Office Of The City Administrator - Regular Meeting

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Good afternoon and welcome to the Life Enrichment Committee meeting of today, July 14th. The time is now 4.02 p.m. and this meeting has come to order. Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit a speaker's card for items on this agenda. If you are here with us in chambers and you would like to submit your speaker card, please fill one out and turn it into a clerk representative to my left, your right, before the item is read into record. Online speaker requests were due 24 hours prior to this meeting. The meeting came to order at 4.02 p.m. Speaker cards will no longer be accepted 10 minutes after the meeting has began, making that time for 12 p.m. With that, we will now proceed to take roll. I apologize, give me one second. Council Member Gallo. Council Member Houston is excused. Council Member Wong. Council Member Wong. You can just say present until I fix this. Thank you. Chair Fyfe? Present. Thank you. We have three members present, one at SKUs Houston. And before we begin, Chair Fyfe, do you have any announcements?

Yes, we will be changing the speaking time for public speakers on all items. due to the impact of public safety calendar, and we want to make sure that we get out of here on time. So I just want to make the announcement that we will be changing our commentary to one minute.

Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Thank you, Chair Five.

We're expecting a large group.

Moving to item one, approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting on June 23rd, 2026. I'll move approval. Thank you. We have a motion made by Chair Fife, seconded by Councilmember Gallo to accept the draft minutes from the committee meeting on June 23rd, 2026 as is. On roll, Councilmember Gallo. Councilmember Houston is excused. Councilmember Wong.

Aye.

Thank you, and Chair Pfeiffer? Aye. The motion passes with three ayes, excuse me, and one against, Houston, to accept the draft minutes from the committee meeting on June 23rd, 2026, as is moving to item two, determination of scheduled outstanding committee items. This is also known as your pending list.

Yes, the D3 office has no changes to the pending list at this time. Are there any changes from the administration?

No changes. Thank you. Thank you, noting Council Member Houston at 4 or 5 p.m.

I'll entertain a motion. I'll second.

We do have a motion made by Council Member Gallo, seconded by Chair Five to accept the termination schedule outstanding committee items as is. On the roll, Council Member Gallo. Council Member Houston.

I gotta abstain, I don't know.

We're at the pending list item two. Oh yeah, aye. Thank you. Council Member Wong. Aye. Thank you. And Chair Five. Aye. This motion does pass with four ayes to accept the termination schedule outstanding committee items as is. Moving to item three. Adopt a resolution awarding a grant of construction resource center in an amount not to exceed $100,000 for fiscal year 26 through 27 to support the development and implementation of the city of Oakland's mentor protege program in partnership with the National Association of Minority Contractors, Northern California, NorCal. And you do have three speakers for this item.

Thank you, Madam City Clerk. We will hear a presentation with five minutes on the clock from Malene Espia.

okay good afternoon chair fife and committee members i am emma lean espia and i'm the director of the department of workplace and employment standards also known as dwes thank you for the opportunity to present this item today dwes is requesting approval of a one hundred thousand dollar grant with construction resource center also known as crc in partnership with the Northern California Chapter of the National Association of Minority Contractors, also known as NAMAC NorCal, to support the city's first full implementation of the Mentor-Protege Program on a public works project, specifically the MLK Jr. Way Streetscapes Improvement Project. It is very exciting to be able to support both this innovative Department of Transportation project and this important Mentor-Protégé partnership with this grant. Mentor-Protégé partnerships have been a component of the LSLBE Local Small Local Business Enterprise program for many years, but this is the first time it's being deployed on a public works project. To ensure we get this partnership set up for success, this grant will allow us to provide structured technical assistance, trade-specific training, and business capacity development to small, local, and minority contractors. Meaningful mentorship, including regular coaching, site visits, and project management guidance requires trade-specific expertise that the city does not currently have in-house. CRC and NAMAC NorCal bring decades of contractor development experience, strong technical assistance infrastructure, and deep access to minority contractor networks. They fill a gap the city cannot fill internally, and their work will allow us to deliver a high-quality, accountable program. The grant funds a structured set of activities, including a program management plan that sets expectations for mentors and protégés, onboarding for the mentor and protégé, a tailored support plan based on the protégé's specific needs, trade-specific technical assistance, as well as back office support. We expect several programmatic outcomes, including a strong, replicable mentor-protege model and strong mentor participation because expectations and oversight will be clear. We also expect that over time, mentor-protege partnerships will result in measurable reductions in contracting disparities as proteges will have greater capacity to compete for city contracts as both primes and subs. This work directly supports Oakland's equity goals by expanding access to contracting opportunities for small and minority-owned firms that have historically been underrepresented in the city's contracting. TWES will track progress indicators and will also work to refine the mentor-protege program as needed based on the work of this grant. The fiscal impact is a one-time $100,000 grant, fully funded in the fiscal year 25-27 adopted budget. Funding comes from Measure BB, local streets, and roads. And I'm happy to answer any questions.

Are there any questions, comments? Councilmember Houston?

Yes, through the chair. I just have a few comments. You saw me get up. Sorry for being late. Somebody's in my parking space. Happens to me all the time. We gotta do something about that. So you saw me get up. I went and spoke to the city attorney's office and I just called Ryan Richardson. So I just wanted to be transparent, because in this world you've got to be transparent. And I asked them would it be any kind of conflict of interest, because I know CRC. I was raised by their father. When my father died, their father helped me fix up cars and learn how to do carburetors and things like that. And I trained under CRC. that company. They taught me so much. I mean, my success was on the book and the structure of that, right? So I just wanted to make sure that it wasn't a conflict of interest. So I just asked this, they said, if you have any financial, nah, I don't have none of that, but I have learning experience from being trained under this great, great organization with the structure, with CRC. So I just wanted to be transparent. So I know I always ask everybody, I'm just gonna be me, transparent, so everybody knows. So it's a great organization. The people that actually work for me right now that was unhoused and justice impacted in my prior life, trained under that, now they work for the city. So it's a great opportunity to change lives. It has structure, everything you need for success. So I just wanted to share that.

