City Council - Regular Meeting

Recording in progress.

Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the regular meeting of the Madera City Council. Today is Wednesday, 02/18/2026. I call this meeting to order at 06:01. We have a council member, Mejia, who will be remotely online on Zoom, who is due to an illness. So city clerk Gonzales.

So for roll call, it's, mayor Gaigos. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria. Here. Council member Rodriguez. Here. Council member Montes. Council member Evans. Here. Council member Mejia. Here. And council member Villegas.

Here.

And just as a reminder, under the Just Cause, councilwoman Mejia, she will need to keep her screen on at all times for public viewing. We will every item this evening will be called by roll call, and I'll turn it back over to you, mayor.

Thank you for that. We're moving on to, our city clerk will be announcing our announcements for the public online and in the chamber.

The Madera City Council meetings are open to the public. This meeting will also be available for public viewing and participation through Zoom. Members of the public may also observe the livestream meeting on the city's website at www.madera.gov/live. Members of the public may comment on agenda items at the meeting or remotely through an electronic meeting via phone by dialing 669906833. Enter ID 85823229836 Pound.

Press 9 to raise your hand to comment and 6 to unmute yourself to speak. Comments will also be accepted via email at citycouncilpubliccomment@Madeira.gov or by regular mail at 205 West 4th Street, Madeira, California 93637. We'd also like to remind the audience that Wordly is available for translation.

Thank you for that announcement. At this time, if you could please stand for an invocation by pastor Brandon Hopkins from Grace Community Church and remain standing for our mayor Pro Tem for the pledge of allegiance.

Well, thank you. And on behalf of the Madera Ministerial Association, thank you for having us here. Let's pray together. Lord, we thank you for our city, Lord, for what you're doing in our city. Lord, we thank you for the public servants that you've called. Lord, those you have, divinely and sovereignly elected. Lord, we ask that you would protect them, keep them safe. Lord, we pray that you'd give them wisdom. Lord, you've called them to a a high calling of managing, overseeing, and caring for our people. Lord, we pray that that is their goal tonight, that is their heart, is that it would be toward and soft toward the people.

Lord, the the full class of the people of Madeira, both the marginalized, the well-to-do, and everyone in between. Lord, we ask that their hearts would be soft toward the city council leaders, and, Lord, that ultimately that your will would be done here tonight. We, Lord, ask for wisdom, for patience, for peace, and for unity and accord tonight. We ask these things in the name

of Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen. For the pledge, please?

Ready? Salute. I pledge allegiance to the divine of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it ends, one nation under all, indivisible with liberty and

justice for all.

Thank you for that. Moving on to the approval of the agenda, I bring it back to my colleagues for any questions or concerns. If not, I'd entertain a motion and a second.

Motion for proof. Second. Second.

Thank you. I have a motion and second. Roll call, please.

Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria? Yes. Council Member Rodriguez?

Yes.

Council Member Montes? Yes. Council Member Evans? Yes. Council Member Mejia? Yes. Council Member Villegas? Yes. Mayorica? Yes. Motion passes.

Thank you. Moving on to the next item.

As under presentations, it's a proclamation recognizing Black History Month.

Thank you for that. I come down to the podium here to recognize three amazing women. We had a very nice, ceremony for Black History Month on, Sunday. Councilwoman Anita Evans was the maestress of ceremony. She did a great job. So at this time, I'd like to, present this proclamation if the Mitchell sisters would please come down and join me. And while they're coming down, I just wanna give a little background. These young women here that are coming down have given so many years of service when it comes to educating our young children in Madera Unified. They worked with my mom for many years. Together, they're a hundred and eighteen years total in years of service and education.

They were chosen by the committee because of all their service they have done throughout the city of Madera. So I would like to give this proclamation on behalf of the city council and myself, mayor, Cece Gaigos, for back history month in a very large part of American history and should be studied throughout the year. And since 1976, February has been designated as a month in which especially memorable event should be recognized and celebrated. Black Black History Month is an occasion to rediscover the endurance stories of African Americans and the gifts of freedom, purpose, and opportunities they have bestowed on future generations and honors this accomplishment in men and women who have become strong role models, as you see here, including our very own community members. We have Saletta Mitchell, Alice Fay Mitchell, and Jeralei Dean Mitchell.

The Mitchell sisters are lifelong residents of Madera, and like I said, teachers. The city of Madera recognizes you for all your years of service, and and we acknowledge all that you've done for this community. So the month of February as Black History Month and wish to honor this pay tribute to all of you, the Mitchell sisters, for their commitment and contribution to this community. So on behalf of my I myself, Cece Gargos mayor, and the city council, we proclaim Black History Month, 02/18/2026, and we thank you for all your years of service very much. And these young ladies sang at the Black History Month.

It was amazing to hear them that afternoon, and we thank you for that performance. It was so elating to everyone that day. They we were just in awe and a standing ovation by the community that day. If one of you would like to say anything, you're more than welcome.

Of course, they chose me, and I'm not a speaker. But I can truthfully tell you that when we first came to Madeira, we were going back home to Oakland. We knew no one. We have no family. But the city of Madeira, I taught at Monroe in Washington School, and the three of us ended at the at the same school, made us family.

And that's the reason that we stayed because of the feelings of needing us, wanting us, respecting us and above all things loving us. Our Hispanic families that we worked with, we studied like ten years in order to get, the credential to work in that area. They were family. Madera community is our family. Where we don't have a lot of blood relatives left or we had very few to begin with, The community has made this wonderful for us.

So our songs that we sang the other night, could have sang more songs. We love singing. We love making people feel good. And as my mother has said many, many years ago, if you have music, you will always be happy. Thank you very much for this great honor and we are truly humbled by this this evening. Thank you.

And for the second second proclamation this evening, we have a proclamation recognizing California earned income tax credit awareness week.

That will be presenting by council member Montez.

To ask, my former CDBG commissioner

that, ditched us to go to I'm just kidding. No. She's she's been a huge community advocate and continues to do so, I think, on a

much bigger platform now for United Way of Fresno, Madera County.

So get into it. So I'm just gonna read for, Cal EITC Awareness Week. Whereas, the California Earned Income Tax Credit, Cal EITC, a refundable tax credit was enacted in 2015 and along with the federal earned income tax credit, EITC, there's a lot of acronyms, I'm sorry, is one of the most effective tools we have to fight poverty for Californians, whereas California has made even further expansions to impactful state tax credits by also establishing the Young Child Tax Credit, YCTC, in 2019 and the Foster Youth Tax Credit, FYTC, in 2022, which further help to provide meaningful support for families and individuals across the state, and whereas in California, immigrants pay roughly $8,500,000,000 annually in state and local taxes. These taxes fund critical public services and infrastructure Californians depend on. I TIN holders are ineligible for the majority of federal tax benefits, but California has made the groundbreaking decision to expand benefits like the Cal EITC, YCTC, and FYTC to I TIN holders who meet eligibility requirements.

Hopefully, everybody followed all of the acronyms. And whereas among those eligible for Cal EITC, 53% are Latino head of households, 54% are female head of households. The state EITC outreach and education ensures the most economically vulnerable Californians are reached. And now, therefore, let it be resolved that mayor Sisiga Aguas, and on behalf of the entire city council, hereby proclaim January 02/06/2026 as Cal EITC Awareness Week. And, you know, I have way of, Fresno County, Madera County do a lot

of work in promoting that and helping people navigate this process. So Right. For

everything you do. Thank

you, council members. There's just a few important things I wanna make sure that come across. I know there were a lot of acronyms, the most important thing to know is that the California earned income tax credit is available to many working families. And, governor Newsom declared January 30 through February 6 Cal EITC week. Why I'm particularly here is that United Way, Fresno, Madera Counties is offering free tax preparation services to families who make $69,000 a year or less.

We've partnered with Madera Unified School District, and it is being offered every Thursday at the Family Resource Center, the new one that opened up in that Walmart area parking lot. We're also, offering it on select Saturdays. So to make an appointment, it is appointment only, so we are not taking walk ins this year. You can call 211, or people can visit myfreetaxes.org. Again, that's myfreetaxes.org.

You'll enter in your ZIP code, and then available tax sites will become available to you. So in the city of Adaire, again, it's being offered here, in partnership with Adaire Unified School District, Encompass Madera. We also have a tax site in Chowchilla, Oakhurst, and numerous tax sites across Fresno County. They are free, and they're, actually done by IRS certified volunteers. We have over 160 volunteers, including many professionals from the city county, the university. So we have lots of people who volunteer. They become certified by the IRS, and they're able to do those tax preparation services for you. So I encourage you to share that information with others, and to encourage residents to make those appointments and come out.

Congratulations to those who received proclamations today at the city council meeting. Moving on to the next item, city clerk Gonzales.

Public comment. The first fifteen minutes of the meeting are reserved for members of the public to address the council on items which are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council. Speaker shall be limited to three minutes. Speakers will be asked but are not required to identify themselves and state the subject of their comments. If the subject is an item on the agenda, the mayor has the option of asking the speaker to hold the comment until that item is called. Comments on items listed as public hearing on the agenda should be held until the hearing is opened. The council is prohibited by law from taking any action on matters discussed that are not on the agenda, and no adverse conclusions should be drawn if the council does not respond to public comment at this time.

Thank you for that. I open it up for public comment. Is there anybody in the chamber that would like to come up to the podium, please?

Good evening, Madam Mayor, City Council. My name is Harlan Herpetoe. I'm the founder of the Big Valley Horseshoe League. Tonight, I would like to publicly express our sincere appreciation to the Madera Parks and Community Services. Over the past twenty six years, our league has worked in cooperation with the park department, and we have never had a better partnership.

Our league nights and weekend tournaments, the depart the park department ensures that the tables at the rotary park are disinfected, trash cans are emptied, and the restrooms are clean. I would personally like to thank the park director, Mr. Joe Hebert and the park manager, Mr. Hector Sanchez, for all the past years of cooperation and to our league. From ladies who work in the office and prepare our league and tournament schedules to the many park employees who maintain our beautiful parks, we sincerely appreciate their efforts.

In my lifetime, I have lived through a lot of cities in the state of California and I truly believe that we have some of the nicest parks in the state and that's thanks to our good park department. Thank you very much.

Thank you for your comment.

Hello, everybody, council and members of the community. My name is Michael Hoffridge. I was a veteran of the eighty second Airborne Division, first Gulf War, and, thirty four years at UPS. Retired, and now I work on airplanes at the airport. And you may have seen us fly over for the parades and stuff.

We do try to do stuff for the community. I have a proposal because I work on the airplanes and stuff, and I restore World War two airplanes there at Modere. And the old crop duster area is a vacant building. I would like to possibly put a museum in there. And I'd like to call it the Central Valley Vantage Aircraft Museum, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving, restoring, and displaying historic aircraft to inspire and honor veterans and, aviation pioneers from Central Valley, particularly, like, in the ag industry because I have, an ag airplane that was a World War two plane that served in the valley and still as a crop duster, and I'm gonna make that as a, museum piece.

It's in restoration right now. But, that's my idea, and I would like to pro propose it to, the council to maybe get behind it and, you know, help us build something in a community that could, inspire younger kids is you never know when the next, major general Garrison is gonna come out of, the works here. And, you know, just you just never know. I mean, we got lots of parks that come up, and, people get behind those. We're wanting to build a museum where we can inspire youth. Anyway, thank you. Sorry. I'm not a public speaker. Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Okay. My name is Alexis Morales. I live in the city. Our home used to be county since since what since I was five years old, and it became city about '20 in 2015. And right now, currently, they're doing KB homes next to us. So I was wondering if they would be able to bring the waterline closer to us, or are they, like or if you guys that are, like, I don't know, giving them, like, what? Like, them.

So so pretty much, we want the city of water and then the sewer extended, but it costs so much. And we wanna we have a land there, and we wanna build our own house, but the city's not letting us because they're requiring those requirements. And, you know, it's so expensive Yeah. After, you know, doing that, and then we still gotta pay, you know, every monthly and then plus to build the house. It's so much money. So we're just here if you guys can help us out in, you the city, help us out on that because we're really trying to build our homes there, and it's just it's really difficult right now with that.

Yeah.

So that Pretty much it. Yeah.

Yeah. We just get the

house on because I don't know where

to Could you state the address?

What's that? The address. The address is 510 East Adele Street.

Cross Street would be Austin. Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Thank you.

I see no one else in the chamber. City Clerk, do we have anybody online or on Zoom? Okay. With that, I close public comments. Moving on to the next item.

We have no items under public hearings. Under section b consent calendar, matters listed under the consent calendar are considered routine and will be enacted by one motion and one vote. There will be no separate discussion of these items. If discussion is desired, a member of the public or a member of the council may request an item to be removed from the consent calendar, and it will be considered separately.

Thank you. I bring it back to my colleagues for any concerns or comments. I see that, and I open it up for public comment. Anybody in the chamber? City clerk, anybody online or on Zoom?

We have none, ma'am.

Thank you. I will close public comment at this time and bring it back to my colleagues. I do have one comment. I will, appreciate my colleagues approving the consent calendar, five b. We have someone that we're going to honor, hopefully in the next meeting who is very important to this community and has been an advocate for the Doors of Hope. So if it does get approved today, I look forward to seeing them at the next meeting. With that, I'd like to entertain a motion and a second.

Motion to approve is written. Second.

Thank Thank you. With that roll call,

please. Council member Rodriguez?

Yes.

Council member Montes?

Yes.

Council member Evans? Yes. Council member Mejia? Yes. Council member Villegas?

Yes.

Mayor Gallegos? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria?

Yes.

Motion passes.

Thank you for that. Moving on to workshops.

Item c one, discussion and direction regarding city private, domestic water well permitting regulations and policies.

Alright. That'll be presented by our community development director, Tackett. Thank you for being here tonight. There we go. Alright.

Thank you. City clerk.

Good evening, mayor Gallegos, mayor Pro Tem Zakaria, council members Will Tackett, community development director. This item before you this evening is the workshop, to facilitate discussion and receive direction regarding the city's private domestic water well permitting regulations and policies. To discuss the regulatory setting, the County of Madera is the local enforcement agency which administers its ordinance for the construction, maintenance, abandonment, or destruction of water wells. That county ordinance prohibits issuance of well permits within 500 feet of the public water system except in limited circumstances. Those circumstances include as required by the affected public water system, which would be the city, And this provision essentially serves as a mechanism for the county to refer those well permits to the city as well as an authority for the city to approve or conditionally approve issuance.

Other exceptions include when a water well serving a parcel is not currently connected to the water system and needs to be replaced or deepened. So replacement, deepening are things for which well permits can be issued within 500 feet of the public water system. When the public water system does not agree to provide service for domestic or fire flow purposes to the parcel within ten days of submittal of a written application for service, the county can also issue water wells within that 500 feet of the public system. So what regulations does the city of Madera have? There are no statutory provisions or standards pertaining specifically to private water wells within our municipal code.

