City Council - Regular Meeting

both the regular and special meetings of the Santa Monica City Council. Please turn your phone off or on to vibrate so as not to interrupt the meeting. Um, Council Rasin, would you like to You made eye contact first. Would you like to say the pledge of allegiance? I aliance 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.

I'm going to call the role now. Council member Negrete here. Member Hall present. Council member Rasin here. Council member Snell here. Council member Zerniskaya here, Mayor Pro Tim Swick here, and Mayor Terosas here. Um, Council Member Zern Skaya, will you please do the land acknowledgement? I would be happy to.

The city of Santa Monica is located on the land of the Tovangar. With great respect, the city acknowledges the Gabrieleno Tongba as the first people of this ancestral and unseated territory of Kurovanga, a village that we know as Santa Monica. We honor their elders, past and present, and the Gabrieleno descendants who are part of the Gabrieleno Tongva tribes. We recognize that these peoples are still here, and as settlers and kuyam guests, we recognize our responsibility and obligation to care for their land in partnership with them. The city of Santa Monica commits to work in partnership with the Gabrielo Tongba people to uplift their voices and visibility on their ancestral land.

Great. Thank you. Um, madame clerk,

um, I want to ask, do any council members have any, I'm sorry, will any council members be recusing themselves from any items on the agenda pursuant to the Levane Act? No. Hearing none. Great. Um, in terms of just moving on for agenda management, I would call for a motion to move the CMO report of the week. And is there a pet of the week? I don't see one yet. Uh yes. And the mayor's highlight uh before general public input. So that would be now. Um and then to hear part of the closed session not so we're going to hear close session for an hour and then any part of the closed session not heard after an hour move that to the end of the meeting and to continue all of the appointments except the landmarks commission appointment.

So moved. I'll second it. We can do this by voice vote. Great. All those in favor? I I

I don't see any opposed or abstension. So, we will move forward. Um, great. So, city manager, do you want to give your uh city manager report and pet of the week? Madame mayor, members of the council, thank you so much. Um, we have a brief update tonight that we wanted to share. First, um, everyone is hopefully enjoying the weather. It's officially spring and what a terrific time to be in Santa Monica. Um, as we get ready for this weekend, um, we're planning on wrapping up women's history month with the making her story mayor panel with two members of our current council participating. That'll happen this Saturday at the main library. We're also going to be transitioning to arts, culture, and creativity month and national poetry month as we hit April. Um there's some terrific programming um happening right here in our city. We hope everyone takes advantage of these opportunities. One thing we want to let the council and community know also as we come up on this pending weekend, we are aware there's going to be an additional No Kings demonstration happening on Saturday. Um wanted to let everyone know that our public safety teams are plugged into everything that's happening. Um, the event is planned to start at 11:00 a.m. at Palisades Park. It'll run till 1:00 p.m. Um, our public safety teams will be deployed. Our public works team will be available. We'll make sure that everyone is able to exercise their First Amendment rights in a way that's safe right here in town. Um, now the part that madame mayor you were asking about, one of our new favorite parts of the council meeting, we have been bringing up for everyone to meet um, an adoptable pet of the week. Who have we got this week? This week we have our friend Bar Talk.

Bar Talk is a Bar Talk here. Bart Talk is supposed to be here. Do we need to delay until Bart talk arrives? Because I I did actually see this on Instagram yesterday and I was hoping that Bart talk was coming. Bart talk is supposed to be here. I am looking for Bart Bar Talk's coming.

Bart Bart Bartk is is running around right now. As we wait for Bartk's um entrance, we wanted to share Bartk is a 5-year-old Yorkie terrier. Um Barttok was brought to the shelter at that time. He was timid, desperate need of a haircut, but he's slowly coming around um and now is getting excited when folks come up to his kennel. He would certainly do well in a home with patient owners who are willing to gain his trust. He enjoys wet food, comfy beds, and stuffies. So, um as we search for Bartuk, um he is adorable. We have a picture of him up on the screen. Um, we hope that you will contact the animal shelter if you're interested in meeting him. And as always, you can visit the Santa Monica Animal Shelter Foundation website to make a donation or shop the Chewy wish list as we're looking for staff. Maybe we'll uh

Yeah, maybe we can do the uh other items and maybe Bar Talk will arrive. Uh, great. And I also wanted to announce or I neglected to announce for the anyone who's here on items 4B and 4K, those items have been pulled from the agenda. So, I just wanted to let everyone know that. Great. So, we will um move on to the mayor's highlight. Um I for today, we're going to call forward the Virginia Avenue Park team. Uh and just for those of you who don't know, we've been, you know, once a month trying to acknowledge the the great work that our staff has done so that those in the community can hear about it and understand uh the inner workings of what's happening at city hall and how all of our amazing team members uh make the city run and run well. So uh we are bringing forward housing and human services, Virginia Avenue part. Um Amy, are they here? They're going to Okay, great. You can stand at the podium if you'd like, but um so the support and services provided by Housing and Human Services staff in collaboration Oh, wow. Okay, there's a lot of you. I love it. Um in collaboration with local partners at Virginia Avenue Park has long made VAP one Virginia Avenue Park one of Santa Monica's most valued community assets. VAP serves as a welcoming community hub that provides equitable, free access to a wide variety of social services and resources that support the well-being of people in the neighborhood. offerings include affordable afterchool programs, employment help, healthy living tools, and community engagement. 2025 was extremely challenging for some of the most vulnerable members of our community who faced food insecurity and and continue to quite frankly aggressive immigration tactics and economic hardship. In the face of these challenges, members of the Pico neighborhood leaned on VAP for support and as a safe harbor of community trust and strength. HHS staff stepped up efforts in the following ways to meet community need. VAP weekly food pantry so critical housing and human services

increased funding to the Westside Food Bank to support households during last year's federal shutdown to help lowincome residents whose CalFresh, otherwise known as SNAP benefits were not renewed. In addition, we worked with the food bank to purchase grocery gift cards for distribution at the weekly VAP pantry for Thanksgiving emergency. Oh. Oh, great. I didn't even see those. Beautiful. Emergency financial assistance to households impacted by ICE enforcement, housing and human services increased funding to Haven services for an emergency relief fund, which provides direct cash aid to Santa Monica residents and workers directly affected by the ice raids. Know your rights educational workshops in partnership with VAPS familia latina flu community group. regional advocates, local community organizers, and immigration attorneys. Staff has brought a series of know your rights workshops to VAP aimed at providing timely policy updates, safety guidance, and practical information to households navigating challenging circumstances. Free legal consults, free monthly appointments are available for 20inut consultations with an immigration attorney contracted through housing and human services every second and fourth Saturday of the month. So great for the community to know that as well. Consultations are provided at no cost to individuals who live or work in Santa Monica. Mental health support. VAP staff worked with local mental health provider SWI Suie to provide a workshop routines focused on well-being and practical strategies for managing stress and anxiety caused by federal immigration policy. The workshop also included information from a local attorney on safety and their rights. Sorry, I this you're just doing so much we have to talk about all of it. uh immigration related assistance website and phone line. Housing and human services staff have created a dedicated line for community members to speak to city staff to understand resources available. If anyone is interested in

calling that number 310-569-7461. In addition, the community can visit the city's safeatome web page at Santa Monica.gov/safeatome, which provides residents for local families and allies. The staff at VAP reflect our core values in their work every day. The team's motivation drives them and addresses some of our community's toughest challenges from food insecurity to aggressive immigration tactics. So, just thank you all so very much for the care that you bring every day to our community. The programming in your park, in our park, really meets people where they are. The offered programs are rooted in integrity, ensuring equitable access to those who need assistance, consistently working to do more. Our staff demonstrates humility by putting community members and their needs above all else. So, with that being said, I'm going to come down, but maybe one of my colleagues would like to read out, would you like to read out all the names as we This is a kind of a shared endeavor here. Um, yeah. And so, we're going to read out everyone's names as we uh start, you know, coming forward with all of your certificates. But I I just I think on behalf of all of us, we are so so thankful. All right, I'm go ahead and just read the names here. Uh, Brenda Deleserto.