I appreciate that level of transparency for the record. And so I gather that you were asking if you will have to recuse yourself from this vote based on past previous relationships. Councilmember Houston, is that it?

Yes, and they said no, because there's no problem there. Yes, no problem at all. I just wanted to say, and I'm glad I was able to say this because I have personal, and I share this all the time. If I don't know something, I'm gonna follow your lead, Council Member Fife. I'm gonna follow your lead, Council Member Wang. I'm gonna follow the lead of the committee. But if I know something, I'm gonna speak on it.

Thank you for sharing that. And if there are no comments, oh, I apologize, Council Member Wong.

Thank you, and thank you so much for your work on this. I was just wondering, since I was doing a quick Google search, it looks like there's a number of federal programs, like through the Small Business Administration, the Department of Transportation, and other federal programs that are available. Are you planning to set us up to be able to either encourage some of those relationships or entrance into some of these federal programs?

Yeah, the idea is to learn from the best programs that are out there. So certainly the federal level has the mentor protege programs. We also know that locally there's some other jurisdictions that have it. And so that this is a first time for us, we want to get it right. And we also want to make sure that our program evolves to incorporate what we learn from this, but also what are some of the best practices from those other programs. We do want to have the best mentor protege program here in the city of Oakland. And we also wanna set up both our primes and our mentors and proteges to be able to participate in these other ones. And hopefully that experience here helps open up more opportunities for them. Great, thank you so much. I will move the item.

And I just want to say, Director Espia, it has been a pleasure working with you on this project. I know your passion for ensuring that we are doing what we can in terms of moving the ball forward when it comes to programs like the mentor protege program. And you've been a very good partner in making sure that my desire to um just move the disparity study results forward in a way that can be done administratively but done cohesively can actually happen so i just wanted to thank you because you've been a really good partner for me with your expertise and your knowledge on these topics so i wanted to appreciate you for that and i do want to state that i'm also very proud that the first time that this will be realized is on the mlk streetscapes project in my district with an oakland born and raised native stanley cooper who will be the um protege in this in this project and i hope to see that even with the bi monthly i believe reviews that will come back from how this project goes that we can also bring back to this committee maybe a couple times a year how the concretization of this program is working so that it can be applied to other businesses. I would like to see this mentor protege program where it has this type of technical assistance for small businesses applied across the board in the city of Oakland for other small businesses who need support with back end office or support applying for their different permits or whatever. I just feel like minority businesses would be so much better served if we had the type of support that crc will be providing in this program to other businesses so i appreciate you all for being here and we can go to our public speakers madam city clerk

Thank you, Chair Pfeiffer. Moving to our public speakers. When I call your name, please approach the podium. State your name for the record. If you are participating via Zoom, please raise your hand so you're easily identified. Thank you. Jeremiah Jackson, Lynn Turner, Blair Beekman, and Ms. Assata.

Hello. Thank you, esteemed members of the council. My name is Jeremiah Jackson. I serve as a consultant to the National Association of Minority Contractors here in Oakland. And we really deeply, deeply want to express our deep appreciation for this opportunity, but also our support for this particular grant opportunity. One of the things that we know as folks who have served the area for over 60 years is that this is critical for the development of small businesses for contractors and for helping people to really be able to address the needs of the region and particularly the city of Oakland. We have worked diligently, working with tremendous experts and people with deep expertise, as well as looking at best practice methods and methodologies for ensuring success and being able to categorize a success in such a way that the city of Oakland will be able to not only repeat our success in the future, but also then to grow it in a sustainable way. And so we really do recognize that this does address a number of needs that the region has, that contractors have, and that our organization has, as well as making sure that the city of Oakland is able to address some of its own priorities, particularly with those coming out of the 2026 disparity study.

Good afternoon. Thank you guys for allowing me to speak. I really appreciate this grant as well, and it's much needed. My name is Lynn Turner, co-founder of Construction Resource Center, and we teach the business side of construction. We get into weeds. Most of these companies teach from the 50,000 foot level because we're contractors, being contractors, understand the good, bad, and the ugly of construction, we teach you how to build your foundation, set up your back office, and build a sustainable company. And so this will help us move these things forward. And considering the disparity study, I mean, this is a small drop in a bucket of what we need, but it's headed in the right direction. And so we appreciate it and ask that you guys move this forward.

Thank you.

It says in the report that this project was codified in February of 2021 and for the first time we are moving the project forward in 2026 any reason for that. Oh no, it's black people. That's gonna be impacted a whole lot. Maybe that's it. It says also in the report, the city lacks a standardized financial monitoring tool and technical assistance to ensure that the mentor-prodigy relationship deliverables can build meaningful capacity and benefit the project. I mean, what does that mean? We don't have the tools to assess the project? Come on, guys. We've got to do a little bit better, a whole lot better. And $100,000 will allow for what? Is it limited, or is that the maximum? How did you all come up with $100,000?

Thank you for your comment, Ms. Assata. I move into our Zoom speakers, Blair Beekman. I do not see Blair, and that concludes your public speakers for item three.

Thank you for the public speakers coming out to speak on this agenda item. We have a motion on the item, I'll make the second.

Thank you. We have a motion made by Council Member Wong, seconded by Chair 5 to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the July 21st, 2026 City Council Agenda on Roll. Council Member Gallo? Aye. Thank you. Council Member Houston? Aye. Council Member Wong? Aye. And Chair 5? Aye. The motion does pass with four ayes to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the July 21st City Council Agenda and through the body, would that be on consent?

On consent please.

Thank you. Moving to item four. Adopt a resolution one accepting and appropriating and authorizing agreements for the receipt of continuum of care supportive housing program renewal funds from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in the amount not to exceed $5,650,302.02 awarding and or amending the grant agreements to the nonprofit agencies of the terms and in the amounts identified in Table 1, using CoC funds and other state and local funds, and three, authorizing the city administrator to identify backup fund from state and local sources that have been appropriated for homelessness programs and to allocate or reallocate such funds to the programs identified in Table 1 to continue operation through the grant terms in the event CoC funding is delayed. And four, accepting and appropriating additional COC funds that become available for the same purposes through both fiscal year 26 through 27 and fiscal year 27 through 28 and authorizing the city administrator to amend the grant agreements to adjust the grant terms and the amounts within the limits of the awards. And you do have two speakers for this item.

