to to efforts that that people see fit for them to invest their time and energy in and where they see results And so I think there's been some overtures from some of the current leadership at the staff level and definitely from council in terms of forming partnerships. I think we had a meeting last week where our acting city manager discussed what private and public partnerships look like and how they serve the city to accomplish its objectives. That's really, I think, where we need to look very aggressively in ways that we haven't before. And to be able to leverage the expertise to be able to bring in additional resources to be able to create that create the outcomes that we want, because we're not going to get it through the traditional means that we've been able to over the past century of the history of the city. I've been up here many times talking about the Chamber's willingness to help be that sort of partner. We stand here still ready. And I think if we can get that started, you know, some of these objectives that may seem too big or may seem unattainable all of a sudden look like maybe we can. And so I know it's incredibly challenging, but I appreciate the fact that these conversations are being had. And really, I want to encourage you. We need all five of you to work together as a body to get through this. It can't be done by one council member or just by the mayor or just by the city manager. It's going to take you as a body working together to get through these these challenges. So we're here to help drive those conversations forward and execute on the work. And we're also here to help, you know, ultimately, all of you be successful. I hope they don't lose their jobs, Scott, but So we're all on the same page there. So, you know, and in speaking with a lot of my peers, we're not the only city going through this. So we shouldn't be ashamed to have these conversations. We shouldn't shy away from them. We need to have them not just tonight, but ongoing until we can find some passports. So thank you.

Thank you for your comment. Next comment.

Um it's much more fun to come up and get into that proclamation than but I wanted to come back and I'm going to be uh I'd love to tell you I told you so I told you so I told I'm not going to do that because I'm a bigger man than that this is an education problem no one's been willing to talk about this this goes back decades this is not a new problem this is the same problem I'm struck by even tonight I want to pay you a compliment mayor after the homeless access center you made a point of saying something that no one would have ever said before maybe since which is you don't expect money from the general fund don't do you I mean like let's communicate reality can we please do that and I think that's to your point it can't be one it has to be all of you and I mean and it's not this council's fault this goes back decades right And essentially, it turns out, if you have almost no economic activity, the city will fail to realize the money it needs to provide services. Not new services, not additional services, the services that you've had for decades. Our level of service is lower than, I'd say, any cities other than Stockton. Our parks don't look as good as they did. Our infrastructure is woeful. Not only have not had new investment, And it's because we haven't had any normal economic activity. I don't think that our city spends money wastefully or any probably better than most cities. This is an income problem. But no one knows there's an income problem. You want to raise a rate for one and a half, 2% for, there's people in uproar because they don't think you need the money because none of you and the folks going back in time, no one's ever told the truth. And the truth is that, I'll give you an example. And by the way, it pains me to say, but you did an excellent job, Scott. So stay in your lane, because this is where you're good. Okay. He really did. He really spent a lot of time on it, and I do appreciate that. But I'll give you an example. Back in the days, we had a great recession, and then everyone came out of the recession but us, and we're struggling, and our fire station's closed half the time. we've got you know four cop cars on the street not six and it gets so bad that uh an ill-fated uh ballot measure comes and goes in 2016 it doesn't pass in 2018 we rally the troops we hold our nose and we say we can't have this condition anymore business community comes together passes major l and there was an assumption and i think a quiet agreement that the city would know and when i say the city i mean staff primarily but also members of the council at the time would no longer conduct business exactly the way they did prior to getting into that problem. Now, that wasn't in writing, and we didn't shake hands. It was just an assumption there would be an education process. Because normally, when you get down to that level of problems, you want to correct. Nothing happened. Nothing's changed. Nothing really meaningful. In other words, we had no industrial growth before the need for Measure L. We passed Measure L. There's been no industrial growth. We've retended to things, which is fine. Why did – why do we think we don't need industrial growth? And as important as it is for you as a city for us to have the money to deliver the services that the people need, more importantly is their opportunity to climb up the economic ladder. That's actually more important than the services you provide. It's the business climate. It's the – that's a quality of life issue, paying your bills. Dare I say it's even more important than parks. Because it's hard to enjoy a park when you don't know where your rent's coming from. And that's where the people that you represent live on a daily basis. Now, it's true that we can't turn that overnight. And this council has been the first council to really, I think, address that and try to turn the ship around and recognize that economic reality lives here in Lodi too. This fantasy land that we've been living for decades that we need no changes and will somehow have the money Well, here we are again. Now, we haven't earned the right for another sales tax increase. I don't think one would pass because nothing's changed. The building over there, nothing has changed. There's been a lot of turnover. There's opportunities for change. We're all excited for that. But somehow those lessons of economics, basic economics, just didn't seem to permeate. So what's going to have to change? The days of using consultants are over. We don't can't afford them. And so we're gonna have to do all the things that you folks are coming up with and you. But if we don't change if I'll leave you with this, I've got 20 seconds. I challenge each and every one of you to be honest with your constituents on a daily basis about the economic realities of Lodi. I'm not sure, I don't think it's gonna cost you your jobs, I hope it doesn't. But if it does, it's worth it. Because you're never gonna get people to vote for a sales tax increase or any increase or accept lower levels of service until they know the truth. And you may have to start with your staff. And I'm sorry we're here again.