Yeah. Wave when your name is called so everyone knows who you are. Okay. Oh, Brenda. All right. Dolores Romo. Yay. Edgar Miguel Martinez. Edgar Miguel Martinez. Uh, Emma Vidz. Erica Jurner Rogers, Ignasio Mendoza Lopez, uh Francis Rodriguez, Janet Gondo, uh Janet Gondo,

here. Uh, Kimberly Sue, uh, Lena Dudy, Liz Baron, uh, Lucas Salmagi, uh, Michael Jackson, Monique Maldonado, uh, Pamela Gutierrez, Torres, Sarah Zapedo, Sarah Zapeda. No. Uh Charlina Dudy.

Okay. Uh Snow Dietrich. And Tia Bryant. Thanks everyone.

Maybe you guys in a little bit. Maybe you Ready. But thank you guys. Do you want to read the transgender Dave? Okay, great. Okay. Um, so we will now be proclaiming transgender day of visibility and we are going to call forward Robert Graves if Robert Graves is here or anyone else. Yay. Who's here for Transgender Day of Visibility and uh we're going to ask Mayor Prom Zwick to read the proclamation. And then Robert, I think you're going to introduce um Oh, I'm sorry. Edward is going to read the proclamation. My apologies. You're not reading it. Okay. Uh come forward, Mr. uh Robert Grace. Yes.

Thank you. Um they're running to get Edward just um good evening honorable mayor u mayor prom council members and those in attendance today. Uh it is my honor to introduce the author Edward Underh Hill who will read today's proclamation for trans day of visibility. But before I do that I'd like to share a bit about myself. Uh my name is Robert Graves and I'm a librarian at the Santa Monica Public Library where I have worked with extreme pride for the last 20 years. Woo. December 19th. I am proud that I work in a community, workplace, and for a city government that values and understands the need to commit our efforts to protect and celebrate the trans community who I would like to remind everyone here are members of our family. Uh they are our parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, cousins and children and friends as well. uh whether biological or logical family. Um and they are as deserving of our love and care as any other family me family member. They are also one of the most vulnerable communities in worldwide and face unwarranted and hysterical attack from virtually every direction and it's heartbreaking for an ally like myself to witness. We only need to look at today's headlines to see how much adversity they face. As the president is currently demanding that Congress pass the Save Act, a voter bill that superfluously attacks trans youth and their access to life-saving healthcare and their ability to participate in kids sports like every other child child their age. In my 40-year career in librarianship, I am often asked why I became a librarian. And I will often tell this story. Besides growing up in a neighborhood library, which felt like a safe space for me, um I was a um latch key kid of a single mother. Um I grew to love books

and their ability to provide either a mirror to see myself reflected back or a window into worlds I did not yet experience on my own. Uh, in my teens, I went to that neighborhood library um, questioning myself and my my identity and shily asked the librarian for books on homosexuality. The librarian gave me the Dewey decimal number and I went to the shelves to to explore on my own and unfortunately found a very dismal and dispiriting selection to guide me on my path. But a few minutes later, that same librarian approached me and handed me a book and said, "This is all you need." Uh, that book was Armistad Muppin's Tales of the City. And that book changed my life. Um, it depicted a group of friends who lived together in a house in San Francisco and included people from every walk of life who created their own found family. At the center of that family was a character named Anna Matrical, a mother figure to all of them who in the course of several sequels was revealed to be, spoiler alert, a transw woman. Reading about that woman and her capacity to change the lives of everyone around her for the better, informed my own understanding of how to treat those around myself. In my role as a librarian, I developed an affinity for programming and service to teens and that led my co-founding of the Yaw West Book Festival um which was born in Santa Monica in my office um 13 years ago at the Santa Monica Public Library with the guidance of local authors Melissa Dela Cruz and Margaret Stall who is herself a mother of a trans child. Since the first festival in 2014, Yaw West has featured nearly 20 trans authors because we understand that every young reader deserves to see a story that reflects the reality of their own lives. That leads me to Edward Underh Hill, who I was first introduced three years ago when he appeared at the library's Y West

preview event, Fierce Friday. A transmale author, Edward was appearing in support of his gorgeous, romantic, and magical YA novel, Always the Almost. Sorry. Um, magical is a fitting way to describe Edward's work which consistently centers trans and queer characters showing that life is full of possibility. His other works include the YA novels in case you read this. This day changes everything and the adult novels the in between bookstore and the upcoming the house of now and then which releases this mid this May. Edward is also a fierce advocate for against book bans. Uh further cementing him in my heart and mind as the perfect person to read out this year's proclamation celebrating trans day of visibility here in Santa Monica. Would you please welcome me in joining join me in welcoming uh Edward Andre Hill. Hello, my name is Edward Underh Hill. I am a trans man and author and a testament to the power and the vulnerability that comes with being visible. Today, we gather to affirm that visible or not, we belong here. Whereas trans, gender non-conforming, and interex TGI people have existed here long before this place was called the city of Santa Monica, we acknowledge that we stand on unseated Tongva land, where indigenous peoples held and still hold space for two spirit and gender expansive individuals. And whereas visibility is not just about being seen, but also about being heard, it is about the freedom to tell one's own story, for that story to be recognized and celebrated. Because the stories we tell about ourselves now will one day remind tomorrow's children that they belong just as we do.

And whereas across the United States, the increased visibility of trans people has led to both greater care for us and greater harm, including a rise of legislation aimed at censoring our stories, restricting our access to health care, taking away our bodily autonomy, and even our ability to name ourselves. And whereas Santa Monica has and will continue to support access to all stories, including by hosting the All West Book Festival for teen readers and supporting its fearless librarians at the Santa Monica Public Library as they participate annually in band books week, thereby celebrating the trans and queer stories that make up a disproportionate number of the books currently being censored across the United States. And whereas we recommit to honoring the TGI people who have lived, are living, and will continue to live in Santa Monica. Thank you.

Okay, Mayor Proick is coming down to proclamation. We'd love to take a photo with anyone who's here uh for trans day of visibility. He's going to each other. Beautiful. Thank you all so much. Um we will now move on to general public input and um comment on this on special agenda items. Um, we have I'm just looking. We have exactly 25 commenters, I believe. So, city attorney, what's the rule? And we have 25. Is it more than 25 or 25?

Is it 23? 23 plus two on the phone. Plus two on the phone. Okay. So, everyone will have one minute. Does anyone want to make a motion? No. to move that we extend the minutes to two minutes. I'll second it. Who second it now? Yeah.

Mayor, we have any discussion? Sure. Go. Um, my thing is not on, but I don't and I don't see Okay. Council member Hall. So, our timed agenda has this going until 3:00 a.m. tonight. If we do two minutes for input on items that are not on the agenda tonight, that will be an extra hour of time. Um, and I will be voting no on this for that reason. Okay. Yes, we do have several comment. We have lots of comments on the next items as well. Yeah. Thanks. I I must apologize. I just check it is if more than 25 speakers are registered. I apologize.

