City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay. Let's go ahead and get started. Council member Bowen. Okay. The time is 07:02, and I am calling to order this San Leandro City Council meeting.

Hello? Hello? In order, please. Thank you so much. At this point in time, we are going to have some new citizens lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. So if I could have our new citizens come forward, and they can come with their teacher and whoever wants to join them, but come forward. Ms. Lam, if you could bring them forward. And then Madam Clerk, if you could turn on the microphone right there at the podium. Right there by the microphone. And then if you're able to stand, please do so. And you guys just begin and we will follow.

Okay. Pledge 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.

Thank you very much for doing that. You can have a seat, and we will recognize you a little bit more fully in just a minute. Madam clerk, would you please take our role?

Council member James Aguilar. Present.

Present.

Council member Victor Aguilar present. Council member Bolt

present.

Vice council member Bowen present council member Simon

present

Vice mayor Viveros Walton. Present. And mayor Gonzalez.

Present. Now tonight, we have the appointment and scoring in of a new member to the Recreation and Parks Commission. I'd like to move this item up here into section four where we do recognitions, just leaving it way down at the bottom during action items. Any concerns? Seeing none, we will make that adjustment to our men to our agenda.

State of San Leandro conducts orderly meetings to fulfill its mandate.

Discriminatory statements are conduct that would potentially violate the Federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 and or the California Fair Employment and Housing Act, California Penal Code sections four zero three or four fifteen, are per se disruptive to a meeting and will not be tolerated. Please see the city council handbook and city council meeting rules of decorum for more information. This point in time, madam clerk, your announcement.

If you would like to make a public comment during the meeting, you can do so in person or via Zoom. If you are present at the meeting, please complete a speaker card and submit it to the City Clerk before the item is presented, then wait for public comment on that item to be called. If you wish to participate in public comment via Zoom, you can use the raise your hand tool when the item is called. During the public comment session, speakers will be invited to speak and will have a set time to share their comments. A countdown timer will appear for their convenience, and when the time is up, the microphone will be muted.

All raised hands outside of public comment will be lowered to avoid confusion. Once public comment is opened, hands may be raised to speak. There will be a thirty minute window for public comments, which will take place under item seven, public comments as per the published agenda. After this time is up, the council will proceed with the rest of the meeting's agenda. If you have not had the opportunity to speak during the initial thirty minute period, there will be another chance to do so after item 12, city council reports.

Okay. At this point in time, I believe there is nothing to report out of closed session, but I will go to city attorney to confirm.

Thank you, Mary. You are confirmed. No reportable actions were taken in closed session.

Okay. Thank you. So, at this point in time, let's go to item number four. This is where we moved our first item, 10A, into the section on the appointment. City clerk Bunting, would you please proceed?

Thank you. Mayor and council, before you this evening, this item is a motion to appoint Emilio Pinonas to fill the District 3 vacancy on the Recreation and Parks Commission. After the City Council votes and makes the appointment, we have invited Mr. Pinonas to be in attendance and receive the oath of office this evening. Emilio, if you're here, that would be, in just one moment. Thank you. And with that, I'm available with any questions.

Any questions? Okay. Do we have any public comment on this item? Do we need to take public comment on this item? We do. Okay. Please proceed with any public comment that we might have.

No public comment on this item, mayor.

Okay. Do I have a motion, please? Councilman Regulier James Aguilar. No. Victor Aguilar.

I'd like to move this item.

Okay. Vice Mayor.

Second.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Seeing none, please vote.

All votes are in, and the motion carries unanimously. Emilio? I, please state your name.

I, Emilio Pinonas.

Do solemnly swear or affirm.

Do solemnly swear or affirm.

That I will support and defend.

That I will support and defend.

The constitution of The United States.

The constitution of The United States

and the constitution of the state of California against all enemies foreign and domestic that I will bear true faith and allegiance

That I will bear true faith and allegiance.

To the constitution of The United States.

To the constitution of The United States.

And the constitution of the state of California.

And the constitution of the state of California.

That I take this obligation freely.

That I take this obligation freely

without any mental reservation

without any mental reservations

or purpose of evasion

purpose of evasion

and that I will well and faithfully discharge The duties upon which I'm about to enter.

The duties of which I'm about to enter. Congratulations.

So for those of you that are out there, we certainly appreciate the volunteerism and we encourage everyone to consider serving on one of our commissions. Thank you, Mila, for stepping forward to do this. Now we've got two proclamations and a recognition. So as per the agenda, we will begin by declaring May as Mental Health Awareness Month. We will then proceed to declare May as Asian American Islander Heritage Month, and then we will receive a generous donation from the Rotary Club.

Okay. Let's begin with Mental Health Awareness Month. And health services. I've got doctor Mai Li, Julia Liao, and Tew Kwok. Okay. So we're gonna do this. Gonna give this to you. If you can look this way. So I'm gonna read along and you can follow if you'd like. There you go.

Here we go. So whereas mental health is essential to our overall health and the importance of attending to it has become even more pronounced over the last few years. And whereas nearly fifty eight million American adults live with some form of mental illness, where they experience anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, or others. And whereas many people with mental health issues may not know how to access resources for their needs and stigma or fear of discrimination keep many who would benefit from mental health services from seeking help. And whereas the city of San Leandro supports efforts to address mental health and the emotional well-being of individuals and at risk populations and favors legislation to strengthen such services.

Now, therefore, I, Juan Gonzalez, the third mayor of the city of San Leandro, hereby proclaim the month of May 2026 as Mental Health Awareness Month in the city of San Leandro, And do call upon our community to increase awareness and understanding of mental illness. To reduce stigma and discrimination towards mental illness. And to promote appropriate and accessible services for all people with mental illness. Thank you for being here with us. Jack, say a few words.

Yes, please. I'm gonna have to read this to keep it under the. Get a good evening Mr. Mayor Gonzales and council members My name is Miley. I am the program director for the dental residency at Asian Health Services.

Our CEO Julia Lou and to clock as you can see are here and behalf of Asian Health Services we want to thank the mayor the city council members and the city of San Leandro for this important recognition. We are honored to be here today because we recognize that there is an incredible need for not only dental but also mental health services in the city of San Leandro. We are proud to say that we are one of the first integrated dental and mental health clinics in the country. We are also the first dental teaching health center in the state of California. Our new clinic is just right across the street right next door to T.

O. So you can stop by and say hi to us. Our clinic includes dental specialties and a licensed clinical social worker supporting our patients. We started the dental mental health model because as dentists we saw an increasing number of patients who were struggling with depression, suicide and domestic violence. I recall seeing having a patient who was struggling with depression and she had just lost her adult daughter.

She was experiencing severe anxiety during a routine dental clinic cleaning. It wasn't because she was being at the dentist, but just rather she was still mourning her daughter. So I shared this with our licensed clinical social worker, and she was able to reach out and, get her the assistance that she needed. Our dental clinic opened on 12/04/2024 which is two full time dentists myself included and we are now fully staffed with four to six general dentists and specialists on any given day Our specialties include pediatrics, oral surgery, periodontal surgery and We provide care to medical patients who would otherwise have difficulty finding dental offices that accept their insurance, especially specialists. We currently have about 2,000 active patients from zero to 100 years old and this accounts for about 6,000 visits in the past sixteen months alone.

So we provide basic dental services as well as crowns, root canals, extractions including wisdom teeth, dentures and implants and we are excited to have our dental residents join us this July. So we cannot have been able to provide such wonderful services for the community without your support Thank you so much again, Mr. Mayor council members and the city of San Leandro for this great honor

Thank you so much. This kind of innovation in the city of San Leandro. What was it? First in the whole state of California. I love it. City where innovation flourishes. Okay. We will move to our second proclamation declaring May as Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month here in the city of San Leandro. If I can have everyone from the Vietnamese American Community Center of the East Bay come on up. This is your time.

So we've got Ms. Hien Li, the instructor of all of these wonderful new citizens. And we're going to give you this proclamation for all the great work that you're doing. Come on over so that everybody has space. There you go. Come on up. Perfect. Thank you for being here today. So I'm gonna let you tell all of your story, but just for the for people, to recognize out there that you've helped over 500 students

Yes. Approximately.

On their pathway to citizenship.

Citizenship. Yes.

That's amazing. Thank you. And when you were young and came over here to The United States, I was young. I was in the city of Houston when there was a a large group of Vietnamese Americans that came to The United States back in the seventies. And to think that, you know, we have grown up together apart, but yet together, and I'm so excited about having you here today.

I wanna say I was very young.

You were very, very young. You were young. I was young. You were very young. Whereas Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month is a month to celebrate and pay tribute to the contributions of the AAPI community to American history, to society, and culture.

And whereas president Obama issued presidential proclamation 8369, proclaiming May 2009 as Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. And whereas Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders comprise many different ethnicities and languages, and their many achievements embody the American experience. And whereas Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are leaders in all aspects of American life, including government and industry, science and medicine, arts and armed forces, education, and sports. And whereas San Learo community has greatly benefited through the cultural richness, diversity, and generosity of its local Asian American and Pacific Islanders and celebrates their contributions through various public programs and events each year. Now, therefore, I Juan Gonzalez the third, mayor of the city of San Leandro, do hereby proclaim May 2026 as Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in the city of San Leandro and do call upon residents to actively appreciate and to celebrate both their AAPI neighbors and more broadly AAPI culture and heritage.

