Neighborhood Services and Education Committee (nse) - Regular Meeting

Hey. Welcome all to the Neighborhood Services and Education Committee meeting of April 10. Before we begin, I wanna remind the committee members and

members of public services and education committee.

Follow our code of conduct at meetings. This includes only commenting on the specific agenda item and addressing the entire body. Public speakers will not engage in a conversation with the chair, council members, or staff. All members of the committee, staff, and the public are expected to refrain from abusive language, failure to comply with the code of conduct which will disturb, disrupt, or impede the orderly conduct of the meeting will result in removal. This meeting of the Neighborhood Services and Education Committee will now come to order. Can the clerk please call the roll?

Campos? Candelas?

Here.

Cohen? Vice chair, Duan?

Here.

And chair Ortiz?

Here.

You have a quorum.

Thank you so much. Now that brings us to, item b, review of the work plan. Items recommended to be added, dropped, deferred. And then item one b, sports, field use, and equity status report. Do we I guess we have a recommendation to defer this item. Okay. Does anybody can I get a motion? Alright. We got a motion. Is there any, public comment for this item?

We have no speaker cards. Okay.

And we have a we have a motion. We have a second. Can we please vote? Alright. The ayes have it. I don't see anything on the consent calendar. Let's go to item d one reports to committee. Parks, recreations and neighborhood services Volunteer Management Program Annual Report. Looks like we have a presentation from Andrea Flores Shelton, Olympia Williams, Maria De Leon and Tori O'Reilly.

Good afternoon committee. I'm Andrea Flores Shelton, Assistant Director of Parks, Recreation, Neighbourhood Services. And I have my stellar colleagues with me, Olympia Williams, Deputy Director of Community Services Maria De Leon, Deputy Director of Recreation and Tori O'Reilly, our Division Manager of Parks Maintenance and Operations. We're pleased to present the PRNS Annual Volunteer Report, which provides a comprehensive overview of volunteer engagement across our three operating divisions: Parks, Recreation and Community Services. Each year dedicated volunteers contribute thousands of hours, and you also contribute quite a few hours.

Our volunteers apply their skills to maintain parks and trails, enhance community center programs, beautify neighborhoods, and engage with residents to foster a stronger, more connected community. However, all volunteer programs are operating at full capacity with demand outpacing the supply of staff to coordinate and facilitate all of this volunteer energy. Volunteers play a crucial role in supporting the city's mission to improve public spaces and services, and further investing in infrastructure to support them will amplify their impact. We also want to point out that the Parks and Recreation Commission did hear this item on April 2 and have sent a letter to you all on their perspective. With that I'll pass it over to Oh, this is me as well.

Oh yes, so now I'm going to pass it over to you.

There you go. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Maria De Leon. And we just want you to know that volunteers are truly beloved and essential in filling service gaps and fostering connections with volunteers and program participants.

As stated by a volunteer advocate, quote, volunteers don't get paid, not because they're worthless, because they're priceless. Volunteers are priceless to the recreation division because they provide essential services that encourage community engagement, promote inclusivity, and create safe spaces for all participants at all ages. These essential services include community center programming, therapeutic recreation, and older adult services such as the senior nutrition program. In fiscal year twenty twenty three-twenty four, thirty four thousand seven hundred and seventy three hours were volunteered in a combination of community center and older adult services. Next slide.

PRNS continues to greatly benefit from volunteer services with our programs such as older adult activities and specifically the senior nutrition program. In this past year, these programs were supported by approximately two thirty two volunteers with over twenty five thousand hours at 14 locations. And as we progress, PRNS continues to engage older adults, volunteers with children and youth to provide mentorship opportunities, and share valuable life experiences, engagement through gen to gen intergenerational activities, and volunteering efforts with skill development, supporting community center special events, and activities leading exercise classes. Next slide. Volunteers are utilized to support community center staff with a variety of programs at our facilities.

In the past fiscal year, four forty two volunteers have supported community center operations with just over nine thousand hours at our 10 hub community centers and three outreach sites through gen to gen activities, which is intergenerational activities, and special events such as cookies with Santa, Easter egg hunts, cultural events, and various community celebrations. Although I know that Andrea already mentioned it, I just want to reiterate that although there are ongoing requests for volunteer opportunities at Community Center, our staff is maximized at the maximum capacity to accommodate increasing volunteer related requests. In order to do this, we would definitely need additional resources to plan, coordinate, and facilitate these efforts. Now I'd like to transition it to community services division deputy director, miss Olympia win Williams, to continue our update.

Thank you, Maria. Good afternoon, chair and community members. My name is Olympia Williams, deputy director for the community services division within PRNS. The community services division's neighborhood litter program coordinates and leads the volunteer engagement efforts for Beautify s j, working closely with dedicated community members who help to organize beautification efforts across the city. In 2324, the team coordinated and supported 430 litter cleanups and is on track to exceed that number this fiscal year.

Volunteers are an essential part of the beautify s j blight reduction service delivery strategy, playing a critical role in supporting efforts to address urban blight, enhance public spaces, and engage residents to create a cleaner, more vibrant San Jose. We focus on coordinating and collaborating with neighborhood associations, businesses, council offices, and creek partners such as the trash punks, South Bay Clean Creeks Coalition, and Keep Coyote Creek Beautiful to address litter and trash and remove graffiti in public spaces. To further enhance efforts, we have increased our partnership with schools and interjurisdictional partner partners such as Caltrans and the Valley Transportation Authority to collaborate on cleanup events along freeway off ramp areas. These efforts led to 15,000 plus residents contributing over thirty eight thousand hours of volunteer time to beautify our city. To strengthen our volunteer base, the neighborhood litter program actively engages in outreach at resource fairs, collaborates with the mayor and council offices, presents at community meetings, and utilizes a diverse range of social media platforms.