Thank you. We will put five minutes on the clock for Shalon Keener. And you have the floor.

Thank you and good afternoon, Chair Fife and committee members of the Life Enrichment Committee. My name is Shalon Keener and I'm the manager of Community Homelessness Services. And I'm here today to present a resolution authorizing the acceptance and appropriation of up to 5.65 million in federal continuum of care or COC funding from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, better known as HUD. The Continuum of Care program has been a critical component of Oakland's homelessness response system for more than three decades. These federal funds support housing interventions that help individuals, families, and transition age youth move from homelessness to stable housing. Today's action would allow the city to renew funding for four established programs. The Housing Fast Support Network, operated by Bay Area Community Services, or BACS. The North County Homeless Families Rapid Rehousing Collective, operated by Building Futures with Women and Children. The North County Homeless Youth Rapid Rehousing Collaborative, operated by Covenant House California and East Oakland Community Project. And then the additional one is the Oakland Homelessness Youth Housing Collaborative operated by Covenant House California and East Oakland Community Project. Collectively, these programs provide transitional housing, rapid rehousing, rental assistance, case management, and supportive services that help some of our most vulnerable residents achieve long-term housing stability. This item is particularly time sensitive. One of the existing agreements expires July 31st, and while the city has received informal notification from HUD that these grants have been renewed, formal grant agreements have not yet been executed. This resolution ensures that we can accept the funds when they become available and maintain uninterrupted services for residents currently enrolled in these programs. The resolution also authorizes the city administrator to utilize previously appropriated state and local homelessness funding as a temporary bridge should there be any delay in the federal award process. This flexibility is essential because without it, programs would be forced to suspend operations while awaiting federal contract execution. Homelessness continues to be one of the most significant challenges facing Oakland, primarily, excuse me, preliminary results from the 2026 point in time count indicated that homelessness did decrease by approximately 20% since 2024. While that progress is encouraging, more than 4,400 Oakland residents continue to experience homelessness, and the need for effective housing interventions remains urgent. These continuum of care programs are producing measurable results. During the most recent reporting period of fiscal year 24-25, the funded program served 484 individuals, across 334 households, including 129 children. More than half of the individuals served identified as black or African American. reflecting the disproportionate impact homelessness continues to have on Oakland's black community. Collectively, the programs achieved a 73% rate to exits to permanent housing. Several programs significantly exceeded that benchmark, including Building Futures Family Rapid Rehousing Program, which achieved a 97% permanent housing placement rate, and East Oakland Community Project's Youth Rapid Rehousing Program, which achieved a 100% permanent housing placement rate. These outcomes are the results of intentional performance management and accountability. The city closely monitors all HUD Continuum of Care funded programs through monthly invoice and expenditure reviews, quarterly data and performance reviews, and ongoing contract monitoring. Performance measures include exits to permanent housing, housing retention, income growth, utilization of supportive services, length of stay, and timely and accurate data entry into HMIS or Homelessness Management Information System. The city reserves the option to make changes and HUD continuum of care subrecipient agreements, including ending subcontracts with agencies whose programs do not meet contracted performance outcomes. The oversight ensures that public funds are directed toward programs that demonstrate results and advance the city's strategic goals. In total, These programs support 186 housing beds in units throughout the Oakland's homelessness response system. If this resolution is not approved and funding is not renewed, those beds and services could be lost, resulting in hundreds of Oakland residents returning to homelessness. The loss of these programs would significantly impact our ability to maintain progress toward reducing unsheltered homelessness in Oakland. This recommendation is also directly aligned with Oakland's recently adopted homeless strategic action plan. The programs support key components of that plan, including interim housing, permanent housing, prevention of returns to homelessness, and increased access to coordinated supportive services. Through transitional housing and rapid rehousing interventions, participants receive assistance securing permanent housing, increasing income, accessing benefits, improving health outcomes, and achieving long-term stability. In addition, these programs advance the city's commitment to racial equity. Homelessness continues to disproportionately affect black Oaklanders due to longstanding structural inequities, including historic housing discrimination, redlining, and barriers to economic opportunity. Sustaining proving housing interventions is one of the most effective ways we can address these disparities and improve outcomes for residents experiencing homelessness. For those reasons, staff respectfully recommends approving of the resolution to accept and appropriate the continuum of care funding, authorize the associated grants agreements, establish contingency funding authority in the event of federal delays, and authorize the acceptance of any additional COC funding awards during the grant term. Thank you for your time and consideration, and I am of course available to answer any questions.

Thank you. Do we have any initial questions from the committee? Council Member Houston?

due to just a couple i see company house that's in covenant california c western ab hollywood c sam andrew c hollywood this just question to the chair there's no local companies that could do this work that LIKE IN OAKLAND OR BECAUSE I SEE COVENANT HOUSE THAT'S COVENANT CALIFORNIA I SEE SAN LEANDRO I KNOW YOU DID YOUR THOROUGH RESEARCH AND THINGS LIKE THAT BUT IT'S SIMILAR TO WHAT JUST HAPPENED IN THE MEETING PRIOR TO THIS THAT WE ARE GOING TO OUT OF Oakland and out of the Bay Area hiring people that can do body work on cars in Oakland and we don't want to send as we're going to Hayward so is it any. But next time is it any companies that could take the place of these companies is doing work in because that's $674,000. Another one is 500 and so over a million dollars to the place in Hollywood.

If I'm correct, Covenant House is in my district. They had a grand reopening this year there near Jack London Square, I believe on Harrison. So regarding that particular location, I know that's based in Oakland. Right. But Shalana, if you have.

Yeah, through the chair. They do have places throughout the state of California, but this particular location is in Oakland. They are housed in Oakland. Okay, okay. And they do business out of Oakland.