We do have provisions for metered services that requires metering when connections are required, and we do have provisions for cross connection controls to avoid contamination stances. To give you a little bit of context on how implementation is currently occurring, the general plan does identify a planning area that does extend beyond the sphere of influence or the urban growth boundary, which I'll, depict in just a moment. That planning area does extend outside represents the area which the city envisions may ultimately be included in either a sphere of influence or an incorporated city limits. It's important to note that outside the city limits, general plan is only an advisory, although it does provide a statement of use as the city desires in these areas as well as policies pertaining to a host of various issues and the future growth of the city. So what policies do we have?

Any lands in the planning area outside of the city, which are proposed to be converted from agricultural use should be annexed before development. City encourages county to assist in the implementation of this policy by taking the following actions, discouraging subdivision and incorporated lands within the planning area to parcel sizes less than 20 acres. This is to avoid parcelization and an inability to integrate in the future to ultimately realize the vision we have in our general plan. Also directing all new urban development within the growth boundary, that's development that would typically be expected to connect to the community sewer and water systems to annex into the city and by supporting the annexation applications to LAFCO. So we just discussed in brief the growth boundary.

All future growth is to occur inside the boundary. This is per the general plan, and it's intended to define the physical limits of development for the city that includes infrastructure expansion. So infrastructure is only intended to serve the area inside the growth boundary and our policy state that we should keep those services to minimum capacity so that excess would not be used to support growth outside the boundary. This exhibit is from our tax sharing agreement. The blue boundary the dark blue boundary is what is defined as the growth boundary within our tax sharing agreement.

And I will discuss that on this next slide, just for comparison purposes. So urban development projects, those that are discretionary and require approval of the county planning commissioner of the board of supervisors and which are outside the city limits, but within our growth boundary are required to be referred to the city for consideration of annexation. The city may adopt a resolution of intent to annex. If it does not adopt a resolution of intent to annex, it has two options. We either determine the project is consistent with the general plan, in which case we can release processing to the county, and that process can continue in accordance to the extent allowable by law with city standards, or we can determine a project is not consistent with the city's general plan, in which case the project shall not proceed in either the city or county.

This limits severally the types of projects that we see, and it certainly doesn't cover, all domestic well proposals or purposes. But I do bring it up as a comparative analysis of how one coordination program is implemented versus the absence of what we have on the water wells. We could consider water wells in the same light based upon, in some respects, consistency with our general plan and policies. We also have policies that are specific to infrastructure and water expansion. Facilities should be phased.

We shouldn't be leapfrogging. Right? Water supply and delivery systems shall be available in time to meet the demand created by new developments. This factors into how we sequentially develop and how we should be fiscal responsible, in our development, and they should be assured through the use of bonds or other sureties to the city's satisfaction. City shall also seek to protect the quality and quantity of groundwater resources, including those which serve households and businesses which rely on private wells.

And that, again, will be a factor as we talk about, potential issues or concerns with domestic water well proliferation. As for the state of California, the state has indicated in code every human being has the right to safe, clean, affordable, and adequate water for human consumption, cooking, and sanitation. Does provide an exception, accepting water supplies for new developments, and implementation shall not infringe on the rights or responsibilities of the public water system. Again, this is tying into our authority, which is currently afforded through the county code. Groundwater resources shall be managed sustainably for long term reliability and multiple economic, social, and environmental benefits.

Sustainable groundwater management is best achieved locally through the development, implementation and updating of plans and programs based upon the best available science. So the city is recognizing local agencies, as being the best management entity for these things. And there is no California statute at this time, which dictates that local governments must issue or cannot deny well permits. There have been initiatives which have not been passed to date. There have been orders which were issued during drought periods, but those are no longer effective at this time.

So what issues and concerns do we have? One is based upon urgency, and this is typically related to existing wells that are in danger of failure. I don't see that so much as a concern for the city where we have existing wells serving, habitable residences or existing uses. It would not be staff's proposal that we limit the ability to replace those wells or allow them to continue on a private water well supply. Surety, and I don't mean security by this, but advisement and disclosure disclosure to prospective buyers.

What we want to do to the extent possible in staff's perspective is provide prospective buyers the ability to make informed investment decisions. And unfortunately, we don't have the guidance, neither documentation or regulations at this time that might assist them in avoiding circumstances where they purchase property, but may not have an ability to install a well and or may not have city services proximate and feasible to serve future development on that property. Consistency with the general plan, we do see proposals that propose to develop single family residences on large parcels, and that may have an ability to impede the city's ability to get the density that is in our general plan land use designations or ultimately to comply with the vision and or policies objectives of the general plan. And that can be either within the existing city limits. It can be within that larger planning area or sphere of influence or a growth boundary.

Annexation feasibility. Not in all instances can a property be annexed without bringing additional property with it. And we want to be cognizant of how we annex and how we grow. We want to create logical boundaries and service areas, and sometimes that means there may be intermittent parcels that we would typically request to be brought in for that contiguity that may or may not involve willing property owners, and that would ultimately be dictated through the LAVCO process. Demand on local aquifers and maintaining a sustainable supply.

The more we pump out of

the ground, we're a sole source, The more that puts our local aquifer in danger and may impede our ability to provide a long term sustainable supply. There are concerns over water quality and camp contamination, proximity to other wells, which may have leakage, which may not be maintained, proximity to private septic systems, any number of factors, agricultural pesticides have the ability to cross contaminate wells. Again, that also contributes to the potential for contamination of the aquifer. And then there are fiscal concerns. The longevity of the wells.

Public water system is maintained by the city. We collect fees. We have the means to maintain those systems, whereas private wells are the burden and responsibility of the property owner. We know. We've discussed a mitigation program for these wells, and we know that often the cost of maintaining or reconditioning those wells may exceed the means of the household, or the owner of property.

And what that means is a, additional need for further governmental assistance. It means that we might have private systems which aren't participating in our program for our public system, and ultimately, that can lead to fiscal burdens on the city. So what are we here to consider tonight? Staff would posit having clearly defined and codified standards or adopted, policies pertaining to private domestic water wells can contribute to the city's ability to ensure the near and long term availability of adequate, reliable, and water quality resources as well as an ability to deliver such resources to consumers in a responsible manner. This is consistent with the policies and objectives we do have in our general plan.

How do we see other cities doing this? Some of the common components that we can, see or observe from other Central Valley cities, some have outright prohibitions, that strict prohibition against new private water wells. Or you may often see, a prohibition with limited exceptions based upon economic feasibility, perhaps based upon the volume production of a well, based upon legal agreements, which ensure, participation and connectivity in the future or annexation, etcetera. Exceptions may be based upon additional scrutiny requiring special reporting, for the specific circumstances and conditions relative to a respective property. We see standards for minimum separations between public systems and or other private wells.

We also see setback standards which would dictate proximity to property lines. Again, this is all a proximity issue and trying to ensure that those private wells are, reduced from contamination potential. Timing. We see provisions relative to timing. Following annexation, how long do private property owners have to connect to city public systems?

And that may also be based not just upon a chronological timeline, but the proximity to the public system may also be based upon, again, failure of the wells or a need to be, re conditioned. And we also see that some local ordinances require findings, again, for consistency with plan policies, health standards, environmental protection objectives, and the like. This concludes staff's presentation. This is a workshop item. Staff's request for direction, is essentially we would suggest that it might be prudent for the city to have formally adopted policies for areas that are outside our purview in which we cannot control by local ordinance, as a matter again of advisement.

These are things that we can get on our website. We can control the Department of Real Estate, but we can provide them with notice. It's documentation that we can afford to the county so that everybody has an understanding of where we stand as a city. And again, that might contribute to an ability for prospective buyers or property owners to make those informed investment decisions. For land that is within our boundaries, staff would posit that it would be prudent to have, provisions within our local ordinance that control when, where, and how, we regulate domestic private water wells in their permitting process. With that, again, staff is seeking direction. There are alternatives in your staff report that the council consider. Otherwise, I'm available to field any questions that the council may have. Thank you.

Thank you for that report. I bring it back to my colleagues for any questions or concerns. I don't see any. I just have one comment, director Tackett, is I thank you for your due diligence for this because it's heavy. And, the policy c one dash 44 leapfrogging is is very important to me because I see that in the county. And so with our staff looking at that, I'm very happy to see that all that the the things that we're gonna put in place are well needed to make our city grow and be sustainable and grow healthy. So thank you for that. Opening up for public comment. Anybody in the chamber have any comments?

I do have a question.

I see none. City Clerk Gonzales, anybody online or on Zoom?

We have none, mayor.

Thank you. I close public comment at this time and bring it back to my colleagues, council member Rodriguez.

Thank you, mayor. And I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to answer. No worries. But, well, so this domestic well mitigation that we just went through with Keith and what have you, I mean, we're essentially saying pretty much the same thing. Right?

I mean, if if we have someone within our sphere of influence or someone within city limits Or in in the case where I think there was a gentleman that had come out here last time and had a similar issue. We can't as a city, I think we're saying we have a statute to locally deny that permit. Correct? And could they then use the mitigation to make that connection? Are are we

going to see a lot more of that coming through? Again, it depends upon proximity to the public system. What we have right now is reliant upon the county's ordinance and our implementation methodology of referrals to the city. They are within 500 feet. We do have some authority and controls.

If they are outside of that 500 feet, we do not necessarily, and there are other exceptions the county can consider to allow those domestic wells to be permitted. With respect to the mitigation program, we're talking about instances where we have existing private wells that are in danger of failure, again, reconditioning, need to be redrilled to serve an existing use. Again, staff's position is or what we would suggest we exercise caution is how we allow additional well permits to come online because, again, with respect to fiscal responsibility, additional wells mean future potential to request mitigation or additional governmental monetary assistance.

Yeah. Yeah. So in this case, when it's outside the 500 feet, I mean, the protocol is that the county gets the request. They refer that to us. Are you saying there's gray areas where that doesn't happen?

The county ordinance does not require them to refer well permits which are outside the 500 feet to the city. The city the county does do it as a courtesy. And so in that respect, again, from staff's perspective, it would be ideal to have some type of a formal policy in how we would support or not support those areas outside of the 500 feet for which we do not have any authority by ordinance, but for which we certainly have an interest based upon our planning area and our growth boundary.

Yeah. But, I mean, outside of that, we're we're talking some really huge costs to try to connect that directly to city water or something to that. Right? I mean, it it it's gotta make sense, I think, to some extent.

Yeah. And then staff would not be proposing that necessarily. We would require connectivity for those types of distances. But, again, having some sort of documentation that better informs the public of where the city stands, the county of what we would support, I mean, ultimately, if we had that, there may not be a need to refer those items to the city because the county already knows where we stand.

Got it. Thank you. We appreciate you explaining it. It's all I know.

Thank you. And so council member Montez.

We're gonna be duplicative of what council member Rodriguez or mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez said. So because you're essentially just asking us to codify what kind of we already do?

What we do now, we do based upon objective, essentially, ad hoc policy and based upon the authority that we're afforded through the county code. But we don't have codified regulations ourself how we deal with either properties that are within the city limits or, well, I guess the code would be limited to what was in the city limits.

I guess my question would be would there be any kind of deviations from what current practice is? Or we're essentially trying to codify current practice and include things within our sphere of influence so that we have a little more teeth, for lack of a better term, to enforce.

There could be. And that's why we're where we're seeking direction from the council. Staff has attempted to be equitable in its consideration of these wells. Keith and I have worked again on somewhat of an ad hoc policy so we can be objective and equitable. And those policies are based upon much of what you heard in this presentation or you saw in other local ordinances based upon what we see, typically for proximity to public services, What we most commonly see for proximity is at 200 feet of city services.

Is it more than that? Again, is it serving an existing use? Is it for new development? We do look at whether or not the proposed new development would be consistent with our general plan, and we've responded accordingly to the county. Not with a recommendation to approve or deny, but based upon whether or not the city supports that new development and or the, drilling of new wells.

Okay. And so you're not asking council today to set, like, hey, 200 versus 500. That's something that staff would

No. That's that's something that staff would propose to bring back based upon the direction we receive, whether that direction be, yes, bring back an ordinance for consideration, whether that be come back with additional workshops with more information, whether or not you would request that staff attempt to prepare a resolution that covers some of these geographic areas that would not fall under the purview of the municipal code, etcetera.

Okay.

City attorney?

Let let me know if I'm overstepping here because usually I just give legal advice. So I think what staff and what I'm also looking for when we come back is, do we have enough nods for to want to formally do something about this, or do we wanna keep on operating off of our current system? And if I see people are like, hey. We wanna update, which I'm counting one, two, three, four, 5, we wanna update. Okay. So we got at least five council members update. That's helpful. The other thing is is we one thing is do we wanna put some sort of, requirements within your within a certain distance infrastructure that you need to connect in if you wanna extend. And I don't know what that number is yet. Will and I would have to take a look at it and figure out what it is and come back with a recommendation.

But I'm I'm seeing some nods that that is something that the council would be open to. Hope somebody's taking notes because I'm not at this point. Well, the other thing is is do we want a safety valve? For example, there may be some ag land if you're bringing in a huge number of of properties. You may have somebody who's been farming there for a hundred years. They get scooped up as part of the lab co process and brought into the city, and now, technically, they're in the city, they have an ag well. Do you want to allow them to continue to operate as long as they don't change the use? They keep on doing what they've typically done, and as long as they're not, you know, selling now their water outside the site or trying to expand it or something else. I'm seeing some general nods there. Okay. Well, I have a question

for that.

Okay. We

Sorry. Maybe I've kinda bridged too far.

Okay. So let's start with council member Zakaria first. Mayor Pro Temps.

Excuse me.

And and just, I guess, to get some clarity on some of these things. So, like, when we're talking distances well versus, hooking up to the city, is there is there a huge difference in cost between the two, and at what distance maybe does that become greater? So the 200 versus the 500, for instance, if somebody is attempting to hook up, is it dramatically different in cost when we're looking at the 500? 300.

That's not a number I have. I'll look over to our city engineer who may have something of that is a linear cost of extending a line at a certain size, but I don't have that specifically at this time. It is information we can bring back for further consideration.

And then the the other question too as he's walking up is I mean, we're talking about water, but what what happens with when it comes to the septics and these things? Is is that a dual thing that that'll be required, or we're just gonna focus on the water at this point?

With respect to timing, yes. It's something that can be considered can be considered likewise based upon either timing following annexation, proximity to city services. Legal counsel was just mentioning, do we include provisions that would allow existing wells remain online for certain purposes? Would we want to include provisions, respective to the timing of when existing private systems are abandoned? But but in general, when we're doing this infrastructure, water and sewage, it's gonna be at the same distance,

or is there is water there first? Or you know what mean? When they're saying 500 feet, is is it anticipated that both services are available?