Additionally, I wanna highlight the efforts in our Project Hope neighborhoods. Next slide. Thank you. Project hope is a neighborhood engagement and community organizing program that works to empower residents in nine neighborhoods that work to increase engagement in civic life. Project hope volunteers contributed over forty six hundred hours towards event planning and hosting, monthly strategy meetings, neighborhood association meetings, and community engagement efforts such as community cleanups.

Our Project Hope board members worked tirelessly to improve their communities, and I am thankful for their continued contributions. Like the recreation division, the Beautify s j team has reached maximum capacity and would welcome additional resources to continue to expand our support for additional engagement and volunteer cleanup activities. Thank you again, and I will now transition the remainder of the presentation to Tori O'Reilly, a division manager in our parks division. Thank you. Chair

and community matter members, my name is Tori O'Reilly, division manager overseeing park maintenance and operations. All park volunteer efforts in San Jose are coordinated with the Healthy Places Index or HPI in mind. The HPI is a statewide tool that ranks neighborhoods based on conditions that impact health, like housing, education, air quality, and access to services. Lower HPI scores mean a community faces greater challenges and is prioritized for equity focused programs within San Jose Parks. The department offers two main opportunities to volunteer with park stewardship, one day events and the adopt a park program.

In 2023, 2024, volunteers dedicated thirty seven thousand twenty five hours across a 140 park locations, significantly contributing to enhancement. However, with current staffing levels, the program is stretched to its limits. Additional resources would allow for greater coordination, expanded outreach, and the ability to engage even more residents in our vital efforts. The program is inclusive and adaptable, allowing individuals of all abilities to participate. Volunteers support routine maintenance such as laying down mulch, adding fiber to the playgrounds, trimming rose bushes, ground level tree pruning, painting benches and picnic tables, and supporting special projects like native garden installations and tree plantings.

All of these activities foster the art and distribution, focusing more on parks and lower HPI areas that may require additional support to meet our maintenance standards. This graph highlights the shift in one day events between 2020 and 2024, demonstrating a commitment to directing resources where they are most needed to enhance park conditions and community access. Park adoptions. Currently, 90 of our two twelve parks have been adopted, and the department is committed to increasing the number each year. The accompanying chart illustrates percentage of adopted parks based on the Healthy Placix index scores.

Recognizing disparities in park adoptions, the department is actively working to address these gaps through strategic partnerships and with working

also

with parks and their communities. As illustrated in the Healthy Placix Index by council district chart, much of volunteer planning within the department utilizes the HPI framework to prioritize equity in volunteer planning. This approach ensures that resources and volunteer efforts are directed in areas of greatest need, fostering more inclusive and sustainable park maintenance. Okay. So our next steps.

As we have discussed today, the department relies on volunteers to stretch its limited resources. However, the demand for volunteer coordination and outreach in all divisions has exceeded our current staffing capacity. Moving forward to strengthen and expand these team. Proud in leader management, reduce redundancies, and integrate digital the tools for scheduling communication and tracking, as well as strengthening the department's ability to collaborate both internally and with external partners. With additional staffing support, we believe these initiatives can be fully realized, allowing the department to elevate volunteer engagement and meet the needs of San Jose's parks, community centers, and neighborhoods.

This concludes our presentation. I will now hand it back to Andrea Flores Shelton, our assistant director for PRNS.

We'll take any questions. Thank you.

Great. Thank you so much for that informative presentation. Do we have any comments from the public?

No, Speaker Kriggs.

Great. Really appreciate the work that's gone on in regards to the volunteer management program. Know, there's that great quote from Martin Luther King, everybody can be great because everybody can serve. And I think that HPI map really showed the the need that a lot of our districts have, especially in District 5 that score was seen that as the lowest is always disheartening. But knowing that members of the community, whether that's Project Hope or other leaders, have always come up, stepped up, and volunteered their time is definitely humbling and part of why we do our our job up here. I see that council member Condellis has raised his hand to speak.

Thank you chair. First of all, you for the presentation. I I think every year we we hear about the amount of engagement that we we have from various members of our community. It's always it's uplifting knowing how big of that how big of a deficit we have with regards to what we need to actually be able to provide a a a park system that adequate for our community is is again it's uplifting. So thanks for that and you know I know last year one of the things I mentioned was better coordination especially with regards to those whether it's a Sunday series or the clean ups to with our offices.

And and I I do wanna commend staff for for I I've seen the the change. So so continue doing that. Don't let up. We in fact, this past week, my my team and I, we pre sanded the Lake Cunningham Park sign, and prepped it and we got a brand new fresh coat of paint on there that I thought was supposed to be done today, but to my surprise I I went and it was already done. So, but but things like that are are are exciting and and and something that I'm I'm appreciative of.

So so don't don't let up. That's one. Two, is with regards to staffing capacity and and where it relates to pre pandemic levels. I didn't see that in the report of what our volunteer management capacity is now to where we were pre pandemic.

Thank you. In the parks division staffing has remained the same since fiscal year eighteen-nineteen. Eighteen-nineteen? Fiscal year eighteen-nineteen.

Okay, got it. 2018, 2019 I'm like what? We didn't incorporate it until 1870, hasn't it? Two

hundred years.

2018? '19. So

pre pandemic levels, same staffing and yet the number of events have doubled.

Got it. But I mean in the same report we say that we still haven't gotten back to volunteer engagement levels pre pandemic.

So, yes, I understand. There's a mention in the report about pre pandemic and our older adults volunteer levels. So, we've taken a phased in approach so that they feel comfortable coming back and volunteering. There's some of our older adults that are volunteers are still a little bit cautious. So, the goal is to do this continually in a phased in approach, but there's a lot more enthusiasm as time goes by with the pandemic being long gone for a while now.

