City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening. Thank you everyone for being here. Plymouth City Council regular meeting of Thursday, March 12th at 6:31 p.m. Um, if I can get a roll call. Council member Bottomley absent. Council member Cranford here. Council member Dell here. Vice Mayor Hornish here. Mayor Nun here. Thank you. We have a quorum. We stand for the pledge of

allegiance. Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, this time we're move on. Item two, approval of city council regular meeting agenda of March 12th, 2026.

I move to approve the regular meeting agenda for March 12th. I'll second it. Thank you. Council member Cranford. I. Council member Dell I. Vice Mayor Hornish. I. Mayor Nun. I. Thank you. Motion passes. This time we're gonna open to regular meeting public comment. Um I have a comment card here from Peter Garaldi. You please stand. Your mic on. Can I interrupt real quick? I just wanted to let everybody know I'm on call and my on call phone is here. So if it rings I apologize in advance. Thank you. Just

I need you to press the turn your mic on right there and then you have to talk into the microphone. Camera will set up it for you here. Oh, okay. All right. This is not on your agenda,

but I'd like to address the intersection off Highway 49 that intersects Mill Street coming up this way, Proctor going up, and Locust going the other way. Uh you got poles on both sides of the street, but you don't have street lights on them. Uh you have a pole a little bit south of that intersection that has a street light on it. Uh we had that foggy spell here a while back where it was dark. Well, that hole lit that area up so good it looked like I thought that was the intersection, but it wasn't. Almost went into the ditch. So, if the city could look at a way of getting lights on those two poles on both ends, both sides of that street. Uh, they're right close to the diff one on the north side. There's a tree that would probably have to be trimmed some, but there's no reason why you guys can't put street lights on both of those. And there's even one another big and pole up towards the church. And you could light that intersection that will very well. and then you probably won't make that mistake again. During the daytime, nighttime with without fog, probably no problem. But when that fog comes in, you can't hardly see the road, let alone see where you're going. Anyway, if you guys would take that under consideration, it' be great. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for your comment. Other people have brought it up. It's uh time and money, stuff we're going to be trying to do. Thank you. Do we have Zoom on? Do we have anybody on Zoom? is on. Okay. Anyone else for public comment? Hearing no one seeing nothing on Zoom. We'll move on to Well, actually, I do have something. Yeah, I do have something I want to read into for public comment. Um, let me get to it here real quick. The councilwoman Bottomly wasn't able to be here tonight, but she's asked me to read this for her. So, she says, "It was my intention to attend tonight's city council meeting via Zoom to participate in agenda items that are important to me, particularly the employment agreement we are drafting for the city manager position. However, after a citizen raised a concern that my participation could potentially constitute a Brown Act violation, I decided it would be best not to attend. I am currently on vacation with my aging parents and am therefore unable to attend the meeting in person. As a member of the ad hoc committee, I have still spent several hours during this trip drafting and editing the proposed employment agreement and compensation package. I believe the citizens of Plymouth would agree that maintaining a healthy work life balance is important. I extend my sincerest apologies for not being able to participate this evening and look forward to seeing everyone at the next meeting. We'll close the public comment. Move to item 4.1 2025. Oh, wait. Yeah. 2025 general plan annual progress report.

Um, once a year the state of California requires that the planning department bring the general plan annual progress report to the city council for discussion. um before we submit it to the state and we're required to submit it to the state um prior to April 1st. In the city of Plymouth, we also bring it to the planning commission prior to the city council so they also have a chance to to hear the report. Um similar to last year um and you have the very long general plan annual progress report in front of you. similar to last year. Most of the goals and the policies of that gen of our general plan um have not been complied with and we most likely will not. There's a number of things in there that are very costly. They make much more sense for bigger cities and so they remain um not completed this time. Within the last year though, we have uh completed two items. We have our objective design standards which were adopted by the city council with the companion zone zoning ordinance amendments and that complies with the um policies within the general plan that talk about design guidelines and then we have the improvements along Highway 49 that have been um completed the walkway etc. As far as the housing element goes, the housing element is in there. Although we are not certified, we have adopted our six cycle housing element. And with regards to the housing element, we are working on accessory dwelling units. Um the ordinance that's required as one of our policies. That ordinance was reviewed by the planning commission last week and they adopted a resolution recommending city council approval. And so you will hear that soon at the next meeting, the next council meeting. So, that's on its way to being completed. There are several others that are in there that we continue to work on and you will start seeing more zoning ordinance amendments related to implementation of the housing.