All right, thank you for your comment. Do we have anybody else who would like to say comment? All right, seeing none, then I will turn

Well, thank you gentlemen for showing up I took notes so I A couple overall concepts. We are a full service city. There is an expectation of a certain amount of staffing, departments. We have our own library. We have our own fire department. We have our own electric utility. That's a very rare thing in towns that are 68,000. I mean, we are at the bottom of the size of full-service cities in California as I looked at it. So we do have a challenge in that we actually, even though we've had an increase of about, believe it or not, in the last six years, we've had an increase of about 30 staff positions. So we have tried to move our city by staffing up to meet the needs of a full-service city, but Mr. Karub is right. We have not kept up with the economics of understanding that and what that means and the impact on things like continuing deferred maintenance, in particular on our parks. i think we all expected with the passage of measure l that we would see more investment in our parks but our parks are barely afloat and christina doesn't have enough money to hire the necessary staff so we're failing in that You know, I want the bad news. This is the first budget. Thank you, Janelle. I hate to say it, but thank you for the bad news, because when I look at this forecast and I see 4.2, which is now maybe down to 3.9 is what you're saying. in the hole that's eating our savings okay and then you look at our uh reserve accounts okay that's our savings that's that's that's our catastrophic reserve in case we have another major disaster um such as we had with covet our economic reserves just our regular savings account and then we don't touch the measure lcat and economic reserves and then we dip into our pension stabilization we will be out of money by fiscal year 30 out of money because we won't have cash on hand to pay any of the debt that you have done a very good job of saying conservatively here's where we're going so it is a problem that has to be solved now and and you're absolutely right i believe in monetizing our assets I think this is something that we can talk with various departments about. We have land, we have buildings, we have a great opportunity with our electric utility. It is the gem of our city. It is also the thing that brings an economic opportunity for businesses. So, you know, with those really low rates, we probably could see higher rates that would contribute, but would it contribute to the general fund? That's the key point. is how do we get more money in the general fund so you know uh supervisor ding was here they had a balanced budget but you know what the first thing they said was we're not raising fees we're looking at efficiencies and operations in the departments before we're raising fees okay That's a reality they can afford. We certainly can look at efficiency in department operations, maybe integration of department staffing. There's a lot of things. We get our new community development, public works director on board, new city manager, and certainly working with Jamie, we may be able to find more efficiencies. We do need to monetize our assets. We've got some fabulous assets. It's why we are the favorite small town. And to our chambers comments to Jp public private partnerships. We don't know how to do those. We need to start working and leveraging the assets that the private sector provides us, and i've heard everything from individuals like naming rights. uh on parks and other facilities um i'm open to anything and i think what we need to be doing is sitting down and i have no problem sitting down before the election okay i'm not afraid of addressing the bad news and talking about things that are difficult to hear so once we've passed this budget which i hope we will do tonight because we have to continue this process Um, I think that we're going to have to sit down and do a series of special sessions, and I'm happy to see one in October. You know, so we can get this started because we don't have much time. We are well past having time to deal with this, and we need to do The long term issues i'm so appreciative that we got economic development that we actually got an economic development department and a director and a plan in place that is our long term strategy. But in the meantime, we need to look at those middle term is as Scott indicated, and the shorter term and. know i'm not in favor of some of these things i'm really not but i can be convinced with economic we need to know the numbers first i need to know the numbers and i need to know where my community is on the issue of cannabis so i'm open to just about anything at this point i'll hold my nose but i'll be open to it