But just like you mentioned before that there's still some hesitation on some of our older adults to return.

Thank you Maria. I guess in the part of the report was early. It was in the initial analysis. I mean it's on page, what is it, page two of the report. There's a mention with regards to contributions in twenty three-twenty four but the end, literally the last sentence of that paragraph, which doesn't speak to specifically on the senior nutrition program.

And so my question that naturally spurs that anybody would read this was, if that's the case, we haven't reached our pre pandemic levels, our staffing looks the same, then you know why is there an issue or conflict of okay well we've tapped all we can with the current staff capacity that we have. Let me finish. And why the delta? Does that make sense?

Yes and I want to point out how we're trying to have a unified volunteer management approach to PRNS, yet we have very different you know operations. And so I would say what's very different post pandemic is the growth of Butify And again the energy around litter cleanups and whatnot. So I can let Olympia speak more to sort of what I think we have done a great job of bringing back volunteer hours. It's number of events and how those events then create work outside the volunteer event itself.

So not all volunteer hours are created equally, is that what I'm hearing? Not all volunteer Well, I guess that's part of the report that could be, you know, I think is causing me some questions. Well you know there's five different mentions of our staff capacity which resonated. I get it. We're asking you all to do a lot with what we have.

And especially that letter from from our wonderful volunteer parks commissioners who say we need a volunteer manager for every district basically. But but which I I I get, I understand. But but I guess it would be it would be interesting and I'd love to see what programs specifically are over prescribed with volunteers basically and which ones are not. Because I couldn't tell, I couldn't discern that. You probably have that information but I think that would be helpful.

Yeah I would say it's park maintenance and it's litter. Is it specifically dumpster days or litter? Pick Whereas our community center based older adult program there's capacity there.

So it's not the one day events, it's the neighborhood litter program or is it because the way it's sorted

So in the parks division we have and our one day in Beautify SJ in the community services division we also have, you could describe them as one day events, they're the Neighborhood Association litter pickups.

Got it. Oh, no. I'm just reading from

the report.

So, okay. Well, I appreciate that. I know you don't have any Olympia, I know you you, all have a a very difficult challenge. But, you know, however we can help to throw some bodies out and help, folks, the folks throw stuff into the dumpsters, you know, the the the we're we're we're there. But but with that, I'll I'll I'll move acceptance of the staff report and thank you again for the work that you do. It's great.

No throwing bodies away though. That was a that was a slip there. Next, I'm gonna go to council member Dewan.

Thank you, chair. I just wanna say I'm grateful and I appreciate all your hard work and especially all the volunteers out there. That volunteer, there are times out there on Saturday and Sunday away from their friend, families and friends, an activity that they could be doing especially on a beautiful sunny day or even a rainy day for that matter. And I've gone out there almost every single Saturday to to work with Beautify San Jose or keep Coyote Creek beautiful and many other events. Now the the volunteer is is the core value that supplement everything that we do here in our community is not only allow our young people to, you know, get take advantage of filling in their volunteer hours.

But I wonder do we have any particular program that we can print out a certification that show how many hours or what they've done because. Those certificate. Will help them. You know, give a leg up on on on an interview to a college or even a job. So I still volunteer with the the Red Cross, especially the Sound the Alarm program.

And there's time we have like 250 volunteers and and we we print out those certificate and I personally sign every one of them. And so our volunteers really appreciate the fact that, you know, you've taken the time and and give them a recognition for their time that they can put it in their their profile, the, you know, social media or just an an advantage to to procure a job or a position in school, whatever it is. Can we implement something like that?

We are celebrating all of our volunteers next Wednesday, right? Next Wednesday? Yes. So we have our annual recognition event that we do and we would be happy to consider in the future a certificate. PRNS, we love to give away swag and great things, but we are under cost control measures at the moment.

Part of the efficiencies and us moving to digital tools, this is something we've long worked with. I know we've worked with the city manager's office on this and previous mayoral administrations on trying to centralize this because our volunteers also sometimes work with environmental services department, right? So we are hoping to get there that we could do some sort of annual printout to show volunteers what their impact has been. At the moment, we don't have that capability, but absolutely that is a goal. Thank you.

Well, thank you. Do we have any particular ways to really reach out to our retirement communities and say, you know, it's good to be out in the open air. And they don't have to exert a whole lot of energy and get some fresh air and and still support, you know, be a great example not only for your, you know, our younger generation for for all of us. How do we reach out to them and and enable to get more hours of volunteers?

So, some of the recruitment efforts that I know of for our older adults is many of them attend our senior nutrition program. So, they like it, they want to get involved, they see the benefit of it, and oftentimes, well, the volunteer, the classes that we have, the majority of them are for older adults. We call them leisure classes. They're at no cost because we've recruited older adult volunteers that have maybe a specific skill. It could be a sport, it could be dance, it could be music, it could be art, and so we recruit folks that participate in our senior tutoring program, and now there are class instructors at some of our classes, our community centers.

Thank you. I know that our older adults have enormous amount of wisdom and experience and I've I've gone out there planting trees and and I've this one gentleman over in Seventhree, he has thirty five years experience with Evergreen College of maintaining and planting. And and he show us stuff that I didn't know. And we we can leverage those incredible experience to to help our young. Well, thank you very much again.

Thank you both for your comments. Just really quickly if we could go back to the slide, that is kind of like a map of the HPI, scores. Thank you. You had it for two seconds.

There.