As far as projects that we've had within the last year, because that's also part of the general plan annual progress report. Um, we still have several projects that are in planning. We have the Arco gas station which has been an ongoing project for a number of years. We have the Plymouth Hotel. That's the 88 room hotel. Uh that is still in planning. We're waiting for a resubmitt by the applicant of their studies required for the SQL review of their project. He wanted to have his own studies prepared um for that review. So we're waiting on final submitt of all of his studies so that we can move forward. We have the Gage Ranch project which is uh still incomplete. They have recently submitted plans to us for a cursory review prior to submitting a formal set of plans, but they are still working towards their project. Aurora Woods, which is 109 single family dwelling units, which has been a project off and on since 2008, has reapplied, so they're back in for review. They are incomplete. And then recently, projects that were approved include the drink bar restaurant across the street from city hall. that will be the modification of that existing building to a restaurant and bar with outdoor seating and live entertainment outside. And then we have Ned's Table also in the downtown who has approval of uh a bar and restaurant and some improvements to the building as well as an area outside. And then we have uh the fiveplex residential project on Sutter Street which was recently approved um which will provide some multif family units within the city. That's what we have been working on for the past year. We continue to work on those other major projects but um moving forward as we work on those staff does need to start working on housing element implementation. So there will be a number of things that will be coming forward hopefully soon. I'd be happy to

answer any questions you have about the general plan, any of the policies within it, or any other questions you have. We want to uh Debbie, do you have any questions? We should probably start with public comment. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm going to go to public comment on the general plan progress report. Anyone?

I'm not able to see the online. Is there any? I can normally see it. So, there's nothing. Okay. Okay. So, we have no one online and anyone in the audience public comment on the general plan. What's that? Uh, no, we're past that. We are on the general plan annual progress report item 4.1. If you would like if you like to comment on that. Okay. Okay. Hearing and seeing nothing, we'll move on. Any of the council members? Deborah? No. Wendy, sorry. No.

Yes. Uh, can you tell me more about the fiveplex multi? What was it? So, five fiveplex multif family um one-story uh residential development on Sutter on a vacant piece of land. It was approved by the director due to the size. They're smaller units. Um, three are designated for affordable housing, um, low income, and then the other two will be market rate, and then they will have an ADU once they apply for a building permit. How much space is that taking up? Do you know square footage wise?

It was I would have to look it up to be 100% for sure, but round 4,910. It's very specific still

approximately. It's somewhere in those numbers. Uh, and then I know you brought up the Arco. Um, I thought we were in almost like not final stages, but getting to the finish line with that. Can you give me a couple more specifics? So for ARCO uh where we are right now is many many months ago we distributed the mitigated negative declaration for public review and there were comments on it and the preparer of that document determined that he needed to make changes to the document to address the comments. Uh that required uh a change order that came before you to authorize approval of it. Don't I could be wrong. I believe it was around $28,000. And then the applicant is determining on whether or not they would like to pay that amount to move their project forward. They have not paid it yet. So, where we are right now is I need to pay it so that we can finish it.

And I did ask them to change the design of their project. Uh there was several comments that I felt they could address and so I have seen revised plans but they haven't been formally submitted yet. Got it. So next stepping stone if you will. Yeah. Next step is I need them to pay pay or submit plans if they wanted to submit them but they have it is in their court right now. I'm just waiting on them. Okay. Thank you.

So I jinxed myself by making the statement that I made earlier. I've received a crisis call, so I'm going to have to leave. Um, I probably won't be back in time for much else. It's in Pioneer. So, um, I'm going to sign off now. Do I need to do anything, Andreas? Sorry, you guys. That's right. Nope. All right. Yeah.

Okay. I uh I don't have any questions on it. No.

Okay. So, we'll move on to item 4.2, the resource connection presentation. Before he um gets the slides up, I I do want to say I really appreciate that you have a kids zone back there. You're the only city that does it. How long have you guys had that? Is that fairly new?

About almost two years.

