Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Hello. Hello. Hello.

Recording in progress.

Alright. Good morning, everybody. We'll be calling the Tuesday, 05/12/2026 regular Board of Supervisors meeting to order. Can we have the pledge of allegiance led by supervisor Shattello, please? Thank you. Is there a motion to acknowledge the certificate of posting? Sovereign. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. All good. Board announcements.

Are there any so mayors just have any board announcements this time? No? Okay. Great. Moving on to public comments. Opportunity to address the board on items not appearing on the agenda. Do we have any public comment for items not on the agenda?

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. Mister Griffin, you can go first. Morning. Oh, wait. Can you push the button?

Here we go.

Good morning, mister chair, members of the board. Ken Griffin, ag commissioner. I just wanted to report out, that on April 14, you approved the MOU with Santa Clara County, Santa Cruz County, Monterey County, and our county for a pesticide take back event. That event occurred two weeks ago, and it was a huge success. San Benito County alone recovered 8,000 pounds of pesticides wanting to be returned by growers that quote left in the shed, and they don't use anymore.

And overall, the event on the four counties recovered over 67,000 pounds of pesticides. So I wanted to thank you and let members of the public know that that was a great success. Thanks to the farmers and ranchers, and then also to let people know to take advantage of the local event that we have every third week end of the month through Integrated Waste to return household used pesticides that are not being used and just being stored. So that's all I have. Thank you, and have a good day.

Thank you.

Any other public comment in chambers on I have one on Zoom.

Valerie, you've been unmuted and you have three minutes.

Valerie, we can't hear you. Are you I don't even see that she's talking. Her microphone's not moving. We can't hear you, Valerie. Are you okay. Well

Okay.

We can't hear her. So okay. So I have no further public comment.

Alright. Thank you. Moving on to consent agenda. These matters shall be considered as a whole and without discussion unless a particular item is pulled from the consent agenda. Any supervisors have items they wish to pull from consent?

I do. Yes. I'd like to pull one point two and one point three for presentation.

Okay. Any others? Okay.

Great. Do we have public comment on consent items that were not pulled? Any consent items that were not pulled?

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Great. Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda other than item 1.2 or 1.3?

So Second. Great. And if roll call vote, please.

Supervisor Zenger?

Yes.

Supervisor Velasquez? Yes. Supervisor Kosmiki?

Yes.

Supervisor Satello? Yes. Supervisor Currow? Yes. Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Great. Thank you. 1.2, supervisor Crow, hold 1.2.

Yes. I just like to have us adopt these, and if we can present, I do believe we have presenters here. I'm not sure if supervisor Sotelo would like to present one since we're both on the mental health awareness. Would you be or unless the chair would like to? Yes. Do it, I'm happy to You

got it, sir. So then 1.2.

So I'll make a motion to approve.

Great. Roll call vote, please, for 1.2. Thank you.

Supervisor Zanger?

One sec. Sorry. We do public comment before we go to the approval.

If you'd like to make a comment on 1.2, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press 9 or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Thank you. Now if we can do a roll call vote, please.

Supervisor Zanger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez?

Yes.

Supervisor Kuzmaki?

Yes.

Supervisor Sotelo? Yes. Supervisor Kurl? Yes. Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Great. Thank you. Supervisor Sattella, you're in.

You guys wanna come up?

So joining us is some of our behavioral health team. Thank you guys for being here. So I'm not going to read the whole proclamation, but I'll just read a few lines of it. So mental illness and conditions affect the psychological and emotional health of millions of people of all ages, races and ethnicities every year, including about twenty three percent of adults and twenty percent of adolescents that everyone faces challenges that can impact their mental health. That maintaining good mental health is important to overall health and well-being.

Mental Health America founded Mental Health Awareness Month in 1949 and provided this year's campaign theme, More Good Days Together, encouraging us all to reflect on what a good day looks like for ourselves and for our communities, and to work together to connect people and to support each other to overcome and conquer this growing epidemic. San Benito County Behavioral Health is committed to supporting the community's mental health journey by ensuring that essential programs and services are provided and known, sharing resources through community events such as free community awareness events at the Esperanza Center available to County residents, as well as participating in the Farmers Market throughout the month. San Benito County Board of Supervisors recognizes the significance of eliminating stigma and raising awareness of the importance of early identification and treatment for mental health conditions and embrace the belief that individuals experiencing mental illness can and do recover. And we do hereby resolve that the month of May 2026 is Mental Health Awareness Month in the County Of San Benito. I'll turn it over to Rachel.

You go. Thank you.

Thank you. Well, thank you very much for the proclamation. Most of the events and activities are being handled by Geraldine Arce and Roxanne Chavaria who are spearheading mental health month this month. And so we have a number of activities. They're gonna share those really quick so everybody knows and everybody who's listening is aware in the community to stop and come and find out how you could get some support and assistance.