The provisions that we've discussed relative to the county ordinance is specific to water, not sewer. So that is a separate discussion in that respect. However, when we're talking about proximity to available city services, I would say most commonly, if we have water, we have sewer. Usually, we're expanding those infrastructure we're providing for those infrastructure expansions concurrently.

And if I may, council member, what I've also seen happen in different jurisdictions, I'm sure your city manager is seeing this as well, is sometimes your water will sometimes outstrip your sewer, and they'll connect in with the water, and then their sewer septic will fail. And then they'll wanna connect into the sewer system. So we can come up with proposals for you and come back, to catch that component as well. Generally, they develop together. Sometimes they develop separately. But as a practical matter, when you do one, ultimately, within the next five, ten, twenty years, you're gonna have the second one automatically come in. And the reason, as you know, it's important to get rid of sewer septic is because of nitrate poisoning and infiltration into our water system, so we wanna be careful about that.

Thank you.

Thank you. City attorney. Council member Montez.

Just, the question I was prompted with so we're we're talking about not having kind of like a grandfathered clause. Right? Usually, if you don't do something to kinda trigger it, right, you're not changing the occupancy, not changing the use, then you can kind of continue business as usual until such a time that something fails, then, okay, well, you can't redo your will. You'd have to connect. So that's what we're still talking about Because kind of like the scenario that you you mentioned where somebody, you know, has been farming ag land for as long as they're not changing anything, we're not going to make them change anything unless they're They develop it. They develop it or if their well or well fails.

Well, as far as the well failure, maybe maybe again, it's a policy call. Typically, a lot of jurisdictions will say if your well fails and you are still continuing the use that you had previously, you're still grandfathered in. So you can maintain your well. You can but they will put caps on the amount of flow that comes out. You can't expand your well by 40%, for example, and then expand your ag operations because you're going beyond what you originally had when you came in.

Okay.

If I may, I think the staff recognizes again that there would need to be exceptions for existing uses. Intensification might be a cause to say, no. To your point, we need to keep production at the same levels for the same use without intensifying. We made reference to some of the state regulations which are codified. Everybody has the right to it where it's existing except for new development. So are we talking about intensifying, expanding development? Are we adding new development? And then the other thing that I might add for with respect to the timing provision, I have also seen instances where the failure of a well is also contingent upon proximity. Right? Your well goes down.

You request a well permit to redrill, recondition, or put in a new well. Yeah. But do you have city service as proximate? And then that gets into the economic feasibility and the exceptions that we might wanna consider in those respects.

Thank you for that answer. Council member Rodriguez.

Yes. Thank you, mayor. And, again, my my question is more so aligned to what councilmember Montes had asked there is regarding urban farming. If you bring some in bring someone in within our annexation process that is continuously farming, obviously, that creates a problem sometimes within our competing wells. So, again, you're you're saying that if if that existing, land use or permit, defies what we have in our city limits, does that then would you grandfather that, that that particular case, or would you have them then, possibly revoke that?

As a matter of codified regulations and general policy, we would honor use uses legally authorized through the county prior to annexation. And we would have allowances that would allow those uses to continue in perpetuity unless abandoned, consistent with the definition of abandonment mark code. You discontinue the use for specified period of time, that ends the grandfathering, if you will, the legal nonconformity subsequent uses would need to come into conformance.

Okay. Thank you.

Appreciate that. Councilwoman Evans. Yes. In reference to the, water wells, if you were not in the district and then all of a sudden, you're the redistricting and your land became part of the district, but you did have a well and the line was not close enough to your home, it would be the landowner's responsibility to be able to pipe into the the water well that we already have, the water line that we have. So their well has gone dry.

Now they're questioning, will the city be the one to be able to take care of the water on their property, or will they have to dig and create the line themselves from their property and bring water into their home and to the city's water. Whose responsibility? It would be their responsibility. Correct?

That's correct. It would be the private owner's responsibility just as it would for them to pay the cost of maintaining, redrilling, reconditioning that well. They would need to connect to the water main. We would set the meter at essentially the right of way, and then the on-site, they would be required to pull permits for the on-site plumbing to bring it back from the meter and connect to the existing structure.

Okay. Very good. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Okay. So director Tackett, do you have the direction of the council? Is it clear, or do we need to backtrack it?

I think we're fairly clear. I do wanna give our city engineer an opportunity to respond to one of the previous comments. I'll be I'm putting him on the spot in doing so.

And that's fine. The the question was, 200 feet. What it's a matter of equality between cost in terms of what's it cost to extend a waterline versus what does it cost to drill a a water well. So a water well is $35.50, $60,000. We've heard $60,000 self help in that.

When it comes to extending a waterline, if we're talking about 200 feet or so, it's 200 feet plus the width of the property. We can redefine that in any way we need to, but the goal here has been to go ahead and say it's equal to a water well. The property owner if there's a if there's a choice by the city and it's equal, the city feels like they should extend the waterline. That's where the 200 feet came from.

Right. Thank you for that information. We appreciate it.

And may or if I may, for the point of clarification, and this is going back to, where Shannon was kind of pulling. Is there an interesting exploring both ends of this, The codified regulations for what we can control within our purview in the city as well as looking at formal policies for what we may not be able to codify within our purview.

So K. Thank you, counselor. Thank you for your report. I appreciate it. Moving on. City Clerk Gonzales.

Item e one, micro transit feasibility study update.

Thank you. And that will be presented by our grants manager, Zuniga. Welcome tonight.

Okay. Good evening, mayor, council members, members of the public. This item, tonight is an update on the micro transit feasibility study that the city has been working on for the last few months with FlexLinks. With us this evening is Steve Wilkes from, FlexLinks. He will, take us through the, the presentation tonight and provide an update, where we are at as of now and what is coming up next. So with that, I'm going to pass it over to Steve.

Thank you.

Thank you, Marcella. Madam mayor, members of council, I'm Steve Wilkes with FlexLinks. And as Marcella mentioned, been working with the city since, I guess, last year we fall on this microtransit feasibility study. So what do we mean by that in terms of, you know, we're exploring new transit service types like on demand microtransit. And microtransit can be thought of almost like a shared ride Uber or Lyft type service.

It's sort of the marrying of transit mobility with technology. Typically, there's, you know, an app based, device in terms of your phone or tablet where you can request a ride, get real time customer information in terms of on time performance and arrival times, things of that nature. So, you know, sort of overarching, we're looking at what new delivery schemes might be appropriate. The other key objectives of the study have been to ensure that any type of system design or service improvement strategies meets community needs. And finally, to evaluate the cost effectiveness of the service so that as we look at alternate delivery schemes, as we look at service delivery strategies or service improvement strategies rather, we we gotta keep in mind that this gotta be fiscally responsible at the end of the day.

So in terms of providing that project overview, a bit to the right of center of the screen is this green arrow in terms of we are here. But how did we get here? And there's been a number of key tasks or activities starting off with what were what we called existing conditions. And that was just to get a good understanding for what's currently happening in in the transit, environment and, the community. And the community in terms of looking at demographics, socioeconomic characteristics, getting that understanding of the composition of of the population, and then doing a deeper dive into existing transit operations.

What Madera Metro is doing, dial a ride, ADA paratransit, looking at key performance indicators, the financial side, looking at historical trends in terms of what has it been doing over the last several years. That was then combined with what we refer to as phase one outreach. And, again, back in the fall, a survey, online survey. In fact, there were three versions of it, one targeting the community at large, a second one, high school students, and a third being the community college. Just to gain to get the pulse of the community.

The survey research piece was also combined with other outreach activities, being present at the the flea market and senior centers and social service administrations and and things of that nature, again, to get a better understanding for the community at large and some of these specific market segments. Then there was the analytical piece. You know, building on what we heard in terms of logistic additions, the phase one outreach, we then did what we refer to as modeling in terms of developing a number of different concepts and looking at, you know, net impact on the community, the financial resources that might be required, just to, again, further flush out a number of concepts. And that's where we're at now. You know, we're we're looking at opportunities around the deployment of micro transit services community wide, maybe, specific to certain areas within the community.

And that's what we're now taking back to the community. Another survey that has been designed that's, you know, currently on the streets. It's it's online and and could be reached through a link from the city's homepage. Other outreach activities in terms of revisiting the the community at senior centers and the flea markets. Actually, I'll be at the community, community college tomorrow doing an info session.

In essence, to help, to have the community help us translate these concepts into a recommended approach. And that's, you know, the final activity in terms of the final recommendations, and we'll certainly be back to council, to share those. The existing transit network, you likely know it all better than I in terms of existing four routes. There's a dial ride and ADA paratransit service. Certainly, the dialer well, all services excuse me.

The fixed route run Monday to Friday, limited Saturday service on two of the routes. The dial a ride and ADA provides again seven days a week, with again limited weekend services. Of note, of the four metro, fixed routes, route one operates on thirty minute service, thirty minute headways. The other three operate on one hour. And it's important to note because you're now looking at coverage versus frequency, and the frequency is relatively low.

But when you look at the route network, it's good coverage in the community in terms of providing that connectivity between major attractors and generators in terms of, you know, taking people typically where you'd think they would want to go, and that's back to, you know, the the Walgreens and senior centers and social service administration and and what have you. So in essence, it does a very good job in meeting the mobility or transit needs of what we refer to as the transit dependent population. Those that don't have a whole lot of other mobility options or mode choice options, they may not have a private auto or personal vehicle at home. So to that end, you know, it's providing that kind of, in essence, essential service. What doesn't bode as well are the numbers.

And for illustrative purposes, you know, we're presenting the q two numbers here of fiscal twenty five twenty six in terms of just to provide that snapshot of trip key performance indicators in terms of trip volumes, how many passengers, cost per trip, cost per hour, things of that nature. And, yes, Madera Metro and the services provided, the fixed route, dial a ride, ADA paratransit are expensive in terms of gross costs as well as cost per trip and cost per hour. And it's, you know, precisely for those reasons that we're looking at, you know, what opportunities are there to do things differently? You know, if you know how big the pie is, might we be able to slice it up differently in a more cost effective and better meet, the needs of the community? So similarly, in terms of what the numbers are telling us, of note at the beginning of q two, the city implemented these spare spare lab app for the dial a ride services, which again was is is an app based, capability for trip booking and getting real time customer information.

Interestingly, when you know, at the time of of implementation at the beginning of q two, we saw some 26 to 28% increase in dialyride use, which is an indicator that, you know, the the deployment of the spare lab app enhanced the passenger experience. And that's a great thing. The fixed route service in terms of the four routes saw a rather sharp decline. Well, how do we you know, some pushing 10% decline at the the beginning of q two. So you're getting sort of that trade off.

It's it suggests that people are looking at that kind of mode switch in terms of from fixed to to the dial right. In terms of what we heard when I mentioned a moment ago about the phase one survey research piece as well as the outreach, you know, this illustrates mode choice or modes used rather by trip purpose. And not surprising personal vehicle is is the overwhelming mode used, followed by the dial a ride service. But one other key takeaway from this, excuse me, from this graph is back to my point about, you know, it's meeting the discretionary trip purposes of the community, the social recreational, shopping type trips, but few are using it for work and education. And that could be quite telling in terms of what kind of service improvement strategies might we be able to look at to capture some of those choice riders.

Other elements of of what we heard type type scenarios was, you know, barriers for using, Madeira Metro included. It doesn't go close enough in terms of I gotta walk too far from home to a bus stop. It's that whole first last mile constraint in terms of how do I get to the bus. The other surprising, quite frankly, result here was people don't know how didn't know how to use it or didn't know it existed. So, again, that speaks to opportunities around, you know, building on communication, branding, and marketing strategies for going forward.

The better information or desire for better information was also the number one noted, transit or mobility improvement, as was more stops, more frequent service, things of that nature. So as we embark on the phase two, outreach and engagement and and further refinement of conceptual alternatives, there's a number of things that we're taking concepts or ideas that we're taking out to the community that, you know, what do we still want to know? And it includes and these are some of the key questions that'll be presented at this info session tomorrow at the community college. You know, will pivoting to an entire on demand microtransit system work for you? What type what would make this type of service more or less attractive?

And, again, the scenarios cover the, you know, continuum from and we've seen it in many communities throughout the nation just shutting down transit and converting it to microtransit. Further refinements to the public transit system, maybe some reducing of route of routes, getting rid of the poor performing routes, maybe getting rid of poor, route segments, and replacing them with microtransit. These are the kind of things we want to explore, with the community. You know, would they consider on demand service for maybe, you know, specific times of day provided evening, morning service, weekend service, things of that nature. And if they would rather maintain the bus routes, tell us why.

You know? If so, why? So our key next steps are considering the community input, having the community help us translate these concepts, ideas into a recommended strategy for for for service improvements. And we will revise the conceptual alternatives as needed and, again, make that final determination of what the ultimate recommendations are going to look like. And at that, I just wanna leave this QR code up and and invite you all and and everybody to, through the QR, you can access the survey instrument, the online survey. Thank you.

Thank you for that report. We do have some questions. I'll start with mayor pro Tim Zachariah.

So I know when when we discussed when, in our first meetings, you'd asked about what some of the goals we might have as as council. I took a trip last month, to a larger city where we didn't have our own cars. We had to rely heavily on, like, Uber to get around. And what's disturbing is when I can take an Uber across the city twice the size of Madeira for $10, and you're saying it cost 20 to $40 to ride a bus, I think it should be evident to the community to say, especially when you say cost effectiveness, that our bus system doesn't make any sense. The other part is I would agree heavily when you say, if I had to wait an hour for the bus to come around, but an Uber type system can get me in five to seven minutes, I would say that that service is gonna better serve the community itself.

You add on top of that when you say the routes don't run seven days a week, twenty four hours a day, that there are certain days I can't even ride the bus. I think it gets to the to agreeing with you where I don't know if it runs today. I don't know if it's actually gonna show up, so therefore forget it. I'm just gonna find another way. And I hope through this study that you have and through the community that we can get closer to some kind of system that would say, maybe at this point, buses don't make sense for Madera. Maybe it's a walk back. And eventually, we grow, maybe we can revisit a bus system. But at this point, I I don't see the numbers making any sense to continue on. So, I hope that's what maybe the community will come back with. I appreciate your study because it is very informative. Thank you.

Aye for that comment. Councilwoman Evans.

Yes. Thank you so very much for your, presentation. In reference to, the bus system, I live in District 4, and probably, I would say, 85% of the people in my district do not have transportation. So for me and my district and speaking for the people that I represent, the Buster system is very important. Because when I go out early in the morning, see if I'm leaving home at 06:30, 07:00, on Cleveland there are a number of people there with children, elderly people that get to and from a lot of domestics that do ride the bus, that do ride to the hospitals, things of that nature for.

So, for me in my district, and even in some of the other districts that are on. Side of town that I live on, I see that the, the bus is very important to them. I see that, the young people that ride the bus from my district out to the college area. So I can't say that the bus is not important because I see from where I sit that it is important and I would hate to see that the bus not be. Utilized or not even being available be available to those and as far as the Ubers are concerned.