Okay, cool. because I absolutely love that. So, cuz we I mean we we'll get to it in a minute, but we work with children, families, and that's super unique. So, now I can bug other cities about it and tell them, "Hey, Plymouth's doing it. You can do it, too." So, thank you for that. But, um I'm Mia Hus. I am a resource and referral specialist with the resource connection. And with me, I have Karen Frasier. She is a resource and referral supervisor with the resource connection. And our department is specifically childc care resource and referral which a lot of people don't know what that is but it's exactly what it what um what what it says it is is what it is. There we go. Um who is the resource connection? So we are the behind the scenes people that make child care possible in Amodore and Calaveris counties. Obviously we're talking about Amodore County and the city of Plymouth tonight but we do service both of those rural communities. We are a nonprofit. We are what is called a resource and referral agency. Every county in California has one. We help people find child care, pay for child care, and support those childcare providers who are doing that frontline quality care. And we are, like I said, this huge umbrella across both of the counties. We also have the women infant children, the wick program, food banks in Calvary County, crisis centers in Calvary County. So, we we do a little bit of everything. We're kind of a resource hub for Andor County. Oh wow, this clicker really clickers and me don't get along. So there's our whole presentation. We're done. I'm just kidding. So what is the resource connections vision and mission? Um our vision is strong families, sustainable communities, and successful individuals. And our mission is to engage families, empower communities, and enrich the lives of residents in both Amodore and Calaveris counties. I think most cities would agree that this is their vision and mission as well.

This is a snapshot of who we've served. It's on your one pagers that you have in front of you. We have served 335 providers last year and over 3,000 children and over 570 families. That is across both counties, but again, those are still pretty big numbers for the rural communities that we serve. And I am going to let Karen kind of give you a little more in-depth about all of the programs that we offer just within our resource and referral department because it does get very busy in our office. Good evening. I promise you this is not the uniform for the resource connection. We did this on our own this morning, but we're sticking with it. Um so I'm Karen Fraser.

Can you step closer to the microphone, please? Thank you.

I'm with the resource connection. I've been with them just over six years. Um, these are kind of the core four of our programs. We definitely like to look at it split 50/50 between child care subsidy programs and then the providers programs. But for the subsidy side, we help providers or parents and families and guardians find child care. And we do that in a couple different ways. They can call us directly in our office. We have a website that's available to them 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and they can search for child care. Um the good part about the calling in is that they get that technical assistance component. We're really able to help navigate the system with them. Um especially in our areas, often times we find families are having to travel from one county to the other or vice versa um to use child care. They might work in one county and they might have childare in another. Um another big component and you'll see on the um one pager is the childare subsidy program. So, this program is built off of multiple contracts that we receive to help pay for child care. Um, at this point, it's not covering the full cost of child care. We're finding the co-pays the parents are having to do are getting bigger and bigger. Um, but it does help subsidize it. It's going to help offset a lot of the big cost. And we did just do um over $5.8 million in subsidies were paid to providers between the two counties. I will say the counties are split about 50/50 across the line as far as providers, as far as families, and as far as subsidies go. It's about 50/50. So, I would say a pretty good estimate is just under 3 million went in Amodore County directly. Um, the other part of our program is the resource and referral part and that's the really supportive part for childcare providers. Um, we support with technical assistance. We are the direct line when someone wants to become a childare provider

licensed. We do trainings. We um help them as much or as little as they need getting that licensed facility. We also help centers as well. And we also support what we call this next one FFN care. This is a big bulk of the providers we have in our communities. Friend, family, and neighbor is licensed exempt care. If it's a close family member, they do not have to go through the background process. if it's a neighbor or someone that's a little more distant, they do have to go through the trust line process, which is a fingerprint background check. Um, some of our other programs, I'll go really quick. We do run the emergency childcare bridge program. We do that in both counties that helps support families caring for children that are in the the foster system with immediate child care. So, our subsidy program does take a little bit of time. There's paperwork involved, pay stubs, things like that. Where the emergency gets a direct referral from CPS, we're able to pay for childcare immediately with all that extra documentation. Uh, we have a lending library in our office. We are in Mo Hills, our main office about 10 minutes up Jackson. Has over 5,000 items inhouse, all educationalbased from birth to about 12 years old. That is completely free for families and educators to borrow. They come in, they go shopping, um they borrow stuff, they use it, they bring it back, and it's a really good supplemental resource that helps the quality of child care. Um we do produce the community resource directory. If ever anyone's ever seen that little booklet that's in a lot of services that has every service you could imagine between Amidor and Calgary County, we publish about 4,500 of those throughout the year and distribute them. Um, and then we also offer trainings, professional growth for childcare providers. Uh, that looks like CPR, bringing it into the county, which anybody who knows if you have to get a CPR card, you're going to Sacramento or Stockton at this point. So, we're able to do it locally. We do that in both