Good morning, Board of Supervisors, County admin and members of the public. My name is Geraldine Arce, and I'm joined here with my by my colleague, Roxanne Chavarria. On behalf of our San Benino County Behavioral Health Department, we gladly accept this proclamation recognizing May as meant as May as Mental Health Awareness Month. We are appreciative appreciative of the board's continued support of our efforts each year to increase awareness, reduce stigma, and promote understanding of the importance of mental health in our daily lives in our community.

Good morning. Throughout this month, our team will be participating in the local farmers market each week to share information, resources, and wellness materials with the community. We are also continuing to strengthen collaboration with our community partners to ensure staff remain well equipped to connect with clients with the services and support they need. This month we are also highlighting the Esperanza Center, our community wellness center which is centrally located in Downtown Hollister. The Esperanza Center offers services including mental health screenings, excuse me, a food pantry, housing navigation assistance, and wellness activities led by peer mentors such as art, writing, and cooking classes.

While these programs are primarily designed for clients, all community members are welcome to visit and learn more about the Esperanza Center. Thank you.

You. Thank you. Any Any comments from the board before we move on? Great. Item 1.3 is pulled by supervisor Crow as well.

Again, I'd just like to have this presented so I would make if we could do public comment, then I'd make a motion to approve.

Great. New public comment, please.

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine and the raise or the raised hand icon. And in chambers, we'll start with Cindy Peterson.

Good morning. I'm Cindy Peterson, chief human resource officer for the San Benito High School District. Like districts across the nation, we are facing severe recruitment challenges. Nationally, about one in eight of all teaching positions are either unfilled or filled with teachers that are not fully credentialed. Here in California, we're graduating only half as many new teacher candidates as we did twenty years ago.

These teacher shortages make recruitment and retention very difficult and very competitive for San Juanito High School District as well as the districts around us. And this is exacerbated by the high cost of housing in California. The greatest concern we hear from those that we recruit is affordable and available housing in our community. San Benito County's housing market is critically constrained and the severe shortage of affordable housing creates a significant barrier for district educators, making it very difficult for them to live in the community they wish to serve. To recruit and retain teachers, the question is not only whether a candidate wants to teach here with us, but whether they can afford to live in our community.

A focus on affordable housing is not only an investment in the socioeconomic health of our entire community, but also an important investment in the education of our youth. Thank you.

Next in chambers, Matt Huerta.

Morning, chair, supervisors. Matt Huerta with senior adviser with the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership. Thank you for joining us and many other advocates in celebration of affordable housing month. For nearly ten years, our housing for all initiative has helped our Tri County area achieve thousands of new homes, including many affordable to low and moderate income families. Lower income families are among the hardest working residents who make our region flourish. They especially need access to more opportunities to ensure stability. Please continue to find ways to facilitate and expedite more affordable homes, both rental and for sale, so that our local workforce can thrive. Thank you.

And that concludes public comment.

Thank you. Is there a motion to approve the proclamation?

I'll move to approve the affordable housing proclamation.

Is there a second? Second. Roll call vote, please.

Supervisor Zanger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez? Yes. Supervisor Kosmiki?

Yes.

Supervisor Satello? Yes. Supervisor Kurl? Yes. Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Great. Thank you.

Would you like to Step right. If not, my co partner on the housing ad hoc, affordable housing ad hoc. Supervisor Velasquez, would you like to? You may notice I'm walking a little gingerly. I threw my back out.

I am standing to say the least. I would love to have anyone from the affordable housing, whether it be farm worker housing, from housing, or our from our nonprofit organizations, if you would like to please come up. K. I'm not gonna read the entire thing, but I what I'd like to do is just highlight a few of the areas. San Benito County Housing Choice Voucher section eight program is operated by the Housing Authority of Santa Cruz County.

And the Housing Authority of Santa Cruz County administers vouchers for over 405 households with a total of 1,138 household members receiving housing choice vouchers, which are section eight in San Benito County, as well as received two 20 HUD veteran affairs support housing and vouchers for homeless veterans and twenty four hour housing voucher vouchers from HUD. The San Benito County residents may also receive rental assistance through the Housing Authority of Santa Cruz's project based voucher program. Project based vouchers are used for some, developments within the city of Hollister and the San Benito County residents are eligible for. The County Of San Benito currently has 76 deed restricted single family units and 60 deed restricted rental units affordable to individuals of very low and low and moderate income. The San Benito County currently offers 13 income based rental programs and buildings.

However, the state allows agency rentals and landlords to accept section eight vouchers. Whereas the the state of California Department of Housing and Community Development, HCD, allocates regional shares of statewide housing needs. These allocations are provided to a region's COG, which is the Council of Government, which determines which jurisdictions fair share contributions. The San Benito County COG encompasses the cities of Hollister and San Juan Bautista through the state mandate regional housing needs allocation, which is RENA. As provided by HCD, the Rina for the period of 2023 to 2031 for the Cog Region is 2,194 new house housing elements.

Excuse me. Housing units. Unincorporated San Benito County shares of the Rina numbers include 754 houses and comprise of 246 very low income and a 198 low income with a 103 moderate income units and 207 above, moderate income. Whereas, therefore, it be proclaimed that the San Benito County has the month of May 2026 as declared as affordable housing month. Affordable housing in our community is dire.