Yeah. One that has the map. The map of the okay. Oh. Oh. Well, thank you. The reason why I just wanted to touch on this fairly quickly because we do have some advocates from my district that are present. So this is measuring the Healthy Places Index score of the different districts and it was in relation to their conversation on equity of how to make sure they're directing volunteers to districts that need the assistance. And so HPI, the Healthy Place Index, what that does is it measures the social conditions of that neighborhood and it scores it. Obviously there's different ratings.

Red is not good. Blue looks like it's blue or purple looks like it's in the middle. And then green looks like it's in the positive. If everyone can see, District 5 is the lowest in red at fourteen percent point nine six. If I could just ask staff, I know it's measuring just like the social conditions of the neighborhood. Is there like a couple bullet points of what those conditions are that they're measuring?

Sure, so What I can name off the top of my head is you know is there a grocery store in the neighborhood or people getting you know food at a liquor store you know so do you have access to food, are people educated within the neighborhood, do people have cars or are they relying on walking or public transportation, so that type of thing, what's the air quality in the community? So there's 25 and I can actually send you the full list.

Sure, love that. Essentially like a list of socially determining factors that can measure somebody's ability to access opportunity or you know equitable services. I just mentioned that we're gonna be having a study session next week at Tuesday council session specifically regarding the funding of our parks and how some parks and some districts are able to get more funding due to their proximity to development. If you look at that funding and who has access to that funding, it's very similar to these HPIs. My district still doesn't have those funds.

So we're trying to have that conversation on equity and I felt that I would be remiss if I didn't point out that some districts have things in the city of San Jose, some things don't. And it's on us as a council member to make sure that resources are provided to everyone here at the city of San Jose. Okay. Thank you. If we could call for a vote please.

Alright. The ayes have it. Thank you so much. Finally, for our final item of this council, Children and Youth Services Master Plan Status Report by Andrea Flora Shelton, Maria De Leon, Laura Buzzo, and Amanda I wanna say Oates? Oates. Oates. Sorry about that. And very, very grateful for this new book. Good to have it in form. Beautiful.

Thank you, Chair. Again, Andrea Flores Shelton, Assistant Director of Parks, Recreation Neighborhood Services. Pleased to have Laura Buzzo, our new division manager in PRNS with us today. Maria De Leon, Deputy Director and Amanda Otti with the Library. This is a joint effort between PRNS and the Library and the City Manager's Office.

So while we're fortunate to live in one of the wealthiest cities in the country, it is important to recognize the recent physical and institutional violence impacting youth in our community requires us to continue centering the voices of children, youth and adults who are experiencing many barriers including gun violence and fear of their own government. The Children's Youth Services Master Plan approved by the City Council one year ago yesterday demonstrates the City of San Jose's commitment to partner with diverse sectors of the community to provide opportunity pathways that improve the outcomes for children and youth from cradle to career. Today we're sharing how we have moved from the vision to implementation. And I'll turn it over to Maria De Leon.

Yes, thank you, Andrea. As our deputy city manager Angel Rios once said about the Children and Youth Services Master Plan, quote, we want to send a clear message to San Jose's children and youth. You are loved, you are valuable, and we are here to help you realize the destiny and purpose that is within you, end quote. As you can see in this slide, this intention is fully realized in this Children and Youth Services Master Plan vision, which includes fostering a future where every child and youth in San Jose blossoms into healthy, resilient, self sufficient adults enriched with abundant opportunities to live, work, play, dream, and prosper within the vibrant landscape of Silicon Valley. Since inception of the Children's Youth Services Master Plan effort, we've always been grounded in strong values, specifically those listed on this slide.

And, the seven priority areas listed here on the slide as identified as consistent community themes with those who participated in the focus groups, listening sessions, town halls, and surveys. The seven areas include early learning and childcare, learning and empowerment, health and mental wellness, housing access and security, meaningful and sustaining jobs, safe clean and connected communities, and systems transformation, the city of San Jose's system of care. These areas serve as focal points to the city and its partners maximizing their efforts to achieve significant community impact. And now, I'd like to pass it on to PR and S division manager, Laura Buzzo.

Thank you, Maria. The Children Youth Services Master Plan is designed to provide a strategic framework and approach for creating opportunity pathways. This is achieved by providing guidance on policy priorities, investments, and alignment of programs, operationalizing the city of San Jose Bill of Rights for children and young adults, establishing a strategic integrated city of San Jose system of care with a continuum of support for children and youth from cradle to career, and that collectively we can demonstrate long term and sustainable impact and measurable outcomes.

Next slide.

The Children Youth Services Master Plan does not intend to provide all the answers, as no one organization or entity can effectively or holistically serve youth and families. Therefore, over the year, city staff, through a collective impact approach, engaged a cross sector of community members to codesign the city of San Jose system of care with a no wrong door service delivery approach. In addition, we created seven priority areas, engaging over 120 representatives and community members from 62 organizations to help us refine the goals and objectives for implementation

in the demonstration sites in East San Jose. We also strengthened the city's college and career pathways by creating new partnerships and serving over 3,000 participants in fiscal year twenty three and twenty four. We also partnered with Blue Zones

organization organizations to to complete the Blue Zones Readiness Assessment Report, and in March 2025, city staff implemented and completed the Bill of Rights for Children Youth Audit recommendations. And then lastly, in partnership with Healthier Kids Foundation, nine thirty four health screenings were conducted at five school districts, and an additional 700 children will be screened before the end of the fiscal year. And I'd like to just take a moment to refer you to, attachment one, which has more detailed information about our progress and accomplishments, over the past year. And this visual illustrates through a collective impact approach how we have codesigned key elements and processes of the San Jose system of care with city staff across departments, community stakeholders, but even more importantly, with families, children, youth, and young adults. We will test and refine this no wrong door service delivery approach in partnership with all the community members in the demonstration sites in the communities of Mayfair, Poco Way, and 7 Trees at Santee's.