counties. Um, and then just basic professional development for childcare providers. Um, we run the grandparent respbit program in Amadore County. This program provides over, well, we did provide over 460 hours last year for grandparents raising grandchildren. This program is for grandparents that have custody of their grandchildren. We're able to pay them 16 hours of respit care per month where they're able to go to a doctor appointment, just take a day of rest. Um, and then they have a monthly support group where they get together and kind of just talk about their stuff. We're able to bring things, trainings to them as well. And then our consumable closet that was developed during COVID when everything was shut down. No one was able really to go shopping anywhere. We were able to use CO funds to bring supplies to our educators locally. So we have a closet area in our office where they're able to come in and shop directly for their really crucial supplies, glue, paper, paint, those type of things. And it's completely free to bring back into their program.

There's a lot. I always throw her under the bus for that one and then she lets me take care of the rest. Um I will be brief as possible. Uh this is our community impact snapshot for 2324. On top of the um 25 stats that are on our one pager, I just love to point out the childcare subsidies. You notice in 2324 it was 4.7 and now we're at 5.8. We're expected to see that just continue to grow. And as Karen mentioned, it's not providing the full it's not even close to the full cost of care. So, it does subsidize the care and as you see on these postcards, these are what we hand out to families. And you can see the income guidelines, they do change every year for a family's eligibility to get child care subsidy. So, for um our citizens here in Plymouth and our constituents and families and neighbors that we know, this information can actually help a whole lot of people. And you'd be surprised that families actually do qualify for subsidized childare. A lot of people just don't know about it. And we want to be able to use the funding because if we don't use the funding then it goes away and and you guys know how that is. It's just so important that we spread the word and get those families as much support as we need especially in the economy that we see families struggling already. I don't want to click it too much. So the city of Plymouth, how many childcare providers do you have? Right. So you do have two licensed family childare homes and you have two licensed childcare centers and one licensed exempt center. The best way to describe what a license exempt center is is just kind of like an afterchool program and that's with the school district. So the homes in the centers just vary based on size and ratio with um the amount of children. But you do you do have a pretty decent amount for the size of a city that we are. And the resource connection has been around for 45 years. Um this may have been the first time some of you have heard about the resource connection and we totally welcome you to learn more. We do host what is called the annual Celebrate Our Children Festival this

year. It's going to be on April 25th and we encourage you to come out. It's all over Facebook right now. We're putting up flyers around the county. It's a great family event. Just we get a thousand attendees. It's at the Italian picnic grounds this year. A bunch of nonprofits including ourselves. We have tables with all these amazing resources and they have kid-friendly activities at these tables. While the parents can get resources that will help them thrive as a family, the kiddos are having fun and it's just an absolutely amazing event and I encourage you to come out and save the date on April 25th. We also host what is called provider nights where we have after hours business hours for us where we stay late so our childare providers can drive all the way out to our office and receive a goodie bag with materials and educational items that will help them in the classroom. So for us, it's just so critical that we support our families and children by supporting the child care providers who are caring for these kiddos every single day. It's very critical work. And as Karen highlighted, the consumable closet, lending library, and the workshops that we do, we try to just keep everyone keeping up that quality of care and making sure that people aren't going, I don't want to go over there to that childare provider because I don't like the quality of care that they're providing. And we can try to make sure everyone in our county is providing that quality care. So why are we here? Why are we presenting in front of the city of Plymouth? It seems kind of an interesting thing for us to do, right? We've been doing this road trip across Amar and Calver counties. And we just want to make sure that when you guys are making decisions up there that you're thinking of the families and children that you serve and we appreciate that because at at its core, these children are the future leaders of our county and our cities. And just keep in mind to support your local child care centers and providers. If you know someone who is a childcare provider, maybe ask them if you can come tour their center or their home and just see what it's like or talk to them and learn about their struggles and how you can help them as a council member. Come visit and tour our office. I know it's a little bit of a trek, but our office in McCllome Hill, we've had folks come visit and they're actually surprised the amount of