Unfortunately, we are pushing residents out of our community, especially our seniors and our youth. And I am honored to present this to all of you who have worked on affordable housing for many years and I have known for many, many years. Some of you I've worked with for over twenty five years. So I appreciate all you do for San Benito County, and I thank you. I

just like to thank the board of supervisors and county staff for always being a partner to affordable housing and supporting us. We can't do it without you. And CSDC has been working with the county and the board since 1984, and I look forward to working with you in the future.

Thank you.

Very very quickly. So I've been working on affordable housing for over twenty five years, and some of my first developments were here in San Bernardino County in Hollister area. I could tell you right now, it's never been harder. Never been harder. And so we need every ounce of support from our partners, especially local government and especially in the positions that you're in. So please continue to find every way possible to move constraints and to leverage the resources that you do have to make this happen for our community. Thank you.

I'm Mickey Luna, and I just wanna thank you for any action that is being taken right now in every effort in actually getting a bringing in a more affordable housing. I mean, ours not only our seniors but you know, families that are in dire need and I'm glad to to have heard about the proclamation the way you've read it. Supervisor Kerril because I can tell you if you look back in the history, actually the agreement with Santa Cruz Housing Authority, you're gonna find that my mother is number two in San Benito County that received that certificate at 840 San Benito Street which no longer exists. So it goes way back. It really touches our families, our heart, and we see right now the need to go forward.

And with this agreement, I wish we there was just a lot more because I know they have a waiting list that is forever. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Would

you guys like to do a pic? It's up to you guys. Sure. Why don't we do it right in front here? Mister chair, do you mind if I just stand here?

Because I really would like to present the next one, and I don't wanna walk back. Yep. But thank you. And, unfortunately, when I did the motion, I only did it for the one proclamation.

I understand.

Believe we yeah. I apologize for that.

No worries. So we also have another proclamation within this item. Is there a motion to approve the proclamation for older American heart?

I move to approve.

Is there a second? Second. Great. We have roll call vote, please.

Supervisor Zanger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez? Yes. Supervisor Kosmiki?

Yes.

Supervisor Sotelo? Yes. Supervisor Kerr? Yes. Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Great.

And if I could have everyone that supports our seniors on for our Older Americans month, which is the month of May. I know we have several people here. And and I I thank each and every one of you for being here today. It is and it's an honor to present this today, but also it has a lot of special meaning. Older Americans month is, since I've been on the board, something I'm very passionate about serving on.

And I thank the chair for continuing me being on the triple a. Seniors in our community are in dire need now and always. And right now, my mother-in-law on Mother's Day just went into hospice. So I thank each and every one of you for all you do because every one of you have connected with me in a way that has allowed me to know how to better care for my mother-in-law that I would never have known. So thank you.

So with that said, not gonna not gonna do that. I'm a I'm a I can handle this. So in 1962, a major legislation was introduced in congress to establish an independent and permanent commission on aging with subsequent research revealing that there are more than 17,000,000 Americans over the age of 65, including five point five million living at the poverty level with few health or human services programs available to support them. And in April 1963, the National Council of Senior Citizens urged President John F. Kennedy to shine a spotlight on the older Americans and develop programs to help them as they aged.

In response to the National Council of Senior Citizens recommendations, President Kennedy signed a proclamation acknowledging the month of May as senior citizens month and designation later renaming renamed by president Jimmy Carter to older Americans month because who wants to be called a senior? Just saying. We're just older. With increasing awareness of the need, the Older Americans Act was signed into law on 07/14/1965, which established hereby establishing the administration of aging within the Department of Health and Education and Welfare, and calling for the creation of the State Units on Aging. This act considered one of the most important contributions to the aging legislation enacted by congress.

Historically, Older Americans Month has been a time to acknowledge the contributions of older persons to our country. Today, it is a profound important and profoundly important to extend the 2021 theme, communities of strength, to include the aging and long term care commission of San Benito counties whose members are appointed by the San Benito County Board of Supervisors and who serve daily witness to the belief that the strength of a community is determined by the passion, energy, trust, and accountability of its membership to achieve common goals. I'm gonna just get to the whereas at the end. The commission actively participates in the development of the plans and policies services as the official San Benito County interagency committee of local area agency on aging and serving as the official agency advisory committee to the establishment of the no wrong door aging and discrimination resources connection program. And therefore be it resolved that the San Benito County that the month of May 26 be declared Older Americans Month.

With that, I wanna just make a couple of comments. Our seniors are we are the third fastest growing you guys can quote me if

I'm wrong.

In the state of California, ages 65 to I believe it's 88. We are going to have a senior, and I'm quoting an individual behind me, Tammy, we are going to have a senior issue on care in the future, and it's going to impact this community more than we can imagine. So we have to be talking about our seniors, but also engaging with our seniors in a way that they are part of the solution. Volunteerism, huge for our community and for our seniors. We have the new San Juan Oaks, which is 55 and older.