Thank you for being here.

Hi. Good evening. My name is Heehan Eva Gonzales Lam. I am a an attorney. I teach citizenship at the Vietnamese American communities in the East Bay.

And I on behalf of VACIP, I would like to thank you, the mayor, the city councils in the last two years for giving us an opportunity and support us through our citizenship program. We provide citizenship classes in four different languages: English, Chinese, Vietnamese, and also Spanish now. I believe in the last two years, at least 60 students or 60 new citizens came out from the senior center that's provided by the city of San Leandro. So thank you very much for your support for our program. And as an immigrant and a naturalized citizen myself, I want to say that, yes, it's the immigrants that make America great.

Amen. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna take a picture with all of this.

Oh, yes. Yes. Yes.

Did you get yours? Okay. Rotary. Celebrating one hundred years in San Leandro. Now when it's time to offer help to the community, Rotary is there. Rotary is there here in San Leandro and really throughout the world. It's a long tradition. Come on up everybody. Come on up. That's a hundred years. And I think your official date is in October. Is that right? You're gonna have a big gala or something like that? Yes. So be sure and get you a really big big proclamation then.

On up. On up. On up. Rotary. Rotary. Rotary.

In fact, you're invited.

I'm invited on the fifteenth. I'm sure the whole town's invited. It's gonna be quite the celebration. So at this point in time, there you go. Get on in there. Here we go. It's my understanding that Rotary has been working hard and that they have tried to find some way to make a big impact in the city of San Leandro. And in particular, they have found a way to help drive big change down at the marina, if I understand that correctly. So I'm gonna pass the mic. I think it's to you, miss Cornelius. Who am I passing it to? To Jinhua? There we go. Our president. Get the president friend center right here.

Alright, Jin.

So here we go, Jin. Tell him what it's all about.

Okay. Okay. My name is Jinhua Su. I am the current president of the Rotary Club of San Leandro. I'd like to just say good evening to honor roll mayor Juan Gonzalez, honor roll vice mayor Vivaros Walton, Council Member, Bolt, Council Member, Simon, Council Member, Aguilar, Council Member, Aguilar, Council Member Bowen, City Manager, Cameron, City Attorney Pio Rola.

Thank you for having us. I'd also I just wanna say it's been a true honor serving as president currently and just it's been an honor serving alongside and continue serving alongside so many talented, selfless, and generous individuals and Rotarians here in the in this organization. Just want to recognize a few of our Rotarians here, specifically Herb Ritter, district governor who manages over, 70 65 to 70 clubs in our district. Diane Dorn as well, lieutenant governor. We have incoming area governor, Ed Hernandez.

Wow. Incoming president, Kenneth Pond. Yeah. Thank you. So, you know, what is Rotary? I get this question all the time. You know, Rotary is about making connections both business, personal. It's about camaraderie. It's about most important is about philanthropy, community service, volunteerism. But, you know, Rotary is really a global network of we have, you know, a 100 well, I'm sorry.

1,200,000 members around the world. Rotary Club is one of the most honored, most respected service organizations in the world. Again, we have over 1,200,000 members and that's that's gonna be your neighbor, your friends, leaders, problem solvers who see a world where people unite and take action to create lasting change around the world in our communities and ourselves. We have seven key areas. Peace, disease prevention, water, health, education, local economies, and the environment. So we're about service above self. That's one of our mottos. We also another one of our models is people of action. And so that these models drive our humanitarian projects. We're about bringing together leaders to exchange ideas and take action.

We're about ethical leadership, promoting high ethical standards in all professions. We're about global impact, addressing issues such as polio eradication, cervical cancer, clean water, education worldwide, specifically as it relates to, youth leadership education, peace education, and, also polio eradication which I mentioned. I think there's only two countries left and I think it's the intention of the Rotary Club to eradicate polio completely. The Rotary Club of San Leandro again, were formed in '9 I think 1926. That's I believe December 1926.

So that's gonna be a hundred years. And so again, we all invite you to our gala which will be October 15. That's Sequoia Country Club. And let's see what else. We have about 35 members and our members volunteer and do community service projects in San Leandro impacting hundreds of residents.

And we currently also have various international projects. We give out about $30,000 a year to about a dozen or more local nonprofits ranging from homeless shelters to battered women's shelters to Chicana literacy to, you know, resiliency, gardens, and so on. And we also have international projects. We've done cleft palate lip cleft lip and cleft palate surgeries for Guatemala children in Antigua and all around Guatemala. We also have a youth leadership program in the rural areas of Honduras and we're now embarking on another project to build out kitchens at a government school in Hyderabad, India.

So it's our intention to continue with these projects and and now, before yeah. But but before I pass it to the next speaker, I just want to say again, it's it's it's our honor, and and privilege to offer up this these monies and funds for the project. And I just also want to recognize Parks and Rec Director Vicente Suniga and Jennifer Auletta, Parks and Landscape Manager. And without further ado, I'll pass it on to Ivan Cornelius, Rotary Elder and Statesman and past district governor.

When he says elder, he means

it. 1926

is hundred years ago.

Just I can hear you online.

Can you hear me now?

Online. Online.

I want you to know that hundred years goes by really fast. Of those hundred years, I've been in Rotary sixty one years. Woah. My role here today is just to share with you a little bit of microcosm of what Rotary is in this community. And I can tell you, this community means a lot to me.

I've been here since I was six years old. Rotary, sixty one years. So you can do the math. 1939, I was born. Rotary in the community, I think the biggest impact and our biggest contributions in this community, quite frankly, have been youth.

From the get go, 1926, there were 21 Rotarians. And the first thing they did was sponsor the first Boy Scout troop here in San Leandro, all about kids. The first Cub Scout troop in San Leandro. And then, of course, there wasn't much going on in the first twenty five years. As you know, there was a little war before 1926, and there was a big war after 1926.

And in between, had a depression. So Rotary really didn't get started until after the war. After the war, this community has benefited to the tune of well over $1,000,000 in contribution in charities to the local charities here in the town. One of our biggest contributions in this community has been our relationship with the Boys and Girls Club. Originally, it was a boys club.

And as a matter of fact, in 1944, 'forty five, we actually purchased some property on Davis Street. And we gave that to the boys' counts as their place for them to meet. And subsequently, they found some other opportunity. And in 1947, they chartered the first boys club. You know, they didn't believe in having girls in a club at that time.

Anyway, the first boys club. We have had that relationship from the very get go in 1947. I think we made contribution of $150 Well, I mean, I can remember at six years old, I was at that building. I tell my Rotarians that I said, the only thing I remember about the boys club, it smelled like gym socks. Anyway, we still meet at that boys club.

It's a boys and girls club now, and it's on the corner Marina And San Leandro Boulevard. What a magnificent structure. The other para I mean, irony is the CEO of that Boys and Girls Club from that little thing that smelled like a boys gym socks. Excuse me. The CEO of that Boys and Girls Club was a Rotary Youth Exchange student sponsored by our club.

That CEO of that Boys and Girls Club is a past president of our Rotary Club. That's CEO of that Boys and Girls Club. It came from an organization that used to be ran because I was on the board by one checkbook. That organization now has four fifty employees. That organization caters to almost 7,000 students, after school programs.

That organization, the main building, is a teen center, a dream that even our Rotary Club had when we tried to convert a part of that old building. The other thing that this club is notable for is our relationship with the Davis Street Family Resource Center. What a contribution to this community. Phenomenal organization. President of that organization for almost thirty years or more was Rose Padilla Johnson.

Rose could not make it tonight because her daughter is having chemotherapy. We have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars. I do not know how many turkeys we have bought for Thanksgiving. It seems like forever. I could go on, but I think the thing that you need to know is that our Rotary Club started a healthcare clinic there and our Rotary Club created a free dental clinic there.

We made the contributions. We got the materials. And that today has become a full fledged medical clinic to serve the needy people here in San Leandro. God bless them. And I will tell you, it is heartwarming to see the results and to go to that organization to see what they're doing.

Anyway, I was told I had two minutes, but but, Jin took more than two minutes, so I I stole some too, mayor, but, forgive me for that. But, anyway, we still give scholarships to San Diego High School students every year. We take a minimum of 30 students a year on a two day, two night snow trip every year. And I could go on. But it gives you an idea. There is a rotary club in San Leandro.

Okay. This is this is a gift to the entire city of San Leandro. City council, would you like to come on down? Come on down. City manager, city attorney, anyone who wants to be in this picture. Y'all get in this picture.

Y'all come now.

Yes. Just Yes. Mayor. So just in case anybody didn't hear, hasn't read the agenda, this is all for exercise equipment down at the marina. Give it up one last time for Rotary.

Okay. So at this point in time, we are going to move on to item number five, our consent calendar. Would any council member like to pull anything? If not, I will go to public comment on this item. Seeing none, we will take public comment on our consent calendar.