Yes, they're important to our city, but. Not everyone has Uber money where you can pay. What? How much is the bus now? $2 free further. Versus a 10 or a 20. So children ride for free. Mom and dad get on. They go to Walmart. They go to grocery store.

They come back. They pile everything in, and all the children and everyone get back on the bus and go back home. So, in speaking from my side of town, I I disagree with removing the bus system. That's something that I would would want to be able to continue to keep, and that's that's my comment.

Thank you for that. Councilmember Rodriguez.

Thank you, Mary Viegos, and thank you for that presentation. Appreciate the ongoing study. You know, I think it's evident based on your charts and some of the numbers that you reported back there. There are, certain sectors that could potentially be better off in a microsystem, microtransit. I'm sorry.

You know, a good You know to to councilwoman Evans point, I think there are certain circumstances where a bus is still needed. Maybe the. The school route, but certain routes certainly are no longer really it's evident that the numbers don't really support it. Now the paratransit and your dialer ride seem to be very heavily utilized for a reason. Dialeride, I think it's to make the point here is that people feel better doing an on demand call to get that service done quicker.

I need to go here and there, and I can call and get that done. So, I don't think there's any additional cost if we put a micro transit system in here. I think we can actually be more efficient. And I think you're gonna start seeing that based on your numbers that that is how, areas maybe in more urban areas, you probably see that big, bus route that certainly works. But here in this rural community, I I think sometimes it doesn't work as well.

You can't compare it to a Sacramento or a San Francisco. And and that's the problem that not all size fits all. And I think we get compared with a lot of these urban areas, but Madera specifically is more rural. And I think we have to adapt to that and possibly find a microtransit system that that accommodates the the usage of of of transit. So I do agree with my colleagues both. I mean, I think there there is some use for the bus route, but more importantly, I think based on these numbers that we should start heading the direction into a micro transit system. And I think it's it's just very evident based on your on your charts there, but thank you again for the presentation.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment. I just have one quick comment. Is this, survey also in different languages?

Yes. I'm sorry. It's in both, English and Spanish.

Okay. Thank you for that. I opened it up for public comment at this time. Anybody in the chamber?

Mayor Gallegos, we have the woman with her hand raised.

Oh, we don't we can't see her here. Okay. Go ahead, Councilwoman Mihilla.

Well, thank you, mayor. I think that whichever way the community or the council does decide to head in, we do need to work on ways that we reach people because I do see a lot of people that are very interested in the community in using these services. What's difficult for them is to find things like routes, maps that are accessible. You see them online, but, like, there's there are PDF files that are hard to read. The the times, the fares, the information is very small. And I just think that whichever way we go, we just have to be a lot more accessible to the public.

Is that all your comments?

Yes.

Okay. Thank you for that, Councilwoman Mejia. At this time, I open it for public comment. Again, no one in the chamber, anybody online, or on Zoom? We have none, Mayor. Thank you for that. Thank you for presentation. It's informational, so we thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Moving on to the next item.

Item e two, Caltrans Highway Capital Preventative Maintenance, project 060Y180 on State Route 145, update relative to business owner impacts.

Okay. And that is going to be presented by our director of engineering.

Thank you, mayor. Council members.

Stop, Cheryl. There we go.

Almost.

How is it up?

We have some new, folks in the audience tonight. What we try to make sure is that the folks at home on Zoom are able to see the presentation, so we have to do an extra couple clicks. And that's what we're working on when we're here at the podium.

Thank you. Sorry about the delay. No worries. Anyway, this is the, Cal Caltrans Highway project. We'll skip the numbers on the State Route 145 Madera County update. A little bit of background. Note, I did, in the preparation of this, report, did attempt to get ahold of the project manager for the the project out on Yosemite Avenue that's coming up. He's been out for a few weeks. He was sick. He actually returned, I think, for a short while last week, but, I wasn't able to go ahead and get ahold of him.

So everything I've got here is based upon what I've known from the past through working with Caltrans. Continuing on, the project extends between approximately Pecan Avenue to the East to Story Road. The portion subject to this report is between East And Lake Streets. The project is planned to begin begin construction on May 15. That'll be following up on our water project.

We've been nip and tuck on that schedule. We're we're thinking and hoping we're gonna go ahead and finish that by May 15, and Caltrans can move in. Elements of the project include road rehabilitation, Yosemite Road diet. That's reduction of travel lanes in lieu of other improvements, and those other improvements are pretty much coming up on this. We have bike lanes, bus stops, roundabouts, and traffic circles at Lake C And D Streets, bulb outs at A And B Streets, enhanced crosswalks, center median island, sidewalk in areas we're missing, widened sidewalks in certain downtown locations, landscaped in the new medians and sidewalk areas, new lighting, and upgraded poles.

The will be pulled out, and new there'll be new lighting through there. And then wrap wrap rectangular rapid flashing beacons at the crosswalks themselves. A little bit background on impacts during construction. There are any number of impacts that can come along from roadway construction. Those vary from difficulty in accessing businesses, reduced traffic.

The translation on that, potential customer loss is drivers avoid slowdowns, and then loss or reduction in available parking. Caltrans and the city have done public outreach for the last probably couple years or so. City staff has done at least three different meetings with the downtown association. Caltrans has done at least two that I'm aware of. And one of those meetings was July 31 at the the adult day care center just down the street from the city of engine City of Madera engineering department.

There were questions at that meeting regarding the mitigation. They were filled by Caltrans as well. The project has been aware the MDA has been aware of and supportive of the project for at least well, for the last four years or so. This is a flyer for the, for the meeting that took place at the adult day care center. That was, July 31, and it was sent out, I assume, to all Madera Downtown Association members.

So they did have the opportunity to attend that. And this is just a letter from, indicating that the, Downtown Madera Association, they were aware of this for the last four years, and they were supportive of the program or the project. Efforts to minimize impacts, traffic control. Some of the some of the mitigation measures is just letting the public know upfront. Part of that is portable changeable message signs ten to fifteen days in advance of lane closures or closing side streets.

Old email from Caltrans that went through in agreements that we had with them that they would notify the businesses two to four weeks prior to impending closure and for construction. They would maintain minimum one lane in each direction. There would be night work, for many of the activities that they have, and the trucks would be rerouted away from Yosemite Avenue. Now this is gonna be a little bit hard, perhaps a lot hard to go ahead and look at, but this is this shows staged construction on Yosemite Avenue. And the key parts of this to recognize are the the shaded areas that are on on there.

I think you can see my cursor. The shaded areas on there are the areas that they will be working. When that is happening, they are shifting traffic to another part of the roadway. This next page shows in that shaded area, that's closed, and they've, reduced the road width down, and they have a left turn lane and two through lanes, one for each direction. Now you move into stage two, which is is they're moving on to medians, and you'll see the work that occurred under stage one.

Right through here, you'll see you'll see bulb outs. You'll see preparation for roundabouts. Those will have been constructed under stage one while they're working on stage two mediums. Stage three, they've jumped over to the south side of the street, and you continue to see improvements on the north side. Stage four, they've completed the north and south sides of the street, and they're starting to work on the the roundabouts, and there would be traffic control associated with that.

I've circled up here. This basically says what it is, but I won't I won't go ahead and read through that. And then the last stage, is the final lift of payment, meaning they put a first lift down to go ahead and get the roadway done, then they come back and put the last lift on, and then they strike the roadway for the lane for the ultimate lanes. Other additional impacts are minim minimization impacts. Parking.

That will be impacted, obviously, during construction. So this is from a 02/12/2025 meeting with the downtown associates. We went through that with with, you know, probably four or five members. In the downtown area along the 70 Avenue, property owners and businesses can expect to lose as many as 44 parking spaces with the fully completed project. There will be, potential to go ahead.

That increases maybe to 50 with the work that they'll be doing at the railroad. They're they're going to make certain that there's enough area to queue at the railroad so that that doesn't back, man, call it a half a mile down the road because of the single lane. They're gonna do two two lanes on the West of Mount Of Broach. To mitigate that, there's not really a proactive mitigation, but we the the owners have been noted that we do have parking areas in the city. This map shows us parking areas.

We have about a 180 spaces. Before the meeting, I was alerted to the fact we have this other parking area here. I attempted to go ahead and count the parking spaces, but they were covered up in trees. I figured I realized, like, 30 spaces there. So between these different areas, we have about a 180 spaces. So business owners have the ability to direct their customers there. I know it's probably difficult, but it but parking is additional parking is available. With that, I'm happy to answer any questions that I didn't know about the project that I've heard from the project manager.

Thank you for that report. My colleagues have any questions or concerns? I do have a comment. I was at the meeting. I was invited by one of the local businesses, and there is some concerns, but I've heard some positive things that the road's finally gonna get taken care of, and there's gonna be some beautification to downtown on Yosemite.

So there was a a lot of positive that that take away from that meeting. Caltrans is very respect respectable to our community members that had issues. They answered all their questions that night. And so I thank our staff for being there and answering the questions on behalf of the city. It overall was, I felt, a very good meeting, and everybody went away with understanding what was going to happen for this big hefty move that they've been asking for for years to be done on that road. So thank you for that. At this time, I open it up for public comment in the chamber. Oh, come on up. Yes. Right up to the podium.

I was just gonna suggest the property that used to be the mini mall that burned down, is that gonna be turned into parking for the future, or or you don't know?

Or

Go ahead. City manager Rodriguez will

answer that. Okay. It's okay. Can we

talk about parking for Yeah.

So good evening, everyone. I'm Arnoldo Rodriguez. I'm the city manager. The old hotel at the intersection of Yosemite and E Street, which I still refer to as the old McMahon's Mhmm. Going back to the eighties.

When that building burned, the city approached the property owner at the time, with no clear, with no clear plans from the city, but we did, the city made an offer when we purchased that piece of property. The city owns property in the surrounding area, including the old Ground Station, which we are on the cusp of doing a remodel. And so with the plan, the immediate plans is is not to turn that into a parking lot. Rather, city staff have been exploring different options to potentially go after some grant funding try to make that a multi or mixed use piece of property. We do not have plans in place right now, but staff is is is, aggressively seeking different pots of funds.

No project of that scale because it it is a relatively large piece of property, and there's some complexities. Not because of the property, the funding is the complexity. And what we would like to envision, is a mixed use project that the community can look back in a hundred years and say, boy, the city really got it right. Those projects take a long time, and there's a lot of moving pieces to it. And so as we're trying to piece together different pots of money and potentially partner with different people, those are the things that we are actively exploring.

And, we, Will Tack and myself and Keith are actively looking at different parts of money along with Mike and his team to see if we can put something together. So the short answer is, we do not expect it to be a parking lot. The, the long winded version of it is is we don't have clear plans with it, but the plan is to develop the site with the building that, again, that's gonna create synergy. That's gonna set the tone for Downtown Montero moving forward and hopefully for the next several generations.

Thank you for that answer, city manager Rodriguez. I will, bring it back to city clerk for anybody online or on Zoom.

We have none, mayor.

Okay. I will close public comment at this time, and, my colleagues have no direction, I think. Thank you for that information. Oh, we have councilwoman Mahia has a question.

Yes. Thank you, mayor. Thank you for the report. I would like to know whether it would be possible since this is gonna be construction that's gonna be ongoing for months. Would it be possible for the city to also, have a map with alternate alternate general routes or also showing where parking lots or parking is available? I know that, you mentioned that, business owners can do that, but would the city be able to do, like, a general map of the downtown area for the public's, awareness?

Yeah. I I believe we can go ahead and provide the map with the parking lots on that. I'll make an adjustment on that to go ahead and show the, the number of spaces in that others on that other parking lot. As far as another map showing, I I guess, routes, there are there are multiple alternative routes. I'm not quite sure what we would provide with that at least at this point.

Just general alternative routes for people that may be new to Madera just to get a sense.

Yeah. But right right now, Kaltrans is not planning on closing down the street. There may be short periods of time where they close it. That'll probably be, non peak hours more likely at the night, So there wouldn't be a need for alternate routes.

Okay. Thank you.

Sure. Thank you for that report. K. Directory of engineering. Moving on to the next item.

Item E3, informational report on the Madera Metro Transit System.

And again, presented by our grants manager, Zuniga.

K. Good evening again, mayor, council members, and members of the public. This item is a presentation, for the for Madera Metro, for quarter two. So it will include reporting and project updates that occurred between October 1 through 12/31/2025. Passenger counts.

Prior to September 2025, drivers would keep track of the number of passengers who boarded the bus manually. In September 2025, MB Public Transportation Inc moved to an electronic means of tracking passengers. So now drivers are able to enter the as passengers board the bus, they were able to log each passenger into an iPad, and that iPad will automatically upload the information into two different systems, Sparrow Labs for dialyrate and and paratransit, and Tripshot for fixed route. For quarter two, our fixed route served unders just over just under 15 16,000 passengers. And on the the ADA and dollar ride services served just over 5,600 passengers for a total passenger count for a quarter two of just under 21,300.

In comparison, when we looked at last year's passenger counts for the same time period, there was a very slight increase, less than 1% in in the 2026. We see that the the the decline there was a decline in fixed route passengers of a little over 1,200. While in Dial A Ride and RADA vans, we did see an increase in passengers. Madera Metro is funded by a variety of different sources. They include federal, state, and regional funding resources.

The source composition is approximately 50% federal, so funding from the Federal Transit Administration. 40% state. We have received grants such as the AHC grant from the Office of Housing and Development from the state. We've received in the past PTMISCA funding, SB1, State of Good Repair funding. We also receive regional funds such as LTF and Measure T.

Now specifically with LTF and Measure T, Measure T has different allocation pots that are eligible. For purposes of transit, we fall under the flexible program component. And this component up to 21%, can be used toward public transit improvements. However, we do, some of this out this allocation is shared with our engineering department for other public street improvements. LTF is also shared with engineering for local street and road improvements.

However, local transit needs must first be met. So staff works together. Grant staff works together with engineering staff annually as we put together our TDA application, which includes the CELTIF funding to determine what the needs are. Funds are designated for transit operation specific purposes with limited opportunity to spend beyond this purpose. An example of a of a limited purpose is pouring concrete for or pouring concrete for a sidewalk.

So with the installation or the repair of a bus stop, a shelter, we can use transit funding for sidewalk, but it can only be within so many feet of that bus stop or bus shelter. So we can't do, like, blocks on end leading up to the to the bus stop. Transit expenses include city staff, which, includes two mechanics, the bus stop maintenance and cleaning, our contract with MB, and special transit projects. No city monies are used in funding the city's transit operations. Our expenditures for the second quarter for fixed route, we can see there was a an increase from fiscal year twenty twenty four, twenty five.