I've already done a presentation on what volunteer programs that are available. We need to get our younger seniors engaged to help our older seniors, but also our youth. And I can't thank everyone that's up here for doing all the work that they do. So who would like to go further? Tammy, we'll go start. Here we go, Tammy. And I'm gonna sit if you guys don't mind. I will we'll probably do a photo. So I'll lean. Sorry. You can sit there. I'm on a lean. Tammy? You want me

to go? Okay. Alright.

Tammy says I need to go. So, Clay Kemp, executive director of the Seniors Council Agency on Aging. And I want to just introduce the people that are with me. First, the person who declined coming up here, Tammy Aviles, who is the current Board President of the Seniors Council. And then kind of back in the corner, Corey Schaefer, who leads our county wide volunteer recruitment and coordination project.

Something new that we just kicked off as part of our Master Plan for Aging program, but that's something that I think helps the entire community in a couple different ways. One, obviously having volunteers helps community based organizations succeed at what they're trying to do. But one thing that is overlooked about it and maybe its biggest impact is that studies show the best way to combat loneliness and isolation, which older adults chronically suffer from, is by volunteering with another organization. So Cory is changing the lives, not of just the community, but of the people who step up to help out and volunteer and that deserves a special shout out. We also have Wayne Norton, who's our current board vice president, and Mickey Luna, another board member.

So we're very proud that we have great representation from San Benito County. So Angela already listed some of the highlights. I could go on forever about those details and what all of them actually mean, but I wanna get off the the mic. But what I really wanna do most of all is just thank all of you for being wonderful partners, and by all of you that includes staff. And it's just great to work in a county where everybody works together, and we really do feel the support of the board and county staff in trying to accomplish the goals and meet the challenges of older adults.

The last thing I want to say is the timeliness with affordable housing month is really appropriate. The fastest growing homeless population in the state, in the nation, is individual, is older individuals. So, as much as we don't like to think about grandparents or just older adults living in cars or on the street, that's the population that is growing at a faster rate than any other group. So, it's really kind of an honor to be here with housing advocates at the same time. And again, just thank all of you for all the work you do and your partnerships.

Okay. I'll say something. I mean,

I, you know, I don't get up here enough. Good morning. Thank you very much for this honor. And I just wanted to say to anybody that has a neighbor or a loved one that services are available. They're not very well known. So please, you know, check us out at seniorscouncil.org. Reach out. We're here to help. And, you know, we again, thank you for your support because we couldn't do it without you guys either. So thank you.

You guys want a picture?

Yeah. Yeah.

There's one.

Could we please get a pic? Thanks. Okay. Which one to take? That's Christine. We'll we'll get it, Christine.

Thank you for doing the first.

Great. Thank you. I think that concludes consent agenda now, so we'll move to regular agenda. Item 2.1, this is regarding the our registrar of voters, Francisco.

Good morning, mister chair. Good morning, board of supervisors. I am here today on behalf of the elections office to ask the board of supervisors to approve a narrow retroactive emergency extension with K and H partners to ensure the uninterrupted production and mailing of ballots for the June. The contract expired in 12/14/2025. This was the lapse identified by the auditor's office and resulted from an administrative oversight by my office to register our voters.

Critical materials are already in production and any disruption will now jeopardize the statutory deadlines and of the election. In addition, K and H has agreed to honor the 2021 pricing that we negotiated a couple years ago. We will issue an RFP shortly for a long term contract from any of the seven to eight vendors are certified by the state of California. Now staff recommends the board approve an amendment to number one to extend the contract through 07/31/2026 just to get us through this election and authorize the chair or the CEO to sign.

Thank you. CEO, did you have anything for public comment?

I just wanna make sure that we all in the same level of responsibility regarding bringing retroactive contracts to the board, I think is a disservice. We continue cleaning up throughout the departments. This continue pattern that we have, you were able to see on the consent agenda a lot of the projects from public works as well, contrast the word that they're coming retroactive. And we receive about 13 contracts. We rejected five of them because they don't have any projects.

We only proposing the approval of those. They have an ongoing projects. I wanna invite also the clerk recorders to contribute to help us to not continue with this pattern of awarding work when a contract expires. And I know it happens to all of us, but we just need to make an additional effort. All of us. Meaning, every single department is facing the same reality. We short staff, we miss deadlines, but I want all of us to make an effort so that we can stop with this continued process of bringing retroactive contracts. Thank you.

Thank you. Let's go to public comment.

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Great. Any comments, questions from board members?

Yeah.

Yeah. Thank you, Brett.

Let's go and adapt. How do we further sort of tighten it just from a policy? What can we do from a policy standpoint just to make sure everybody's on the same page?

So the difference that we have right here is the following. On those individuals that are under my supervision, like department heads, it will be a performance review for them. But when you have an elected official not meeting the deadlines, that's something outside of my scope of work. I can only address the issues to you as a board, but I don't really here to do a performance review on an elected official. That's the difference between working with an elected officials versus working with department heads.