Mayor, we have not received any comment cards for the consent agenda, and there's no hands raised on line.

Okay. So I'll close public comment and come back to councilmember Victor Aguilar. Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to move the

consent calendar.

Okay. So I have a motion by councilmember Victor Aguilar. Councilmember James Aguilar.

Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to second.

So we have got a motion by Victor Aguilar with a second by James Aguilar. Both council members honorable council members of this City Council. At this point in time, do we have got any further discussion? Seeing none, please vote.

All votes are in, and the motion carries unanimously.

I do not believe that we've got any item six, but I'm just going look to my right and to my left. Nothing under Item six. We have not come to the time of our agenda where folks from the public can comment on items that are not on our agenda. Do we have anyone who would like to speak on something that is not on our agenda?

Mayor, we have not received any comment cards for items looks like we have one comment card from in the room, and there is currently one hand raised online.

Please proceed in the room first for non agenda items.

Darlene.

Being old in a renewed city, San Leandro. How would you tell it's renewed? One way is because the mayor is using technology that's up to date and not just speech. It's involved, it's encouraging, and I'm old. Where Sprouts is, there needs to be some help.

I called the police department the other day and I got this impression there's something wrong with these kids, what they're doing. And then I find the evidence afterwards that I've called the police department. Our superintendent of schools, in my opinion from listening to further things, is that he lives out of county. He doesn't know the streets. He doesn't know what these kids do after school.

He's gotta hurry home to his teenager. That I think there should be more constructive interplay between the city, the city councils, and so that the kids are not so rampant. I'm an old lady, but these kids, when I say, you know what, it was a year ago when things got whacked in my face, and they're down at McDonald's with a plastic thing that's nerve stuff, but until I got close I didn't know it was a nerve thing. But they had 14 that the San Leandro newspaper, now eight pages, said is illegal in California. We need to educate the people in San Leandro better.

I will just tell you this, that the country of Denmark, how they vote and other things goes through the library cards.

Thank you. Mayor, that is our only comment card from in the room.

So we'll close public comment in person. Move online to open public comment there.

Our first online speaker is Douglas Spaulding.

Good evening. Hello, San Leandro. It's election season. I'm reminded because there are all kinds of announcements, in my email and other otherwise that that, you know, mail in ballots were were mailed out to us today. On the ballot here in San Leandro is Measure discovered by going to the excellent city clerk's page on the city website.

And just to remind you all, because we haven't talked about it, I guess my question is what are you, the city council, doing to promote Measure F? This is the one that calls for district elections, per the California Voting Rights Act. And what that will mean is that each of the six districts, each of the council persons for the six, city council districts will be elected by only by those people in that specific district. No longer will they be elected citywide. Only the mayor's office will be elected citywide.

I'm I'm in favor of of district elections. I think that it will encourage more people to to run for office. I think, you know, the more the better. It promises, you know, greater representation because you won't need as much money to run a citywide campaign. You won't have to knock on as many doors and send out as many mailers and all that kind of stuff. So I think it's really, really time. Our school district has district elections. Next door in San Lorenzo, there are district elections. Or a Loma is now in the process of adopting district elections. So it's time for San Leandro do the same.

And if we fail to to pass this measure, it doesn't mean that we're gonna avoid district elections. It just means that now we're gonna face an expensive lawsuit with the all likelihood of losing and lining up with district anyway. So let's let's just go forward and do it. Thank you.

Thank you. Mayor, there are no more hands raised on

Closing public comment online. At this point in time, we will go through our agenda. There is no public hearing today nor are there informational presentations. So we're gonna move to our action item. We have taken 10 a at the beginning under the recognition section. So let's move to 10 b, presentation on the biannual budget. We have director Nicole Gonzales here to guide us through this.

Thank you. Good evening, mayor, members of the city council. The item before you this evening is the, amendment to the mid cycle fiscal year 2027 budget. This is just a reminder of where we've been. It's been quite a process with our mid cycle fiscal year twenty seven budget.

We are here tonight for adoption here in May 2026. It's been a long road. We appreciate the work that has been done by our staff to get us to this point, the conversations and direction that we received from council, and of course, our opportunity to work with the community on these recommended changes. Changes that took place as a direction from council was the elimination of the economic development studies in fiscal year twenty seven and twenty eight for a cumulative reduction of $100,000 We are also including the reduction in the business incentive program. So originally it was proposed to be eliminated.

Direction from council was to retain $25,000 in 2027, an additional $25,000 in 2028 for a total of $50,000 So again, as a reminder, just on the changes in revenue, this slide here will represent in column D the net changes to the projected revenue. We are projecting a little less, than a million dollars in, original, projected revenue. Again, this is a net change of the total expenditures and transfers in comparison to the fiscal year 2027 adopted with a net change of $1,700,000 reduction. And then as a reminder, one of the things that we talked about along the process of the budget were the need for critical needs for infrastructure, one of them being the CAT RMS. And so in addition to the adjustments to the proposed adjustments for the general fund this evening, we also are, looking for authorization from the council to amend the information technology fund, which would take into consideration some reductions, to services that provide to the General Fund, but also accounting for the CAT RMS capital infrastructure project.

Similarly, the painting and roof replacements will be funded in the Facilities Maintenance Fund and so that is captured here and is also in the resolution seeking an increase in appropriation in the Facility Maintenance Fund of 1,600,000 Furthermore, there was further discussion on the support from general fund transfers to other capital funds. In that amount, it was a reduction of a million dollars And so again, seeking, in the resolution, a change in adjusted appropriation for the capital fund of a deduction of a million dollars. And then lastly, just, looking again at the ten year forecast, when we take into consider everything that, we've discussed and gone through over the last several months, again, focusing on line 29, you'll see that the city is meeting its 20% and really exceeding its 20% reserve policy for economic uncertainties and so as a reminder in past projections before we did all this work over the last several months we were projecting a very different picture we were essentially not meeting that 20% goal in fiscal year twenty twenty seven we were below that economic uncertainty by 2030 in the negatives and then by 2032 the city was looking to project to have a negative cash available and so this is a very different picture than what we are looking at even in June 2026 Again, acknowledging the great work that staff has done, the input and review from our community, and then the support and direction that we receive from council.

And so just wanting to make sure that we're constantly providing this as a point for the council, but for the community as well, that we are monitoring our General Fund and health of the General Fund so that we have long term fiscal stability and sustainability. With that, we are seeking, approval from council, to approve the resolution amending the fiscal year twenty twenty seven budget, including both the revenue and expenditures appropriations.

Okay. So what we'll do is we'll take any clarifying questions at this time, then we'll go to public comment, then come back to council members. Council Member Boldt, please.

Yes. Thank you. Appreciate the presentation, but more importantly, wanted to reiterate what you said, all the hard work that staff is doing to make sure we're getting to the spot we need to be at. I I wanna point out in in the file twenty six one ninety one, I think it's page seven where it talks about the painting of city hall and the community center. We said it on the day of when we talked about appropriating a million dollars.

If we could divide that up in between the two years, I don't know if we need a motion or what to to make this happen, but I'd like to split that up so that we're doing 500,000 in one year, 500,000 in the next. I mean, it it helps us in the budget to do that. It's kinda like when you do your dental work, you know, you do it at the end of the year, so you have two balances to go off of. So I wanna make sure we're not forgetting

So I think that that's a the question is to achieve that end, would we need a motion?

Yeah. What do we need to do to make this

So when we get to the discussion part of this, you could make a motion to make that recommendation.

Okay. I was just making sure that we're not going down that path and I'm not stepping on anybody's toes. I wanna make sure we're going up.

Well, topic was discussed at the last meeting.

Three.

Yeah. And I think that this reflects the consensus of the council, but you're always welcome

Okay.

To make a motion. Seeing no other questions, I have one question. The IT the slide that had the I, IT information technology. I just wanna make sure that I understood this correctly. So that's slide number six. The decrease of five forty three zero eighty two is the same as before or this is a new number?

This is the same number that has been presented

Before. Thank Yes. That's all. At this point in time, we will go to public comment on this item.

Mayor, we have received three comment cards from within the room, and there's currently one hand raised online.

K. Let's go ahead and take our online hand, and they will come back in person. So we're opening public comment online.

Our online speaker is San Leandro Chamber of Commerce.

Hi. Good evening, everybody. It's Emily Grego, president of the President and CEO of the San Leandro Chamber of Commerce. I wanted to say thank you to Councilmember Bowen and BOLT for doing some work on these budget cuts around the business incentive program. Appreciate that.

Still very concerned about the cuts being made to the downtown ambassadors and the third party cleanup company that helps with encampments. All of that is incredibly important to a community feeling safe and clean and for businesses wanting to be here and employees wanting to work here. So I just concerned about that. I don't know if this budget is going to come around again in two years, and then maybe some of that funding is is comes back to us. I I feel like once you cut something from a budget, it's gone forever, and so I'm just very concerned about that.