Okay. Well, you know, as we've stated multiple times, we accept meetings, written comment, all kinds of comment in advance of the meeting. Okay. So, we will call uh up our speakers then. Uh Naomi Maurice, Andrew Hoyer, Bill Davids, Andrew Gladill, Lizzie Moore. One or two minutes? It's two minutes.

Am I good to go? Okay, I'll try and keep this brief. Um, good evening everyone here. Um, so nice to meet you all. My name is Naomi Maurice and I'm a water quality data analyst at Hila Bay and I'm here to talk to you all about some of the water quality issues that we've been seeing at the Santa Monica Pier. So many of you all might be aware, but uh the bacteria levels at the Santa Monica Pier are very high and oftent times make it unsafe for folks to swim at this site. Um the pier has been on Heal the Bay's beach bummer list for 14 out of the last 20 years. So it's been uh one of the top 10 most polluted beaches um pretty chronically in the state of California. So um we're really focused on trying to solve this issue and just wanted to bring to your attention that we're partnering with um the office of sustainability and the environment from the city of Santa Monica to really try and address this issue. We're bringing together folks from the city as well as local stakeholders, academic researchers, things like that to go out and actually um take some additional samples and try and figure out what is causing this pollution. So, just wanted to let you all know that we'll be headed out to the sand in the next couple of weeks. We're going to go take some additional samples, try and figure out some of the sources, and then come back with some results. So in the future if there's time would love the opportunity to speak to you all about some of the results and the recommendations that we have. So thank you all. Have a good night.

Thank you.

Uh good evening. My name is Andrew Hoyer and I am the vice chair of the urban forest task force. Uh we are very thankful for the efforts that have been taken to increase the number of trees planted in our downtown core. However, we are still in a significant planting deficit trend that has continued since the pandemic. The current budget is $150,000 versus a precoid budget of $450,000. Factor in all the inflation that has occurred since then and you can assume that Santa Monica is at risk of losing more trees than it can replace. To prevent the complete loss of our urban canopy, tree replacement should exceed tree removals. To grow the actual size of the canopy and its benefits, carbon sink, shade, habitat, etc., replacement should be double the remov. We are currently under our removal rate. If our city has started to finally recover economically, as will be reported later tonight, I can see no better use for some of those new monies than to plant more trees. Please adjust public works budget accordingly. Mother Earth will thank you. Um, good evening all. I'm Andrew Gladill, um, uh, Ocean Park resident and chair of the, uh, urban price task force. Now that Vice Chair Hoy has done the pitch for more money, I'm here with public service announcements. So, Santa Monica's Arbor Day planting is April 30, 9:00 a.m. Joslyn Park. Uh, the tree care day taking care of some previous plantings from previous years. May the 7th, 9:00 a.m. in Hutchkins Park. Um, and it's a lovely place to spend a morning. Our next urban task force meeting is May the 13th, 6:00 p.m. at the main library. And all are welcome. Thank you. Thank you so much. Um, we have Mr. Davids and then Lizzie Moore, Karen

Shiloh or Shillow, sorry if I'm pronouncing that wrong. Richard Wis and Brian Neville. I've been trying to raise concerns about Santa Monica Code 4.36.080. I have had three emails go to Deputy City Attorney uh Romy Gansshaw. Uh, no response. I've requested twice the two different times a meeting with our city manager. No response. Essentially, I've been a resident of 220 San Vicente for this is the beginning of my 36th year there. We have gone through construction issues as our mayor knows from the rent control board days. Uh uh we went through massive construction hearings. This time out though we are dealing with the city code which basically is holding us in captivity. Uh we are having massive disruptions, massive upheavalss to tenants lives in the building. Tenants are moving out because of this code, because of the way it's being manipulated and authorized. We are now down in a 90 unit building to 45% occupancy. Three or four more tenants have indicated that they're going to move. That's 40% occupancy on a rent controlled building. Uh the uh construction began in February of 2025. We have passed the first anniversary date. It's projected to continue until probably a year and a half if estimates are correct. We are overwhelmed.

There are seniors who are desperately being impacted. We are being shuffled around like packages in an Amazon distribution center. Uh I'm a youngster in terms of seniority in that building. Uh there are who are 84 85 86 years old. Thank you. Um we're not permitted to respond but staff can we make sure that we're urgently responding to this? I believe the rent control board is already looking into this. Um, all right, Lizzie Moore. Thank you, Mr. Davids.

Good evening, honorable Terosis, Mayor Terosis, and council members. It's a pleasure to be here before all of you. Um, one year ago or so, I stood before you receiving the beautiful commendation for the work that we did to support our community with fire relief on behalf of Santa Monica College Foundation. And I just want to say that one of the things that was so special about that date was while we were sitting here waiting for the commendation to happen, um the the comments that were before you were from the Santa Monica Trapeze School and they were trying to plead with you to help them find a new home. 48 hours ago, my phone blew up in my role as the president of Santa Monica College Foundation because my neighbors saw a sign that said the Santa Monica Trapeze School was going to be moving to our backyard. And when I say our backyard, I mean directly, if you look over my fence, it's my backyard. A small plot of land that is adjacent to where the ceramic studio is. And while I am all for flying high and trying to figure out how to support this amazing organization, if you could imagine a 40ft tower raised right in your backyard, no matter what that looks like, with the lights that will be shining, with the hours that it's going to be operating, the the ha the safety hazards that uh accompany the telephone pole pull wires and just a myriad of things. I don't know that the consideration was actually there and I would just invite you to please come see the space. Um, we found out two days ago. We were never notified and we listened to the Santa Monica Airport Commission's meeting from uh the

24th of September. Oh no, the 23rd of September 2024 where it's not notifying the neighbors. So, I just ask for your partnership as always in helping us find. Thank you. Um, Karen Shiloh.

Good afternoon all. As a city planner and one who has worked on the planning of small airports, the first and foremost foundation of every city is preserving the historic value and critical identity of the city. City planning 101, which might sound familiar. Santa Monica Airport is an enormous part of this identity. Not only were Douglas World War II planes as well as commercial and cargo planes developed here, but courageously fought in World War II to give us the freedom and values that we have today. This is not the case for any other city in the US. And most airports I have seen on the east coast where I come from do not compare to the beauty of the Santa Monica airport. And yet they are still kept open with noise mitigation because of their significant role. Santa Monica Airport provides something to that no other development can which is the training of pilots in the service of emergency rescues, cargo shipments, passenger services, wildfire fighting, surveillance and support to agricultural crops. police safety, surveillance, and so much more that is important to our community. Not only does Santa Monica already have a park, but a new and costly park could not come even close to what Santa Monica airport and its surrounding local businesses have and will contribute to our society in the future. To conclude, imagine this new case study in city planning textbooks that a 107year-old beautiful airport was demolished at a

tremendous cost to make a park of which one already existed or instead that it was kept open for the growing local businesses in Santa Monica. Thank you. Thanks so much. Um, Richard Wis, Brian Neville, Jonathan Foster, Sean Besser, John Prindle.