Together, we will prioritize the needs of youth by eliminating obstacles and connecting them to educational supports, workforce development, career exploration, health services, and other basic needs more effectively. And you can refer to attachment two, the City of San Jose System of Care No Wrong Door Handbook, which we created that also provides a little bit more detailed about the processes and tools. I'm gonna now hand it over to Amanda Audi.

Good afternoon. I'm here to talk about college and career pathways. In July 2022, the Google Community Benefit Fund invested in the library to launch a three year project, now known as the college and career pathways supportive strategy, to coordinate efforts throughout the city to achieve the goals listed on this slide. The initial three year project term closes in June 2025, and the team has made meaningful progress toward achieving these goals. We've built partnership structures and collaboration opportunities, including those related to the master plans meaningful and sustaining jobs priority area that allow for more targeted and effective programming to advance education and employment outcomes for youth in San Jose.

We focused on developing and expanding quality youth employment opportunities and programmatic supports including 11 city directed programs serving over 3,000 participants in the last fiscal year. We've presented information about college and career pathways annually to the NSE through the education strategy annual report which is typically presented in the fall. Our city team's strategic approach to this work is organized in a three part framework recognizing the various roles the city plays in addressing opportunities for workforce development and supporting economic stability. The first is the city's role as a classroom, which is led by the library department through the implementation of the education strategy. The second is the city's role as an employer, which is led by HR and supported through all departments facilitating workforce development programs and initiatives.

And the third is the city's role as a community connector, which is led by our Parks and Recreation Department through the implementation of the master plan and the youth empowerment alliance and uplifted by all departments, fostering partnerships and relationships with community organizations and its members. You can go to the next slide. This slide includes information about program improvement and development efforts in flight in 2025, including the development of a new apprenticeship program across four departments, the launch of a pilot for a new resilience core pathway at the library focused on computer science and aligned with our SJ access initiative, new professional development and workforce readiness training opportunities for youth connected to SJ Works, enhancements to the city's internship program, and new workforce development opportunities for adults with disabilities. I'll turn it back over to Laura.

Thank you.

So our next steps will just follow. We will, work collaboratively with our city staff and partners such as the C. C. Puede Collective, Somos Mayfair, GRAIL Family Services, Catholic Charities, Franklin McKinley Children's Initiatives, our school districts, County Of Santa Clara, and many other community partners, as well as our families and our youth. To implement the system of care in the demonstration sites, this eighteen month project will allow us to test, refine, and strengthen best practices to expand to other communities.

This will also position us to secure additional funding for sustainability expansion. In addition, we will provide increased scholarships at Mayfair, Seven Trees, and Emma Pruce to serve 158 youth. We will track performance measures and outcomes. We recognize that now more than ever, we need to align internal and external resources through braided funding such as funding from the County of Santa Clara Department of Family and Children's Services. We are leveraging investments of over $1,000,000 in grant funding and support to community based organizations in our demonstration sites.

We will finalize our evaluation plan with city staff and community partners to develop key performance indicators and track outcomes, and ensure progress and continuous quality improvement. And lastly, PRNS layered the Children Youth Services Master Plan priority areas, and the San Jose Youth Empowerment Alliance strategic plan extension and presented a draft to the policy team in February. In the extended plan, the San Jose Youth Empowerment Alliance had developed a uniform vision that encapsulates the goals of both the Youth Empowerment Alliance and the master plan, which is to build healthy, safe, resilient, and prosperous families in assets abundant neighborhoods while eliminating disparities for youth and families living in poverty. And in closing, we'd like to take a moment to thank our city staff and our many community partners and families, some of them who are here with us this afternoon, who continue to be engaged in realizing the vision of the Children Youth Services Master Plan. I'd like to now hand it over to our assistant director, Andrea Flores Shelton.

Again, we're open for questions. Thank you.

Alright. I had to throw you off a fastball right there. Do we have any, questions or comments from the public?

Yes. We have 10 speaker cards. We have one Spanish speaker card submitted, so Wordly will be assisting with that translation. If you submitted a speaker card for this item, please sit in the front row marked reserved in blue. The first available speaker can walk up to the podium to speak. You will each have two minutes. Thank you.

You're gonna call the names?

Linda, Adrian, Destiny, Veronica, Angelica, Bertha, Ashley, Michelle, Cara, and Victor. Thank you. Please make your way down. Whenever you're ready.

Thank you, City of San Jose. Hi. My name is Adrian Estrella Luna. I am a sophomore at Cristo Rey San Jose Jesuit High School and a resident in District 10. I just wanted to say thank you to the City of San Jose for helping make health screenings available at schools all over San Jose.

I can say from firsthand experience that it means a lot to the students of San Jose to be able to get these health screenings. With the funds you have provided plus the funds of other sources, we, Healthier Kids Foundation, were able to screen more than 16,000 students for dental, more than 6,000 students for hearing, and more than 6,000 students for vision in the city of San Jose already this year, and we still have more screening scheduled. Almost five thousand students were identified as having dental needs, and more than one thousand were in pain and having dental emergencies. As an alumni of Rocketship Si Se Puede, an intern at Healthier Kids Foundation, I am happy to be able to give back to my community with my help and services. Because of your support, kids like me can get our vision, hearing, and teeth checked right at school.