Of course, I also do see that the chamber's budget is cut somewhat as well, and I believe we've been a great partner to the city. And so I hope that, you know, as times get better, maybe we see this funding coming back. But if you all and the ARU. I I don't wanna be remiss about the ARU. Those are the downtown ambassadors, ARU, and the cleaning really add to the community just feeling safe where businesses wanna be, where people wanna come out and shop. And so I'm I'm concerned with those cuts. I hope there's some more discussion this evening around them. Thank you.

Thank you. Mayor, are there no more hands raised online?

So we will close public comment online and come into the room. Opening public comment here.

We received three speaker cards, and those are from, Brody Scotland, Shailani Alex, and Alana Miller.

And you guys can go ahead and come just come up to the front row right here so that your walk is a little shorter.

Hi. I'm Brody Scotland with the Arts Culture and Library Commission. The staff report recommends eliminating the library art grant funds, and that's a bummer. Perhaps you've enjoyed the lovely mural at Jupiter Corner at Bethel Community Church on Bancroft or the butterfly mural just installed downtown, funded by the art grants. Local author Rose Whitmore was able to complete her first novel with funds from this program.

It's being published in 2027. We are making a difference in our community with these grants, and thank you for previously funding them. In 2024, the budget for the art grants was $80,000 This year, it was down to $30,000 If this passes, it will be $0 I know that everyone's got to tighten their belts, but that's not a belt tightening measure. We just won't have a belt. That is a $0 vote for funding arts and culture in our community.

That's a $0 investment in artistic improvements in our city. That's a vote of no confidence for artists that they're bringing economic benefit and other value to the city. I just received an invite to participate in San Leandro's place branding exercise. The invite said, the goal of the place brand is to help us better position the city as a great place to live, work, visit, invest in. I think art is essential to all of those things, and I bet arts and culture will feature prominently in our eventual Place brand.

I don't want to lose the momentum we've built and the hard work we've done. The city used to pay a consultant close to $10,000 to manage the prior art grant program, and now it's all done in house. For my day job, I help manage an art grant program, and I provide my expertise for free here after busting my hump all day because I wanna live in a city where kindness matters, volunteerism matters, and art flourishes. Please reconsider cutting that $30,000. Thank you.

Thank you. The next speakers are Shailani Alex and Alana Miller.

Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Shailani Alex, and I serve as a commissioner on the San Leandro Arts, Culture and Library Commission. It's an appointment I'm honored to hold. Thanks to this council. I'm here to address the proposed elimination of library public art funds. While I understand the need to balance constrained budget, I want to highlight that this is a high leverage investment, one that represents well under oneten of 1% of the city's total budget, yet produces returns in threefold: economic activity, community well-being, and civic identity. Studies from the U. S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and Americans for the Arts show that arts and cultural industries annually contribute over a trillion dollars to the total U. S.

Economy, and at a smaller scale locally, even modest public arts investments can generate noticeable returns through increased foot traffic, audiences spending money in nearby local businesses, and support for working artists. But beyond economics, public art carries clear social values. It can increase library visitation and encourage people to stay longer, ease stress, and strengthen a sense of belonging in shared civic spaces. These are things that square, squarely fall in alignment with some of the things we're celebrating this month as well. So protect those values while respecting our fiscal realities.

I might offer the following suggestions. First, does this need to be a full elimination, or is a partial reduction possible? And then second, and also in partnership with you, how can we use those preserved funds to leverage external matching funds and partnership opportunities to amplify city dollars so we don't have to disrupt any plans and goals around the general fund. As a commissioner and active worker in the arts and culture spaces, I am personally committed to strong stewardship of this investment. While elimination of this funding may create minimal short term savings, it does not, it actually it does risk long term cultural, economic, and civic loss that is far harder to rebuild once it's gone.

I respectfully urge City Council to preserve public art funding as a small but high impact investment in San Leandro's continued vitality. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. The next speaker is Alana Miller.

All right. Good evening, City Council and Mayor. My name is Alana Miller, I have the honor of serving as the chair of the San Leandro Arts Culture and Library Commission. I'm here tonight to ask the City Council to not eliminate the ongoing budget for the Arts and Culture Grants Program. Over the past three years, the San Leandro Arts and Culture Grants Program has been a testament to the City's commitment to creating a more vibrant, connected, and beautiful community.

The grant program is part of our cultural infrastructure. It has enabled artists, makers, and culture bearers who live in San Leandro to practice their crafts and build creative capacity within their communities. The impact of these grants can be seen and experienced all around in murals, art classes, mosaics, dance and music performances all these free and open to the public. This has fostered creativity and innovation, skill sharing, and making San Leandro a place where artists and art lovers want to live. Despite the achievements of this program, each year its funding has been reduced.

After 2027, its total funding will be $0 We are only asking for the budget to sustain the current $27,000 a year grant program and keep this momentum going. I ask the City Council to keep the Arts and Culture Grant Program in the budget for 2027 and beyond. By backing the grants program, you send a clear message that art is integral to the city, not an optional nice to have. Thank you.

Thank you. Mayor, there are no more comment cards?

So we will close public comment and come back to council members for discussion. We will begin with council member Bolt. I

was gonna start with the motion, but now I'm seeing it light up, so I will pull myself out.

Thank thank you very much. Let's let's have some discussion before you go to a motion. Thank you. Councilmember Bowen.

Yes. Thank you, mayor. We have actually had a lot of conversations about this budget, and, I really appreciate the conversations that this council has been able to have and, obviously, the finance committee and and all of the thought that's gone into this. And I will say, and I can imagine the rest of my colleagues feel the same way, but every time we work through the process, I go home and I'm like, oh my god.

I should have

really advocated for this more. What if I would have done that? And I go back to our retreat and a very clear decision for us that we were going to really be, what's the word, have strength in sticking to trying to balance this budget and looking through the lens of fiscal responsibility so that we don't have to make real hard cuts further along. Not to say that any of the things that we're doing now are not hard. I really, really hate that we are cutting library hours.

Although it's gonna be up on the whole because we made a decision to give access to folks with another library, which is absolutely wonderful, but it's, you know, it's that the balance of it. And I really wish we could not only, you know, fund the ambassador program, but expand it down further on 14th Street. And so many things we've talked about, and then obviously hearing from our public commenters today, yes. Like, I wanna fund all of that. What I would say is that, hopefully, this is not where we stay and that I know that this council in the comments that we've made and in the work that we do in the in when we leave the these chambers is really to promote these programs because this is what the community wants, and this is what makes San Leandro really wonderful.

So I think the push is gonna be on us to somehow be creative in whatever we can to try to support additional funding that is not out of the general fund so that we can balance this budget. But I would say I I support the budget as presented so that we can move forward with this so that come July 1, we can be in in a good place. But I I think the direction certainly for me is to if there's any money, certainly some of the the the programs and cuts that have been floating through these conversations, I think staff have noted. It is really important for us because I think so many of the things that we've talked about really speak to not just the nice to haves because I understand it's not infrastructure necessarily or it's not public safety, but it's the things that make a community thrive. It's the things that actually are the root causes of so many of the other things that we're trying to address.

You know, I just this is this is a hard decision, but I think that it's getting it's helping us as a city be in a better place. And I I don't know if did you if the finance director wanted to respond.

If you'd like to weigh in on this or anything else.

Thank you. I did just want to provide a little bit of context about the mini grant for the arts program. Director of the library, Brian Simmons did provide some additional opportunity for funding for 2027. So through a combination of some carry forward dollars as well as some gift funds that we have, we will have enough funding in 2027 to fund that program just through a different form of funding, as you mentioned. So it won't be necessarily purely general fund, but it will be a combination of some carry forwards from other programs this year and then some gift funds that the city has received.

Was there anything that you needed to Yes. To elaborate on that? Please proceed. There you go.

I absolutely love that and just want to reiterate that. Let's do that for opening the library on Mondays again and maybe even Sundays. Just throwing that out there. Really, really want that to happen in the safety ambassador program.

If I I just wanna clarify something. For safety ambassadors, my recollection is that's in the future. Is that this year?

It's being considered, potentially next biennial budget 2829. So it is not included as a reduction in this budget.

So specifically for 'twenty nine, so not for 'twenty eight, but for 'twenty nine, fiscal year ending 'twenty nine?

For the Downtown Ambassadors Program? Correct. There's proposed reductions for consideration in both 'twenty eight

and Both. Thank you very much for clarifying. Vice mayor, please.

Thank you. I did have that as one of, the kind of clarifying points and to kind of add some more context, but it's also my understanding that the funding remains, flat. There is there's no cut, but the funding remains flat for the ambassadors.

That is correct.

And I think some of the, what what, what we have all received via email, is around not including a COLA increase. And so we are committing to funding the ambassador program at the current rate, but needing to make the tough decision of not including a COLA, but continue to fund the position as the the in the same amount, so to speak. I I just serving in the finance committee. We've had a lot of really tough conversations both as a council during our strategy meeting in March and even before that as then director UN, finance director UN kind of rang the bell several years ago, even, when I was first onboarded to the council, in 2024, staff has been ringing the bell on the impending fiscal situation that we are we are looking at. And there's a couple of things that I wanna highlight.