Hi, good evening. Uh, my name is Richard Wis. I'm a new to the community here. I'm actually following up to show a support for Santa Monica airport as well. Um, I'm a fellow pilot that moved from the east coast to do my flight training here. And although it's quite obvious for aviation, the aviation community, why Santa Monica airport. so iconic. Uh there's so much history here. I want to talk also just enlighten a little bit for people that are not aware about the non-flying community benefits that this airport does provide. Um just in in from my point of view uh airports like Santa Monica, all these small uh airports, general aviation airports, they provide a level of safety for the hub and spoke system for the transportation infrastructure for our national airspace system. If we have an emergency, we have need to do an emergency send. We need to help passengers out. We need to be able to descend to a an airport that's close by and and airports like Santa Monica airport provide that. Obviously, there's an economic development for the workforce development for the community, for engineers, for maintenance technicians, instructors, dispatchers, hanger storage services, air traffic controllers. Those are all part of the Santa Monica Airbor ecosystem. Um I I don't want to remind myself of what happened here last just last year over the LA fires and how what what logistics hubs their airport provided in in emergency preparedness and disaster relief. I'm also a volunteer pilot of transporting uh patients that bring back to volunteer organizations like Angel Flight West in Santa Monica. There's a lot of patients that do come to Santa Monica and Santa Monica Air services these people. I'm one of those volunteer pilots. And lastly, search and rescue efforts like the civil air patrol. They're also housed at at Santa Monica. So all these services are kind of ancillary to the main um mission of that that airport. So just to conclude, it's not just a place for hobby flying. It's a trans is part

of the transportation infrastructure, emergency asset, economic catalyst. Thank you. Uh Brian Neville and then Jonathan Foster, you're right after that.

Good evening, council. It's a pleasure to speak with you. Thank you all for serving the community. We appreciate that. Um I would like to also talk about the future of the airport. Uh I live next door to the airport and um I think that it's a huge swath of land that the majority of the community is not using. Um, I think a lot of people are like, "We're not using this. We could turn into a park." Very few people that actually live in Santa Monica, I think, are actually pilots. What I think people aren't looking at, we're not looking into the future. We're on the edge of a renaissance or maybe a golden age, I should say, of aviation, electric aviation. Um, in 2028, Archer Aviation is going to be providing air taxi services for the Olympics at rates about the the price of an Uber Black. And so what that what that looks like for people that live here is that you could get to LAX in 8 minutes for maybe 50 bucks, 100 bucks. This is a revolution. And if we take away the airport, we're we're not going to be able to capitalize on that new wave of technology. And I think it's important that we keep it open for all the reasons that they just mentioned, but I think the vast majority of the community is is not pilots and maybe they don't appreciate that, but if it was accessible and it was useful to a lot of us and we could just hop on a taxi and be downtown in 8 minutes for a relatively low price as opposed to, you know, it just being used for private jets, which is is fair. Um I I think that would be a great uh benefit to keep it open. So anyway, my time is short, but thank you so much. Thank you.

Hello, Jonathan Foster. 1981 1981. Do you remember that? On September 11th, 1981, first time new world order was used by Vice President George HW Bush on the floor of a valid open session of Congress in DC said there is going to be a new world order. And a few that was in September. A few months before this, Dick Cheney who was Secretary of Defense under Reagan sat down with Oded O D Yan Y I N O N at Camp David in April of 81. What we are seeing today was decided in April of 1981. What we are seeing uh uh what Odin uh said he he said um to Dick Cheney. Dick asks, "What do you need?" And Od said, "Well, Israel is from the river to the sea." Something that's never been realized yet. In the New Testament, Jesus already knows what they're doing. Jesus said, "Should it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" Mark, Matthew, and Luke. So Dick said yes, of course. And then on September 11th, 2001, we all know what happened. And all of this is now is a worldwide knockb. That's what's going on. The IDF number one killer is suicide. It's a knockba all over Santa Monica, too. By the way, separation of church and state prevents US money from being spent on religion. But the AP pack, Los Angeles, Jewish Federation, and all of that has America putting the Old Testament together for them. And the biggest problem is how many died without salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ. And they will pay for this with their lives. I, Jonathan, don't want to be used as a part of harming Christians, which is what they're doing. They're harming Christians. They would

shut down the Christian church in America if they could. I don't. Thank you, Mr. Poster. Sean Besser, John Prindle, Robbie Lear, Hunter Hall. Good evening all. Uh Sean Besser here. I am a vice chair of DTSM and the OPA executive board. I'm here tonight to share strong support of the expansion of the entertainment zone both in downtown Santa Monica and uh crucially. I'm so sorry, but that is not general public comment. That's an agenda item that will be coming up later on the agenda. Okay. Unless you're just speaking generally, but I believe a city attorney if you want to. Opine.

Yes. Um that is correct. If you would like to speak directly to item 11 C, that comes up um after close session um for all the remaining items left on the on the agenda. Okay. So have to limit it to then. Yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Um John Prindle, you're also Okay. I think we'll uh take the party back there.

Yes. So, so sorry. It just has to be properly agendaized. Um on the proper agenda item, I mean Sean Besser, John Prindle, Robbie Larer, Hunter Hall, Daisy the Venice Healer, Doug Trussler, Morgan Hunter Gross. Are any of you here? Feel free to come on up. We then also have Claire Thomas, Karen Melik, Denise Barton, etc. and you can feel free to come up if I've called your name just in the spirit of uh expediency. Thank you. I have a video to play. I didn't make the video, but I have a video to play. My name is Morgan Hunter Gross.

Did you submit it to the clerk's office? Correct. Before 12:00 11:30. Okay. They said it could play. I didn't have to download it and send it up before. In the meantime, is it the airplanes? Yeah, it's about airplanes. Exactly. Okay. Is it about airplanes? My special interest is about airplanes. You kidding me? Must be talking about aerospace. The FAA has released a blueprint for playing audio in the nation's airspace.

At first, air taxis will operate existing routes and helipads used by helicopters today, following the same rules as other aircraft. As operations increase, the air taxis could fly in designated corridors. Initially, pilots will be on board and actively fly the aircraft. Pilots see and avoid other aircraft and coordinate with air traffic controllers. Air taxis likely will operate one way only within the established corridors set first. But as air taxis increase in number and complexity, strategies for two-way traffic could be introduced. In these corridors, operators could be responsible for keeping aircraft safely separated using industrydeveloped technologies and FAA approved rules. This blueprint is a key step in the FAA's work to safely usher in this next era of aviation.

Thank you. So, uh, right outside City Hall, even the rosemary bush has a little bit of foam nests on it. Juvenile insects using the plant as both food source and shelter. It reminds me that not every visible irregularity is a crisis and that good governance means understanding the system before we rush to poison it, erase it or call it a problem. I'm going to name some companies. Joby, Archer, Beta, Whisk, Electra, Ampier, Regent, PAH, Pika, Lyft, and Pivotal. I'm going to give you some words. A AAM, Advanced Air Mobility. UAM, urban air mobility, powered lift. Vertiport, a vertaport is a landing facility with V. Okay. EB 105, which is brand new from the FA. That was an FA video, by the way, everyone. Okay. The engineering brief 105 is FA's current Vertiport design documents, giving us um uh EV tall, which stands for electric vertical takeoff and landing. The new mosaic is brand new. It's the modernization of special airworthy certification of FA's modern modernization of light sport, which is what we've been flying at Santa Mon for a while. Those piston powered Oh, agas is going away and um a bunch of good stuff. I want to thank you guys for your time and you guys stay here late which is really impressive and I don't this many people later.