We are the the quarter two expenditures were approximately 589,000, while the dollar ride ADA paratransit expenditures also increased and were just shy of $431,000 Again, part of this increase is due to an increase in contractor fees. The city's on time performance objective is 90% or greater for fixed route and dial a ride. We can see that across almost across the board, with the exception of dialoride, we are meeting that target. A vehicle is considered on time if it departs a scheduled time point no more than one minute early and no more than five minutes late. So we can see that dollar ride is coming in just shy of about three across three months.

We are working with our operator in assessing, you know, that the their on time performance, and some of it is just getting delayed from one stop to the other and trying to pick up as many passengers as possible. Sometimes dial a ride buses are pulled from their dial a ride into fixed route if there's some other form of delay. So there's numerous there's different scenarios that occur that could impact dollar ride, but it is something that we are working with our operator on. Madera Metro so additional reporting includes fleet performance, driver management, and driver assaults. If we're under fleet performance, we did have one mechanical failure that led to a tow, and there was one accident reported this quarter.

Under driver management, there were four new hires during quarter two. MV staff received training on distracted drivers, blind spots, and using proper body mechanics. There were two verbal assaults, during the second quarter in December. Both of the assaults, verbal assaults, were from the same passenger, and each assault was documented. As a result of this assault, and according to the code of conduct, this passenger is no longer, able to utilize our services.

There were no, complaints during second quarter that we received or that MB received. There were a couple of special events that Madeira Metro participated in. The first was held on December 5, and it was our downtown Christmas lights parade. We had a vehicle in that parade. We also had our the Jolly Charlie parade that we partner with parks with.

There were a total of this event took place December 19. We pulled 10 buses off of our routes, and there were a total of 134 participants that evening. Marketing during the second quarter included numerous social media posts. Given the holiday season, we do notify the public in as much of advance as possible. We do this through social media.

Flyers were also posted on the buses well in advance of the holidays. We also provided the Madeira Food Bank flyers with fare details for their November and December food box distributions. We continue working with the food bank for ongoing distribution so that this information continues to go out to the public. Staff also met with Madera Unified School District Director of Community Services to share route and fare information. So Madera Metro project updates.

We do have a few projects underway. We have the renovation of the intermodal facility. Plans are final specification plans are with our contractor, and we are waiting for their final feedback so that we can move forward in releasing an or having an RFP reviewed and released. The feasibility study, we just heard about this, study. As Steve mentioned, we do there is an outreach event tomorrow at the community college.

It will be held in person and via Zoom. It is a it's an informational workshop for the students there. And, we are working toward finalizing our transit options, based on community engagement. And the third is a canopy, installation at the Madera Transit Center. Our contractor is currently working on it, and, they he is making, good progress. And it will be completed no later than May 2026. And I believe, yep, that concludes my presentation, and I'm available for questions. Thank you for that.

I bring it back to my colleagues for any questions or concerns. I see none. I will open up for public comment. Anybody in the chamber? I see none. Anybody online or on Zoom? Do we have Councilwoman Miyia's hand up just in case because I can't see anything? No? Okay. I'll close public comment at this time. It was informational only, so thank you for that report. Thank you, Beer. Moving on to e four, fourth of July celebration. That will be presented by Parks and Rec Director Aber. Look, you're not at the end, Director Aber. Oh, you are at the end too. Oh. Sorry. Take that back. Now and the end.

Not at the end, but not yet. Anyway, madam mayor, mayor pro tem, council, guests, colleagues, Joe Abert presenting item e four, fourth of July celebration. And let's go ahead. During the 02/04/2026 council meeting, council requested that staff prepare an update regarding the fourth of July celebration and fireworks display. This report provides a historic overview of the event and serves as a foundation for discussing, discussion regarding the city's role in recent years following its reintroduction of the Greater Madera Kiwanis Club.

If you looked at your package, I kinda gave you a summary of the his history, which was actually pretty interesting when I did the research. I won't go go into a lot of details, but, in nineteen o three, what happened, the, city did not have a fourth of July celebration. And it was caused a lot of embarrassment to the city because neighboring cities actually did have a, celebration, and our streets were pretty much bare at that time. So in nineteen o four, what happened was they instituted an elaborate parade that was held, down, Yosemite Street. And this this parade, started the whole impetus of fourth of July celebration in Madeira.

This was these parades continued for a number of years, and they they they the the historic term was Victorian comforts. And what those Victorian comforts were were, they were handling handing out ice water in wooden barrels. They had seats set up for people to sit sit down, and this eventually evolved into a, tradition where the parades got bigger and bigger where you had floats, and they actually had the term I've never heard before, and I don't know that's ever been spoken in this chamber, which was goddess of liberty beauty queens that were actually going on floats, down Yosemite as well. These were the traditions of the parade, and the parade got bigger and bigger, and there were bands or music, and it's actually a pretty big event. So that takes us into really, where where we've evolved.

And so some of the challenges that this this, parade, evolved into was a it moved on from a, parade into a a fireworks spectacular. And over the years, they in the modern era, what we've found is that there were cancellations or funding issues with the city. There were COVID issues or vendor issues, and these things continued. So we had start stops, and things things didn't happen smoothly. The city historically hosted the event at the fairgrounds and at Town And Country Park and at the golf courts.

Due to budget constraints, the city stopped hosting the event in 2017. Several years ago, the Kiwanis Club relaunched the event at the fairgrounds, and, that was through dough donations, and there was a actually donation of $10,000 from Mid Valley disposal. Earlier this month, the, Qantas Club approached the city to explore options for the twenty twenty six celebration coming up in July. No notable financial impact is associated with the writing of this report. The cost of the fourth of July celebration, if assumed by the city, is still to be determined.

But we do have kind of a line of sight, on some of the costs of I mean, the devil's in the details, but, basically, an approximation would be, for the fireworks show about 37,000, fairgrounds rental, and including the state fire marshal about $7.07 k, advertising 2 k, and, the fireworks event is, free of charge to the citizen citizenry. And this report is for information only, and that concludes my presentation if you have any, questions.

Thank you for that. I'll bring it back to my colleagues for any questions or comments. Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria?

Go first. Go ahead.

I I think I know very little bit about this event, but, just to speak on it, it I think just the city, and the Kiwanis were is looking for a great partnership together. We've had a partnership through the years of putting this on, and, you know, I would like to see that, it come across that it's it's not something that, we wanna keep it going. We wanna keep moving forward, but we wanna have the city have a bigger part in in what's going on. So

thank you.

Thank you for that comment. Councilmember Rodriguez.

Yes. Thank you, mayor Gagels. And, again, thank you, director Abert for the, providing some context of how this event evolved. Over the last couple of years since 2017, as you mentioned, I think the the city, due to budgetary constraints, had held back on the celebration, and this was being held at the golf course. But there was always conversation between myself and part of the Kiwanis, councilmember Sakuraya, bringing it back.

So we were able to gather some, elected and community leaders, partners, to come meet at the fairground over the last, I think, maybe three, four years ago. And our attempt was really to try to get this back in a controlled area. We thought the fairgrounds would be the best. Obviously, the city was always a great partner. City has been a great partner.

County has been involved, you know, and other private organizations that have helped us. Obviously, Mid Valley being one of your bigger ones, but you also have a lot of the private and companies that that partake. So I think for us, it would be, it would be a great joy for this council to continue that. Now I know that there's, a budget that is of concern, but let me tell you this, that every single year that Kiwanis has been able to gather close to 40 to $45,000 to get this again in cooperation with the city, the county, and other partners. And we feel very strong that it will, but it's very hard to put the burden on one person.

And typically, lies on council member Sakurai, which is mainly a a good portion of the Kiwanis. Myself, we help with trying to gather, donations. But I think in a partnership with the Kiwanis and the city, I still think we can still bring this together for our citizenry and also be able to provide an excellent fireworks show. I think there's some constraints with the, contracts. We are celebrating the two hundred and fifty years again, so I think it's gonna be big.

I think it's important for us to to move on this. If there isn't direction, I would advise that we at least try to come to consensus to see if we can have the city take on on this project. I would hate for us to revert back and then bring it back five, ten years later, when you had this momentum already building in the community. And that's all I have for

now, madam mayor. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria.

And just with that direction, I would ask if the council would entertain a motion to approve, $20,000, and this is more to, to help secure the, fireworks vendor at this time and, bring back a full budget. I know Joe has brought about some numbers, but to to bring a full budget of understanding. But, again, knowing that we're gonna continue to raise this money through, community efforts as well. So thank you.

Thank you for your comment. I'm gonna date myself. I'm talking about forty years ago. I was part of Parks and Rec when the we did the fireworks. The city of Madeira did it.

I was like a teenager at that time, and it was a great event. I think it's something the city probably could handle and take back. When we did run it many years ago, we had all the service clubs that were part of it. So maybe we can go to the table with the Lions Club, with the Rotary, noon and morning Rotary, and then the Kiwanis all be a part of this great adventure that we're going to take on as the city, but we need partners in that. So not putting it on one service club, maybe bringing everyone in, and even looking at to see if the fairgrounds could like somehow donate their their amount to use the facility because it's a city event.

And I know they're, bound by the state, but it doesn't hurt to ask that this is something the city is a government agent agency is going to be taking on that maybe we can get, a consideration of a waiver that we do for many of our events that happen in the city for different entities like Madera Unified or different clubs that are doing the events that happen on our properties. So that's just a comment. Council member Rodriguez.

Thank you, mayor Gagos. And I forgot to add. I I do apologize, but there is other service clubs that are very part of this and happening part of this year. Again, Rotary, Evening Lions, they've always been a great partnership. I think we've included them since the inception of this, event that we've put together. Also, I just wanted to let folks know that, the the the issue comes around how do we get the money. Right? And and the city has always had great partnership with a lot of these vendors. So when they give us they wanted us the money, they're always thinking it they're doing the business with the city. So in a case like this, I think it's best to have the city be the forefront of it.

We, on the back end, can generate the funds or at least gather the support to bring in money to the city to be able to pay for this event. We're hoping that again, we've done this for going on four years, and we've met every single, budget item. So we haven't matter of fact, I think we had some seed money to continue for the following year. We also wanna propose that same thing. Again, speaking as a council member and also as a Kiwanis that the partnership continues so that we continue this event and we don't let it lapse. It just gets harder and harder for us to bring something like this back. There's a lot of momentum that was built before. So

Thank you

for your comment. So my question would be, mayor pro tem Zachariah is asking for a $20,000, motion. Is that coming out of the park's budget? Is it coming out of what fund would be looking to use that money from?

If council provides direction, we can take the $20,000 from fund balance. And those are the funds that have not been allocated as part of this year's budget. And so we can most definitely do that. And then at the next council meeting, with direction from council, obviously, but teeing off of what council member over what council member Zachariah and council member Rodriguez noted is that we would come back with the full budget breakdown after meeting with the Kiwanis Club, after meeting, with some of the other, service clubs, and we would obviously try to have that back at the next meeting because timing is always a bit challenging, especially with a couple of months to go. So, hopefully, that so it it would be fund balance if that's the direction of council.

Okay. Thank you for that. Councilmember Rodriguez.

Yeah. And I know it's a big ticket item, so I just wanna make sure that people understand that through our agreement that we have with Mid Valley, $10,000 of that money goes towards this event. So it's not like we're saying, hey. Fork out $20,000. Part of those 10,000 is there.

The other monies, again, is something that we, through Kiwanis, have been able to gather through different donors like PG and E, Begundas, Richard Spencer Construction, you know, private people, the county, and other partnerships that come together. And that again amounts to that amount that's needed for this for this fourth of, July 4. I mean, we've called it the spectacular. We wanna continue that same tradition going, but I wanted to make sure that's clear, that it's not necessarily we're just working out money that we don't already have. It's money that's coming your way. You already have it anticipated for this event, and then the remaining balance should be able to, we should be able to garner that through through support from the community.

Thank you for that comment. I open it up for public comment at this time. Anybody online or on Zoom, city clerk Gonzales? We have none, mayor. Councilwoman Mihiel, have her hand up?

I do.

K. Thank you. I'll bring it back to my colleagues for a motion for that direction.

Oh. Excuse me, mayor. If I may add, a few seconds ago, I recommended fund balance, which does have funding in there for this. However, I would also ask counsel to provide staff with some leeway. We could potentially use the city manager's contingency account, which does have money that was allocated. I simply wanna make sure, that I don't to allocate that if it's already been allocated. I'm trying to go off topic for the account recall. But if it's okay by council, I would prefer to use, the city manager's contingency account if there's adequate funds. If there are not adequate funds, we would, tap the fund balance if that's appropriate.

Okay. And so with that, are we able to, when we do get the donations, to put that money back in that account?

We would put it back in either the city manager's contingency account or fund balance depending on where the money originates from. Okay. That's typically how the city operates. Wherever the money originates from, it goes right back into the account.

Okay. Thank you. So I'll entertain a motion in a second.

I'll second councilman.

I can recommend I mean, I'd like to make a formal motion to to ask for $20,000 for the securing of the fireworks vendor. I'll second it.

Okay. Roll call, please.

Council member Montes? Yes. Council member Evans? Yes. Council member Mejia? Yes. Council member Villegas?

Yes.

Mayor Gallegos? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Zakaria?

Yes.

Council member Rodriguez?

Yes. Motion passes. Thank you for that report, director Aber. Moving on.

Item five commercial interior paint solid paint solid.

Alright. And that will be presented from our new director of planning manager planning manager, excuse me, who's preparing for us for the first time, and he's gonna probably need some assistance.

You got this?

Mayor Gallegos, mayor pro tem Zachariah, and members of the council, David Burletti, planning manager. This item is an administrative report regarding commercial paint color for exteriors, and this report was requested by the council because he wanted to take a look at and review what regulations do we have in place or what could we put in place to regulate color of buildings for commercial properties. No action is required. This is really an opportunity for you to talk about, what you might like to explore or if there are opportunities. Again, no action is required, but you may direct staff to take some action.

The city has two main opportunities to address or have input to aesthetics for commercial development. Those two times occur when we're going through a planning entitlement with the planning department. Planning entitlements are site plan review, that's administrative level or conditional use permit that might be at the Planning Commission or precise plans or subdivisions that go to the city council. That's the first opportunity we have to have input on what standards are in place that need to be addressed. The other is when we're processing building permits with the building division.

Of those two different types, when we're going through the planning review, that's when you're looking at the land use, the form, things that may be subjective. And there's some discretionary application when we're making those reviews. When we're going through planning or building review, those are more building code requirements that are objective, and they're they're ministerial. What you wanted to talk about tonight was paint color. That's preference.

That's somewhat subjective. While we have those opportunities to to look at our standards and apply those, there are mechanisms that cities have authority to to provide additional input. We make reference to government code section six five eight five zero, and that cites the authorities the city's authority to adopt regulations, to protect the the scenic beauty and general wear welfare of the community, and that can include aesthetics and paint color. We do have references in our code that talk about paint, but they're very limited. There are just a couple.