That means we can focus better in class and feel our best every day. Thank you for caring about students like me.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Good afternoon. My name is Melinda Snavely, and I'm here wearing two hats today, both as the chief executive officer for the Healthier Kids Foundation, but also as a resident of East San Jose and a mom of five youth here in San Jose. And I can say that from Healthier Kids Foundation, Adrienne shared with you that in combination of the funds provided for this initiative as well as other partners, actually we completed over 30,000 screenings so far, and as she shared about dental screenings, we've had over 7,000 needs come up that we've been approaching through the no wrong door approach to support. So supporting families with getting connected to care and services and medical homes, and it's been really important for those families to have a trusted advocate in the community. As a mom, what I can say is that I leverage all of your resources that you've made available through the Children and Youth Master Plan.

I have kids that ride the bus each day on the 25 line and land over at the library in East San Jose on Allen Rock, and they have a safe and welcoming place that they spend the afternoon doing their homework until I get home from work. I have a child who walks down Allen Rock Avenue and goes to the Roosevelt Community Center almost every afternoon and leverages the relationships in the safe, trusted space that's there as well. So thank you on behalf of my role as the Healthier Kids Foundation, but also as a mom in East San

Jose. Thank you. Next speaker.

Good afternoon, chair member Ortiz and members of the committee. My name is Veronica Goe. I'm the executive director of Grail Family Services. I'm here today to thank the city of San Jose for the investment and the development of the Children Youth Master Plan. Why is this master plan so important for the whole city of San Jose, but even more important for the East Side Of San Jose?

Because we know the families in East San Jose have been underinvested for many, many years. This is an opportunity to finally give them access to the resources that are available through city and county. So, we're very excited. We're extremely grateful that, Grail Family Services, in partnership with Somos Mayfair and representing the Sisapuede Collective, will take the responsibility to implement this amazing plan. So it's we don't take this responsibility lightly.

We know it's it's a huge responsibility, but we're ready to do it. I wanna highlight, that we're incredibly thankful to all the city staff, leadership of, Angel Rios, but very thankful for Laura Busso, for how she's partnered with community, not just for this project, but throughout her career. So I wanna give her, thanks. I wanna tell you that one of the things about the master plan that's very unique is how it was designed with community input. We intend, because that's how we work, to continue the investment on partnering with community, to hear their needs and response to those needs.

I think that it is important that the city listens to community because when you when government listens to community, you build trust in government. And with all the division that we're experiencing right now, building trust in government, it's important for all the residents of San Jose. So, again, we

Thank you. Next speaker.

Good afternoon. My name is Angelica Ramos, and I am the director of policy and communications at Grail Family Services and a mom of a toddler in their toddler school. We are grateful to the city of San Jose for your vision and leadership in developing the Children and Youth Master Plan and for your commitment to building a more equitable, coordinated, and family centered system of care. I wanna also echo a special thank you to PRNS division manager Laura Buzzo who has worked hand in hand many, many, many, many, many meetings with us to coordinate and center family voices. GFS is proud to be one of the demonstration sites helping to bring this vision to life.

In partnership with Somos Mayfair on behalf of the CCEPuere Collective, it's an honor and a challenge that we are ready to accept the implementation in East San Jose, a community that is long under resourced but rich in culture. We are especially encouraged that early childcare and education is a center focus of the Children and Youth Master Plan. East San Jose is a historic childcare desert and this investment is not overdue but also transformational as we face the potential cuts and funding loss with respect to child care. As we move forward, Grail Family Services remains committed to centering family voices, being innovative and providing the best possible information and insight throughout this pilot. We know that this is a powerful framework that allows us to integrate our services in ways that align with the city, the county and philanthropic partners, a true public private public partnership model.

Thank you again to the city for walking us alongside in this journey from cradle to career to uplift children, youth, and families across our city.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Hello. My name is Destiny, and I'm proud to be part of Grow Family Services and the Cisapoada Collective. I want to thank the city of San Jose for your partnership in developing the city's children and youth services master plan and the single system of care. We know that this is a big step forward for families in East San Jose, especially in neighborhoods like Mayfair that has been overlooked for too long. As a GFS staff member, I'm especially grateful that early care and education is a key part of the plan.

Our community has long been a childcare desert. Too many families don't have access to the quality care their children needs to grow and thrive. This investment gives our kids a stronger start in life, and GFS has been a the forefront of supporting our providers and families through child care access and economic mobility. We're also really excited about the no wrong door approach, making it easier for families to get connected to the services they need without having to tell their story over and over again. GFS is ready to get to work. We're honored to help lead this effort in Mayfair with Somos, and we look forward to showing what's possible with when the city and community come together for our children. Thank you for believing in East San Jose families.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Yes. My coworkers to Grow and Lydia and Marta. We're here on behalf of Grief Family Services and the community, if we may. I am a graduate of our Jobs to Grow program. We would like to thank the city of San Jose for its collaboration in the development of the city's children and youth services master plan and the single system of care.

We know this is a huge step forward for families in East San Jose, especially in neighborhoods like Mayfair, which have been overlooked for so long. As child care providers, we are especially grateful that he Early care and education are a key part of the plan. Our community has long been a child care desert. Too many families lack access to the quality care their children need to grow and thrive. This investment gives our children a stronger start in life, and Grief Family Services has been at the forefront of supporting our providers and families through access to child care and mobility, ours, our providers and families through access to child care and economic mobility.

Next speaker.

We're also very excited about the no ground door approach, which will make it easier for families to access services. Thank you.

Hi. I am Cara Ramirez. I am a junior at Abraham Lincoln High School and a member of Jovenes Activo Somos Mayfair. I'm here to reaffirm my full support to this plan and urge the committee to ensure that adequate staffing and technical support are in place for the long term implementation for the children and the youth master plan. I also want to I want also want there to be ensuring that educators have the tools and training needed to support their students so that no student feels left out. I want students to get more access to career opportunities so they have access needed to experience for the experience required to reach their goals for the future they want to achieve. Thank you.