Thank you. Um I don't know if any of you are Daisy the Venice healer, Doug Trussler, Claire Thomas, Karen Melik, but feel free to come up if I called your name. Yeah. Great. Can you say your name when you do come up, please? Hey superheroes.

I go by Daisy the Venice healer. I consider myself the friendly local neighborhood superhero. I'm here to speak on the airport and also I'm here to talk to you guys about my biod diversification project. So right now it's kind of small and I have four gardens. Two are in Santa Monica. One is in front of the courthouse right next door and there's fruit trees and veggies and flowers and it's gorgeous and delicious and beautiful. And we wouldn't eat from these gardens cuz they're next to the road. The other one is in front of step up on second. You know the trees how it's just dirt and it's ugly. Imagine if they had a beautiful little garden around it. So that's what brings me to the airport. I believe that our ecosystem is a part of us and we want to be in a state of interbeeness with all of life. And I honor the Tongva people and the nation and the land, but we are not honoring the land because we're overtrimming the trees and we're not attuning to nature. But we could be. So I propose that we create the airport into a national uh food forest, ecosystem, whatever you want to call it, national park. Also evols, we don't need an airport for that. They can both drive on the road and fly. And it's not true about these air taxi and having to need an airport. We don't need that. What we need are ecosystems. We want to be more like the aliens and less like the humans cuz I we're going to be like superheroes or some aliens. I don't know what you're going to call us, but we got to be something different. Holy cow, I have 28 seconds. That's basically all I want to say. You're so lovable, dooa doodles. I'm going to be running for city council. So, we going to twerk. We're going to start all the meetings by twerking, moving our body, and we're going to be splashing. We're going to have watering holes. We're going to hair flip. Can't wait to be on city council. It's a popularity contest. So, of course, I'm going to be the mayor. Then,

I'm going to rename myself the queen. So, it's good to see you, queen. I love you, Dennis. Yeah. Good to see you, queen. Okay. Doug Trussler, uh, Claire Thomas, Karen Melik. Good evening. Thanks. Good evening. Thanks for having me. I not used to being on the clock, but I can see the need for it. Um, six months ago, the city disclosed fiscal distress and a negative credit waiting watch. In response, the city's realignment plan projected 60 million in deficit spending. To me, this isn't a plan. Here's what a plan looks like. Two cities to our north, so sorry, but the realignment plan is not this item.

Not I won't be talking to Two cities to our north, San Jose and San Francisco are actively dismantling failed policies and senting businesses to come back. San Jose is on track to reduce homelessness by 30% or more. San Francisco is moving in the direction few thought possible. Santa Monica can adopt these str same strategies. The fiscal dividend alone could exceed $100 million. Enough to address affordability, create worldclass infrastructure, more public safety, and yes, ambitiously ambitiously help renters become homeowners in Santa Monica. 5 years ago, standing here would not have crossed my mind. I love my work and I have no intention of I had no intention of stepping into local politics. But after watching Santa Monica for for over 20 years, a city that I love, it's impossible to ignore. Tonight, before you before you vote, ask yourself, what could Santa Monica look like if it returns to fiscal health? The answer, everything that made this city great becomes possible again. Thank you.

Great. I would say tune in because that is what that agenda item is about. Um Claire Thomas, Karen Mel, Denise Barton, Lawrence Cohen. Good evening. Uh, my name is Claire Thomas and I'm here as president of the Friends of Sunset Park neighborhood organization. I appreciate that Mayor Terosas and council members Hall and Rascin are now aware the new guidelines for the neighborhood organization grants do not align with the unanimous decision of the city council last September. Madam City attorney, sorry. Right. So, that item is actually a 16 item for the special meeting agenda and the public comment on that will be heard after close session with all the remaining items on the agenda. So, no. No, not hearing that right now. Do I know need to go back out and sign back in or can I be moved? I think our clerk will

I was I was directed to sign in for this. No, no, no. Can you go back out in the lobby and ask him to move move you around? That's all to item 16. Yeah. As to items being to the 16 item. The the special meeting will be heard of the 16 items. Um if I had understood it would be first and so the gentleman downstairs told me to sign in for one. So apologies. Do you have any general public comment you'd like to deliver? generally about the neighborhood organizations. Sure. But uh I'll I'll refer to the city attorney on whether that's proper if it's not on the agenda. Speaking generally about the um it's fine without that as long as it doesn't relate to the agenda item. The agenda item that you're looking for is agenda item number six. Correct.

So that's what I would be when when you go speak to the clerk's office is agenda item number six. Thank you. I'll be back. Thank you so much. Um, there. Yeah.

Good evening. I'm Karen Milik and I'm speaking for myself tonight. The joint use agreement for middle and elementary schools has been in place for 24 years providing parks and programming to Santa Monica residents. The Crest child care program was crucial for me. There are currently 141 classes in the active net uh at going on at these location. This all goes away if the city lets the joint use agreement expire in 27. The city needs to negotiate a new agreement to keep these programs going. The proposed partial tax of 495 by the citizens is to replace the city's 12 million joint use agreement payment to the district. This transfers the city's commitment onto Santa Monica's residents and makes housing less affordable. The city's financial are approving. It's glad to see in the actuals that the general fund had an excess of revenues less expenses of $2.5 million for 2025. And this is before the new revenues from the realignment plan. The school district is in an even better position, averaging 14 million in surpluses the last 5 years, 9 million when you take out the pandemic funding. and they have a record high of 84 million in SER reserves and yet enrollment is down 19%. So a reduction of funding would not cause teachers to be let go for fiscal reasons. There was a large increase in property taxes this year due to the school bonds. The new parcel tax would almost double the existing partial tax payment. Renters are affected as district taxes can be passed through. Partial taxes put a disproportional burden on lower income residents. This new tax will literally take food off the

table. Please do not support the partial tax and work with the district to continue joint you. Thank you. Denise Barton, Lawrence Cohen, Jerry Rubin, John Medlin.

Good evening. Since at the last meeting my meme and the audio was cut. Let's try this again. My meme was a questioning raptor with three screaming guinea pigs at the bottom titled, "Are they using us as guinea pigs with the top saying if high concentrations of human metaphenomo virus or HMPV have been detected in the wastewater of communities of Northern California according to the data from the wastewater dashboard continue at the bottom with California and other states that recycle waste water for the watering of crops and adding it to clean water sources using the residents as guinea pigs. It's also being found in Los Angeles and there's no vaccine or treatment, leaving me to ask, has your water treatment found yet found out how to remove all pharmaceuticals yet? Because it doesn't seem to be eliminating disease. I mean, since this is the strategy chosen by our city council to overdevelop the city, not what's in the best interest of the of the residents. Now, I'd like to make some points again from the April 26, 2022 city council meeting regarding city clerk Denise Anderson Warren. Miss Anderson Warren is commonly known to be servicing serving the interest of the lobbying group Santa Monica Forward and not being a neutral public official, which is concerning because she's in charge of the elections. She's also interfered with and lied about sub submission by a group opposing a ballot measure which she was never disciplined for as well as having HR complaints whitewashed. Hopefully you can see my questioning bringing Miss Anderson Warren back for another election. Unless all of these reasons are why you brought her back. Thank you.

Lawrence Con. My name is Lawrence Cohen and this is our new image which is now going to be on my car between now and April 12th. So much has changed since I first spoke to you a couple months ago. So so sorry. This is this is actually a 16 item as well. So, I think you would be looking for agenda item number six to speak on this as well. There's a 16 item to actually fund um this evening.