There's a handful. There's one area that's referring to requirements for graffiti abatement that when we paint over graffiti, we match the color of the building that's already there. Another area is that when we have vacant buildings and we're going to board up windows or board up other openings, that those boards be painted to match the color of the building that they're going on to. And then the last is really just a reference that's very specific for telecommunication towers, and that's keeping a neutral tone, but also when we're doing monopoles that look like trees that we use colors that match. So they're very specific to to more nuisance problems, not so much aesthetics of what we want the community to look like.

What we use to get to what we want the community to look like is commercial development design guidelines, and they provide directions on, on features that can be incorporated into projects, most projects, most of the time. Those guidelines are intended that projects meet the standard that the community is looking for. It's important to recognize the style and design of projects stems from the property owner, from the designer, the project proponent, what wants to go there. So while we recognize there's what the community wants to see, there's also the property owner or developer's preference, but the city wants to provide input, and we wanna have a starting point where we do that. And prior to building prior to that planning review process, applicants are encouraged to meet with development department staff.

That's when we'll introduce those guidelines and say, This is what the community wants to see and wants to look like. We recognize they have their own vision, but we want to share within the community's vision that you've shared with us. It's important to notice that to note that the design guidelines were not intended to be adopted as an ordinance. There's too much that goes into development across the board throughout the community. It wasn't intended that they be adopted as an ordinance because they don't apply everywhere all the time to every project.

Throughout that planning review process I mentioned earlier, staff is referring to those design guidelines, sharing those with the applicant. And those areas that are addressed in those guidelines that we're sharing, those typically transform into conditions of approval for projects. So while they're not in an ordinance, they do wind up getting into the conditions of approval that are either approved administratively by the commissioner or by the council. The guidelines covered quite a few areas, not just paint, but what you wanted to talk about tonight was paint color. So in those guidelines, there are specific references to paint.

They're in the report that I provided to you, but they include statements that say the building should not be distinguished by its color, but rather the color should be used to enhance the architectural features and should complement the character of the district that it's in. Color schemes should be should tie buildings together. Multiple colors may be used a certain facade, but you don't want to use more than three more often than not. Combinations of extremely dark colors or a monochromatic approach are discouraged. Color choices should fit the material that's being used.

Intense, bright, or fluorescent colors should be used sparingly, and the main and the trim shouldn't should have some variation. Building projections like chimneys and outcroppings should match or complement the color of the surface that they come from. So there's a limit to what we have to use. We covered what the city already has in place. It's the design guidelines.

Part of what you wanted to know for this report was what do other communities do. So, we took a look at other communities, specifically ones that had regulations in place that pertain to paint. Some cities use a design review board to evaluate and approve what's going to be what can be used. Some may have specific color palettes that they've adopted for certain districts, a downtown district, a historic district, or a specified geographic area of commercial activity. They could also have zoning ordinances that establish standards for certain zones district wide, light commercial, heavy commercial, industrial.

The regulations can occur in different forms. They could be through preapproved palettes or colors. They could be through regulations that are adopted that say that they need to get approval from administratively from staff or through some other process, or they could have restrictions on nuisance colors. For the cities that we reviewed that did have regulations, it's important to note that existing buildings weren't required to repaint to meet those whatever color palettes may be adopted. Those regulations were really intended for new development, much like our development standards are intended for new development.

However, there was one jurisdiction that we saw that did have a mechanism in place, an ordinance that said administrative approval was necessary when you were repainting the building. So those are the things that we have in place. Those are what some other communities have. That concludes what I wanted to present to you tonight and leave you with alternatives. You can direct staff to explore ordinance amendment. You may have some other direction you'd like to explore, or you may have, no further direction. I'm available for questions.

Thank you for that report. I'll bring it back to my colleagues. Whoo. Same time. Here we go. Council member Montez.

So I know this has kind of been, talked about, I think, before. My question would have been I think you touched on it a little bit. We're not gonna require anybody to repaint an existing, building. The enforcement mechanism, I imagine, would be through code enforcement. And then really the implementation or the control would be at the design phase.

Would anything that's being proposed stop, say, like, a corporation that has pretty unique colors that they have the same colors where I'm thinking of, like, Walmarts. I'm thinking of, like, Targets. Right? Because those buildings are red generally, which I could see those being very bold. They're not necessarily enhancing the architecture of the building. It's like, you know it's a Target because they have their Target, and then usually it's a red building. Right? Or am I getting that wrong? Sometimes

when you have get this read. When you put regulations in place and you're specified being very, very specific, you'll run into where that can clash with national retailers. So that's that's the other side of what we need to consider when you're when you're thinking about this tonight is that there's a reason why we don't wanna be rigid because we don't want to run into problems where there may be a national retailer that we want, but and we're gonna have a very abrupt point where they don't match. We'd rather have some flexibility where we can encourage them to change or modify or adapt what they normally do to fit what we wanna see. When we have something that's adopted in the ordinance and it's very rigid, we don't have much room to work.

Right. Because I imagine I can see somebody, and this was the the dilemma when, you know, enforcing. Right? Hey. Well, they're doing it. Why can't why can't I? And then sometimes you don't have a good answer as well. You're breaking the rules, and, you know, we you I have you in front of me now. Right? And we'll deal with them at a certain point. But that I guess that's my question. That's what you're envisioning, having something that while we can have some input, it's not super rigid. So, some corporation or or any business, right, that wants to come in because it doesn't necessarily have to be, like, a large corporation would be able to navigate our processes to say, hey. While this may be a little bit outside, it's not I don't know. I mean, there's really no code against ugly.

Right? And that's some one person's ugly might be somebody else's beauty. But that's something that staff would be prepared to navigate if things like that come through.

Yeah. We'll say subjective.

K. Thank you for that. Councilmember Rodriguez.

Yes. Thank you, mayor Diego. So at this time, the city doesn't really have any mechanism that that would say you can't paint your building a certain way. Right? There's there's nothing in place other than, you know, yes, we we could definitely develop some type of amendment to the ordinance or add some policy. But at this time, if if we saw something that was just way out of whack, I mean, they have their legal right to have that. Right? I mean, I don't think there's anything we can do at this time other than they're asking for an entitlement, some permit, or something that's gonna come before the planning. And at that moment, maybe subject to this is what we'd like this permit to have.

If it's new development, we can we can Yes. Stand on we don't think that color works where you wanna put it. And and how far we can get with that, I couldn't say. With regard to something that's already in existence, you don't need a building you don't need a permit to paint something. Yes. So if it's existing development, there's nothing we have in place that I'm aware of. If it's new development, we have design guidelines that we say this is what we wanna see, and we'll be aggressive about that.

So at this time, we don't have that. But you you mentioned something earlier that if we do, we can encounter some issues. If we have, for example I mean, you mentioned, like, a chain store like a Target or something like that or something bigger that may wanna come. But because we have these rigid rules, and that may be a a deal breaker for them.

Right? That may be an extreme scenario, but but it's Okay. It's in the spectrum.

I got it.

And if I could, council member, I've actually seen that in other jurisdictions where they've tried to get in a larger, you know, big box or whatever, not necessarily big box, but national or international corporations, and it doesn't match up with where their designs are. And because of the impediments that we already have here in California with regards to CEQUA and everything else, just said that we're just gonna go to the adjacent community with our business. And so it actually ended up driving, ironically, business out. But some places, on the other hand, where it's very desirable to go in, it used to be San Francisco was a good example of that, you would see the branding being muted or modified, the tiny McDonald's signs. They weren't big.

They didn't have the traditional things for the buildings. So it just depends what your market is like, given our economic status here and given the current economy of California, it's probably gonna be a challenge at this time if there's too many constraints.

So I I know with new projects that are coming through, I mean, obviously, that's something that we can reference. But, again, with existing legal counsel, would would be shooting ourselves in the foot by doing something like that or would be welcoming something litigation to some extent?

Potentially. I mean, you can I hate to say it, but, you know, the the there's the old joke that, it's too bad that attorneys have such a bad reputation from the acts of just one or 200,000 bad attorneys? And so you can sue basically anyone for anything, and what I've seen happen is the the big players will leave. They just wanna get involved, and they'll go someplace else because they can do that. If you try to do too much of imposing conditions, that can lead to challenges by the developers.

In the with regards to aesthetics, I mean, that's been a question of what is beauty for two thousand five hundred years when the Greeks first posed it. We do have some control over that as a city. So from a purely legal perspective, if you wanted to put constraints on, you certainly could do that. I found what is least likely to give rise to lawsuits and provide flexibility is to have guidelines versus ordinances or to have, even sometimes design review boards. The challenge with design review boards is there first of you have to have to find people to beat on them, which can be difficult.

Second of all, sometimes they don't agree with each other even with the guidelines that they have, and so it doesn't provide consistency to the development community. So there's there's advantages and disadvantages with with all the approaches. Most cities, I would say, and I'm looking at David here, a vast majority try to use some sort of guidelines. I'm also looking at the city manager here as a as a kind of a to set the outer boundaries of of what what is expected for a new development.

Got it. Got it. In this case, like, with our local committees, like the beautification committee, I mean, they would also be set by those guidelines, but they couldn't really enforce someone to say, hey. This is how we want it to be. I mean, they could certainly have a a say in what they'd like to see, I mean, for beautification purposes, but not necessarily.

Yeah. And one way you could enforce that is through an ordinance require that for a COP or something else that it go to your beautification committee or your design review committee or whatever or recommendation to the planning commission. So that does some of the enforce it. Challenge with that approach is it adds another layer to the improvement process. So you've got to go out, got to get them they need to have a quorum, make a decision, and then make the recommendation to the planning commission. So that's an extra step in the process.

Thank you, Shannon, and thank you again, David.

Thank you for that comment. May I approach him Zakaria?

So I I think through the you know, seeing a lot of the things coming through planning, what I would see is, you know, in corporations come around, they say they want these things, but because you have that rigidity, they're they're still flexible. They don't just give up on us. So I wouldn't be too scared to say because we have some guidelines that are maybe a little bit more heavy handed that they're just getting the above. They may want and give some pushback to say, well, we wanna use maybe this color because it's in our palette, and you may have to be accepting of that. I think for me, the concern is you go through the planning, you you tell them it's gotta look like this, and you gotta be within this palette.

They build it, and they match it. And then two years later, they sell it to somebody else who paints it purple because they don't have to go through the CUP process or they're getting that that planning approval. And now it's it's all they can do whatever they want. And I think for us, it's reminding ourselves that we're not just looking for that business. We're protecting the surrounding business. Say, I don't want a purple business. It lowers my property value, distracts from my business. So that's, again, why the you know, as planning, we say we want some consistency within a district so that everything kind of looks a certain way with some flexibility, but it should somehow flow together. And that's kind of what I would think is coming about.

You have a problem with Purple?

Where

where we have projects that have gone through the entitlement process more recently where we've been specific about what it needs to look like, we go back and look at those conditions of approval and look at the site plan, and that's something that we can enforce. This needs to look like what was approved in 2015 or 2010 or whatever year it was. I think we may be getting situations where stuff that's being painted we don't have that history with, that it goes too far back, that we don't have that original, here's what it was supposed to look like, and we do have the authority, and through code enforcement, to go make it look like it was approved. We get that with signage. We can get that with color.

There there are issues that we do go back to to the project approval and say, this is what was approved, and you need to it needs to stay that way.

I agree with, mayor Proteim Zechariah about we do want our city to look nice. We want we want residents to know and be proud of where they're living and and where they're driving in with their kids because it just gives a respect to the whole cleanliness of the city of Madera, and I think that's important. So I I get that. I think what we have to do also is look at our existing developments that we have and come up with a guideline for those existing buildings so that we are covering our bases with brand new buildings with the CUPs, with planning commission, but we're also looking at the existing buildings that we need to change that color palette. Because you had put I had looked at the report, and I highlighted some of the parts that other cities are doing, like preapproved palettes and colors, but make the guidelines not so restricted where it's just, you know, we're highly suggesting it, wording it where we're not I don't know if we wanna say this is what you have to do, but we would like we're highly suggesting this.

And maybe it has to go to approval through administration or the planning commission where they have the final say of what's happening. We do have Councilwoman Mahia has a comment.

Thank you, mayor. I'm wondering whether it would be possible to have some type of incentive to that the city could provide maybe, like, a matching, like, helping people, be able to repaint their buildings if we do adopt guidelines or an ordinance for color palette?

I did talk about that, councilwoman Mahee, at the last meeting about maybe using cannabis money to use an incentive or the council to come up some other kind of a grant to help those existing buildings to repaint to our pallet, and staff could always come back with that information. Does that answer your question?

Yes. It does. Thank you.

Councilwoman Evans.

Yes. Thank you for your report. What I would like to ask is I understand that we can't just maybe force people to select, but as a city, as a whole, in a body, the suggestions that we offer that they stay within the realm of, as you say, a color palette. And those cities, those, businesses that coming that are coming in would understand, okay. This is these are the colors that we recommend.

And, you know, they may very well have a choice, but not be so much out of the spectrum of the the browns and the purples and the the other colors, but just say on a on a basis. Now I will commend the fact that those of you that came to Pan Am the other day, the color that's on Pan Am is is absolutely gorgeous. And to see something like that downtown or even in the palettes of that would highlight and enlighten the city as itself as opposed to having the mismatch colors of everything going all which way. And it would, you know, bring pride to our city because Yosemite, for example, is basically the downtown area. And when you drive down there, it's mismatch.

So to drive and see things flow in an even basis would be so much better. So maybe not to say that you have to, but a strong recommendation and keeping everything in a color spectrum. Is that something that can be done? Yeah.

May I respond to that? Please. Excellent. Yes. So, actually, Will came up and was reminding me of something. So thank you, Will. So one of the options that you could do as a city council is adopt an an approved color palette, and that is the foundation or the default saying, here are the ranges. Here's your basic ways of doing it. But then build in a safety valve, and the safety valve could be for exceptions. Then you could have a process for doing that.

That may be either an administrative approval to allow it or even like as an appeal to the planning commission. So there is an opportunity for people that may have exceptional circumstances to be able to present and get a feedback on what their color palette would do while at the same time providing certainty for what is already preapproved. So if they know that they reach those color palettes, they're gonna be fine.

Thank you for that comment. And I think with the color palette, it would also help our public works department because when there's graffiti, we wanna clean it up right away. If we have a color palette, we have those colors on-site that we can go out there and just take care of it right away. And peep most of our residents wouldn't even know something had gotten graffiti because we will take care of it. It's hard to match those colors of buildings that we don't have those on our side. So it would help overall our whole city and our residents, I think, if we did something like that. Mayor Pro Tiv Zaccaria.

Just to keep it short and and just kinda add to, councilman Montes' point. I mean, like, they're they're having a clause, like, if if there's a branding color, like, again, it's Target and then red is their color or McDonald's, you know, whatever that maybe that can add to their ability to use some of those colors, but not just overly paint the entire building that color. But I think branding is important to these companies, big or small, so that that could be part of that clause as well.