Talk about it over a joint.

I'll take by way of wine instead. That we both agree on. So I look forward to this discussion. I look forward to working with our private sector partners, because I think that they have a significant amount of experience, but even more an investment in this community just like all those taxpayers that are funding us um have as well so i i don't have anything to pick apart i don't have detailed questions i am glad we got from 4.2 to 3.9 it's still ugly you know i still don't like it and um but i do appreciate that We got the bad news because it's very hard for staff to deliver that and I think you did an excellent job of it and Jamie it's now in your lap to help us through this process, so That's really a kind of all I've got to say

Thank you so much. So I'm just going to make a quick comment. So I'm very pleased with that conversation that happened here with the dais, because I've been asking for these kind of honest conversations to happen since Lindsay and before you, Erin, because they tell us about the budget. And I'm like, yes, but we need to think about five years, six years. I'm not a short term person. I'm long term and and for me to put on the table for me. I'm I'm for taxes. I could say I'm for taxes, and if it takes me my job here. Okay, so be I'm never wanted to be here. Anyways, I just came here because I saw that I needed the community. So as long as I can help and move the city forward for other future people, I will always do that. So And yeah, we passed the budget now, but the real work starts after passing the budget because we need to look at efficiency, talk about all the other options. Like you guys, I'm not saying yes or no to any of this. Just let's start having these conversations after this meeting. And it's just problems to solve. So if we, the community, the staff members, the council members, we realize that this is a problem, we'll get there. So and with that, I will move to more council comments.

I completely agree. I think following the approval of this budget, we should get together with a number of meetings, throw things on a dart, and then figure out which ones we actually want to pursue. I was talking to a few members of the community right before this about the same subject. Some of them are not gonna be good looking at all, right? I had a few individuals tell me we should be looking at parking meters in downtown. I had a few individuals tell me we should look at signage along highways, like digital signs, sponsorships for parks. I mean, all these things are gonna be very small, but they are gonna add together. And again, do I think we should leave anything off the table? I think we should have a conversation about everything. So I'm in agreement with that, and we have to start somewhere, and I think, again, following this discussion, it should be the immediate. I think one of the issues that we have had is organization and leadership, right? In the last two years, a lot of movement in the city manager position, and really, when we're talking about our 27-28 budget, You gotta start now, right? You don't get to put something in the budget one month before, two weeks before just because you want it. So it takes time to study these issues and to be able to prove to people and our constituents and the business owners why we're doing what we're doing. So again, I'm in full agreement and I think we should start directly after to give ourselves ample enough time. But again, and what I would say is we should have a meeting where everyone is throwing something at the dart, or throwing darts at the board, and then having a conversation where we're pulling those off and saying, this is the order of how we're going to take it serious and what we're going to look at first. So thank you.