Yes. So, since it's on the agenda, um um speaking under item number six would be the proper place for you to speak. And that'll be after uh Yes. So, the clerk's office can help you, but it'll be after close. Should I go out and have something to eat? Sure. We're we're trying to keep close session short this evening, so Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, we will. I'm glad Bar Talk didn't interrupt me. That was Yes. Maybe Bar Talk will show up at some point here. Thank you, Mr. Cohen. Uh Jerry Rubin, John Medlin, John Cyrus Smith, Harvey Eder.

Uh thank you very much, Jerry Rubin with the urban forest task force. But just speaking for myself, I was here yesterday when the airport commission voted to uh support an LC compliant creation of a great park. I want to thank Amber Raine and her design team and all the people that are supporting this, including the council and everybody. Um, so much to be said for how everyone is respectfully preserving the history of the airport, but you understand you could enhance safety through helicopter access, not just at the airport, but throughout the city. Anyhow, what I really wanted to talk about today also is gratitude because Earth Day is coming up and I still remember how the city was so supportive of planting the tree of gratitude in memory of my late wife Marissa. We're going to hold a public gathering there, just a short gathering five o'clock on Wednesday, April 22nd at the Tree of Gratitude that was planted on Earth Day three years ago. and also its sister tree, the children's tree of life that was planted on Earth Day back in 1983. I do want to thank my wife for her behind thescenes help to create the urban forest task force and I want to thank the late I mean the former mayor Gleam Davis for the proclamation she gave in support of the tree of gratitude. I want to thank our former city manager, David White, and our urban forest people that helped to get that, you know, Matthew Wells, Robert Castanada. I agree with the chair and the vice chair of the urban forest task force hopefully to become a standalone commission that

we need a budget increase. We need some more support for the trees. Thank you, Mr. Rubin. Yes. Um I think we have fond memories of the planting. Yes, we we do happy hands here. So, sorry. John Medlin, John Cyrus Smith, Harvey. Yes. Uh I'm now in my 30th year of being in a consecutive years in living in Santa Monica, California. Great place to live. By the way, what's the number one priority of all governments? Public safety.

Public safety. How important is it? Ask the people in Tel Aviv tonight. Ask the people in Tran tonight. You know, we have Here's some data published by the Santa Monica Police Department, also filed with the California Department of Justice and the FBI. The violent crimes in this country in this study peaked in 2018 at 797. Then they went down 6 to 664 539 and then in 2021 up 607 up in 2022 677 and up in 2023 to 692 and oh my gosh in 2024 they went down and what did we do with the chief of police then? Oh, he had differences of opinion and pres and priorities. So, he's no longer with us. And yet, you know, I think we have an orange guy. Okay, I'll be inappropriate. We have a president, I call him the orange guy, who has a thing called misinformation and MAGA from the Santa Monica Daily Press and also stated by uh M council member Negradi on her one of her websites says part one crime which tracks violent offenses and burglary declined 12.5% falling from 4,793 incidents in 19 in 2024 to thou two 4,194 in 2025. It's nowhere on the Santa Monica Police Department's website. It's Today is what? It's uh March the 24th. 83 days have passed since the year ended. We have still not filed and reported the public crimes in this city for 2025. The city of Los Angeles on the 20 on the 12th, excuse me, on the 8th of uh

Thank you, Mr. Redlin. Great shirt. John C. Smith. Good evening, Mayor Council. I have a point of order to ask. Since we have an agenda, the uh neighborhood grant item is its own special agenda item. It's a a special agenda. Correct. Um shouldn't if you have questions about the order of the agenda, you can talk to the clerk or the city attorney, but we're not having a a question and answer.

Okay. Um, I'm John Cyrus Smith, parks commissioner and board member of Wilmont. I just want to remind some of the previous speakers that the airport was a park paid for with a parks bond long before it ever became an airport. Um, I brought a little hand, a little thing. This is the four agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. Be impeccable with your word. Never take anything personally. Never assume. Always do your best. When it comes to the neighborhood grant program, the city and some council members, I believe, have not been impeccable with their word. This is not in order at this time.

I understand. That's what I was trying to make. Uh since there's an agenda item and then the special meeting is its own, the grant is its own agenda. Shouldn't that be a that means that special uh I can talk about this item in this context but I only have to wait till the 16 item until later. So the so standard practices right so it's a 16 item it would be heard with the other 16 items on the special agenda. So you are looking for agenda item number six I think when you go out and speak with if I understand the question correctly. Well I I I thought there were two different there's two different meetings. There's the special meeting just dealing with the grant program.

We haven't called that yet. I understand. But uh so why if it so if that item is not on this agenda if you want to make general comments not about an agenda item, go ahead. Yes, that item will be heard with the so they when agenda management happened earlier this evening. So the 16 item that you are speaking about will be heard at the same time as the 16 item for the regular agenda. So you will be commenting during the number six which is where they hear all of the public comment for the remaining items on the agenda.

I understand that. But I I just thought that since we the this that item is not on this agenda that I might get a chance to talk about it now and then maybe as part of the next agenda later. But maybe I'm mistaken. All right. Sorry. So how much time do I have? A minute 10. So, um, let's update the memorial park expansion. You guys, you at the beginning of this year, I came to the council and I said, "Let's, I challenged you guys. Let's finally get these shovels in the ground." Memorial Park expansion approved in 2019. Airport Park expansion approved in 2017. Nothing's been done on either. Um, it was a money issue. We have the $18 million from the Santa Monica College bond and now the school district says they're ready to chip in the 5 million that they promised back in 2019. And since we've shaved $17 million off the price, that brings it to 23 million. We finally have enough money to go forward on this plan and uh I just seek your help in trying to get that going. Thank you.

Thank you. And I believe we have uh one late before. Oh, okay. move to hear the late Does anyone a second? And this is before the speaker on the phone. All those in favor? I I Any opposed? Okay, Mr. Adder.

Thank you. Uh my name is Harer. I'm speaking for myself, Public Solar Power Coalition, etc. Um, I wish I had more than less than a minute, but uh, it gave you five pages circulated to you in the city council and city manager's office and it referred to the nine pages that we gave uh, half a year ago that everybody lost and sort of the clerk management and that's pretty outrageous. It was a notice of litigation, affidavit declaration and statement of facts, which is the net nut of a lawsuit. And we've been going to justice to attorney Rick uh summing 114 million step up and uh the place up in Hollywood. Okay. And uh that was two years ago in in October there were 40 million going after their executives for fraud and wasted all this and it's being investigated. Okay. And there were three pages also when it refers to 11:02. This is retaliation for truthtelling. That's against state and federal law. And we filed also a lawsuit here with with the city about

Thank you. Nobody's got any information. Um Mike Montgomery and Gerald Baker uh are on the phone. I'm sorry, Merritt. Um I don't know what happened, but apparently this this gentleman here registered to speak. Oh, okay. Didn't register, so he should get the two minutes before the time. Yeah. Okay, great. And I'm sorry. Can you give your name is Frank? Absolutely. My name is My name is Frank Mele. Thank you. Mhm. The mic. Yeah.