Department heads already warned that if they continue with this pattern, it's gonna be a write off in their performance review. But in elected officials, how how do we do it? So I I just one county council maybe to give his thing.

Mister chair, mayors, board of supervisors, this is something that the board has expressed a concern over, that is our procurement and contracting procedures, and to ensure compliance with the current purchasing policy. We, for example, had a department heads meeting yesterday. And again, we reaffirmed the importance of complying with the purchasing policy and to avoid what we have typically seen, which are contracts that have expired and work is performed and contractors are paid without a contract in place. We have contracts that expire and then we end up with retroactive amendments. And so we are with each review of a contract that's submitted to the county council's office, that's something that we are reminding all the departments of what are the requirements of the purchasing policy and to ensure that going forward that they do in fact comply with those.

I would also note, as I had indicated previously, the State Controller's office has expanded their audit into our contracting and procurement procedures. And they are seeing much of what the CEO and I have seen that has been present over the past several years. I expect they'll be coming forward with recommendations to the board on policy and procedure reforms to move away from exactly what we're discussing. Other other problems that we've identified are evergreen contracts, Those that automatically renew without further board action. These are the types of things that we are working on.

The board has expressed its policy concerns very clearly, and so we are continuing to remind the departments that in fact that these changes have to be made going forward. Ultimately, it's for the board to decide whether or not you wish to approve these retroactive contracts. We are hoping that over time there will be fewer and fewer coming to your to your attention, and that we will be able to eliminate them except under emergency circumstances.

Thank you. Yeah. And I

get that, and I understand there's there are gonna be oversights at times. I just mean from a policy, whatever we can do as far as like, you know and I know we're gonna get it sounds like we're gonna get those recommendations and putting a hard stop is that like, where's that hard stop? You know, when a department, you know, it's not just one department, it's basically all the departments submit something or a contract ends more so in the process. There should be a trigger in our systems contract ending. Okay.

Now there needs to be action for this to move forward. It's not left up to the discretion of a potential oversight or whatever might happen within the department. That's kinda, you know, what I'm seeing as the need for the ultimately, solution to this. So it's not we don't have those, you know there are gonna be human errors that's just inevitable. So we don't we we have multiple layers to to stop that from happening.

That's and this has been an issue for me since I basically got on the board. I remember when I got on the board and we had it just jumped out to me how many of these contracts were just being renewed. And I'm not saying this this is maybe a little bit different from what we're dealing with here, but just from a global perspective, contracts that were being renewed basically without second thought. It was like, well, we've been dealing with this vendor for seven, eight, nine years. Let's just keep the gravy train going for them. And so I'm personally of the belief, I thought we had something in place, you know, that automatically after a certain number of years, you have to come back for renewal going out to bid and going through a new process to make sure that we're keeping it clean.

Thank you.

Supervisor Kurrow?

I wanna thank all the comments, and I completely agree with supervisor Kosmicki. This is something that we've been working on for quite a few years. This is not new. This there's nothing new about this. There is no system in place at this time that actually has all of the contracts in one database.

It does not have the official start and end date of any contract. It is impossible for the CEO to manage this or the departments to even have fair warning that a contract is expiring unless they have fiscal assistance within their departments and they do not have that level of assistance in their departments and we can use software to fix this, but we have to get the software. We've been talking about OpenGov for almost four years now and OpenGov is not fully in place and OpenGov was the recommendation of the solution. I can't say that OpenGov is the all end. I really want now that we have a new CEO, I want the CEO to make some recommendations on this.

But right now what you're dealing with is if a department doesn't know that a contract is expiring, there's not like an alert system that comes up. And what I do know is that the departments that are coming forward are the departments that are trying to fulfill the procurement policy. They're trying and working to ensure that they are not missing these things. But with the things that are happening, we're not gonna go from being completely no tracking to full tracking and implementation immediately. So I look at this as a transitional period.

I thank the departments that are coming forward. I thank the CEO for actually bringing only the contracts that have actions that need to be taken forward. Because bringing every single one of the contracts forward that were is absolutely ridiculous. We have a procurement process, which means going out for documenting it, and ensuring that we are getting the best bang for the buck. And I also agree that the evergreen contracts, we have to have a serious conversation about what is considered a timely renewal of a contract.

If you're talking about election software or software that is used only every couple of years, going out every two years is a huge burden on a department. You have to look at when does the programs or the product is being used and how often you should renew it and where technology plays a part in that. So with all of that, I wanna thank every one of the departments in including the clerk recorder's office for coming forward with these retroactive because at least now we're informed. And I appreciate that from the CEO. Thank you so much. Thank you, mister chair. Thank you.

Yes. Thank you. And we

we talked about this as we experienced our budget issues last year. I've made a comment about it's gonna take us a couple years to catch up and fix these issues. When's the hard stop? I think we're approaching the hard stop. I think after we do this budget, that's pretty much it. Either we get the information we need. Maybe the answer is I know it's hard to your your department too. Every six months, maybe the department heads come through and talk about what's their forecasting the next six months here, or if you're doing a five year contract, probably in your case, four or five year contracts. So we're aware of it. They're aware of it, and it helps everybody.