I agree. We need revenues, right? I agree the expenses didn't go up, but I've been in the city council many years. When it was down, we passed Measure L. I was mayor at that time. I'm a no-tax person, right? It brings in $9 million a year, okay? But before you do that, If you want that, you guys go out there and, say, make committees like that. Also, parking lots down, down, down, right? Say, let's put parking lots on. You're gonna have to get those property owners, they won't want that, all right? So everything you want, it's, it's easy to say, but it's hard to do. But if you wanted to really put your word, word of mouth, go out there and elicit a sales tax, all right? Get a committee. Last time it began from the city council, right? You get a committee. And also, it's no brainer to see where you get revenues, right? Parking, you could do that. Write it down, and then have a committee here, and then say, let's support this. Bring in city council. And then I think we could work with it. I understand what you're saying. I have a little different view of our budget, right? We have reserves in 2031, because, because we save money. That Minister Allen gave us $9 million a year, right? Because of that, the way we handle it, we have reserves in our retirement funds. So we have, I differ in the sense that we have time, but we're gonna have to work together. I agree, we have to work together. And you guys go out there and rather come here and say, do this and this, then you do it yourself, and then get, get these plans to us. That's my thoughts anyway.

Yeah, I watch Channel 3 every day when I'm sitting at home, and every local jurisdiction is going through the exact process to meet their statutory guidelines, deadlines. And they're all in a pretty awful situation. I'd argue that our situation is slightly better than a lot of our neighboring jurisdictions. The writing is on the wall that you know we need to we certainly need to take some actions here I won't repeat a lot of the suggestions made, but I think we are. We have some ideas in mind on how to address these issues, and we have the right staff coming in to potentially do so Kara coming from Elk Grove. They certainly know how to grow. They've had lobbying services. They don't do cannabis, but we'll work on that. And yeah, I think there's opportunities, but I just appreciate the honest assessment. And it sounds like there's the political will up here to try and have some of these hard conversations.

City Manager?

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of the council.

Just a couple of thoughts if I could as my final action here in putting my name on it. I wish I was here sooner to help with the conversations, to have those important conversations. But I commend you all for being willing and prepared to have those difficult conversations because that's what it's going to take. And, you know, I think that you're on the right path. I commend you for, you know, the entire organization. You know, when I first got here, you hear of all the turmoil that this community, that this agency has been through for the past couple of years. That's not easy. And, you know, as the time that I've been here to see you step by step by step get through that, That's what's in front of you again. But it's going to be that tenacity and that determinedness and that focus. And I think you're taking steps every step of the way. When I first got here, we had that conversation about revisiting your strategic plan goals. You have 46. We whittled it down to eight. And that's a huge step, because now you can start talking and focusing on what are the priorities. Where do we need to focus? and make those hard decisions of what is real and what's not. And so I think there's a lot of opportunity there. And so by taking those hard looks and having those hard conversations sooner than later, that will go a long way. And just so you know, I've talked to your staff along this whole process about we we need to be thinking you know not feeling overwhelmed we need to have a reality check and this budget certainly does that and i appreciate you know janelle and her team putting that hard information and presenting it you know that's that's what i've asked them to do is like we need to tell the the story you you know that's our job as staff is to educate and inform the council of what the real story is behind you know behind the scenes and the curtain and all that stuff So now you have it. And but in this situation, it's real easy to get overwhelmed. But you have to have a game plan and you have to start looking at this in bite sized chunks and saying, OK, what is our first priority? What is our and save money and find ways to make money and all that stuff and then go to the next priority and then the next priority. Until slowly but surely, you're out of it. Because a windfall solution, I've been in this game a long time. I haven't seen it. And it's just by incrementally going after it and attacking it. And so I think... And I see that in your staff. Okay. And it's been a pleasure to work with the budget team. Excellent work. And I appreciate all the department heads and their staffs for really jumping into this. You know, when I got here, it was, you know, we didn't know where we were at just yet. And when we got the numbers, it was okay. We're sorry, but they rallied around that. And they understood that. And they're trying to do the proverbial more with less. But we've got to fix that model. And they're on board with that. And so I'm excited for you. I feel for you. I've been in a lot of bad budget situations. But the community is behind you. I think there's real opportunities here. You're putting foundational pieces in place. Your economic development strategy. I mentioned it in our special meeting. It's time to build a new economy. You can absolutely do that. But you have to be purposeful. You have to be focused and all aligned in doing that. And it can be done. But you got to play to your strengths. And sometimes you have to create new ones. But that strategy is out there, and you have a lot of committed people to focusing on that. So while it's definitely a big hill to climb, it's not insurmountable. And I think that you're putting pieces together to help with that. And the conversation we had at the special meeting about being smart about the new growth areas. Growth is not the answer by itself. It has to be the right growth. in my experience I will say. Because if you continue to invest in the old trends as one of your constituents mentioned, you know, that's not going to fix anything. That's going to add more problems 20 years down the road. And so there's a real opportunity here and I'm excited for you. And I wish you all the best with that. And I think you're putting the right pieces in place. And most importantly, you have the right mindset. And that is let's address this head on, excuse me, and tackle it and help us help ourselves. So I will just, again, thank all the staff for putting all the hard work into this. I appreciate the council's focused and interest into the budget. I've worked with a lot of councils on budgets, and sometimes it's just whitewashed and, you know, glanced at and so forth. And what's the bottom line? You guys, I can tell that you all care very much about this. And so to the community of Lodi, I think you're in good shape that you have people that are watching out for you and want to have those difficult conversations and make those tough decisions to help the community maintain that award winning reputation that you just received. with that i appreciate the opportunity to work with you i wish i had more time but i'm turning it over to some good hands and i think you guys are going to do some good things so thank you for the opportunity thank you so much for the comment um do we have any more comments from council i will entertain a motion so move to approve the 26 27 annual budget second If I could, all the other things that go in that motion with the GAN limit and all that other stuff, correct?