Um like Lizzy, I am a um resident of Dewey Street in Mar Vista with a back wall that borders Santa Monica directly adjacent to the southern edge of the airport. Uh we've recently just through a happen stance two days ago uh learned of this proposed relocation of the Santa Monica Trapeze School uh at 2800 Airport Avenue immediately behind our homes. Um I think that everyone's familiar with what the school does and is. Um, in reviewing the airport commission meeting from September 23rd of uh, 2024, it appears that the project was approved before any outreach to adjacent residents had occurred and neighborhood notification was described on the agenda as a to-do list on the to-do list. Um but 18 months later, uh it's only through the start of the construction process that we're seeing that the the uh surrounding neighborhood has been alerted to um the development. So uh we have just as of yesterday uh started to request permits, impact studies, any details about how uh the operation would function, what considerations were made for local residents who the airport commission board or uh commission board commissioner in the notes of the meeting clearly knew would be affected. The site has historically been a low inensity parking lot or staging area that's been uh controlled by Santa Monica College. and the proposed uh this proposal represents a significant change in use directly next to residential homes. So, we're not here to oppose the use outright. We simply are asking for a pause to allow for transparency, proper review, and meaningful engagement with the residents most affected. Thank you.

Thank you. Um Mr. Mele, uh Mike Montgomery, Gerald Baker, and I'll defer to Madame Clerk to pull them up. Mitchell, we're ready for the caller. All right, Mike Montgomery is not present, so we will go to uh Mr. Baker.

Good evening. Can you hear me? All right. Yes, we can hear you. Go ahead.

Excellent. Thank you so much. Uh good evening, Mayor, Council. So, you know, nine days ago on a Sunday night, families were at our pier. Kids were playing in the arcade. People were enjoying one of the most iconic spots in all of California. And then, terrifyingly, there were gunshots. People ran. A child was scooped up Midame by a terrified adult. Two human beings were shot for hours. Our pier was a crime scene. A suspect was arrested. The pier would reopen the next morning and then silence. People in our city do not feel safe. That is not an opinion. It's what residents, business owners, and visitors are saying every single day. I want to acknowledge Council Member Lana Grae. You've been present, accessible, and genuinely engaged with this community. Your constituents see it, and we appreciate it. But Mayor Terrosus, you are eight weeks into this job. This shooting happened on your watch and the most visible landmark in this city. We need to hear from you. Not a press release, not a statement about equity and inclusion. A concrete public safety plan for the pier. More officers, better lighting, real crowd management on weekend nights. The pier is the front door of Santa Monica. When gunfire breaks out there on a busy Sunday night, that is a governance failure, and this council needs to own it. Santa Monica is worth fighting for, so please fight for it. Thank you.

Great. Okay. Uh moving on to uh consent calendar. Um actually I'm my apologies. Public input on items under the consent calendar and close session only. We have one commenter. Morgan Hunter Gross.

Yes. Okay. Hello. I'm here to talk about item 4G, which is the emergency homeless proclamation. Um, okay. So, what I wanted to Okay, we're in his little is tell you about some pictures I took after while you guys were on break last week. I walked down to Tongva Park and the sun was setting and those big metal things I have it framed with the sunset. I came around and I saw a homeless man. He was standing looking at the sunset really enjoying his time. A Porsche 911 target pulls in front of the Santa Monica sign. A man walking on the pier holding a portable television in a a bathrobe and a hat wearing sandals. He was interesting. But the showers are fascinating. I wanted to take a picture of showers, but I had to wait a while cuz there's some kids showering. I don't want to take pictures of kids showering obviously. So I'm starting to take pictures of other people to document the showers, the cold showers. And this woman's trying to take and her boob pops out. I'm like, "Okay, this is okay. I'm done taking pictures here." So then we at the same time people are uh, you know, playing volleyball. There's some kids smoking some weed by the corner who had traveled because they're taking have a camera. So they traveled all the way from wherever they came from, the middle of the country to promote whatever thing cuz they're cool in Santa Monica cuz Santa Monica is cool. Uh, okay. Then I get back starting to head back to Tongva Park. A man is sleeping in front of the Tongva Park sign. I walk a little further more towards the entrance where people are coming off of the train and there's a now a a police an unmarked police now standing on now drove up onto the sidewalk and there's another homeless man who's now walking away on his bike blaring colored lights. He was just about to fall asleep. The sun's going down. He must have just gotten off the train. He found a nice spot, but you can't sleep there, obviously, which is

an interesting concept that you can't sleep on the floor. Okay, I'll move on. I don't know the laws on that one. But what I believe was interesting the first time I ever saw was the elevator for the pier. It was the first time I ever saw it. Um, it's only open when the restaurant is open.

Thank you. Um, we are now moving on to the consent calendar. All items are going to be considered and approved in one motion unless someone I I I apologize. I wanted to ask the question before we move in before we move forward if there's um if there's anyone who wanted to report on travel. I know that's out of order, but

Oh, my apologies. Okay. Did anyone want to report on that? Um, uh, Council Member Snell and I, uh, traveled to the National League of Cities in Washington DC. A week ago, um, we met with our, uh, Congressman Ted Louu, Senator Adam Schiff, and Senator Alex Padilla. We attended alongside our lobbyist in independent meetings lobbying for um, thanking for the funding we have received um, and also trying to secure future funding. Unfortunately, during a time when we have no budget set. Um, nonetheless, we were there present representing Santa Monica, everything from a new bus stop on PCH to affordable housing. And we also attended alongside the League of California Cities to um also support the larger California interest in continuation of funding for muchneeded infrastructure programming.

Great. And I see council member Zern, you're in the queue. Okay. Council member Snredy made most of my statement, but it it was interesting to um meet with our congressional leaders u uh and to um discuss the issues of funding during a time period when the federal government's budget was frozen. Uh it was difficult for me to uh be there knowing that our TSA workers were uh were not being paid. Fortunately enough, we both got out safely and got in an untimely manner. But I it really was a eye openening event for our federal government as to how um how there really isn't any answers with respect to where the funding is going to go to. So

my just a question, was there any advocacy around HR1 backfill for full scope medical for people who need their health insurance? I just am curious. There wasn't specific to that, but there was a lot of questions from the League of California on healthcare back funding. I think

right now, unfortunately, there was blank stairs and there will be a race to submit funding. The question was, is this scalable? You're asking for 4 million. What if you get 200,000? Can you still use it? So, being able to think quick on our feet, I think what put it Santa Monica at an advantage is we have proof of the work done. We were able to come with the Virginia Avenue project photos. we were able to show that we know how to use the money responsibly. And so at the end of the day, I think it's very important that we are present in those rooms at that time to to stick up for Congressman Lou was very receptive, gave us 30 minutes to talk with and has um made a commitment to come to to us on April for our blue bus effect.

Oh, great. April 9th. I you heard it here first. That's so exciting. So that was also a a positive note on our we said we put his face on the flyer so now he has to come. I hope uh Mr. Gupta heard that. Um and we send our condolences to him. I think his father just passed away. Uh council member Zernay.

So I just wanted to report that I was very lucky to be able to attend the annual civic well conference in beautiful Yusede National Park. Um it took place over the course of four days from Thursday through Sunday. And I uh the theme this year was climate resiliency. Last year was kind of a prep, you know, emergency preparedness in light of the fires and we got to learn a lot from folks who had been through th those types of events and I think brought back lessons and this year got to learn a lot about climate resiliency and a lot of pro- environmental policies and a lot of folks were pretty jealous of a lot of the stuff we're doing and we have done here in Santa Monica.

Fantastic. Thank you all for being such great representatives. Um, now is anyone trying to recuse themselves from anything on the consent calendar? Staff has pulled 4B and 4K as a reminder. Yes. Uh, Madame Mayare, uh, I will be recusing from 4H and 4 I out of an abundance of caution. Uh, because Kaiser Permanente and Cumins are clients of my employer. Thanks. And I believe that you would like to pull item 4 C. Correct. Okay. So why don't we um entertain a motion?