One is that I am despite the cuts. And I do want to clarify that every single department is is making significant cuts in relative to their overall budgets. Some of the departments are small, like HR. So, when we're looking at a proportional cut versus the larger departments, they're looking at a significant cut as well, even though the number itself is not that large, but the department is small. But what I am proud at least for this budget, and this is why we have to make all these really hard decisions is that we're protecting jobs this year.

No one is getting let go because of our budget situation. I'm really proud of that. It is something that we had to at least for me, it was a priority that I, kept present and in the front of my mind and it was something that I wanted to make sure that we protected people's jobs in San Leandro because the people who work here actually provide the services that we all need. It it it is not technology that does it. It's people.

It's people who provide services. And that's that's something that I'm particularly proud. Despite the really heavy and difficult cuts that we have had to make. I'm proud of that. Regarding and I'm just gonna drill down into some of the items that were brought up by some of the public speakers.

The third party encampment cleanup, essentially what it does is although it is a reduction in the appropriation, new number is actually reflective of what we actually spend year over year in third party encampment cleanup. So unless encampments increase, we will continue to see the same level of service. So really what we're looking at is right sizing the appropriation to ensure that it actually is reflective of the usage. We talked about the ambassadors. The ARU, that's the alternative response unit that several of my colleagues have been bringing up through the months.

And that I know is we worked really hard to get it off the ground and hats off to the fire department and to all the other kind of integrating departments that help make the ARU a success. It is something that we're keeping an eye on. And although it is not slated to be to have a reduction, an overall reduction this year, we do have to find some bridge funding over the next biennial budget. It's something that not only does it help the downtown businesses and the people who come to downtown, but I'm particularly proud of the lives that it has changed of the people who are served by the Alternative Response Unit. And my gratitude to the staff who make this, again, people who make this program work and who make this program effective.

So, thank you. Finally, I just want to end with my gratitude to the council. We all have things that we deeply care about and that we advocate. And we I am particularly grateful for your all y'all's partnership as we kind of navigate this particular year. We are, this is not the end of it.

We are looking at the next biennial budget also with cuts. So we're gonna have to look deeper and we're gonna have to think again about prioritizing. This is just a one year budget and we're gonna do this all over again for the next biennial budget. My gratitude to the finance team and to all of the department heads who have brought us to this point. My gratitude to the community who shows up and elevates the priorities of what you want to elevate and it is hard for me to do this.

But thank the community for coming out, both online and through the forums and all the meetings that we've had. And I will close with that. Thank you.

Council Member Boldt, please.

Yes, thank you. And I, again, I agree with everything that was just said and the only thing I was gonna add to Council Member Bones was a a r u and I know you've talked about that. It's important to you but then vice mayor did it. So, good job. Sometimes, it takes me a couple times around the block to find the address but I always find the address. Am I asking for something wrong when I'm saying divide these two up? Now that I'm thinking about this is a biannual. Am I screwing? Am I can you speak to that please? Sorry.

Sure. What I would say is if we split it up it's not something that the city could necessarily afford. It does change the projection for the city. The city has the ability to pay for that now. And so changing the direction and splitting it, it actually may not be as cost effective.

Obviously also when you are bidding for additional more than one project, it could account for some savings rather than bidding for two individual projects. I don't necessarily have all those level of details. I am not an engineer, but I do know economies of scale essentially as you're bidding for two projects rather than one, there may be some savings associated with mobilization. But essentially it is in the budget this year because it is something that we can afford and it's currently in the second part of our two year and then next year we will come to you with a proposed new two year biannual budget.

I just want to say director Marquise has basically said the same thing about getting a discount when you bid both at one time and so I'm going to withdraw my suggestion to make it two parts. I'm not gonna have two people telling me one thing and me do that something different. So I I withdraw that and I support the Okay. Budget as is.

So any other questions or comments? Okay. So I'm gonna weigh in with mine quickly. First, just I agree with everything that everybody has said, big picture. I think another thing that I will highlight is unlike some cities, we have not requested a salary give back or a salary increase deferral from our employees.

There are cities that are doing that. We have not done that. So if there is someone front and center in terms of maintaining our culture of dedication to our employees, who, as you saw from State of the City, are doing some really great stuff, we really do put our money where our mouth is. We don't just talk about it. We recognize the contribution that they are giving us. The second thing is that I will be at some point in the future specifically making a proposal that any excess funds that we receive go to those deferred capital investments. For every single dollar that we're not spending on repairing the roof that leaks into our buildings,

for

every single dollar that we're not spending on the roads, the roads are getting worse at an individual road level, we need to start addressing those hundreds of millions of dollars. And the other place would be, I would be open to going directly to unfunded pension liabilities. Those are the two things that pose the greatest risk to us, to the long term financial stability of this city. That being said, I do want to talk about what our public commenters came to speak about. Cause I do think that it's interesting that at a time when we are looking to cut historically, what always gets cut is the arts.

Arts suffer anytime that there are budget cuts and they suffer it dramatically. And it hadn't really dawned on me that the number used to be like 100 ks or 80 ks or something like that. I think when the library and arts commission were merged, it was 150 for a year. And then it went down to 30,000 and now we're really talking about zero. And the reason that it's zero and not the 20,000, that's something about where we allocate some money is because the staff report makes it very clear.

We are eliminating. It doesn't say we're making an adjustment. It says we will be eliminating. And that's just a fundamentally a really bad place to be the more that I think about it. Do I think that everyone should take a decrease relative to two years ago or three years ago? Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, sorry guys. I can't say that we're gonna go back to a 100,000. It's impossible as far as I'm concerned. But I really struggle that when we're not even in crisis yet, we're not in crisis and yet we're completely eliminating those grants.

Having driven down Bancroft to go down to Jefferson Elementary, the fact we have a giant mural directly across the street from a school that brings joy and sunshine to students every single day when they're dropped off at school. It's just amazing. I think it's just amazing. The fact that you go downtown and where you used to look at a nasty trash enclosure, now you see a beautiful butterfly mural exhibit. I think that's fantastic.

To me, that's incredibly valuable. When we talk about things like mental health investment and stuff like that, that is mental health investment. So the only thing that I would propose different from everything we've because we've done slicing and dicing and all that kind of stuff, and I was in finance with vice mayor and also in finance, is that you Councilmember Aguilar, Victor Aguilar. Mean, we did a lot of cutting. It was very painful.

But it didn't quite dawn on me how significant the arts have already taken it. And so to go to zero really fundamentally bothers me. So the only thing that I would propose is that we keep that $30,000 going forward, that that is the direction. We have to have something dedicated to that so we can continue to add just a little bit of art in our city year after year. We're not talking about millions of dollars. We're not talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars. We're just talking like about $30,000 And I am good in math. Someone gave some math up there. The math was not right. It's not less than 1%.

It's not less than a tenth of a percent. It's like two one hundredths of 1%. It is tiny what we're doing now. And I think that we can at least keep what we're doing. So that would be my recommendation, my council members that we adopt adopt the budget recommendation as is, but we make sure that 30,000 that is currently going remains.

Councilmember Bold.

I will second that.

Okay. At this point in time, have a motion by Gonzales, a second by Boldt. Any further discussion? Please vote.

All votes are in, and the motion carries unanimously.

Okay. At this point in time, we'll go to our next item on the calendar, is, I believe, mister Pirotta, city attorney Pirotta, leading us through item 10 c.

Thank you. Thank you, mayor, and thank you, city clerk Bunting. This is, a presentation with actions counsel on SB seven zero seven implementation, the meeting disruption policy, and language access policy. I'm Richard P. Euroda, your city attorney.

We'll recap, what we've done so far related to s p seven zero seven, a summary of the key provisions of the new legislation that went into effect 01/01/2026 and also has provisions going into effect July 1. We have recommendations from the Rules Committee to the full council and an overview of the proposed policies that were also vetted by the Rules Committee. In short, SB seven zero seven expands mandatory hybrid public access for city council meetings. Recall that, especially during during the pandemic, we went to virtual meetings under the emergency declaration, and it worked. We had Zoom meetings and we've since instituted hybrid Zoom meetings for council meetings.

SB seven zero seven has made that mandatory. We have remote attendance flexibility allowances for council members and other members of boards and commissions. We'll talk about that some more as well as mandatory language access outreach requirements. Staff has recommendations that are focused on meeting legal requirements without adding significant resource costs. And that's a key driver and consideration we'd like for you to consider throughout the presentation.

Here we are in the process of the implementation of SB seven zero seven's requirements. The assessment phase has, was finished. We are now in the framework framework phase where we're establishing governance, with direction from the rules committee that's already occurred and now here before you on the city council. After the framework phase, we will go into the infrastructure phase, which has already been starting to be planned where we're configuring meeting rooms, the technology, updating internal procedures and training staff presiding officer training staff, presiding officers and presiding officers. We're going to start implementation for the July 1 items of the legislation, of course, in line with the law, and we will continue to monitor and adjust and return to counsel as needed with refinements or budget requests.