Yeah. Do you need me to read it into the record? You want to put that slide up with all of those things?

If you just say staff's recommendation, I think we're covered.

Okay. Staff's recommendation. We'll accept staff's recommendation for approval of all those items associated with acceptance of the 26-27 annual budget.

Thank you.

Okay.

All right, and it passes, so next item.

Mayor, the last item of the night is to discuss and provide direction to staff regarding data centers in Lodi, and I'll turn it over to Councilmember Bregman.

I'll make this quick, it's late. In regards to helping our budget, my initial proposition was for resolution against data centers in city limits and looking into the feasibility of one near White Slough in the countryside. Since then, I've gained significant clarity through engagement that this is not an option our community wants, nor, from my understanding from council, to look at. And I am proposing a memoratorium against data centers altogether. I've been told it's a mute point due to no companies currently applying for permits. However, I do believe in being proactive instead of reactionary. There are currently microgrid companies that are integrating into neighborhoods. A couple of company names are Crowley, Volta Grid. So I do believe it would be a future issue for Lodi's infrastructure as far as the city limits go. I don't think that's something anyone wants. our sphere of influence should be for residential properties and business owners and businesses thereof. So again, I do hold the city limits in high regards in that sense, as well as some of the possible health effects from these data centers. Again, I don't think it's something that council wanted to begin with from what I got at the last meeting. And I've gotten enough feedback from the public to take a stance on it. So I'm leaving it to the rest of the council to chime in. Thank you.

DAVID BURRAGE- Just a comment. That is going to be a big, big project, right? So that's my concern. My estimation is it's going to be costly. It might be better to ask the NCPA if it's feasible, right? Because I don't think the city by itself can do it. And that's my thoughts.

We had a meeting with NCPA. Councilmember Bregman was involved as well. about the feasibility. And I don't know that we've gotten a clear answer just yet, but there was some research going into that.

Thank you.

I just want to be clear. Are you advocating for no action?