resources we provide in the office that we have. We do have a local child care council. It's a um LPC, a local planning committee. It's called the Amor Childcare Council and they meet on the first Tuesday of every month. If you're interested in getting involved in that or just learning more about them, definitely reach out to me. You can scan the QR code on our one pager and our contact is available. And just make sure you're prioritizing childcare centers and providers in your general plan. It's already required by the state to do so. Um, but it's always important to make sure that if there's ways to kind of implement more support within the general plan, we would greatly appreciate it. and also crafting ordinances and making decisions that are friendly for providers, childcare centers, and families with children. It's always good to keep them in mind. And I just want to say thank you so much for your time. I know it's been kind of um a longer presentation than you're used to and um I I welcome any questions if you have any or if you just have any statements. We also appreciate that.

I got some questions. Uh on April 25th at the Tail and Picnic Grants, what's the time frame for that? Yes, it's from 11:00 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thank you. And then I just want to ask, how can people donate supplies and like what do you look for in donations? We do have um on our website, we have a QR code that links to our Amazon cart that has all the supplies that we generally put into the consumable closet.

Um when you purchase that, it goes directly to our office. Um, we go out for community grants often to be able to come do it. Like we went to we go to Amador Giving Tuesday every year and just look for different type of grants to help fund it. Um, and then we also take just general straight donations. We've had people who are clear cleaning out their craft closet, bring stuff to us. Um, so crafting markers. Yeah. glue sticks, paper, right? Paints supplies, anything you can think of that little children would need to do art and crafts, play-doh. Um, where else do you get funding from? Is it state driven as well or? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So, um, yeah, most of most of our funding, especially with, um, subsidy and our resource and referral is state funding. Um, we do have just a small bit of federal funding, but most of it is state. And then we do have um smaller grants with like other community organizations and like for our consumable closet that we work off too. Okay. Um for those not here, I'm just going to read off your phone number and website. Uh if you're local 2097541075 or 877-9449911 and their website is rr.trcac.org. Thank you for coming on. Thank you. Thank you.

All right, we're going to move on to We should ask if there's public comment on that as well. If anybody anyone like to make public comment on that presentation being none, no one on Zoom. Okay. Thank you for being here and uh we will close public comment. Move on to item 5.1 or minute consent calendar items. Do we have any correspondence? No. Okay. Um and approving the regular minutes. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. You're welcome. I'm just checking it. Okay. So, public comment on consent calendar items. hearing. See nothing. Okay. You want to make a motion to approve the I'll make a motion to approve the regular meeting minutes of February 26, 2026. I'll second the motion. Council member Dell I. Vice Mayor Hornish I. Mayor Nun I. Thank you. Motion passes.

All right. All right. I can move to item 7.1, the adoption resolution 2026-3, authorizing the execution of amendment professional services agreement with asset environmental incorporation to extend the term of the agreement to December 31st, 2026.

Gage Ranch, as I mentioned earlier, is still in progress. They have been a project for a while. Uh we are still working out some of the issues of the project and they as I mentioned recently submitted a tenative map for cursor review. They do remain incomplete. We need a formal submitt of a tenative map. I need a formal submittal of their plan development documents and then they'll need to work out a development agreement with us. However, we can't ever go to hearing without a SQA document and there are steps along the way that we have to to meet to complete SQA work. And so our SQL work is delayed because of everything else. The way the contract with the scent is is that it's a yearly based um contract. So every year we come back and ask for another contract extension uh so that we can complete the work. The work is very near completion. Uh we will need to do some final work based on any changes to the tenative map. Um after our review we'll know a little bit more. I just don't know more of what we need to change at this point. But some minor modifications still need to be made related to the ultimate change from the RV park expansion with Gage Ranch to just a single family residential development. So for example, the traffic analysis had to be revised. So work does still need to be completed. Um, so we would like to ask that you continue it for another year so that we can get the EI work done and hopefully get this project to hearing within a year.

Thank you. Do we have any public I just wanted to add one quick note in the staff report. We're asking for an extension until December 31st, 2026. The draft that ascent prepared accidentally referred to 2027. Oh. So that's a typo that we'll ask them to fix in the version that we actually execute. And be clear, we're asking for an extension through the end of this year, not next year.