Key provisions of SB seven zero seven. There are three different categories of legislative bodies to which SB seven zero seven applies, and these are all changes in the Brown Act. If it wasn't made clear, SB seven zero seven amended the Brown Act. And the rules apply differently depending on the type of legislative body, council, standing committee, or boards of commissions. What is important, I think, in sort of the immediate sense, and we have received questions from council members about this as well, is that SB seven zero seven makes permanent rules related to legislative body members, yourselves, use of social media.

And the slide says that yourselves, as members of legislative body, shall not directly respond to any communication on an Internet based social media platform such as Facebook, Instagram, etcetera, regarding a matter that is within the subject matter jurisdiction of the legislative body that is made, posted, or shared by any other member, one of your fellow council members of the legislative body. This includes comments like emojis. Excuse me. This includes comments, likes, emojis, and reposts. Essentially, this means is that, for example, let's say vice mayor Verus Walton makes a post on Facebook and council member Bolt responds to it by liking it or putting a thumbs up emoji to it or whatever, another emoji that makes that shows agreement, that's prohibited.

You should not do that amongst yourselves as legislative body members under this law and this rule. Naturally, it's to prevent the appearance of a seriatim or serial meeting amongst the council that did not happen or decision or discussion occurred outside of an open and notice meeting such as this one. Great question from council member James Aguilar regarding what what about a repost? Well, what if council member James Aguilar post something and council member Victor Aguilar reposts it? That is also prohibited.

So just keep that in mind as well. What if the city, however, puts out a post on Facebook advertising a city event or a calendar of some kind? Obviously, great. That is not of course, the city is not one of you all. This a law is between legislative body members, so you can repost that particular, city issued or city created post.

Where we want it to be careful, sort of there's some natural nuances to this, is that if a member of the public posts something and there are comments below that post, that comment section, if you comment to it, a fellow council member, and this is an original comment to someone else's post, not one of your fellow members' posts, but a member of the public, not on the council, and someone makes a post, a comment to that resident's post, you again, the slot then applies. You can't repost it. You can't like it. You can't like the council member's comment. You can like the community member's comment, but the council member's comment as we all understand in the cascade of the comments of that post should not be liked, emojied.

I think I just created a new word. Emojied, etcetera. I can stop there and ask her any questions or we can keep going there if you'd like to.

Do we have any questions? It could begin with Council Mervoldt.

I I think you answered it but I wanna be extremely clear. If the city posts something, they, you know, something's going on. Mhmm. One council member reposts it. Yeah. That's that post. Yeah. And then, I'll just say me. I I see the same city post. I can then repost the cities even and we're both reposting

Yes.

But they're they're the cities. Correct. We haven't created a serial

okay. You have not. Great question.

Thank you.

But to be clear, these are posts about subject matter within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council.

Yes,

ma'am. So for example, if we're putting up a post that says, wow, what a great Cherry Festival, Presumably anybody could repost that or like that.

Yeah, think that's fine.

Because it has nothing to do with a matter such as our, the budget decision that we're making. Right. Has nothing to do with some legislation that we're considering. It's just celebrating the city of San Leandro.

I think that's fine, mayor. Yes. Okay.

Because I think of what I That's have Of what I've seen from council members, that's what I see. I see people liking each other's, that something good has happened in the manor. The swim team is doing something, and we're just celebrating, uplifting the entire city. The other question that I have is with respect to personal accounts, as opposed to city accounts. So I've got my own Facebook as a person, and I've got my mayoral Facebook. I am assuming that what I do with my personal Facebook I can do period, full stop, with no control. This is a very

great question again, but I do believe that if you are using your personal for city business reasons.

Let's assume that I'm not, right? That's why I have a mayoral Facebook and a mayoral Instagram.

Yeah, I think then as long as it's a very clear line that this is about Juan Gonzalez Private citizen? Private citizen. Yes.

That's fine. Any other questions? Seeing none, if you

would proceed. Thank you. This is a mandate. As I said before, there's a hybrid public participation requirement, which we're doing right now, is virtual participation is required for the public through a platform such as Zoom or Teams. We must adopt disruption and continuation policy if we do so because it's now mandated that we have this virtual participation.

If the meeting is disrupted, the tech the technology of the meeting, the Zoom or the Teams goes out, is unavailable. Then the meeting must pause, and it can pause for up to one hour for access for disruptions for disruption while good faith efforts are taking place to restore access. Of course, if within the first three minutes we resume the Zoom access, then we don't have to wait that full hour, of course, to resume the hybrid meeting. So our policy does reflect that. It's just logical that that would be the case.

However, if the meeting does cannot be brought back online within that hour, there are certain findings that the council can make to continue the meeting and continue its business without the virtual participation and some findings that will be have to be made. We will, of course, work for that to never ever happen because we do enjoy, I think, and the public really does participate in our hybrid meetings and virtual meetings and it's been helpful. Here's an option that was created by SB seven zero seven where we have a hybrid public participation option that's applicable to boards and commissions where virtual participation by the public at boards and commissions would be available under SB seven zero seven. The cost to do so right now is estimated to be $30,000 to $150,000 and that goes to the upgrading, etcetera, and the staff time to staff those boards and commission meetings which currently meet, in person without a virtual option. There is a mandate for agenda translation.

City Council meeting agendas must be translated into applicable languages. In San Leandro, we use the American Community Survey, which is reputable and used by many other jurisdictions. In San Leandro, Spanish and Chinese are what the American Community Survey says are the languages we must translate our agendas to. Not each and every backup document, staff report, or study that we attach, just the agenda titles, the 20 or 30 or so words that inform the public and gives a reasonable person the opportunity to understand and participate in the meeting if they want to through a virtual or in person. So the related meeting information must be posted prominently online.

What that means is that we have to post that the agendas are available in Spanish and Chinese, in Spanish and Chinese on our main website. Go here and it's translated to get to our agendas. We have a mandate to outreach and do reasonable efforts for city council meetings to encourage participation by groups that don't traditionally participate in city council meetings. That means that we do public posting on our boards, our outside boards, our outdoor boards here at city hall for additional translations. I believe also they're available at at the libraries as well.

And assist with meeting translation and interpretation at meetings, which we already do, and provide a means translated again in the agendas to contact the city clerk's office to request translation and interpretation for our meetings. SB seven zero seven also provides an option for fully remote member participation for eligible bodies. And the eligible bodies are a finite list and they're listed on the slide. The ineligible bodies would not be able to have fully remote member participation. And that is because of the unique subject matter of those particular bodies, and they are listed here.

There's an option for fully remote member participation for council standing your finance committee, your, facilities and transportation committee meeting, and your rules committee meeting. However, there are certain requirements. All of the council members have to participate remotely if they are located in San Leandro from locations within San Leandro that are accessible to the public and allow members of the public to go to that location and participate remotely. We would have this room, and the city clerk would be here to take public comment for members who want to come here. And again, this is for your standing committee meetings where the three of you are on the standing committee.

For boards commissions, all members may participate remotely without providing the address of their physical location. But then again, that is also not recommended by staff because right now the the costs associated with in implementing that. And that council authorization would be required for that particular for a fully remote member participation. Like I said, that one physical meeting location, typically right here where the city clerk would be, would be open to the public with one staff person to receive public comment at a static location, and the council has to adopt findings every six months that fully remote member participation is, permitted. What the Brown Act s b seven zero seven also did was codify the just cause circumstances and clarify them in SB seven zero seven in the Brown Act.

And just cause circumstances we know for this body allow remote attendance by one of you, by a legislative body member if they have these particular bullet pointed needs or issues for the meeting. What this essentially means is that you don't have to publish your address, your static address in the agenda before the meeting, and you would be able to attend the meeting without publishing your address where a member of the public could go and participate in the meeting at an ADA accessible location wherever you are in the world. It's gotta be a static location. But you are only limited you are limited to appear remotely under the just cause reasons that I list here for a maximum of seven meetings a year because this body, the city council meets three or more times per month. And, of course, for other bodies that meet five meetings per month, it's a little bit less.

So Just Cause is really about exceptional or emergency circumstances. It if you recall, if there was an emergency circumstance, the council actually had to vote to allow you to participate remotely if it was an emergency circumstance. That particular requirement was removed from the Brown Act by SB seven zero seven so that it's just you announce why you're attending remotely, and then you just attend. There's no city council approval required. This is a busy slide.

I understand. I'll just leave this up here for a moment because there were the the rules committee vetted all of these issues and made recommendations and provided feedback to the full council here and now for you all to consider. Decision point one, we already do. Hybrid participation. We support Zoom and Teams. And, we did consider landline telephone as backup call in, but we do have a landline telephone here in the room. And they can the members of the public can use the telephone numbers that are provided in the Zoom invitation. Disruption policy, we have that policy drafted. It's been presented. It's in the agenda.

Excuse me. It's in the year packet. We implement, what do you do about implementing hybrid public participation for all legislative bodies? The Rules Committee was supportive of staff's recommendation to take no action at this time regarding boards and commissions. There was an interest in hybrid public participation for council standing committee meetings, and there was a request for additional information on potential costs.