Okay, so where am I getting this at? 1325 Northwest Ave. And then we got one at San Leandro Headquarters on Fairway. Okay, I must have got the wrong addresses here. I have to do some more research.

I believe what we heard from Shalon was that they serve people throughout the state of California, but I know they do really good work around young people in the city of Oakland for Covenant House. If there are no other questions, we'll go to public speakers. Wanna call your name? I apologize, Madam City Clerk. We do have questions from Council Member Wong.

Thank you, through the Chair, and thank you for your critical work on this. I'm just wondering, I think it's a double-edged sword that our pit count demonstrated a 20% reduction. Are we seeing a similar reduction in our grant amount from HUD as a result? Or are they maintaining?

Through the chair, Councilmember Wong. There is a slight decrease in funding that came through for the HUD COC. It was not as significant as others, but it was a decrease of sorts.

Okay, and I have been following the news somewhat, but I know that there is a preliminary injunction that was issued by a federal judge because this administration wants to move away from housing first. Are you, now I noted that you have already preplanned for any gaps for just a delay in this grant, but do we have any plans for what may happen if beyond this this set of grants if there may need to be planning in case this moves, the Trump administration is successful in moving away from housing first?

Through the chair, this particular funding source has already received the award for it. But for the next iteration, we are currently working on the application. There have been some changes. For example, they're prioritizing permanent housing and transitional housing and moving away from somewhat of rapid rehousing. And with our consultant, we're working closely with our providers to potentially either transition or start new programs or figure out a way to maintain those beds. So to answer your question, we are working actively on ensuring that those beds do not go offline and or we can continue in another capacity.

Okay, great. Thank you for that. And then finally, I just wanted to know, I find the metric like exit, like percent exits to permanent housing to be actually pretty opaque. just because i think the term permanent housing covers such a broad spectrum of placements and so can you just describe like qualitative qualitatively what what that means i think what's important for me to distinguish and this may not be data that's available at a quantitative level but whether we are actually placing, or these providers are placing people into, are they in a market rental house with a rental assistant? Is it short term? Are they in PSH, which requires ongoing OpEx? Just because I think it is important, and I distinguish a measure of success of someone who's actually able to be in a market rate housing simply because then it opens up a spot for somebody who has a disability to be into PSH. And then finally, I think just a metric that's important to capture is also just the length of time that they're in these transitional units, since they may have an 100% exit to permanent housing, but maybe the length of time is five years, you know? So just to exaggerate, but I think it would just be important to get that data. Thank you. Sure.

Were those questions that you're requesting a response to on the dais or just something you would like to see in upcoming reports?

I think it would be good to hear a response, but yes, it would be good to see that in future reporting. And I know that the metrics, this is an ongoing conversation that we've had, can be difficult to capture, but to the extent that we can, it'd be great to see that and would love to hear your thoughts on whether those are metrics that can be captured.

Through the Chair, yes, so we leverage HMIS, and so to your point as it relates to permanent housing, it does vary. There's different categories in which a provider can select, including the ones that you mentioned, and so it does allow us to go into the HMIS and pull which ones we're So it is very broad to answer your question. And then as it relates to your second question, which I think was around numbers, I'd have to get back to you on that. But I think for the most part, it is a little difficult to measure or be able to give you a full detail because there's so many categories. But ultimately, if someone is removed from homelessness as it relates to being in the housing queue and or no longer considered unhoused and that. in which they became a part of the queue. They are now removed from it and in permanent housing, assuming they're no longer unhoused. I hope that answers your question.

and then in terms of the measurement of length of time just because throughput is an ongoing conversation right of increasing that through the chair that actually is a metric that we can track um and i can give that data to you yeah okay yeah that'd be great thank you so much what we can do is we can work together with the city administrator's office in your office to figure out where these metrics should show up in reports so that they're timely and responsive to what the council members saying but also in alignment with the work that you're already producing to bring to committee, so thank you for all your work on this. And we can move to our public speakers.

When I call your name, please approach the podium. If you are participating via Zoom, please raise your hand so you're easily identified. Blair Beekman and Mrs. Asada.

I'm still waiting for the room to fill up, but anyway.

So when I heard that the Oakland Housing Authority had a waiting list of 5,000, what's the waiting list for all of these different entities? So the Harry Robinson Center only can accommodate 137 people at a time. The Hollins, 150 to 180. Covenant House 60 at a time East Oakland Community Project 60 youth 18 to 24 at a time East Oakland Community Project 7 youth and 23 families so we and then the Oakland homeless youth collaboration 31 slots so we have very limited capacities for service So what's the waiting list? What's the waiting list? How many people need to get accommodations and are waiting to get it? And what's the solution for?

Thank you, Ms. Assata. Moving to our Zoom speaker. And I don't see Blair. And that concludes your public speakers.

Thank you to the speaker and for our staff for the presentation. I will entertain a motion on this item. We have a motion on the floor from Council Member Guyon, a second from Council Member Wong. Okay, yes.

We have a motion made from Council Member Guyon, second from Council Member Wong to approve the recommendations of staff and afford this item to July 21st. City Council agenda on roll. Council Member Guyon? Aye. Thank you. Council Member Houston? Aye. Thank you. Council Member Wong? Aye. Thank you. And Chair Fife? Aye. Thank you. The motion passes with four ayes to approve the recommendations of staff and afford this item to the July 21st City Council agenda and through the body that would be on consent. That is on consent, thank you. Thank you. Moving to item five. Adopt a resolution, one, accepting an appropriating anti-poverty community services block grant in the amount not to exceed, in the amount of $1,319,745 awarded by the California Department of Community Services and development of the January 1st 2026 through december 31st 2026 program year 2026 csvg program and discretionary funds as it becomes available to authorizing the city administrator to accept and appropriate any additional grant funds from csd for the same purpose within the 2026 csvg program year three authorizing the use of general funds to the pay to pay the human services department internal services fund changes in the estimated amount of 56 692 and central services overhead charges for 2026 programs in the estimated amount of 178 968 and you do have two speakers

Thank you. We will put five minutes on the clock for Ms. Ashley Jamont, and you have the floor.