Okay. All right. So, do we have open it up? I guess public comment item 7.1. Any public comment? Nothing online. Okay. Council discussion. Okay. So, can get a motion to adopt this resolution? I'll make a motion to adopt the resolution to extend um the agreement until December 31st, 2026. Second. Council member Dell. Hi, Vice Mayor Hornish. Hi, Mayor Nun.

I thank you. Motion passes. Okay, moving on to item 7.2. 2. Continue discussion. Ordinance 2026-2 adopting procurement policy CC-45. City man. No, go ahead. I'll I'll take this one. It's the same draft we had last time. It was giving everybody a chance to kind of go through the the policy in detail. We haven't made any changes to the draft that's in your packet today. So, this is an opportunity to provide some feedback and then we'll actually bring it back for adoption at the next meeting. We're not not intending to adopt it today. Just looking for feedback here today on the procurement policy.

All right. Um we'll start with public comment on 7.2. Any public comment? Nothing. All right. We'll close public comment and move to council discussion. Deborah, do you have anything on it?

I did have a question. Um, under soul sourcing, who approves the soul source? Is it the city manager or if there's if we're looking at doing soul source, will it be based on um like the price range of approval or does it come before the council? How how is that going to be determined? Depends on the price range. However, do you have any more specifics price range wise? Like up to $5,000 this or 10,000? Like what are these thresholds? I'm just curious if you know them. If not, no worries.

Don't know them off the top of my head. I thought they were in the policy. Just scrolling through here. If there's other comments you want to keep going through while I'm looking for that answer question. So uh one of the things um that I was curious about is under the approval authority um we had it has department head at 50,000 or less city manager at uh 50,000 and one to 100,000 and then anything 100,000 and one or more um is city manager upon city attorney or mayor concurrence. I was wondering if we could maybe lower those a little bit. Do 25,000 for a department head, 25,0001 to 50,000 for city manager and then 50,000 in one or more

council. Yeah. So last time the discussion had been around just eliminating department heads. So that was my intention for the version that I revised. Just leave it at city manager and then have council approval above that. But definitely looking for guidance on what dollar amounts you're hoping for. I would be in favor of eliminating the department head one and there are I did find the purchase amount bid types. Okay. Spreadsheet.

Yeah. I just noticed we don't have page numbers making a little hard to rightate. Yeah. My feeling is in an emergency, I can't see a situation where $100,000 would need to be expended before the council could be brought together. Um, quite honestly, I was surprised to see it was that high. I would have thought down lower to like 25,000 myself, but I don't know how the other and in years past. I mean, what have what have the examples been that substit um constitute an emergency or

I I'm not aware of one for the city of Plymouth on on when an emergency prepared. Do you remember anything? There was a roofing issue at one point, but well, most of these things that I remember over my years living here have been like a broken water line or something in the street in the middle of the night. And that's something that for one, the city employees tend to deal with and even if a contractor's brought in, you know, we're not necessarily it's nothing that can't can't wait. Even if a contractor has to come in like on a broken water line, we're not it's not that much. They could call us the next day and ask and we could get together if we had to to approve higher. So you are you recommending 25,000?

Well, I mean it's we've never even needed to have that. So, um I'm totally okay with eliminating department heads and sticking with the 25 grand. I mean, if we've if it's been a non-issue so far, but yeah. Um I just don't know why it was written up that high. It seems kind of um so the higher amounts come from our our template policy for this. That's kind of standard numbers for bigger smaller looking at other cities.

Looking at other cities that that's just pretty typical amounts. Perfectly happy to change it to a lower amount. That would be appropriate. I would think that 25 would cover anything that we're going to run into. I mean, and if not, you know, there's always going to be three of us available in in town in general. Get together pretty fast and make a decision on something if we had to. Okay. Where, you know, um Yeah. Yeah. All right. We'll change that to 25.

Okay. What was the next? Did you have another concern ever that you were rampant? I know we we talked about local preference. Is that part of this? Yeah, that's in here. Yes. What page number? I'm kidding. Page number. Uh empty space. Um, I did read through the emails and it sounds like 3% is um the most,

how do I put this? Uh, fluid way of handling it, the most PC. 3% would be my recommendation, right? It's a safer number than going any higher than that, right? State law doesn't prescribe a specific number. So, unfortunately, we don't have a clear this is the right number. Mhm. I mean, it made sense. The higher you go, the riskier it is, right? More susceptible to challenge. And it's currently written up as 3%. Is that correct? Correct.