Language access policy, that policy, was, is a mandate and is presented at this meetings, in this meetings packet. Simplifying public comment, there was rules committee discussion about whether to rely on prior subcommittee, city council standing committee comments, or continue taking comments at both levels, both at the standing committee and at city council meetings. The rules committee recommendation was to take public comment at both. And finally, authorizing members of eligible bodies to be fully remote. Staff recommended taking no action at this time as it could require additional expenses for the city to do so and the rules committee was supportive of staff's recommendation.

The meeting disruption policy is presented to you as well. I'm sorry, in the packet and we recommend adoption of that. It requires again a recess of at least one hour if service is disrupt is disrupted. The meeting may resume before the one hour has finished if service is restored or after the one hour if certain findings are made. And finally, we codified the language access policy as required by SB seven zero seven. So staff recommends the city council adopt the proposed resolution that approves the city council meeting disruption policy and the city council meeting language access policy.

Thank you very much. Do we have any public comment on this item?

Mayor, we have not received any comment cards, and we currently have, one hand raised online.

Let's take the public comment online. In person is open and closed.

Our online commenter is Alvaro Ramos.

Can you hear me? Yes.

Okay. So, one of the questions that I really thought of when I was looking at this was, know, sort of what's coming to my mind is the compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. I don't know if that's sort of like somehow outside of like, you know, you're talking about language access, but you didn't there wasn't like a percentage of the city's population of how much is, for example, American Sign Language. So that's something that I'm always thinking about because I don't have a disability. I don't know what that lived experience is like.

But I also want to recognize that it can be really difficult to even get into a meeting, quite frankly. So I'm always thinking about what is like the what kind of things could be done regarding like you know assisted technology and issues like that. And I did like seeing the consideration of like technology failure as an issue. I do think if your internet gets interrupted, the computer stops working, then you're going to need a telephone as a backup. I think that the other thing that I just find kind of annoying a little bit is the remote attendance by the Brown Act.

I just feel like it should be unlimited remote access. I think that's a change that should happen. I know that there have been things going back and forth with state bureaucrats and the governor about like we want to be remote and and no, don't want to be remote but the governor is out doing who knows what. So, you know, that I think it would be more forward looking if it was unlimited.

Thank you. Your time has elapsed. May are there no more hands raised online?

So we have closed public comment and come back to council member questions, discussion, dialogue. Council member Bolt.

Thank you. Just on that last comment by the from the public, is there a limit when we notice that we're gonna be for instance, when I'm doing work in different state and I have to is there a limit to those?

No. For the we'll call it the traditional teleconference rules, there's no limit.

Got it. It's only you can do it. During emergency circumstances when we do not provide an address that there's a limit.

Seven times. That is correct.

Seven times. Okay. And then thank you. I just wanted to make sure on that. And then last, that's a huge gap. 30,000 to a 150,000. That feels very like, meh, just throw some numbers out. I'm really interested because we get it all the time especially at the facilities one we're in like, oh, this needs to be online or we need to be able to participate remotely. I'm interested. I don't wanna add to our budget right now and you know, go a $150,000 into making it accessible.

But my question is is if if we were to put it on on YouTube like this is tonight. But there's no public communication back and forth because I believe that's where the dollars come in is when we're allowing people to participate remotely but if they could just watch it, is that illegal? It it to just post it and let it play and then they can't participate that way. Is that is there something wrong about that?

No. That's not illegal to do. And the meetings are simulcast on Zoom. And then I do they're not. No. I mean, on Zoom. We I mean, we have a live Zoom, but they're not on Zoom.

The city council is So we're gonna

let's just clarify the

record Yeah.

Very quickly. City manager, please.

Thank you, mister mayor. Thank you,

council member Volt. The only meetings that are on Zoom are, the city council meeting, the one we're in right now. Councilman Bo, I think you're referring to the city council standing committee meetings. Those we do not stream those. We have a voice recording for those meetings.

So it's it's it's available at a later date.

Yes. It is available on our website with the agendas and the minutes.

Is there a benefit? Maybe there's not even a benefit then to having it in the moment. If they can't participate, I mean, it just gives them the option to hear it an hour earlier or something. So, maybe that's not even worth the effort. Okay. Yeah, that's all I got.

Council Member Simon, please. Yeah.

My comment is somewhat in line with council member Boltz. I get a lot of comments from my commissioners as well as just members of the public who would like to have more access to these meetings. For example, the CPRB meeting, arts commission meeting, they would like to have remote access. A lot of people travel, they go to work, and they would like to participate, they cannot. Or the public would like to listen in.

But I understand there's a cost impact. I understand that's why we're not doing this, because there is a cost impact. That's my understanding. I'm curious, back to the 30000 to January Is there I mean, can we explore if there's any more cost efficient ways to allow access? Maybe there's newer technology out there or something because I know there's a great benefit to it. I know we're not doing it because of the money, but if there is a more efficient way to do it, I think there's a lot of value.

I'm going to bring that. I think that's intended for city manager as opposed to a legal question. Is that correct? Let's start with city manager.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember Simon.

Technology wise, as as you can see, we have the technology to run the meetings virtually as we're doing right now. It's staff capacity. And so we we would need someone to do the meeting on the virtual side. So there's a there's staff person who's managing the room, the in person public commenters, the presentation, all of that, but someone else has to make sure that the virtual side is working. For boards and commissions, that person right now isn't there because it's an we don't need to fund a staff person to be present at the meeting to do that work. If the council directed us to do that, now we have to fund a person to do that work or individuals to do that work.

Councilmember Simon, I'm assuming you wanted to continue?

Yeah. If it's a staff issue, I'm just hoping, you know, someday technology with AI or something could help us with this. I don't know if it exists now, but I would really hope that sometime we could find some other options because I think there's a great benefit there. Thank you.

Councilor Merlebone, please.

Thank you. I remember the rules committee having a lot of very nuanced questions about all of these rules that kind of went in circles but really did help us understand what was happening because it can get very complicated. So thank you city attorney for helping us walk through that and city clerk as well. I just wanted to make a motion to adopt the resolution to approve the city council meeting disruption and meeting language access policies. It's at chapters fourteen and fifteen respectively to the City Of San Leandro administrative code.

Councilmember James Angular.

Mayor, I'll second.

So we got a motion by councilmember Bowen with a second from councilmember James Aguilar. I did have a couple of questions, and then I'm supportive ultimately, but I do want to have a couple questions answered quickly. Did it do we have any other speakers? Seeing none, I'm gonna ahead and ask my questions. For the boards, boards and commissions in particular, if they were to permit remote locations, they the individuals would not have to permit public comment from those remote locations. Is that correct?

That's correct.

Okay. Thank you.

If

the if the hybrid option went down, so suppose that we did it for these boards and commissions, if the hybrid option failed, would they also need to wait to continue their meeting, or could they continue?

No. They would have to wait.

They would have to wait. Okay. Thank you. And then the last one. I know we had a discussion at Rules about the a telephone option, And I've I've heard some nuanced things.

I just wanna try to button it up nice and tight. As I understand it for our city council meetings, we have chosen an AV audio visual option. And I think in particular we use Zoom. By virtue of having publicly agendized that as our remote participation method, it's my understanding that if Zoom went down, we could not switch to the telephone option because the announced method is our method.

That is correct.

So if the Zoom went down and we were not able to recover it within that one hour period, the council would be able to make findings to continue the meeting without using any virtual option.

Okay. That's all that I've got. Thank you, council members, for your thoughts on this. Thank you for the rules committee because I know I think this went twice through the rules, if I remember correctly, and so it was good to get unanimous guidance out of rules to adopt staff's recommendations. So at this point in time, we've got a council we've got a motion from councilmember Bowen, with a second from councilmember James Aguilar. Please vote.

All votes are in, and the motion carries unanimously.

Okay. Coming to item 11, I don't believe we have any council request to schedule agenda items. Are there any announcements from council members? Beginning with council member Pollan.

Thank you, mayor. Just wanna share a few quick things. On Thursday, I attended a really informative, East Division meeting for Cal Cities, and the topic that we chose to discuss was on ebikes. And I just wanted to share some information about that with the rest of the council because I think it's something that's gonna keep coming up. Just this week, a mother in Orange County was charged with involuntary manslaughter because her child ran into an elderly person, and that person unfortunately passed away.

It's obviously, you know, not it's something that's coming up more, and that was the point is that in certain communities and I've not heard it as much in San Leandro, but I know that, obviously, it's it goes within jurisdictions or across jurisdictions and and is is problematic. But e bike ridership is up, but what we basically learned, we were able to hear from both the transportation committee committee because there are no less than 12 bills going through the state legislature right now regarding this in terms of any sort of regulation and also to do with enforcement and also to just figure out who's responsible for what, what because it is happening in cities, but then is it the manufacturers? Is it the parents? Is it police that can follow-up with any sort of enforcement? And so I will say that it was incredibly insightful.