Thank you so much. So good afternoon to our esteemed council members and our Council Chair, Council Member Fife, as well as our other elected officials. It is good to see you all here. My name is Ashley Jamont, and we are going to do a brief overview so I can reintroduce myself to everybody in my new position. so i wanted to give you all an overview of my division so aco cap is our alameda county oakland community action partnership and in within that division you will find my program which is our csbg grant which we'll be talking about you'll also find our sugar sweetened beverage program you'll find our volunteer tax assistance program and you'll also find our recast program so our recast program holds majority of our samsa funding around our mental health programs working with trauma and resiliency our vita program as we call it our volunteer tax assistance program is our program that we have throughout the city which supports our residents in conducting their taxes annually our sugar sweetened beverage program and our summer foods program our summer foods program we have over 55 sites throughout the city of oakland that feed our youth and young adults snack and lunch every single day so we're excited about that and a press release was done about that before the beginning of the summer and our sugar sweetened beverage program which also subsidized and supports that program and that also has an advisory board You'll see ACOCAP, which has 18 board members. We have four committees, our executive committee, advocacy committee, our fund development, and our program planning committee, which then drops down to overseeing our CSBG funds, which we have 17 grantees throughout the city of Oakland in which we partner with. So just a little bit of an overview of what our what our CSBG and ACOCAP does. So ACOCAP directly supports the city of Oakland's economic development action plan. We also support the strategic work that we are doing throughout the city of Oakland by making sure that we work with our training and employment. We work with organizations that support low income housing. We also do a lot of work around community development. civic engagement, advocacy and community building. So we reduce poverty and promote economic opportunity by supporting programs and services that help our low income residents here in the city of Oakland. We have community based organizations, public agencies, educational institutions and residents, and we help them identify and develop community driven solutions to the root causes of poverty. So what is the Community Service Block Grant? So the Community Service Block Grant is a federally funded anti-poverty program administered by the United States Department of Health and Human Services as well as the California Department of Community Services. Our CSBG provides flexible funding and enables community action agencies to respond to local needs through services such as, like I said, workforce development, housing stability, emergency assistance, financial empowerment programs, civic engagement opportunities, and community development. All of this, of course, is guided by our comprehensive community needs assessment, as well as our strategic plan. So here's our strategic plan for 2020 to 2025. As we all know, it is 2026. And we are working on creating our new five year strategic plan from 2026 to 2031. That again will be informed by our community needs assessment and our strategic plan. So as well as in your packet, you will find our Community Action Plan for 2026 through 2027. That was also a flyer or a attachment within your agenda. So I did want to put it up there with one of our clickable links so you all can have it. um miss meadow's not gonna scroll through it it is 112 pages so please at your leisure take the time to look at some of our data and some of our graphs and charts around poverty where it is localized within the city and what are some things that we're doing to combat that also you can find more information on our website and i am happy for any questions thank you

Thank you for your presentation and your service, your continued service to the city of Oakland. And if there are no questions from the committee, I will go to public speakers.

Thank you so much, Chair Five. And thank you, Ashley, it was a great report.

Thank you. You're welcome.

Blair Beekman and Ms. Assata.

So this is a resolution for Grant January the 1st 2026 through December the 31st 2026 is that what we are seeking approval for something that was started in January. Okay, so the board is supposed to be one 3rd elected officials, one 3rd representatives of the low income community, one 3rd of the private sector leaders who selects this board. They selected. Okay, going on to the next concern. The next concern is, I notice when I've been to a couple of y'all meetings, y'all spend a lot of time traveling and going to conferences. How much money is spent on that? Okay, all right, no answers to that one. No, no, you're not supposed to answer me. I just like this. I like this moment where everybody says nothing. It's funny to me. Okay, and then the last thing is what is the breakdown?

Thank you for your comment, Ms. Assata. Moving to our Zoom speakers. Carmen Beltran, did you fill out a speaker's card? Carmen Beltran?

Hi, excuse me.

Did you fill out a speaker's card?

No. I'm sorry.

Unfortunately, we'll be up to discretion for the chair.

I will speak to you after this meeting. You've been here several times before, so because you need translation, we will have our city administrator come and work with you on answering any questions that you have. And I'll also be available after the meeting. She will translate for me. Thank you.

Thank you, Blair Beekman, and I do not see you in the queue, so that concludes our public speakers for item three. Item five.

Thank you, and Ms. Germont, if you could respond to a couple of the questions, and I will lay them out, just in terms of how the board is selected, and I do wanna say for the public, there are people who come to these meetings frequently, that understand what the rules of procedure are but there's some people who don't know that unless an item is agendized the committee nor staff can respond to questions unless it is the purview of the chair so i'm asking as the chair for you to respond to how boards how the board is selected with the tripartite makeup of the individuals that sit on the board if you can answer that question

So from my knowledge, there is an application process in which the prospective board members are allowed to apply. And some of our board members have been on our board for many years. And that then is reviewed by our, I would assume our CSBG team, as well as potentially at the state level. And then we are given the opportunity to review and weigh in on those selections based off of the recommendations from the state and from the city.

I believe I chose my representative. I have a representative that serves on the board, Tanya Love, who consults with me on the meetings, gives me updates and tells me what I need to do as a representative. And so I know as a council member, I was able to make that selection. So I hope that answers the question. And at this time, I wanna thank you for your presentation and entertain a motion on this item.

We have a motion made by Councilmember Houston, seconded by Councilmember Wong to approve the recommendations of staff and afford this item to July 21st. City Council Agenda on Consent on Roll. Councilmember Gallo? Aye. Thank you. Councilmember Houston?

Aye.

Thank you, Ms. Ashley. Aye.