So and this is the fun part with newspapers and social media. So my original discussion, and you can actually go back to the video of it. Number one, I've always been against actually putting a data center within city limits. The White Slough area was the exception to that first conversation. So number one, should not have them in city limits. The conversation I had at the last council meeting was trying to figure out if we should look into and have that conversation about doing one near White Slough. Again, feedback that I've gotten, no one wants it. So my suggestion is we actually do a memorandum against them altogether. city limits and White Slough area. And I will say this much too. The technology is very new, okay? As far as the health effects, water usage, all this stuff. It's in the worst situation it can be in right now. I will also tell you from what I've found, everyone's in distress of this stuff right now because it's new, right? So my suggestion is we should give it some time. But my other suggestion too is Be proactive in the sense of don't have these guys knocking on your door don't have them buying a property near you because they think you're going to be open to it don't have them put these micro grids in your city that are going to affect your infrastructure so. Again, my suggestion is put a memorandum on them.

I. I don't support moratoriums. Frankly, you're absolutely right on the technology changing. Enacting a moratorium and having staff go to the expense and effort to determine what's feasible and what's not feasible in a moratorium, the language means everything. I don't want to ... Who knows? It could be down the road. These could be very small footprints. you know i just i don't like the concept of the moratorium period on anything on any development type on whatever so i think i'd rather just let the market move forward in the sense that if they're if we are viable we're still waiting for research from ncpa um you know we'll deal with what comes to us and at that point in time we have every right to say no And so I say we just, it's good information to have, but I just would not recommend any action by council at this point in time.

So I was not here when this discussion was happening because I was in DC, but we have seen that we have real problems that we need to solve. So investing more time on this is just, in my opinion, a waste of time in this discussion, this item, and anything. So I just recommend that we table it indefinitely. I need to go to public comments. Do we have any public comments?

I had a 30-year career in tech. Starting in the early 80s, I had data centers. City of Lodi has a data center. You put a moratorium on data centers, you have to decommission your data center. All the bad news are 100 megawatt and larger data centers. All the bad news are poorly implemented data centers. I highly recommend no moratorium, no approval, wait for something to happen. The technology changes a lot. I've had data centers go from a million square feet to 10,000 square feet. In five years. The size, the power consumption, the cooling necessities, all those things change. Nobody's knocking on your door right now for a data center. I would just hold off on this particular topic and not pass anything. Thank you.

Uh, yeah, I completely concur on that. I'm, I'm, I'm with you. I don't understand having a moratorium, which means we never look at it again. That doesn't make sense. But when we're, I understand not putting in the city limits, but I'm also concerned about putting it out at the slew because of the environmental impact. I mean, this is where we're talking about the sandhill cranes is where we're talking about other things that we really need to think about here. Um, And I also question the financial gain because the construction of these, they bring the people in to build them. They'll bring the people in to run them. So what we're going to get is a security guard and some janitors. So I feel like we really need to look at the bigger picture before we start trying to attract data centers into our area. Thank you.