Okay. So, let me open it for public comment first. Anybody in the chamber have anything?

Come on, Clint. So we're here to. So what you're saying is is is it the the way the yellow is painted on or just the color itself? Because I think the building looks nice. It's a nice change from the majority of Madera to me is boring. I grew up on the coast. I love being on the beach and seeing different colored buildings. The reason why I think you're you're you're getting what is what I call graffiti, some people call, tagged, is because they wanna see something different. They don't wanna see the same boring looking buildings. Two weeks ago, I also remember Viegas.

He was wearing a really cool suit. He had red on it and stuff. I thought that was super normal. Everybody in in this room, they're all wearing the same basic colored jacket. They're they're a calm color, but he I really thought his outfit looked cool two weeks ago. I'm just hit me.

I was I got I

got fit with it.

The aura hit me. I I was like, I gotta I'm probably the only person in Madera according to this room that thinks that yellow looks, I don't know, I guess disgusting or whatever you wanna call it. No. It's different. Maderas are supposed to be different.

I mean, you're proud of your city, and you're all you're all intelligent. But who let I mean, didn't anybody see them paint it while it was being painted? Because, I mean, it's the painting the way that they painted it looks the paint the painting was not done professionally. But I think that if they painted it a solid yellow, it would I mean, I would love to see if the building's ever gonna get tagged because it's yellow as opposed to error. I mean, there's been buildings out by Ross that get tagged.

Then, yes. But if you've got a if you've a ton of of boring brown paint in stock, yeah, it's gonna get painted back over quick because you've got plenty of it on hand. I'm just I'm just, I've been listening to this whole discussion about that building, and I find it disappointing that people don't want buildings of different colors in Madera because of where I grew up. So I'll let I'll stop there.

You for your comment. City clerk Gonzales, anybody online or on Zoom?

Councilmember Mahia. We have none. However, I do see councilwoman Mahia's hand raised.

Okay. Councilwoman Mahia.

Mayor, I think that part of the discussion should also include what that would mean for murals. I know that in the past, our community has rallied, behind murals that they expressed the sentiment of the community, but be it a cultural expression or or former members of our community. And I think that that's an important part of the discussion that should also be considered.

And I think somebody else could probably answer. I'm gonna try to answer that. Murals, they have to, have apply for permit and be approved to put a mural. No. Not correct. Okay. So Will's gonna answer it because director Tackett's going to give that comment. Thank you.

Good evening, mayor. Council members will tack it. No. We do not have prescriptive codified regulations on murals and nor are they a regulated item. They are mentioned in our site and ordinance, but they it's written as a guideline. They are intended to uphold communal values and be consistent with our policies, and that's all the more language or regulation that we have relative to murals.

Perfect. Thank you for that answer. Clears up everything. So let me see if I get this correct. It sounds like the council direction would be to go to approve color palette with safety measures in place of expectations that would go back into the planning commission.

I I just wanna make sure we're defining, at what stage because, I I didn't quite under

There's expectations like a corporation comes in and they have a brand.

I'm I'm just in general. Someone purchased an existing building, is doing the same type of work. Don't know if they're gonna have to go through a CUP. They go out and they paint their building. I mean, that's kinda where I'm what's what's the deal there? I mean, is that specific for something

else? Yeah.

It's probably that and then to add existing development guidelines.

Council members, yes. That's something that would need to be defined in the ordinance. At present, the trigger or threshold for entitlement is additions to buildings or changes in site. So we would need to modify that or include new provisions to specify clearly that the repainting of the building would also trigger a discretionary process.

So if someone wanted to paint their building, they'd have to come before the city council to say, I wanna paint my building now.

If that's the way the ordinance was written, but it could also be written to be considered at the administrative level of staff, the planning commission level, or the council. Additionally, those provisions could include provisions for appeal. Right? Administrative, this starts at the administrative level. If someone is unsatisfied with the decision of the director or the planning manager, that can be appealed to the commission, which can be appealed to the council and run through the process that way.

K. And that doesn't open up for any litigation?

And I I'll defer on that. But, again, we have to be part of a discretionary process that provides that remedy.

So and and that's what I would add. It's just that we're very cautious on how we word that so that we're not discriminating anyone specifically that wants to go pink, purple, and or yellow.

Ethan, talk Okay. I have some other comments here.

Mayor, just so I'm clear from this from my end, this is only gonna apply to commercial. Right? It's not gonna apply to residential or industrial. It these your your request to staff is to come back with some pallets for presentation to the city council for approval, and that can include a variety of pallet options.

Mhmm.

That would be for potentially new and existing remodel, repaints, whatever that's going on, and that there would be a a recommendation or staff would have proposals for how we handle murals as part of that process.

And safeguard guidelines for

The safety valves for the corporate business.

I had one last just to make sure. Is this retro is this retro? Would this be moving forward?

It would be moving forward unless you wanted to pay for every paying job and Got it. Moving forward Assuming Okay.

Once it's approved by the council. K.

And if I may, Shannon, counsel, one more point. As the zoning regulations or ordinance is currently written, we would need to bring back a resolution to initiate the text amendment to be adopted by the council before we could proceed.

Correct. Council member Montez. I think this was in

what councilmember Rodriguez was asking. But so say somebody like, because we know everybody goes and gets their permits when they're supposed to. Right? I would like, for painting, guarantee you nobody's gonna check. Like, they're gonna buy a building or they're gonna have a building. They're not gonna come to the council to know about this. They're gonna paint their building, and that's gonna trigger what? A site review. What is that gonna trigger for them? Or they're gonna have to return it to the original condition, which would again, they would still need permission for that. So what is that gonna do to somebody? Because I guarantee you, people are not gonna know.

It will happen. Yeah. And, yes, the method of enforcement would be through code, notices of violation, corrective action, whatever that corrective action may be. It might be the filing of an entitlement to, have the color that was painted without a permit reviewed and considered as to whether or not it complies.

So So it would have to go through the review process. So if the inspector says, hey. Yeah. You repainted, but you repainted within the color palette, that's approved. No harm on file, or does it still have to go through? Like, they can't make that determination, the enforcement.

Really depends on the way we write it and the doctor. Okay.

Okay. I mean, it'll be interesting whatever happens.

Councilmember Evans.

Yes. In reference to having everyone to paint it the same color or and and within the color palette, there are communities that you have to when you purchase your property, they they let you know at the beginning. These are the colors that you can use. And if by chance you go out of the color spectrum that they have, you will be violated, receive a fine, and you still have to change your property back to the color palette that is within the organization. So anyone purchasing property prior to, okay, then this is what we're going to offer, and this is what we'll have to be.

But those coming in afterwards, it needs to be written somewhere when you're signing on the dotted line that these are the colors that are specified, and this is what you must bill your building at, and this is the colors that your building has to be. Can we do that or no? Because I know I've

That's also something I would look to direction from legal counsel.

I'm sorry. I don't mean to laugh, but there's just so many ways that this can go.

True. So I'm sorry, Shan. The reason I say that is because of what ability we have within the real estate process.

Yeah. So, and and council member Rodriguez has much better knowledge as to the that real estate process. But, generally, the state sets the requirements as to what notices have to be provided. And then but it's generally presumed that if you're a commercial candidate, you would be sufficiently, sophisticated to use due diligence as part of that process. But do do you have any additional thoughts, like,

council member? There's just a seller questionnaire. There's a lot of information that goes out and disclosures that go out to whatever buyer, but I don't think anything discloses there that you have to have this particular code. Or, again, it reverts back to, I mean, maybe the city's ordinances and what have you. But then here's the thing. You record that document. Here's a commercial building that's just purchased. Does that get a trigger down to so you get the trigger to the assessor's office, the county's office, but it doesn't come back here to say, hey. We got a new building that just got purchased. Maybe we ought to tag this and make sure that it go through administrative process. I I don't see, that that may be a lot more than what what

Yeah. There's there's there's no mechanism in place for that. And if we were, it'd probably be quite expensive because just as know, even to get the preliminary report, you're dropping anywhere from 500 to $700 Yeah. Per part parcel.

Now to councilwoman evidence, you know, with conditions, covenants, and restrictions in these particular subdivisions, yes, you're gonna have those things, And HOAs may may do the same, but, I don't know how it works. Think here

They're they're a private contract.

You you'd have to go.

And I'm sorry. I don't mean to speak out of turn, but if you go to Bakersfield and you go downtown Bakersfield, almost every building

is the same color.

And it's in it's within the spectrum of them saying you will or you don't. So

And and you do, as a council, do have authority to do that. One of the things that some of these communities have done, and I can't remember if Bakersfield has done this, they usually have the districts that they designate and say, here's the approved color palette for this district. Here's the approved architectural thing. We do not want, you know, western. We do not want new age.

We do not want postmodernism. We want, I don't know, Mediterranean or name whatever it is that they're using. And then the other thing that they will often do, I think, to some of the council members' comments is they will set up programs, facade improvement programs or painting improvement programs to help the existing businesses come into compliance, and it provides them with an economic incentive so that if they know that they're gonna be using those funds from that program, they're gonna be saving money, and but it has to be done according to an approved pallet that's been authorized by the city.

RDA did that years ago. Count mayor Proton Zacaria.

And I think to Will's point is, you know, if if your business, you wanna get going quickly, you're gonna comply with the palate and not fight the process and go through the process and fight and fight. I mean, you might might be that one off, but most people are gonna say, if that's what I gotta do, that's what I'm gonna do, and they're gonna comply. It's just the mechanism when they don't or if they do it without notice that I think we need to figure out what we wanna do.

K. Director Tackett, do you kinda know the direction, or do you need it summarized again?

May I state my understanding of the direction for the city clerk at least? So when she writes this down in her minutes, she'll be able to get it. So this would apply to commercial property. Staff is directed to bring back a pallet or a series of pallets for approval and consideration by the city council. This would include both new and existing buildings. And stop me, Arnold, if I'm missing something. We need to have an appeal process for safety valve for exceptions or national well, you know, the bigger ones with approved themes for their marketing purposes. We need to address murals as to how those were handled. And did I miss something?

You captured everything council member Mihiel and had indicated earlier potentially bringing back an item to discuss some kind of pain incentive program. And for clarification, I do think council, not necessarily this evening, but if we're only talking commercial, the question to me will become, does does, do does hospitality come into play, and do offices come into play? There there there are some buildings on our on our major historically commercial corridors that are office designations, and there's offices in them. For example, a dental office.

Mhmm.

That's not necessarily a commercial. It's an office use, so that's something that council may wanna provide some thought and feed it back on again. Not necessarily this evening unless you're prepared for that discussion, but I do think that's something that you may wanna consider. And then going back to something that council member Evan said, how can we notify people? That that is gonna be a challenge, and I think it's it's gonna be on on on on us, on city staff, to do a public relations campaign or, a public information campaign.

And one potential avenue to get information out is during the business license process to add a language in there where we're notifying the community or the business applicant. Hey. By the way, there there's some processes here. But it's gonna take a lot of work. And then also going back to what type of application of going back to something Will had indicated earlier, there are different avenues of getting there.

One could be an online no fee permit where where people submit everything, staff reviews it, We respond via email. So, again, the goal here is not to generate or to charge people or to generate revenue. That's not the goal. The the goal is to ensure that people are painting their buildings consistent with council's direction. Okay.

Are we clear with direction? Okay. Well, thank you for that report.

If I may, just because, I just wanna make sure council member McKee was also fine with this approach for the record.

Yes. Okay.

For that. Moving on to the next item.

Item e six, administration of the community development block grant revolving loan loan fund CDBG RLF program.

Presented it again, I from our grants manager, Zunica. We're almost to e seven.

Almost. Okay.

Good evening again. Mayor, mayor pro tem, council members, members of the public. This item is on the administration of the community development block grant revolving loan funds program. The CDBG RLF program is administered by Madera County Economic Development Commission. CDBG RLF funds are used to provide startup funds to local business owners of low moderate income.

The revenue paid back to the city is considered program income. The approximate program income balance, is just over $389,000. On 08/20/2025, staff from both the city and MCEDC met to discuss the administration of this program As a result of this meeting and additional follow-up discussions, an agreement was reached on the level of CDBG RLF funding. So as mentioned, the current PI balance is just over 389,000. The, program income balance, that m c e MCEDC is requesting to retain is a $150,000, and so that would leave, just over $239,000 of PI to be returned to the city for, reallocation.

There are two outstanding loans, however, for this right now for this for this program. The combined outstanding balance for both loans is just shy of $60.60, $9,000. MCEDC has requested to also retain any PI collected on behalf of these loans. So if this amount would be in addition to the $150,000. Program income is included in the city's line of, CDBG line of credit.

As a reminder, HUD requires jurisdictions to maintain a line of credit balance no greater than one and a half times its most recent CDBG allocation. HUD's HUD performs a timeliness check annually on May 2. Retaining a large PI balance in the city's line of credit will impact the city's ability to meet HUD's timeliness requirement. Staff will return to council later this year for consideration of repurposing the CDBG RLF program income balance return to the city. Concludes my presentation, and I'm available for questions.

Right. Thank you for that presentation. Bringing it back to my colleagues for any questions or concerns. I see none opening up for public comment in the chamber. City Clerk Constellis, anybody online or on Zoom?

We have none, mayor.

Thank you. I close public comment. I do not see council member. He is hand up. It was informational only, so thank you for that information.

Thank you.

City Clerk Gonzales moving on to the next item.

Item e seven, race communications and upcoming installation of Internet and telephone services.

Alright. And that's gonna be presented, starting with our, director of engineering.

Thank you, mayor. I just want to go ahead and introduce, David Gomez. He's new to the city, well, as of about seven months ago. He's a lifelong resident of Madera, and he is a graduate graduate of Fresno State 2022 with a degree in engineering. And he will give the presentation tonight.

Thank you for that. Welcome.

Go ducks.

Yeah. Thank you, mayor Cici, mayor Pro Tem Zaccario, council members. Today's presentation, as mentioned, is gonna be on race communications. I'll pull up the presentation.

Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. K. Yeah. So today's presentation is on, RACE communication and upcoming Internet and telephone services.

Provide a brief introduction before I will, introduce members of the RACE team. But, essentially, just, RACE is an Internet and telephone provider looking to service residents here at the city of Madera. RACE, per their statement, offers competitive service rates, compared to other existing Internet and telephone providers here at the city. Some examples that are current construction, that RACE has done within the last year is, the city of Coachella, city of Merced, city of Fresno, and others in here in the Central Valley. A citywide project is, posed by RACE.

This project consists of installing underground and overhead utility infrastructure throughout the city. This project is gonna be phased and divided into five sections for their first phase. We can take a look at the next slide, overview of the project. So this is the project section map provided by RACE, which shows the five divided sections within the first project phase. There will be a later phase that will include sections that are not shown here that will pick up the remainder, of the city.