Thank you. Council Member Wong. Yes, thank you. Aye. And Chair Falk. Aye. This motion does pass with four ayes to approve the recommendations of staff and afford this item to the July 21st City Council agenda and through the body, would that be on consent? Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Moving to item six. Adopt a Resolution 1 accepting and appropriating direct local program distribution measure BB funds in the amount of $3,202,298 for fiscal year 26 through 27 from the Alameda County Transit Commission for Oakland Paratransit for the elderly and disabled program to provide access to specialized transportation services. Two, awarding reimbursement agreements for paratransit services for fiscal year 26 through 27 in the amounts of $900,000. Five Rivers Transit Solutions, $600,000. And Quality Transit for $350,000. Bay Area Charters for $25,000. One Access Medical Transportation and $75,000 for GoGo Technologies. Three, awarding grant agreements in the amount of $50,000 to city of Emeryville for paratransit services and $300,000 for services opportunity for seniors, for meal delivery services to isolated and dependent elderly and disabled persons, and four, authorizing the city administrator to accept and appropriate any additional direct local distribution funds that may become available for fiscal year 26 through 27 and amend the aforementioned agreements to the increased amounts within the limits of funding. And you do have two speakers for this item.

Thank you, Madam City Clerk. We will put five minutes on the clock for Anna Bactus. And Ms. Bactus, you have the floor.

Thank you so much. Good afternoon, Chair Fyfe and members of the Life Enrichment Committee. Anna Bagtis, Human Services Manager in the Human Services Department, overseeing Aging and Adult Services Division. Today's staff is presenting the 26-27 fiscal year Oakland Paratransit for the Elderly and Disabled Program, also known as OPED. Our plan for the coming year, we are in the fiscal year now, and the accompanying resolution. Staff respectfully requests that the Life Enrichment Committee approve this item and forward it to the full City Council for approval on the consent calendar. On April 27th, the Alameda County Transportation Commission's Pair Transit Advisory and Planning Committee approved this plan. The proposed resolution will accept and appropriate the city's fiscal year 26-27 Measure BB direct local distribution allocation of approximately a little bit over $3.02 million, authorize the agreements necessary to deliver Oakland's paratransit services, continue transportation-related meal delivery and regional partnerships, and authorize acceptance of any additional Measure BB funds that may become available during the fiscal year. This year's program plan reflects extensive community engagement and is grounded in what Oakland residents told us they need most in terms of transportation. To inform this plan, we completed 923, 24 community surveys, 13 community listening sessions, 458 OPEC customer satisfaction surveys last year, Across every engagement effort, one message was very clear. Transportation is the number one priority for Oakland older adults and persons with disabilities over the next five years. Residents consistently told us that transportation is essential for accessing health care, food, housing stability, social connection, and remaining independent in their communities. What the fiscal year 2627 plan delivers, based on what community, from the community input, this plan continues a comprehensive suite of transportation services, including same day transportation, specialized wheelchair accessible van services, group trips, door through door volunteer transportation, transportation related meal delivery, customer service, and community outreach. During fiscal year 26-27, OPEN anticipates providing approximately 19,000 taxi script rides, 7,500 go-go grandparents rides, nearly 12,000 wheelchair accessible trips, 16,500 group trips, and approximately 260,000 home delivered meals. These services help older adults and people with disabilities access medical appointments, grocery stores, senior centers, pharmacies, and other destinations that support healthy, independent living. Customer satisfaction has remained high. Participants consistently tell us that OPED helps them maintain independence and age safely in the community. At the same time, they identified opportunities for improvement, including better on-time performance, expanded accessible transportation, improved communication, and easier access to services. This input will be part of our ongoing quality improvement conversations staff will have with our service providers. Looking ahead, one of our priorities this year is improving how residents access open services. Last year, we piloted a relocation of our customer service desk from downtown Oakland 150, our office here at 150 Frank Ogawa Plaza, and moved it to the downtown Oakland Senior Center. We have seen an uptick in the number of new enrollees and people who are seeing the Downtown Oakland Senior for the first time become members because they've never been there before. This expansion brings enrollment, eligibility determination, transportation information, and other individualized customer assistance closer to where residents lives. And we are gonna be replicating this model for East Oakland this fiscal year. We're also working with the Mayor's Commission on Aging on developing a five-year plan, and transportation is one of the highest need that was identified in our needs assessment, as I had mentioned, and the Mayor's Commission on Aging developed and had stood up a transportation subcommittee that started meeting two months ago. This subcommittee will inform what's going on in the community and will help us identify strategies to fill the gaps in services, especially based on what we have heard from the community members in East Oakland, deep East Oakland. We may have transportation services available, but these services are not reaching East Oakland residents. In closing, the fiscal year 26-27 program plan reflects the voices of Oakland residents' response directly to the transportation priorities identified through the city's age-friendly 2.0 planning process and positions OPED to continue delivering equitable, accessible, and responsive transportation services to older adults and persons with disabilities. Therefore, staff respectfully requests that the Life Enrichment Committee approves the proposed resolution and forward this item to the full city council for consideration and approval on the consent calendar. Thank you, and happy to answer any questions.

Thank you for your presentation. Are there comments or questions from the body? Council Member Houston.

Due to chair, hello, how are you? Good. You said something a little troubling to me. said not reaching East Oakland residents can you explain that a little deeper and I had a couple questions on I might have this wrong too about these addresses because that's the first thing I look at is addresses of our providers so when you said not reaching my East Oakland residents can you explain that elaborate on that.

Through the Chair and to Council Member Houston, when we did our listening sessions and also when we did the surveys, what we found from our residents is that we have transportation such as, example, taxi in Go Go Grandparents, which is being able to access Uber and Lyft without having an app. So you just call a phone number. So it's very easy for older adults to be able to schedule these rides through Uber and Lyft. What we have found is that when they call for a service, suddenly their order gets canceled without any reason, and repeatedly that happens. So we know that gap, even though these services are available, some of our providers, maybe it's perception of the unsafe neighborhoods that people think Oakland is, They don't go, and we need to think outside the box. These transportation, Uber, Lyft, and other services we have available, we need to think outside of the box and figure out a different way of filling that gap. We actually have, testimonially, one of our commissioners got off the airport and in East Oakland, she was trying to get Uber and Lyft, and she had her ride canceled several times and was not able to get a ride. So, you know, anecdotally, that's what we are hearing, so I think what we need to do is really figure out through other input from the community what may be other strategies that we can implement. and working with the Subcommittee of the Transportation of the Mayor's Commission on Aging, we hope to be able to identify some of these strategies to fill those gaps.