It reminds it's a reminder that we can't just go back and fix. We have to be proactive in what we're doing because it's gonna really bring you more better values as you as you move forward. So I think that hard stop is coming up where we can't accept the going back and say, well, we'll fix this. And I think I'm seeing that progress happening, but, you know, everybody, every department needs to really be very proactive in identifying what that is, and it's gonna help them run their department much better. So I'm seeing it go that way. Like I said, this is a two year process. We're approaching that now at this June, July. I think this is a point where we we finally change the ways.

Thank you. You. Alright. So then is there a motion regarding the contract amendment?

Move to approve. So move to approve as recommended. Second.

Excuse me. Do we do public comment? We do that. We do public comment. Right?

Yeah. We do. But we do. Sorry about that.

No worries.

I'll I'll second. I think okay.

Because we already have we have a first and a second. Hold on. Here.

My apologies. Can we have roll call vote, please?

Supervisor Zenger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez? Yes. Supervisor Currow that's Mickey. Sorry. Yes. Supervisor Satello? Yes. Supervisor Currow?

Yes.

Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Thank you.

Item 2.2. This is the Office of Emergency Services, similar approval of a retroactive amendment. Good morning. Morning.

I am here to talk about a retroactive I don't know if I need that out. Thank you. We submitted the contract for our initial review in January, the January. It's taken time to go back and forth between the vendor and county councils, the whole process that we're adjusting to. We have created an internal process of a spreadsheet, which is not foolproof by any means, but we're tracking ours internally.

We did have some, however, on OpenGov. At least it gives you a kind of a three month and a six month notification. I'm not familiar with OpenGov, but I think it could be something that works for us for all our contracts. But we are coming to you with a contract that did expire, and we are asking for a renewal. It has been budgeted. The amount is 21,000 doll 20 sorry.

Don't have an amount in front of me. 22,002.

22. And that will take us through December. I've already started the paperwork to renew it for January.

Thank you. Is there a public comment?

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please invite a speaker card on Zoom. Please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Thank you. Any comments from the board at this time? Okay. Is there a motion?

Move to approve.

I'll second.

Okay. We have a first and a second. Roll call vote, please.

Supervisor Zanger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez?

Yes.

Supervisor Kosmiki?

Yes.

Supervisor Satello? Yes. Supervisor Currow?

Yes.

Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Thank you. Item 2.3.

Hey. I'm here. Good morning. I'm also bringing to you three invoices that we received from the city of Hollister that are from the years 2223, and twenty four fiscal years for nine one one dispatching fees. EMS has been paying what we assumed was our share of the bill to the sheriff's department.

We receive an an invoice from them annually. We journal entry that and pay that. We were quite surprised, as was CEO, to receive these from the city. There seems to have been an arrangement with the prior administration that for some reason the city would be paying them when it is not their responsibility to paying ambulance dispatching fees. So we are requesting payment of those invoices, and we will be paying them ourselves from now on as we thought we were.

Okay. Thank you. We have a public comment, please.

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Thank you. Any questions, comments from the board? Yes. Where's it?

Think this goes hand in hand with the lack of prior administrations tracking agreements and MOUs and contracts with outside agencies appropriately. I'm assuming OpenGov could also potentially be a solution for that. I believe we need to have a policy in place that any memorandum of understanding, any contract, any agreement with an outside entity needs to not only be, of course, adopted by the board, but needs to be recorded in the recorder's office and given to the clerk of the board so it can be documented. These are the internal controls that we keep talking about that we need to know where our our committed costs are. And it goes right along with Supervisor Velasquez's comments.

When we get in this next budget cycle, we need to know what is our actual committed costs across all departments, agencies, and memorandum of understandings. Otherwise, our budget, we don't have true control over it. And I want to thank the CEO so much and County Council for recognizing this very big deficiency that we've had. Because unfortunately, if it's not documented somewhere, how do you know to bill it? How do you know to ask for the bill?

How do you know that they're not giving you the bill? So I see us getting there. It's been a slow process, but I do see improvements. And I do agree that we are gonna have to have a hard line where, you know, it it there's gonna be a point that we say, if it wasn't if it didn't follow our policy, which needs to be updated in my opinion, if it doesn't follow the the recording requirements and the legal requirements, then we need to be able to start saying no.

Mister chair, members of board of supervisors, supervisor Curro is absolutely correct. We have found a number of contracts that should have been approved by the board that the board has never seen. And so we are very critically reviewing every contract. We have now stopped the contract splitting, which department heads were using to avoid board approval. So any and all actions that have been used in the past to avoid board approval have now stopped.

And any and all MOUs, regardless of cost, but which involve an outside agency will be brought to the board for approval. So we are erring on the side of further board authority and erring on the side of further board transparency. And so I can assure you that the CEO and I are ensuring that all contracts that should be seen by the board will be seen by the board and will be approved by the board, especially if it involves in any way policies, intergovernmental policies and cooperation. Thank you. Thank you.