That that second phase is gonna be determined once race figures the take rate and demand that the city, from the city from the first phase. K. So here at the stat city staff did a review, on the submittals, provided by RACE. We found that we are largely supportive of the design. However, we did see some concerns that we would like to bring up to council.

We had determined that there are components of the installation process proposed by RAISE, which may result in the city receiving some complaints. We wanna bring them up. One of these is the installation of temporary utility poles. So the installation of temporary utility poles for the overhead work is necessary for some of the areas of the city due to the poor condition of the already existing poles. The duration of the temporary poles and stalls will vary will vary dependent on when the existing pole owners, owner mobilizes to replace them.

So it's not dependent on race. It's dependent on the owner of said pole. Race has indicated that it may take anywhere from twelve to eighteen months before the temporary polls will come down. Again, that's just dependent on the poll ownership, whereas other cities have reported up to maybe two or more years. City staff is agreeable, however, to extending the allowance period for the placement of these temporary poles.

One component that I did not list here that I kinda did wanna bring up, it happens with every, maybe service provider, project that occurs here in the city, is the complaint, the component of, vault boxes and board pits within the city's public utility easements. It might raise some concern with the residents that are gonna be affected in those, primarily because RACE is gonna be working in, heavily on residential areas. So a lot of these residential areas will have new vault boxes for the conduits that will be placed, ultimately to provide their services. So, but with that, RACE has indicated that they also will do a good job in minimizing those complaints that are before they reach city staff or council. They made it clear that they will implement project managers and other resources to minimize those.

So just a quick recap. Race right now is at the current is at the final stage of securing an encroachment permit for the installation of, of their utility infrastructure. Staff just decided it would be a good idea to bring this up to council, and bring it to your attention in, be prior to releasing the incarceration permit, and ultimately, races start in construction. So with that, we recommend to receive an introduction by both me and, the race team and if if there's any direction to be provided. And if now I can bring up Jim Miller and VP of race communications, and he can go over some of the details of the services that they're able to provide and maybe just a bit more info on the project overall.

Stop sharing the last report.

Start sharing.

Promise I'll get better at this.

Well, alas, our director of IT, will this change with our new system, the click click clicks? Oh, and you don't get used to it yet. Okay.

Very good. Good

evening, honorable mayor and council members. Thank you very much for letting us, speak tonight, and absolutely not a problem to to be here tonight and listen to your agenda and everything that was, talked about. Just reiterates why we're here. We're excited about Madera. You guys are a forward thinking city.

You're a rural city that has sometimes been left out of the loop of technology, from the bigger cities, getting that advantage over you guys. And so race's focus and mission has always been from day one to focus on the underserved or unserved areas of California. So who's RACE? So RACE was founded in 1995 last year, celebrated our thirty years in business. Like a lot of IT companies and tech companies in California, we started in our CEO's garage, building computers.

And then from there, it went into IT support. And then in the early days of voice over IP, which was the first digital zation of, telephone lines. When that occurred, we saw a need that we were going in and fixing other people's problems. And why not start becoming a phone company ourselves so that we can build a network correctly from day one instead of trying to go back and repair old networks that were starting to fail. Doing that, we received what's called a CLEC license in California, and that is when deregulation occurred on the federal level, states were allowed through their PUCs to create a competitive local exchange carrier, giving the residents of the state other opportunities for telephone service and now as it gets into Internet services.

And like I said, our mission is and has always been to develop in the rural areas of California. We first got our our feet wet down in the LA market. It was a great opportunity. But then we saw that there was the Eastern Sierra Range that was way out there on the the East side of the state that was divided by a Mountain Range and had zero connectivity. We were dealing with communities that just had dial up, had no cell phone service, and the dial up was even spotty that it wouldn't connect because Frontier, the local exchange carrier for the region, had just decided to leave it as is and not improve it.

So why does does Moderna need a new company? You already have AT and T. You have Comcast. It's because race, like I said, builds from day one with the new media format, which is fiber. Our networks are pure fiber from where we are in our data centers all the way out to inside the home. And what that does is give you a unlimited capability in today's terms of what type of bandwidth we can offer to the consumer. Could we offer a 100 gig, a thousand gigs? Yes. Is it needed? When the price of the product of the electronics comes down, then it then absolutely, it's needed.

Is it needed on the commercial side? Yes. And do we offer those type of things today? Yes. On the commercial side. If you follow AT and T in the state of California, they've already put in front of the the CPUC that they want to, basically rid themselves of their copper network. And so copper is what we call in our life, or in our business, end of life product. It has reached its limits on what it can do from a technology standpoint, and fiber is the future. So investing in a fiber network into your community is something that's gonna take your community just like you're talking about the fourth of July being spectacular. It's gonna take your community on into the future and keep you in touch with the world as AI is now, you know, the latest subject that we're talking about that uses bandwidth.

Why RACE? The competitive local exchange carrier. It's a it's an acronym. Some people might overlook, but it's a very, very important acronym in what you want to come to your community. ISPs are great, but they don't build to a standard.

A competitive local exchange carrier were regulated by the federal government and the state government. So we build networks that have redundancy in them, redundancy in power, redundancy in data paths to be able to keep your networks up during those emergencies. In addition, we are a phone company. Landlines are important. I know you guys probably don't deal with it as much as some of the mountain communities do, but when you have power safety, power shutoffs by the power companies and cellular towers go down because they don't have extended backup or generators, we're required to keep our networks up.

So that's when a landline is definitely important. I'll get into our pricing, but we're only $10 on our landline because we feel that it's a great thing to have in addition to your Internet. Products, we're very competitive on our pricing. What we're known for, we're we're a first of many in in the state of California. When we first entered into, building up these networks, we were looking at a 100 meg at the time, and this was in mid two thousands.

And we're like, why would we do a 100 when the equipment is available to do a gig? Let's do 1,000 megabits, one gig to every home. So we were the first one in California to offer a gig to a citywide project. Fast forward to three years ago, and we lit up the city of Lancaster, and we were first again with 10 gig after the home. So what we standardized on after our Lancaster build was all cities going forward will have at least a 10 gig as their, capability.

And then like I said, our our phone lines are $10 that comes with unlimited nationwide calling as well. I only put this slide in because I'm not here to talk about sales today, but I know a lot of people wanna know what our prices are. What I'm here to talk about is the construction process, and that's why I appreciate that you guys give us this opportunity. We know that the residents know who you are. You live in the communities with the residents. We wanna make sure that you're informed as construction begins. With me tonight is Dominic Puccini. He's our chief development officer, and he oversees our construction division. He hates it when I say this, but construction is great, but it's construction. If you're building that house, you want the finished product.

The in between to get there sometimes isn't the prettiest. We constantly learn. We've built over 35 plus communities in the last ten years in California. And with that, we are a California based company and California only service company. So when you pick up the phone and talk to our service, customer service reps, you're talking to someone in your local community.

The proposed area that we've, chosen for Madera covers approximately 9,600 homes. And like David said, it'll be broken down into five sections. We don't build in a section one, two, three, four, then five. We know that we're building out the entire five sections, so we build as permits in. Permits come in from you guys, but permits also come in from outlying agencies for us to build, whether it be from the power company, from the, local carrier AT and T, from pole lines that they own, from water districts, and so forth.

So as those come in, we continue to build. Reason that we build all over at the same time is because we want to build this quickly. We want to get the city lit in the twelve to eighteen month period because that's gonna minimize the complaints for you guys. In Chowchilla, we built nine months. Merced, just north of them, they're in a twelve to eighteen month build right now. So by building it quickly, it minimizes that complaint. That's our goal. We don't we wanna get through this phase, and we wanna get to the good phase where people are starting to enjoy the network. But we know that people are gonna have concerns. And so during that period, we wanna make sure that we address them correctly and keep them coming to us versus going to you guys.

What have we been doing to date? So, working with your city engineer, working with David, we, 2025, have learned your standards in your city. We've had our engineers out walking your city. You might have seen strangers in orange vests looking at poles and writing things down. That was our guys base mapping our the city of Madeira so that we can then put our fiber design onto it.

Where we are in '26, we're wrapping up our Merced project and our Atwater project. So we're looking in q two to start bringing those crews down to this region and start building out Madeira. Communication, like I said, is important to us. We're constantly learning. You know, pre COVID, we would hold town halls, and we'd bring two to 300 people into the city to these town hall meetings.

Since COVID, we don't see attendance that great. We've tried the electronic town halls, and we still don't get the numbers. So what we've done done is gone back to the old fashioned direct mail. So, once we get a section approved, we send via mail a letter out to the residents and let them know, hey. This is race that's coming out. That graffiti on the street, don't erase it on your sidewalk. The flags on your your property, don't pull them out. Those are companies locating the underground utilities. We refer them to the website to be able to watch videos on how the process takes place. But we also know that some people pick up their mail, they don't know who race is, and it goes to the trash.

So seventy two hours before we start, the guys will actually door hang the doors of the neighborhoods that we're in with a second flyer to once again inform them. If there's an area where they're doing underground work, we'll work with the city for, signage to put no parking zones during this time zone and so forth. But all that directs it back to RACE. They can contact us by chatting with us. They can contact us by filling out a form.

They can contact us via email or via telephone. So we try to cover all the different options for them to be able to come to RACE to get things resolved. The reason it's important to come to RACE is we open up trouble tickets. And like David said, we're gonna have a local project manager in this area. So we do have outside contractors that we use, but we have our local RACE employee project manager that will be overseeing this project, and he will go to the residence if there is a concern and address the concern with the resident directly.

We wanna make sure you get the answers. The form is one of the best ways for them to do it it allows them to even upload photos if they have photos. If we've damaged their grass, we damaged a tree, we damaged, you know, something, we wanna be able to get it repaired correctly. That is our goal. With that, I wanted to make it short tonight, but I also wanna open it up to you guys if you have any questions.

Right. Thank you for that intense report. Council member Rodriguez.

Yes. And you'll have to forgive me, but the first name again?

Jim Miller.

Jim. Thank you, Jim.

Yes.

Jim, so I I did see some of your pictures there, but how how do you guys, lay out this fiber, for Internet? What what is the source? Are you going you said polls. Are you going through the existing polls now? Can you

Absolutely. Great. And it's a great question. I apologize for not addressing it. We because we are a licensed utility, we follow the current pathway. So if your power is delivered to you overhead, then we deliver overhead. If power is underground, then we go underground. The temporary poles that David, talked about is the CPUC recognized that for projects to get completed, they needed to allow for temporary polls to be set by the operator. What RACE does differently because we we're not just the builder. We're your operator.

We're gonna be here fifty plus years. Well, hope hopefully, I'm retired before then, but the company's gonna be here for fifty plus years. And with that, we wanna to work with you to be good pillars of the community. So we've heard it in multiple cities that temporary poles don't look nice. And so what can we do? So Dominic's team meets quarterly with power companies. We geotag our poles. We share that information with them. Yes. It is the poll owner's, sole discretion of when a pole gets replaced, but we provide them a list of where we are with our temporary poles.

At the same time, we provide that list to the city. So when a, pole owner comes to put a permit in to replace that pole, there's a trigger mechanism that the city can also let us know so that we can get out there and get those poles replaced. Because sometimes once a construction crew from a power company replaces a pole, there's a duration that can spread on time when we're notified. So by sharing our information with the city, we find out that we can get notified quicker to go back to the poll owner and say, okay. Hey. We understand you replaced this poll. Please process this transfer permit so that we can get onto the new poll and remove that temporary poll.

So in a case like Madera and what you mapped out, do you have an idea of how many are doing the poll and how many are underground construction?

Don't don't hold me to it, but I believe it's about a sixty forty split, 40 air, 60 maybe underground. It's it's close to the, maybe closer to the middle, fifty fifty, but it's right in that range.

And how you do the underground construction? Are you having to replace sidewalks?

So we because we're a licensed utility, we operate in the public utility easement or in the, right of ways of the city. And so if there's green belt area behind the sidewalk that is in the PUV, then we will go behind saw sidewalk in the grass versus tearing up flags on the sidewalk. If there's not, then we're typically out in the street and doing a combination of boring or potentially microtrenching if we have a lot of underground.

Okay. But you're not necessarily removing the whole sidewalk to

No. If we have to because we're because we're in a older neighborhood that has a tight, easement and the easement's only underneath the sidewalk for us to set a vault, then we do remove a flag, and we do repave it. Now that that's where our FAQs on our web page, and we also have videos on it on our YouTube page, talk about it and show it that there is a temporary, asphalt patch that's put in place on the sidewalk. And then once they have enough for a truckload of cement to do multiple repairs, they come back, and that's usually within a two week window. Now if we have rain like today, for extended periods of time, it can't delay that.

Well, if you have to, my district has some sidewalks that are lifted by roots.

Yeah. We'll see a lot the more.

Get that going. But thank you, Jim. I do appreciate the, the presentation. I I think it's great that we have the alternative, to, again, Internet and telephone services. That's great to have that competing service because it certainly gives our residents another option. Now I did hear you. You're paying attention to the spectacular, so I may race to come see you.

Absolutely. Try to get someone I don't wanna speak for our marketing team, but I can tell you that, we're very different than other operators. We love to be involved. Right. We've grown our employees tremendously over the last four years, and where they all came from is the local markets that we've expanded in. So Awesome.

Thank you again, Jim. Appreciate it.

Thank you for that comment. Councilwoman, Mihia.

Thank you, mayor. Thank you for this presentation. I'm not sure who this question would be for, but do we anticipate, that the need of having the temporary poles, would overlap with the construction phase that's happening in Yosemite that we're anticipating this year?

It's probably more of your

Yes. It probably is. We we alerted you to Yosemite probably a month or two ago. Right. So Yosemite starts construction about May 15. You're already seeing the waterline construction if you go out there today. So, yes, if you've got anything in Yosemite, you would you you really wanna get that installed quickly.

And we've also looked at portions of Yosemite. It's served from the back of the businesses, as well, so not all portions of Yosemite typically affect us. But in in addition to Yosemite, we've also looked at streets that you're potentially looking at paving this year and us getting ahead of that as well.

Thank you. So if if if this time that timeline does overlap, would it be possible to prioritize expediting temporary pole remover from that area so that, the residents' issues aren't compounded there?

I understand that you you said to expedite removing the pulse?

Yeah. So I know that you mentioned that it's not it probably wouldn't be possible to do it in the thirty days that staff had wanted, but prioritizing just the area where residents are gonna expect that construction so they don't have hitches compounded with the poles and construction and all of that.

Right. I we'd have to look at how many poles are in there. One one I I guess it's more of a complicated answer, to to answer here tonight, but we most definitely try to expedite where we can. But we don't control the removal of the poll. It's the outside agency being power or local exchange carrier in the area that owns the pole that controls the speed of it. We put pressure where we can. We ask for favors when we can. But at the end of the day, they control the speed of it.

Thank you.

Yes.