Do you hear that? Yeah. That's pretty heart wrenching to me that my seniors and my folks ain't benefiting from this in D.P. Stokeland. So what's your suggestion? How can I help? How can the council help? How can the public? What can we do? My seniors are one of the most important things to me. What can we do?

Yeah, through the chair, one of the things that we're thinking about working with the subcommittee on transportation is issue a request for qualifications or some kind of an RFP this year before the closing of the calendar year. and entertain any ideas. It could be from a nonprofit who wanna run band program, for instance, just for East Oakland. Anything, we're happy to hear any ideas from the community, and we're hoping that through this RFQ process that we will find other ways of filling that gap. And it could be community-based.

That sounds positive. Let me ask one more question, then I'm gonna move on. I'm not sure if I got this right. I got it wrong just a minute ago when it came to the locations of these companies. New Jersey, Davenport, Tiburon, Newark, San Francisco. Five Rivers. Transit is in New Jersey. Quality Transit is in Florida. Am I getting this wrong?

Yeah, some of these are local, some of these are not. So Five Rivers is a local Oakland. This is our taxi service company. They've been around for 30, 40 years here in Oakland. And so that's local, Oakland-based.

It says, oh, so its corporate headquarters is in New Jersey, okay. Yeah. Okay. Okay, I'm gonna talk to my colleagues and see how we can do to help, you know, help me out. I need some help, so I'm gonna talk to everyone and see how we can get my seniors to get took care of, okay?

Thank you. All right. So, Ms. Bactus, I wanna get an understanding. So is it just East Oakland where these challenges are happening for our seniors with their transportation? And to be clear, the senior that was not able to get a ride from the airport was using a private ride share service not not one of our contractors correct correct that's correct and do our contractors work after hours and then finally is is east oakland the only place that's having these challenges

Not necessarily. So when we went to the Fruitvale area, we talked to the folks over at Spanish-speaking Unity Council through one of our 13 listening sessions. What we found from that community is that they have a high utilization of public transit. However, it's that last mile where they get off the BART or AC Transit, and then they're carrying groceries. that they are not able to carry all the way home because these routes, these public transit systems are on a fixed route system. It doesn't go door through door. And what we were told was that during COVID, they had a van and it was stolen and they have never been able to replace that van. And that van was helping seniors for that last mile ride. So that was an identified need, and again, we're hoping to be able to work with the community and figure out how to address that kind of need.

Still East Oakland, correct. So are these organizations funded through these funds? So we have funds available, we just don't have, the organizations don't have the resources to maybe reacquire vehicles or, maybe higher, what is the exact issue here?

We have had some conversation with the vendors about this issue and one of the strategies they actually presented to us was perhaps we can give a premium rate for those who will go to East Oakland for the drivers. So taxi drivers who are gonna be going on rides that are East Oakland address can get a higher reimbursement rate than what's our base rate. So that's one strategy that we have tossed around. The challenge we have currently is that they're also increasing the fares this year. So we need to have enough data to be able to understand how the fare, just in general, this new fare increase that they want to impose on us is going to impact the program. And then if we're going to provide an additional sort of incentive for drivers to go to East Oakland, again, how much money will that cost?

Is there any information or data to back up their fear or is it just a perception?

It's a perception, unfortunately.

And are these hours that they're concerned about going to East Oakland after hours, after 5, around midnight? And do the other services that serve other parts of the city operate 24-7?

I am not sure that it has to do with the hours. I believe it's really just the general perception that going to East Oakland is unsafe. We did hear from one of our, when we were doing the listening sessions, that one of the things that they heard from the Uber Lyft drivers, and it may not be related to our contractor, but just Uber and Lyft drivers, was there was an incident where they were in deep East Oakland, one of the cars got, what is that called, carnapped, carjacked. While they're trying to pick up a passenger in East Oakland. So these kinds of stories, they spread to other drivers and it becomes sort of this new way of thinking, unfounded, but it spreads out.

Do you know, and this is my last question, do you know if the vehicles that are used to pick up seniors have to be outfitted for seniors with lifts and other equipment to service maybe assisted walking vehicles, scooters, things like that?

Not necessarily, so a lot of the vehicles that are sent to seniors' homes are sedans. They've had drivers, like taxi drivers, using their own vehicles, because the old-fashioned yellow cabs are no longer in existence in Oakland, so they're using SUVs and sedans, and we are also educating our seniors that if they need if they cannot get on a SUV, for instance, so during dispatch when they're calling their order to make sure to let them know that. They do have limited numbers of wheelchair accessible vans that are available, but very limited, but we do have a specialized van service for people who need wheelchair accessibility with another contractor, not our taxi driver program.

Okay, thank you for that. And I will speak with you offline about some potential solutions to address this gap. Thank you. I have some ideas. Council Member Houston and then Council Member Wong. And then I'll entertain a motion.

Yeah, I'll move it, but I wanna move it for non-consent, because I wanna speak a little bit more, because I have some good ideas also. So we gotta keep the money in the community, right? And if you keep the money in the community and you build community non-profits that know the terrain, know the neighborhoods, aren't scared, that know how to move, then you can move safely. So I've got some good ideas. So what I want to do is I want to sit down with you two and the council member, if we could do it together, because I have some ideas. If we build individuals in our own community to take care of ourselves, right, keep the money in our community, we can make it safe. I know a good fix on that, so I'll move this.

clerk oh never mind all good thank you sorry about that um so I I have to say that anecdotally I have also heard some just complaints about the paratransit system and a lot of it has to do with delays or the wait time really is a key thing that that uh comes out and I am deeply concerned around this idea that as a provider that is getting money, including public money, that you don't have to actually pick up somebody. So I would just encourage whatever ways that we can hold these vendors accountable is really important. I also was looking at one of the attachments and in my reading this correctly, this is the Paratransit program plan staff summary. I see there's a listing of the cost per trip that some of our vendors is this how much they're getting reimbursed by the city or is this how much they're charging since I'm seeing rates as high up to $74 per trip and is that being charged to the residents?