Thank you, next speaker.

Good afternoon, my name is Ashley Guerrero and I'm here as a Jovenes Activo's program coordinator. I'm also here representing Somos who is a part of the collective. First, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the staff for their dedication to the children and youth master plan, particularly for adopting and implementing the bill of rights for children and youth. This is a significant step forward. However, despite this process progress, young people in our community continue to face considerable challenges, including a shortage of resources and youth programs.

Though I am new in my role with the it is clear to me that many select the necessary support to achieve their educational goals. For far too often, youth are dismissed and not taken seriously by adults in the city. We're here today to remind the committee that real progress can't happen without a strong commitment from the council. The budget for this year must prioritize funding for the children and youth master plan, and I'm here just as a reminder to reaffirm our full support for this plan and urge the committee to ensure that there is adequate staffing and technical support to support the long term implementation of the children and youth master plan. Thank you.

Thank you. We have one more card submitted for Carmina. Next speaker.

Good afternoon, Victor Vasquez, proud member of CSA Pote Collective. Thank you to GREL for being such a true partner in this struggle. I wanna speak a little bit about what it means to support and why we need resources for our youth. Know, Veronica mentioned that we have a great responsibility that we're gonna take with you and the county, and there's a lot to be at stake. 66% of our Latino youth has faced arrest and citations in 2001.

That is a difference of their white counterparts are only at fourteen percent. More than fifty three percent of youth 14 17 are arrested and they come from 95000 '1 Hundred 16, 95001 27, 95121, and 95111 where I live. So definitely places an issue in race as well. And if you look deeper into the statistics that young people in juvenile hall face, eighty five percent of girls and sixty seven percent of boys have significant issues with depression, anxiety, and emotional factors. Thirty one percent of those young girls thought about committing suicide, twelve percent for boys.

Forty percent of those young people locked up talked about a lack of parental supervision, physical and sexual abuse, and trauma affecting their actions and decision making. And these are just some of the stats, and I have more for you. But it's clear that these adverse childhood experiences have long term effects, negative impacts on the health, the opportunity and the well-being of youth, not just when they're a newborn, but throughout our lifetime. And those experiences are impacted mostly in certain neighborhoods and with certain groups of people. So today, as you move it forward, today's a reminder that we're taking responsibility to heal our youth, to love and care for them so they can live a long and successful life.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Good evening. My name is Michelle Ortega, and I'm the new youth and community engagement coordinator at Somos Mayfair. During my teenage years living in the East Side Of San Jose, I witnessed firsthand the effects of underinvested in youth programs and resources. I remember struggling to find supportive spaces after school, places where I could explore my interests and help my studies. Many of my peers and I had to navigate financial hardships, language barriers, and limited access to academic and emotional support on our own.

What we need it and still need are community based programs that offer academic support, mental health resources, career explorations, and safe recreational spaces. We need mentorship opportunities that reflect our culture, our identity, and our lived experiences. With these kind of programs, we can build a stronger foundation for our youth, one that breaks cycles of poverty, promotes equity, and opens real pathways to success. As someone who grew up in this environment and is now serving my community, I know how critical it is that we invest in these supports. I am here to reaffirm my full support for this plan and urge to the committee to ensure that adequate staffing and technical support are in place for the long term and implementation of children and youth masters plan.

Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Good afternoon. My name is Carmina Valdivia. I'm here representing Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County and the Franklin McKinley Children's Initiative. I want to begin by thanking the city for your vision and leadership in shaping this master plan. As someone deeply involved in the community through FMCI, I see firsthand how essential it is to have a plan that reflects the voices, hopes, and needs of our families and children.

I'm especially proud that the Santee And 7 Trees neighborhood was chosen as a demonstration site. This is a home to so many resilient, engaged residents, and through initiatives like ours, we've seen the power of community driven change. Now with this plan, we can have a chance to align our efforts and show what's possible when the community is at the center. With continued support from the city and our partners, we can turn this vision into action and build a future shaped by and for the people who live there. Thank you for your commitment to making this future real.

I believe that's everyone. Back to the committee. Thank you.

Alright. Thank you so much. I see we have one council member with their hand raised. Council member De Juan.

Thank you, chair. Thank you, staff. Thank you to the speakers and and our collaboration between the city, the county, and the nonprofit organization. You know, I I have three kids. And I just wanna say this, it's not it's the community responsibility to make sure that our children succeed and when we don't, we really truly don't have that great future for them, then we fail.

And failure is not an option in this arena. We must succeed at all cost. I just have a few question that do we have a within the program, you know, the the different steps there that help and to guide our children to be to have some type of financial management? Because I I think a lot of our younger children now are grown up, you know, the only thing they know is the the plastic card which is, you know, we we get sucked into that whereas the interest rate now I think is on the average is like 29%. That that's just outrageous.

That's robbery in illegal ways. Right? And do we have any type of program like that for our youth?

Thank you for the question councilmember. I can speak on behalf of the library that there are examples of those programs focused on financial literacy that are presented to youth at our branches, and we are working right now on a project to identify a core series of workshops and learning opportunities that we can offer through our college and career pathways focused programming plank is what we call it, and one of the main learning objectives that we're thinking about is financial literacy, including financial literacy about how to pay for college responsibly and also more generally. We have some really trusted community partners who are doing this work in San Jose as well including through the UC Cal SOAP Consortium. So we have some real experts that you can rely on, but thinking about how we can elevate those programs and access to that kind of information within our community leveraging our libraries and community centers, sort of, and schools as hubs for connecting people to those resources is something that will be part of this implementation plan in the next year.