There's a 200 page slide deck that we were given by the expert we heard from the Mineta Institute Institute that I'm happy to share with the rest of the council and staff so they have it. That's it's an interesting read. Obviously, 200 slides is a lot. But what we were able to glean out of the conversation was, one, how important it is to work on the short of legislation that will pass that is seemingly very far off into the distance because very complicated. But and also funding is an issue of anything that we wanna get done.

There's gonna be a lot of pushback because can we afford to the state or cities afford to do it. But around education with the school district and with the parents, Calcities has resources for that. Danville has been working a lot on this, but really so that both your consumers, parents buying e bikes, understanding what exactly they're buying because a lot of times we think they're e bikes and they're actually e moped. They're just basically mopeds or they can be easily increased in speed. So just thinking through how we can sort of be on the the front side of this because I think that it will become more problematic as we go, so I wanna share that.

And then I also really was, really to today's beginning announcements and recognitions was really sweet. It felt like we were uplifting three really great organizations in the city. So in particular, obviously, the fact that it's mental health, month and especially for the a and a HPI community, something that is often on set is really important. And to have Asian Health Services right across the street, and and their expansion and programming has just been really phenomenal. And then also to to to do the pledge of allegiance, with an, with our newest citizens was wonderful.

I remember going through that process and being naturalized. I actually my first job out of college was to teach citizenship classes at a nonprofit for refugees, so that type of work is really important. And especially during a time when when we think about immigration, it's not always the most positive. It's really nice to know what the Immigration and Naturalization Services is really about and and about really uplifting the community that is that is so enriched by immigrants in our community. And, also, I I forgot the last time, to announce it, but I always wanna uplift the San Leandro Food Pantry.

And so if you wanna donate to them because, the increase in prices of everything, including gas being over 21% more, is really making it very difficult for people to be able to decide between getting to work and getting food. And so the number of people that are going to Alameda, San Leandro food pantry at Alameda, food pantry is is continues to rise. So please do what you can to support them.

We'll continue with councilmember James Eggler.

Thank you, mayor. Just a couple of updates on my end. Last month and this month so far, I've been meeting with the directors of the city's departments, and I'm continuing to meet with directors of every one of them. And each meeting has been really, really exciting. It's been an opportunity to pop around the city and city hall, to get to know what their challenges are, what are they facing, and what are they also celebrating at the same time.

I also attended the Lend a Hand Foundation's Beyond Backpacks Gala on Friday the twenty fourth and I uplift that because I think it's a call out that there are spaces where city leaders definitely can gather to support our public schools, and so if it's an organization that I want to uplift, it's Land to Hand Foundation, and they are really awesome, and I thank Supervisor Tam for the invite to attend. Also attended the State of the City address beside Councilmember Bowen on the twenty eighth, and I really want to congratulate the mayor on a fantastic address, that really balanced the amazing progress that our city is making, but also showing that there are some realities that we face and challenges that we have ahead. And so that's kind of some a couple of things I wanted to uplift. And I think that that's all I have for this evening. Thank you mayor.

Thank you. We'll proceed with vice mayor.

A couple of events that I wanted to highlight that I attended since the last meeting, was the law enforcement memorial ride that the police department hosted last week, in honor of fallen, police and service animals, who serve the police department. It was a it was a truly touching event, with a delegation that is riding thousands of miles. I forget how many miles, mayor mayor also attended that event, and, it was a truly touching event. Also, just, hats off to the recreation team who put together a very well attended Cinco de Mayo event, and it's always a joy to see the mariachi singing and getting the crowd kind of warmed up for the by Costa de Oro. It's always such a joy to see young people enjoying.

And I also wanted to highlight one of the mayor's comments at the Cinco de Mayo celebration, was that there were folks from other cultures that came to that event to experience it and listen to music and listen and watch young folks dance. So that was, touching. And then finally, I attended the Rosales Sister, Scholarship Gala. This is a foundation that was born out of necessity, from the Rosales sisters and, which one of them lives here in San Leandro, and they provide scholarships, for students going to college and university. And it's always as a person who has dedicated the majority of their career to access in post secondary and higher education.

Now more than ever, we need folks to step up and provide support to young people who are looking to advance their careers and their lives through post secondary education whether it's through a community college, a trade, or a traditional college degree. Ultimately, we're all learners and we're lifelong learners, and that's something that the, Rosales Scholarship, is able to provide these young folks. And those are just the highlight of some of the events that I attended since our last meeting.

Thank you. Councilman Victor Aguilar.

Thank you, mayor Gonzalez. I just wanted to report that on April 8, I attended the eleven forty six meeting of the Board of Trustees for the Alameda County Mosquito Abatement District. We inducted a new participant, a new trustee, his name is Ted Kinch from the City of Piedmont. We also approved the LED light upgrade, and we also appointed a colleague to the Hayward Area Shoreline Planning Agency called HASPA. I also we we did not have any West Nile virus to report at that time, but we did get emails from Alameda County mosquito abatement district that there was a bird that tested positive for West Nile virus recently.

So, that would that happen in New York, but we currently have no no one that tested positive for West Nile virus. So that that concludes my report. Thank you.

Well, thank you. So at this point in time, I'll see no more hands. I will proceed. Some of the things that I attended, got to celebrate with the Bamboo Advanced Beauty College on their seventh anniversary. Very touching story by a Vietnamese immigrant who basically built a beauty school, from scratch.

And, the school teaches in multiple languages, not just Vietnamese, including Spanish. SLPD was awesome to attend the swearing in, if only for briefly, to see so many families, to see so many, individuals celebrating the swearing in of new officers and the awards that officers are receiving for some of their hard hard work. Lifesaving. It was a lifesaving recognition award, which I thought was just very, very touching. Arbor Day, thank you parks and rec staff for your wonderful Arbor Day celebration, the tree planting.

There's a pocket park at the corner of Wicks And Merced, and there's some additional work to be done. But just to see so many students from Madison Elementary, they're planting trees with their class, learning about nature, getting their hands dirty, making a difference in their world. I won't say anything about State of the City other than please go watch it online. It's on YouTube, you and can see all the great things that are happening in the city and then some, I think I call it hard truth. We talk about some of the tough stuff that needs to be discussed.

Saw a great collaboration between the San Leandro Art Association and Evergreen Nursery. And I love any time that we can highlight collaboration in our city between businesses and nonprofits. It's something that's really important to celebrate. And so I would encourage other businesses and nonprofits out there to find ways to continue that collaboration. I know we've got some restaurants downtown that are very good about sharing some of their hard earned dollars when organizations like Boosters or others come and they have a special night, you eat in, you eat in.

I think Roundtable is doing one right now. Sons of Liberty has been very good, and there are many other businesses. So thank you to our businesses who collaborate, most recently Evergreen Nursery. On May Day, I had the opportunity to attend both the career day at the high school and then the construction trades workforce initiative. Now, that's particularly important because here within the city of San Leandro, are three sites, two established and one nascent, where young people are receiving the benefits of that early training.

So when it's time to take the, apprenticeship entrance exam, so that they can be mathematically prepared and actually be firing on all cylinders when they go to take that test. And so a lot of thanks to CTWI for all the work that they're doing, in various places in the country, but particularly here in the city of San Leandro. For the only thing I'll add on Cinco de Mayo, very impressed by the professionalism of the city staff. Everything was beautiful. The tables were covered.

I mean, it was just, it was a class act. So thank you. Not only was the music fantastic, I really, really enjoyed both the mariachi and the dancing. That wreath ceremony, mm-mm That was a number one class, class stuff for the police department. And then two last things.

Delaine's Nail Care did a community event in downtown San Leandro, taking literally our most vulnerable residents and offering them free foot care. And they did it for two days in a row. And a number of community sponsors who came together to support her in this vision that she had. So there is no reason why if you are 65 years old and overweight and can't reach down and take care of your feet, that you shouldn't still receive the care that you need. They did some pre diabetes screening on-site and other things.

So I was just very grateful to see that here in the city of San Leandro downtown. So for all that's happening here in the community, certainly I am very grateful. We do not have a meeting next week. I think we've become accustomed to work sessions on the second Monday of the month. We do not have one this coming week. Our next meeting is on Monday. That's a Monday, right? Monday, May 18. And so with that, the time is officially oops. Is it that you're getting the eye? Please proceed.

Thank you, Mayor. And I promise you it's not on purpose. I just forgot As we're talking about community events and businesses, it triggered things that I wanted to mention, especially because we're not gonna have the meeting next week. And, also, these events are coming up this this weekend, but I just wanted to shout out the AAPI Fest that's being put on downtown by the downtown district, which is gonna be the first time they're doing one specifically for the AAPI Fest, which is gonna be fantastic. So that's this Friday from 4PM to 9PM downtown.

And then the other thing that's very it's also food related, but the taste of Asia is also happening this month. And so it's really an opportunity to be able to explore all of the different AAPI A and HPI restaurants that we have in town, and we have many. And so this information is on our city's socials. And then also, I think, easily, can find it on the the chamber website as well.

Definitely get out there and enjoy some of our fine dining, and we'll see you next Friday as we celebrate our second Friday, going into full swing with the AAPI Fest. Our time is officially 09:02 and we are adjourned.