Well, I'm glad that Councilmember Bregman turned around and is against this bad idea. The Datto Center's debate It's gonna hike up residential business electrical bills. It's gonna add, I mean, for example, and I wrote in my letter to the editor, according to the American Policy Center, they give you one example. There's a meta data center in Newton County, Georgia. It's a rural county, and they're using 500,000 gallons daily. which is turning residents' wells brown. I mean, even farmers. I looked at a documentary that one guy has gone around to various states, especially in Wisconsin, and there's farmers out there saying their wells are dry. They're not getting water. We have farmers here. You guys want to have a data center and you have no farmers in the wineries out here, have no water? And it's bad enough we're in a drought, you know, California's been in a drought situation and so forth. Like the gentleman said, it's, there's going to be no jobs. They only bring a skeleton crew. There's no, no money in it. And so you got to see. Wisconsin this past week I went out to Reno if you research at Reno last month six one did a moratorium on these data centers. And so I. went to Reno, stayed the night, and I drove out to where they have their data centers. They're constructing these massive things. I mean, it's just, but it's outside the city limits. But you have to ask a question. It's Reno, Nevada. It's dry, it's desert out there. Where are they getting the water? I mean, this is ridiculous. They're doing the same thing in Utah. Where are they gonna get the water from? I mean, Las Vegas is running out of, They got no water resources. In one of the documentary, they went down to Tucson, Arizona, and they put this data center, but it was the transparency was not there. The supervisors in Tucson, which I think it's Piedmont County, they didn't even know about this project, and staff was putting it on their agenda, and they're like, wait a minute, what is this? What are we voting for? They're putting these things in without the supervisors or even council members, knowing what it is. And and and signing non disclosure agreements the secrecy there. I mean, they don't even tell the citizens what's going on. This is the problem, folks and and you know sandwich key county We have farms. We have, you know, The governor wants to do this delta tunnels. He wants to divert water down to LA. I mean, what's it gonna do to our freshwater resources? So that's what I'm saying is, and these data centers, I hate to say it, it's the key to create an AI surveillance center. I mean, it ties down AI surveillance. So, I mean, But i'm glad that Mr. Council member Bregman turn turn turn around and kind of woke up on this issue, and the rest of you need to really look at this stuff, and Aaron Brockovich is really paying attention. Now this this attorney that sued Pgd. uh down it's you know hickley uh which is by barstow so if you guys i drove down to las vegas and when you drive back from las vegas you're gonna pass barstow and that's hinkley and you see a lot of abandoned homes out there that's hinkley that was the area that the water pollution happened and that she sued aaron brockovich is getting and entering this an arena and she's doing a huge database because a lot of communities are having these data centers forced it's it's turning their their life upside down so thank you good evening council members i'm going to see if we can get us to the four-hour uh

I only got five minutes, but I actually funny story is I started my career as an advocate I actually was on the probably the other side of the aisle, so to speak, where I am today I actually worked for an organization that was born out of the fair child. semiconductor manufacturing issue in silicon valley which aaron brockovich was part of way back in the day and we saw what happened with basically tech companies moving semiconductor manufacturing offshore and i worked with a lot of international companies that were trying to clean that industry up and so i'm very i guess what i'm saying is i'm very sensitive to the potential impacts of uh you know technology and the impact it has on people in communities but ultimately you know you are the decision-making body for this community and i have the faith in you that if uh even if something was to come to you in sort of a surprise manner that you guys would have the wherewithal to be able to manage the process of approval effectively, weigh the potential impacts to the community, and make a decision that's best for us. I i'm a chamber guy, so obviously i'm against kind of creating additional regulation and limiting us in terms of our economic opportunity. So I do think that that this should be tabled. I submitted a letter to Council today, saying such. So really let's let's just let all of the existing regulation we have at the state and the municipal level do its job you guys will have the opportunity to weigh in if we ever have this opportunity in front of us our electric utility and and staff and other people are amazing and they're going to be able to really help guide you effectively if and when this opportunity ever may arise thank you

Sinan, I will turn it back to Canso. Any last comments from Canso? OK. So yeah. So just in the future, please, before bringing things to Canso, talk to your voters. Look that up first before bringing things for the support.

I'd appreciate if you don't chastise me, Mr. Mayor. What's that? Please don't chastise me.

Well, I'm not just giving that that opportunity for you because see, we are expanding right now. Valuable time, and these are on the you. Yes, no, yes.

Something can help our budget. I will bring it to the council.

Okay, but we do your research. I'm asking you to do your research before bringing it here. Well, they didn't want to do this. That's why there's no staff report because you're wasting people's time.

Council approval. I appreciate your sentiment, Mr. Mayor. It's my right as a council member. Exactly.

exactly bring it to okay so yeah waste everybody's time yeah so that's right just like you have before all right thank you