I just wanna ask a quick question. And I feel like I've asked this question before, but I can't remember. So on that spreadsheet that we kind of see where it has the breakdown of all of the calls, and so it specifically says, like, PD, fire, sheriff's office, and then there's the ambulance. So the county, we pay for all of the ambulance calls in the entire county and within the city jurisdictions as well. Am I we're in okay. Okay. I just wanted to make sure I understood that correctly. Thank you.

Mister chair, what is customary as far as, you know, I guess, the obvious question is why does the city of Hollister not contribute to ambulance services? And I know we've talked about just counties tend to do that, but I

just Well, counties tend to have the oversight for excuse me. EMS has the oversight for the of the county. So anything that happens with the contract is county responsibility.

Okay. I just think it should be underscored that the county does pay this fairly substantial dollar amount for EMS services. It's it's significant. So

thank you.

It is significant. Thank you.

Great. Is there a motion to approve the budget adjustment resolution? Oh, I'm sorry. Yes.

I'm sorry. It just popped in my head. And supervisor Kozmickey, you you triggered it from when we were on the fire advisory fire advisory committee together. Is this a topic during the fire advisory and the potential fire district of discussing this okay. I just wanna make sure that that's still Yes. Part of it because I think that type of movement with a fire district and consolidating all of these into a single service could be very beneficial. Absolutely. Thank you for different

models that we we're looking at.

Thank you.

Thank you. K. Is there a motion to approve the budget adjustment as stated and authorize EMS department to process the invoices?

I move to approve as recommended.

Is there a second? Second. Great. So first and second, can we have roll call vote, please?

Supervisor Zenger? Yes. Supervisor Velasquez? Yes. Supervisor Kosmiki?

Yes, sir.

Supervisor Sotelo? Yes. Supervisor Currow? Yes. Five zero vote. Motion passes.

Thank you.

Great. Thank you. Moving on to our audit committee. So the board will the board will adjourn as the board of supervisors reconvene as the audit committee. Item 3.1, is there a motion to acknowledge the certificate of posting?

Move.

Is there a second? Second. All in favor, aye. Aye. Is there public comments of, items of interest not appearing on the audit committee agenda?

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, you can press star nine or the raise hand icon. And I have no public comments.

Great. Thank you. Moving on to the minutes. Is there motion to approve the audit committee meeting minutes from April 14? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor, aye. Aye. Great. 3.3, receive monthly auditor controller informational reports.

Good morning chair, board of supervisors, auditor controller, Joe Paul Gonzalez. I have a short update. On March 3, we had disseminated all the year end schedules to all the county department heads and fiscal staff. It's available on the county's auditor's SharePoint. On May 15, we're going to have a, it will, that is the purchasing deadline for all departments.

And so if departments need to buy stuff to get to the end of the fiscal year, they better do it now. Otherwise, you know, they're gonna have to get authorization from the CEO's office to make those purchases. Also, the important thing on Cal card purchases, the deadline for all Cal card purchases has to be done by June 22, so those expenditures are properly recorded in the correct fiscal year. So on April 22, the county auditor's office had a Q and A session held with county department staff. And then not on here, but on May 8, last Friday, there was a peer review of the cost plan was held with select department heads.

That peer review actually led to identifying a risk management assignment, a case that was improperly assigned to the DA's office, and that had elevated the DA's cost plan charges, and that was an error reporting by the county's insurance fund, Trindell, that will be addressed and corrected. On May 15, there will be another fiscal Q and A. It will be had specifically for the year end schedule and you know, the deliverables that need to be made for that schedule. And so, you know, we're hoping that more County departments and staff sign up for that. I think we have some numbers.

Okay, so, you know, it's better. We now have 20 people signed up for that, you know, for that Q and A session. And then on May 28, we're gonna have a countywide fiscal training in collaboration with the county treasurer staff on the processes of revenue collections and miscellaneous billing. That pretty much concludes my update. Are there any questions? Thank you. Is there any public comment?

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, provide a speaker card on Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Thank you. Any questions or comments from the board? Yes, ma'am.

Just a couple of questions. The March 3 deadline for purchases, How how is that gonna work? If departments are in the middle of a if departments are in the middle of of some sort of type of

That was a typo. It's May 15, as I mentioned in my presentation.

Thank you. That makes me feel a heck of a lot better, but still May 15. On May 28, you're gonna have the physical training. At the May 15 training, or let's go back to the April 22 training, were staff trained to understand that in order to have purchases approved in advance, it would have to go through the PO process, the purchase order process, so that they know that because otherwise what you're going to have on May 15 at that training is a bunch of people saying they have to buy things and they don't know how they have to go through and get it approved through the purchase order process.

I'm assuming that's what's happening. So at the last fiscal Q and A, we did mention to the departments that the purchasing cutoff date was May 15, which is something we've implemented every fiscal year. And so we did mention that. Specifically, I mean, we could remind departments that they have to make sure that they follow the procurement policy because the purchasing policy does, you know, explain whether they need a PO and what you know, if they have to obtain multiple quotes depending on what additional items they'll be purchasing.