Okay. Yeah, I'm fine with that. I was for moving it up a little bit higher but after you know discussion on it read it I mean I can live with the 3%. Yeah. So my only two comment would be to lower the amount and everything else that I've read makes sense to me. So

and eliminating the department head design. Right. Okay. Sorry. under informal solicitation. Um there I think was brought up there was a typo in the body of it. It says 251 to 25,000 and then under two it says 250,000. Did that get updated? It will. I I didn't make any edits to this. This is exactly the same version you had before. I I didn't tweak it between meetings. I'm just going to take the feedback and edit it once. But yes, I will fix that second reference where it says 250,000 and should be 25,000.

And then on the section F multi-year agreements, it talks about um staff has authority to approve multi-year agreements if the cumulative cost of the agreement is within their approving threshold limit. It says, for example, city manager may approve a three-year agreement for 15,000. That would bring it to 45. And that's over what we're saying is approved though count. Wouldn't that be 15,000 over three years? It would be over three years, but still approving going over

total contract amount. So, if we're lowering the contract, the city manager spending authority to 25,000 across the board, then the example should be something that adds up to less than 25,000. Right. That's all I'm saying. Yeah. So, we'll have to update the example to to line up with the new lower limit. Okay. But the the point of the multi-year agreement is that if the cumulative amount of an agreement still falls under the spending authority, then it Yes. Correct. Okay.

All right. You have anything other else to add on it? No, that's it.

Other to I know that this important to get get done fairly quick. I mean the urgency of really having it tonight. I just having two members out not totally comfortable taking a Well, we're we're not asking for we're not going to vote on approving it. You only want to do the Okay. No, I just I wanted this feedback for the next meeting. I'm going to prepare an updated version and then everybody's going to get another crack because I'd like to look at it some more and I know the other ones will. So, right now that's all I have on it. Okay. But you going to put a night on it?

Okay. All right. Well, keep burying my keep burying the thing on here. Oh, yeah.

Okay. All right. Item eight, city manager report. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, the last couple weeks we've held lifeguard interviews for our summer pull session. Um we're kind of going through and uh we have one or two more inies to do, but it looks like we're at least going to be able to be open 5 days a week. Unfortunately, we didn't get a lot of applicants to be able to fill seven days, but we're still um figuring out that that balancing act. Um we are also replacing all the bathroom partitions over at the pool. They've been rotted and and uh rusting out. Um we use grant money from Sierra for that flexible funds. So that came out that didn't come out of our budget. Um we also had our dam inspection um by the state this this week. Um all reports were reports were that everything looked outstanding. So we'll be get looking for an actual written inspection report here shortly. Uh we also had an Excite Energy out um to do a survey. Um if you remember um a couple months ago they came in or Mr. John Bdette came and presented um about energy savings you on our plant and our other facilities. So, um, we provided them, um, some information they needed to see what they could do about lowering our energy costs. Um, and so we'll be updating that. And also, we received our February stats from the am sheriff's office. Um, I don't have anything from the fire um, as of now, but last month they had 156 total incidents, uh, multiple alarm calls, uh, business checks. They conducted 37 car stops, four citizen assist. Um they assisted for one reason or another to um it looks like a total of 14 um code two and code three uh ambulance calls. They had a corner's case. Um they did a bunch of uh checkouts with vehicles, pedestrians, suspicious persons. They had one theft of property report um and they made a total of five arrests within the city

limits. uh one for possession of controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernelia, and his probable cause for the stop is probably expired registration. Um they had out of state fugitive. Um mis with two misdemeanor warrants that they arrested. Uh another arresty was possession of controlled substances. Arrest four was felony violation of probation warrant. And then the fifth one was a violation of probation. And that's all I have. is Can I ask a question?

Um, are the stops and the arrests up from last month? Like comparatively speaking, do we know? Um, the arrests are up. We had two last in January. We had five this month uh or in February, excuse me. The car stops um to my recollection are right around I think we had 34 35ish in January. Thank you. All right. Uh nine, mayor and council member report. We have that uh request for future agenda items. Uh no request for agenda items. I just have a couple of comments.