Through the chair, Council Member Wong. So the way it works is that we highly subsidize these rides through the Measure BB dollars. So an example, one booklet of taxi scripts gets you $28 worth of rides. We pay $25 for Measure BB, the consumers only pay $3. And they can buy up to 12 booklets per quarter. So that's an equivalent of about three, $400 that we highly subsidize on taxi scripts. So what you saw on the report are averages per ride, because especially for taxi, it depends on the mileage, where you go. But on average, it's about $75 per ride.

okay that's good to know um and why is it that gogo grandparent is down at they they seem to be asking for a much less subsidy compared to the other providers why not expand the service with them or is it because the quality or they have limits with their capacity just so then we can provide more rides with the same amount of money

Through the chair, this is a good question. When we started with Go-Go Grandparents, it was the pilot, because we're not sure how readily adaptable our seniors are when it comes to these kinds of new services, new technologies. piloted with a very small amount of grant, with a very limited number of subsidies that we can provide. And what we've seen is a huge uptick. They're considered, you know, GOGO and Lyft considered hailing services, not like taxi. And we have seen a huge uptick in services, so one of the things that we're gonna do during the request for qualifications when we issue that is to make these services comparable to each other so consumers would have choices. Right now, the way our program is modeled, it's driven towards taxi because that's our bread and butter for many, many years now. And then as these new approaches to transportation are coming online, we want to take a look at these and pilot new ones and also grow the ones that we know are really successful like GoGo Grandparents and possibly increase the number of rides that you can get with GoGo as well as the amount of subsidy that we provide. Okay, great, that makes a lot of sense to me.

I'll second the item.

Moving to our public speakers, Blair Beekman and Ms. Asada.

So the report says this is for fragile seniors. So who qualifies as a senior? Just being a senior is not enough. You say fragile seniors. So who does that include? Does that include, for instance, an individual who's just had surgery on their knee, temporarily will need this transportation for a period of time, but not long term? Does this include an individual who has failed DMV and cannot drive and now they have to depend on some other form of transportation. Do you have a space, an area that is limited for travel? So we have seniors that have to go to Stanford Hospital. Can they be transported to that distance? Is there a distance like 20 miles, 30 miles? That's the limit.

Thank you, Ms. Assata, and I do not see Blair in the queue, so that concludes your public speakers for item six.

Thank you, Ms. Baxas. If you could speak to the length of a travel trip that is covered under these services, I'd appreciate that.

Sure. Sure, thank you, Chair Fife. That's a very good question, and we know that, especially for medical appointments that are specialized, they go outside of Oakland, and the taxi service can go anywhere outside of Oakland. The problem, though, is because they can only purchase 12 scripts per quarter, A lot of folks who are going to these specialty medical appointments outside of Oakland tend to use up their allocation rather quickly. We do listen to folks' needs for requests on a case by case basis. And that's another area that I think we need to address because as people become more and more frail, we should see, again, an increase in these kinds of medical specialty rides for transportation. The other thing that we've been doing is we are looking into whether or not their insurance actually pays for transportation, especially if they are under Medi-Cal. If they're under Medi-Cal and Medi-Cal covers their transportation, they should be paying for those and not our programs. So another education and getting more information from our seniors as we get more and more requests, repeated requests for more and more scripts than the normal allocation. In terms of qualification, if you're over 70 or over, you automatically qualify. You don't have to have a disability or a need. It's not means-tested. If you're under 70, so anywhere from 18 to 69, you have to have a disability and registered with the Alameda, with the East Bay Paratransit, because... A lot of folks think that this is sort of the first resort for transportation. It's actually the second or supplemental to the ADA transportation through East Bay Paratransit. So it's a gap, a stop gap for a lot of folks who are not able to get on the East Bay Paratransit van or they just got off the emergency room and riding in a van that goes all over the city may not be something that they wanna do. This is really filling the gap, so that's another education that we have to tell our consumers when they keep asking for more scripts because they want to ride a taxi rather than an East Bay Paratransit van sometimes.

okay yes uh i know this is easier said than done but i think if there's any way to withhold the subsidy when one of our providers does not deliver on a trip you know we should do that because Looking at some of these subsidy costs they could be getting subsidized I mean if a cop the cost of a trip is $74 and then they don't even go to that household in East Oakland You know, they shouldn't be getting the $74 from us. So Easier said than done.

I know that so, thanks Thank you so much Just one brief you're good council member he said, okay, I believe we have a motion a second on the floor I

We do have a motion made by Council Member Houston, seconded by Council Member Wong, to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the July 21st City Council agenda on roll. Council Member Gallo. Aye. Thank you. Council Member Houston. Aye. Council Member Wong. Aye. In chair 5, aye. This motion does pass with four ayes to approve the recommendations of staff and afford this item until the July 21st, 2026 city council agenda and through the body that would be consent. Thank you. Moving to open forum. Mrs. Sada and Blair Beekman.

so um sanctuary city like i said before is not a legal term so how do we apply it in any documentation uh related to city attorney if there's no legal term for how do you have an ordinance using the term sanctuary city when there is no legal term with that definition so i don't know how y'all do that uh The idea of understanding that you have an opportunity to weigh in on the impact of your sanctuary city status as it relates to jobs, who's getting jobs, who's not getting jobs, housing, who's getting housing, who's not getting housing. And my position is there's a strong possibility people who are here and don't have legal status are getting jobs over the people who are actually citizens of Oakland.

Thank you, Ms. Assata, and I do not see Blair, so that concludes open forum.

Thank you. It is 5.17, and this meeting is adjourned.