Yeah. So here's where my concern always goes. There's always exemptions to everything. It's never a hard, hard cutoff. There's always emergencies that occur. And understanding that that emergency process, I don't understand fully what that procedure is.

If I if my if I may, and I am sure the auditor will agree with me, let me give an example of an emergency purchase. We had a line, water line broken at the park in San Benito Historical Park that provides water also to two residents and the park as well and the public restrooms. I will immediately approve the the the purchase of equipment to fix the issue. That's an that's an emergency. A true emergency.

But our emergency has to be documented for the auditor and myself to agree to proceed with that payment. Only with both of us agreeing to proceed with the payments. If they forgot to purchase something, they're gonna have to wait till the next fiscal year until we get an interim adopted budget.

And so I just wanna remind everyone because of my past experience and what I used to do, there is election code that does allow procurement by the county clerk, registrar voters in the case of an election. I don't want the rules to hinder a process that has to move forward. And the election code allows the county clerk to move forward with procurement outside of the procurement policy if it is necessary. And so I just wanna make sure you never know when you have ten days of vote centers that you're not gonna have an additional safety issue, that the state's not gonna put down a new mandate, that those are not technical emergencies, but they are things that come in. And it's not just in the elections office that that happens.

That happens in other departments, especially law enforcement and, health and human services. So I just wanna make sure that departments are fully informed and aware that they need to get their POs in or whatever the requirement is now to make sure that they don't have a problem with paying a bill for until the next fiscal year because it would have to go into either a budget adjustment or something to that effect.

But we're addressing those issues. I just wanna make sure that situation, the government is we review, we contact each other to agree or disagree and the terms that we mostly agree in those terms. What is what is an emergency? What is a last minute request that requires a special attention? We have been addressing those.

I just want to make sure department heads fully understand that it is on them to have that information in the system so that they have their payments made timely. I had struggles with it. It's hard, especially with the demands of the job and the shortness of staff, but we have to be able to make sure that we're doing these things. It's the first major step, not first, it's one of the major steps in ensuring that contracts and procurement is known for the end of the fiscal year. Otherwise, especially with revenue collection, if revenue collection batches are not in the system, the auditor's office has no idea how much revenue is coming in.

So I I completely agree with this, but I really wanna emphasize in the training that the department heads need to understand it, not just mention it. They need to understand what that process means.

Thank you. Yes.

Thank you. First of all, thank you so much for doing all of these trainings. I really appreciate it. I think it's I'm assuming it's well received, but don't really know. Right? I haven't heard anything. But I was curious, are you guys doing any type of survey when you are doing, like after you do these Q and As or these presentations? Or is there a survey to kind of your fiscal staff county wide to see maybe what they need to learn about or just kind of as a check-in to see how it's going?

Yes, we have done those at the trainings.

Okay.

Because we wanna know where they would like to have special training on, those areas. And so, we do surveys.

Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you again. This is great that we're doing so much training. I hope that the budget cycle goes much smoother than last time. Hopefully we get all of our stuff in sooner. Thank you.

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, yeah, and I I think I heard mention of reminding department heads. I certainly would, you know, just my recommendation would be to definitely send out a memo. Just there's three days left. There's no reason why we, you know, shouldn't do that. So I would I would do that. Thank you.

Mister Yep. Fraser Crewell?

My only other thing is are they or is there any discussion of these trainings being mandatory? I I don't understand why a department would be able to say that they can't attend or aren't able to attend because then that's gonna be a reason for not being able to fulfill the requirements. Is there any mandatory training? So what we can do, I

can coordinate with the auditor's office to see who is attending and who's missing, and I will have a conversation with the department heads that is missing the training.

If that's the will of the board, I'm fine with that. I just wanna make sure that there's no I'm I'm trying to look ahead and say, where are we going to have a crack and where are we gonna fall into it? Let's not fall into the cracks.

Thank you. Treasurer Velasquez, did you have No. Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you. I think this is just a we're just receiving this. Right? There's no action needed to be taken this time.

Thank you.

Thank you. That concludes the audit committee and regular agenda. Now we have closed session. Is there any public comment? We're going to closed session.

If you'd like to make a comment in chambers, please provide a speaker card. On Zoom, please press star nine or the raised hand icon. And I have no public comment.

Great. You. We will, join the closed session now. Thank you. And with a break. With a break before we get in there, we'll take a break. Take a short break before we go into closed session.

Yep. Great. Recording stopped.

Henry, can you mute it and put closed session? Thank you.

Recording in progress.

Henry, can you unmute? There we go.

Great. We are back from closed session. County council, if there's any reportable action?

Mister chair and members of the board of supervisors, there is no reportable action. Thank you.

Thank you. We have our future gen item list. I don't believe we have any future gen items. Is there any public comment on the existing list?

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Thank you. And we are adjourned.