Okay. um was speaking to uh Burke Ranch HRA president who informed me that they did have three separate uh sheriff calls to their neighborhood um all in front of their mailboxes there um some quote unquote sketchy characters. Um I would like to know is um the Veterans Park and other parks uh with the sunshine now are we hurrying up on the weed abatement um clean up that kind of a thing?

They just public works just started tackling that this week. Okay. Um it was also brought to our attention that the cemetery needed some attention. So I sent them on that this um earlier this week. Um, and we just got all of our certifications and stuff for uh, spring. So, they will be you will be seeing them cruising around. Okay. And then I don't know if there's a need for it, but um, having read through this and seen the presentation, is there um, ever a need for uh, a CPR training here at city hall or does the fire department help out with that? or I don't know if there's a even a need for it, but curious.

I'm sure we could put something together. I was my brain obviously went to that direction when um we were going and I could probably find a local company that was really willing to do it for what it would cost for the administrative fees and donate their time. I mean, it's time for me to reup so I know that. So, we could definitely talk about that offline, sir. Thank you. Deborah have anything? Nothing to add. Nothing. Um, no future agenda items.

Okay. Thank you. And I have no agenda items either. Um, here. Yeah. No items. We're going to go to close session and first we're going to take public comment on close session items. So we have item 10.1. Is there any public comment on item 10.1?

Rosemary Marino Moody Plymouth resident. Um, good evening mayor and council members. The council is scheduled to consider an employment agreement for the city manager tonight in close session. Before se before before such an important decision is made, I believe there are several reasonable questions that residents may have. 7 months ago, the city of Plymouth was facing a significant financial crisis. During his tenure as interim, the current city manager did not provide a financial report to the council or to the residents. Without a clear update on the city's financial condition, it is difficult for the public to understand how the council can make a fully informed and responsible decision regarding the new employment agreement. According to the salary range included in the recruitment posting, the proposed agreement could represent an increase of 20,000 to 50,000 above the city manager's co current compensation. At the same time, several of the preferred qualification listed in the job posting appear to have not been met in the council selection. This combination has understandably led some residents to question why the permanent position was offered to the current city manager. When council members or residents have asked questions about the agenda item reports prepared by the city manager, responses have often come from the city attorney rather than the city manager. This has created the perception that the city attorney may be taking on responsibilities typically handled by the city manager. That raises concerns about whether the issues before the council are being fully addressed, clearly communicated, and transparent to the public. This situation also raises questions about the financial impact of the city of Plymouth on the city of Plymouth. Legal services are the essential resource are an essential resource, but they are also among the city's most costly professional services. If the city attorney is regularly assisting with matters that are normally part of the

city manager's day-to-day responsibilities, it could be leading to increased legal expenses. Given the city's existing legal costs, residents may reasonably wonder whether the current arrangement places additional strain on the city's budget. Many of the community many in the community simply want to ensure the city resources are being used efficiently and that the responsibility of each role are clearly defined, allowing the city manager to manage daily operations while the city attorney focuses on legal legal guidance. These comments are not meant to be personal, but rather to encourage transparency, accountability, and thoughtful decisionmaking on your part on behalf of the residents of Plymouth before approving a long-term employment agreement and a potentially salary increase over the base rate. It seems reasonable for the council to ensure that the city's financial condition is clearly understood and communicated to the public. I would hope that the council will take into consideration the preferred qualifications listed in the original job posting when reviewing the city manager salary agreement. I believe this is an important factor to weigh as you determine an appropriate salary for the position of the current city manager who lacks experience in finance and administrative management. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Anyone else? Item 10.1. Anyone on Zoom? No on Zoom. All right. So, close public comment on item 10.1. Item 10.2, conference with real property negotiators. Anyone public comment on item 10.2. Nothing online. Okay. So, we will close public comment on item 10.2. And at this time we will go into private session close session excuse me at 7:24 for

All right. City council met in close session, discussed two items. Item 10.1 was conference with labor negotiator. Um we provided direction to labor negotiator. Item 10.2 conference with real property negotiators. the council's provided direction to the property real property negotiator. At this time 8:50 at 8:50 we are going to close this meeting. Meeting's adjourned.