Fantastic. And I I would hope that we start teaching our youth to put 25% of their earning or gifts into perhaps a five twenty nine plans for their future education. What strategy will be employed to ensure that the plan remain relevant as the need of our children evolve? And and you know, they they evolve pretty quickly these days.

Yes. Thank you for your question, council member. I think our our community partners said it perfectly, right? It's important that we continue to engage our young people, middle school all the way to young adulthood, and the families to really understand and hear from them what are some of the emerging issues, right? We know that our communities sometimes change demographic wise, language necessities, educational needs, and so it's important that we continue to do that consistently throughout the implementation, and more specifically when we evaluate the program.

And we have to be transparent and make sure that we are also responsive to those evaluation outcomes, so that if we're not moving the mark, that we have some introspection to really think about and discuss with our community members on where do we need to shift so we can make sure that we, achieve those outcomes.

Thank you. How will the city continue to, be engaged with our community and stakeholders, to adopt and adjust to plan over time?

Yes. So, if you saw in our, both in the master plan but also in our status report, we will have committees, steering committees advisories at the community level with our community partners, but also across our community stakeholders. So as an example, within our Mayfair Poco Way community, Somos Mayfair, Sisapuede Collective, Girl Family Services will be leading community partnerships that's representative of service providers, educators, and families to discuss, you know, what are some issues or challenges that are bubbling up perhaps in our systems, in how we're serving families, and then be able to elevate that. And some of that may be elevated to you, to city council, if it's a city specific issue or concern, and some of it may go to a county or school district, so depending on that. But that ensures that at every level of oversight, we have a way of being able to provide continuous feedback on what's working well and what's not, so that we can be responsive to families.

Well, thank you very much. And and for the news out there, we we listen to you. We hear you, and we'll support you. And with that, I, move to accept the report to CSY master plan.

Alright. Thank you, council member De Juan. Council member Candelas?

Thank you chair. No. Thank you for for the report and for the feedback. I I you know, I think this is, one of those, difficult plans to to to carry out because the But I'm appreciative and you know I think I appreciate the nimbleness of our plan to be able to be as we evaluate see how we can prioritize and or shift depending on the feedback that we get from our residents, from our community groups and that's super important. I I guess, you know, I I I I I'm curious to see the the outcomes we achieve in the next year while we implement and and have these these pilot sites and have that investment from the county.

And, you know, what what I'm I'm curious and what I'm I'm committed to is seeing seeing that that investment and that commitment from the city long term. And so that's gonna be the challenge, knowing where our budget is and where our budget is going. But but this is this is critical work that goes hand in hand with public safety. I'm sure you all know this. I don't have to tell you all, but but this is this is it's it's it's exciting. And and and being a part of something transformative is is something I'm grateful for and I appreciate the the the leadership of of the department, Angel, and and everybody involved as well as our our nonprofit partners.

Council member, if I could just add, you used the word transformative, and I think I want to sort of really just emphasize this is systems change, really policy work. Numerous amount of stakeholders that Laura's been working about, these are the things that we have wanted to do for decades, right? And so you have this vision and this new reality with funding backing it up to make this transformative work move forward. And so I think we still have a lot of transactional things that we need to do behind the scenes, but if when we talk about what these outcomes look like, right, it's going to be in many different forms. The process, how someone feels when they walk in, that there's these warm handoffs between agencies and that we're working together.

Our community groups that we're funding have really been pioneers in transformative work, right? So we're now the city's catching up in a way and also leading the way in terms of really investing in this, again, vision to implementation. But thank you for, you know, these outcomes are going to be challenging because it is transformative work, not our let's count the number of heads. This is going to be hard, but it is definitely with this type of energy it's achievable.

Well said, thank you.

Alright, thank you colleagues. I just wanna start my comments by also thanking staff for your dedicated work on this master plan, but also the report before us today. I also wanna elevate you, Laura, for your dedication to this work as well as the leadership of Angel Rios. I know that everyone in that booth was highly involved in this plan and just wanna thank you for creating this blueprint that will hopefully help many of the youth throughout the East Side. I also want to thank and give a heartfelt thank you to all of our advocates who showed up today to make sure that you were advocating for the continued support and development of the Children and Youth Services Master Plan.

When this council approved this master plan almost a year ago, I wanna say now, we communicated, we sent a communication to our youth and that was that we see you, we believe in you, and we are going to be investing in your future. Since then, as I mentioned, our city staff, our community partners, our nonprofit leaders who are here today have been working tirelessly to transform the vision here in this document into a reality. And however, we understand that a plan won't be a plan unless it has robust support, funding, as mentioned, I think we've talked a lot about funding today, in order to achieve its potential. If we are truly committed to transforming the lives of young people in our city and building a city of San Jose where every child blossom into a healthy, resilient and self sustaining adult, then we have to match our vision with the proper infrastructure. That means identifying the additional staffing and the additional technical support we will need to see in order to have this work.

And that's why I asked for an MBA during the March budget message to ask the city manager to identify additional staffing and technical support required for the long term implementation of the Children and Youth Master Plan. I just ask my fellow committee members that you keep an open mind to that and that we focus on supporting this as we push this through the urgency and seriousness ness that it deserves. So that we can fulfill our promise to the many generations of San Jose who have not been able to participate in the opportunity and the wealth that has been generated here in Silicon Valley. And then also to make sure that this amazing plan doesn't just stay there. It shouldn't just be a plan that's on a binder or in a binder on a shelf somewhere, it needs to have life breathed into it.

And so we do that by fully funding this program, by fully staffing this program, and making sure that if conversations come around cuts, we defend this program. So thank you and let's go to a vote. Alright. The ayes have it. Thank you all. I believe that brings us to our last item, is open forum. If there's any comments.

There's no public comment.

Okay. Thank you all. That adjourns us. Alright.