Uh just before you do that, I also have to disclose that I'm also accusing from 4H uh because uh my law firm Hansen Bridg LLP also represents Kaiser Perente in unrelated matters. Um uh neither I nor my firm have any financial interest in this. Great. Does anyone want to make a motion or should I do that? I'd like to move that we move the balance of the um consent calendar with the exception of 4H. What was it on? 4 I and C and 4 C. And then 4 B and 4K have been pulled. Yeah, I'll second it. Great. Okay. Council member Negrete. Yes. Council member Hall. Yes.

Council member Raskin. Yes. Council member Zwick, I'm sorry, excuse me. Mayor Pro Timwick, yes. Council member Snell, yes. Council members Zaya, yes. And Mayor Terosas, yes. Phenomenal. Um, I would propose that we hear 4C first since you pulled it for discussion, then the recusals can leave as we vote on those. Um, is there a staff report? uh Oscar Santiago finance director here to answer any questions.

Is is there a staff report or anything or No, no, not a staff report. Um um thank you. Uh so I just have a a couple of questions because um for folks who don't know the annual comprehensive financial report is one of the most important financial documents uh and report card of our financial and fiscal health. So I think it was worth having our director here to share some thoughts on it. Um so director Santiago I'll just ask the the question that's on everyone's mind. Is Santa Monica going broke?

Uh no we're not going broke. um but we would be in trouble if we hadn't taken um decisive action or if the broader economy um takes a downturn. So simply and in a simple way, the way I see it is the city holds 168.1 million in general fund balance reserves. Um we still have aa ratings with our rating agencies and we have about um 851.6 million in total cash and investments. Um the city's fiscal report shows a government under fiscal pressure just like other government agencies, but um not one that's in the brink of collapse. So no.

And uh the report also talks about our rainy day fund. Can you tell us what that is and what shape it's in?

Sure. The rainy day fund, it's the city's uh general fund main uh emergency insurance account. Um it is the money that we set aside to help us through things like the pandemic um a drop in revenues or any natural disaster that may come across um you know may across the city. Um we keep this fund uh strong because it helps us to protect our credit rating as well and keep our um our our uh it lowers our borrowing cost basically. Um as of June 2025 our rainy day fund sits at 63.8 million 63.2 2 million sorry which is 14% of the adjusted general fund budget and our city's goal is to have a return of 15% for a rainy day fund and we're building at at.5% each year to reach 15% by 2027. So in other words the rainy day fund is close to reaching this goal and we're on track to to reach that goal of 50%.

That's great. And I it's probably obvious to everyone, but can you just walk us through very briefly the numbers on like why tourism matters so much to our city finances?

Sure. Sales tax and uh transit occupancy tax, which is hotel tax, make up about 30% of our 2425 revenues. When you account for parking revenues and parking facility tax, that number goes up to 40%. Or about 181.3 million of the city's revenues. Um so why does tourism matter? Well, hotel tax is the tax that guests pay when they stay at Santa Monica hotels, right? Sales tax and parking revenues rise and fall uh based on how many people come to Santa Monica, eat at our restaurants, shop at our stores, and visit our attractions. So, when tourism is strong, these revenues grow. And then when visitors stay away because of concerns over public safety, fires, economic shutdowns, or travel trends, these revenues drop. So again, because they make up 40% of our general fund revenues, tourism is important to us in visitor activity.

No, thank you. Um, the report also talks about our pension plans and it says that they're 80% funded. What does that mean?

Okay, so I have a daughter in college, so I like to kind of think about it in a different way. So a simple analogy is if your child's future college costs are about $100,000, right? Your your total, which is not, but if it was $100,000 and you saved $80,000, then you're about 80% funded. if you but you still have a gap. But if you're steady steadily paying into that um to that fund and your personal investment assumptions hold, then you'll eventually reach 100%. So pensions work in a similar way, but they have just more complex factors at play that could fluctuate from year over year. The factors that are at play are life expectancy, inflation, payroll growth, and investment returns. But the basic idea is is straightforward. We saved a lot of what we need, but we're paying um down the rest and the plan is designed to reach full uh funding over time. One thing that I want to note here is that our Kalpers um they just announced their preliminary returns for fiscal year 2425 which was 11.6%. That's a return on their investments. That is well above uh the return that they expected which was 6.8%. We'll see those um results in our next act report.

Okay. And in theory, we could see years where our investments are not as well and we would see that funding amount go down. So it's it's not it's a moving target. It's a moving target based on the criteria. So like mortality rates, the payroll, all that stuff. Okay. Um so we still maintain a AAA rating from Moody's and Fitch, but they did give us a negative outlook this year. What does that actually mean for residents?

So you know, again, we still maintain a AAA rating, which is important to us. Um and there's a major distinction between a rating change and also an outlook um change rate or a downgrade or an outlook change. And so an outlook signals that a condition could lead to rating change if things worsen. Um it doesn't mean that the rating has changed and we have we like I mentioned to you we have maintain our highest credit rating for the two agencies. So the negative outlook um that they issued uh reflect uh Moody's and and um and Fitch's assessment um of two forward-looking uh things that we're addressing right now. One is the city's ongoing exposure to um ABH 218, which is the sexual abuse litigation, as well as um the projected general fund deficits that we had um during our our our two fiscal years that could further erode our our reserves. Um, luckily for us, our realignment plan is designed precisely to address these um, issues. And so, we're we're addressing this. Um, again, a negative outlook doesn't change anything about the taxes that our residents pay or the services the city provides. Trash will be picked up, parks will stay open, police and fire services will continue as usual.

Okay. And what is the GFOA certificate of achievement? So, it's the gold standard for financial reporting. Um the GFOA recognizes governments uh for producing exceptional, clear, thorough and transparent uh financial reports. If an agency receives it, um it basically signifies that the financial reports meet high professional standards. They are easy to uh for the public to to understand and also shows a strong commitment to accountability and good financial management. We've received this this um award now for 41 consecutive years.

That's impressive. Nice. Nice work to you, your team, and all of your predecessors. Um, last two questions. First being this acter was for year end June 30, 2025. So everything that the realignment plan has done will come through next year's ACT for as you just mentioned. Um but would you agree that the actions that we are taking now and we'll be discussing later tonight in 11C uh the realignment plan update reduce the likelihood that the city will have to make sudden cuts to services or staff uh in the future?

Uh yes um the actions taken to the real rearming plan they'll strengthen our long-term uh fiscal footing and um so it makes it far less likely that the city will need to make cuts sudden cuts to services or staff. Um, so by acting early and proactively, I think we're doing what it takes to build stability and um instead of reacting to crisis. Awesome. And last question, uh, do you think we're in the clear?

Well, I would say that we've made uh important progress, right? And that um, we're not fully in the clear. And one of the things to keep in mind is that we still need to be disciplined on our investments. We need to continue to protect our infrastructure, support our local businesses, um, and continue to work hard to deliver services so that we can keep Santa Monica clean and safe. Um, so staying prudent now will keep us stable, uh, in the long run. Um and you know another thing to point out is that the the structural deficit is being addressed through a lot of stuff that we're doing through the realignment plan including the implementation of new revenues um the ambulance operator program which is revenues parking rate updates digital signage revenues and user fee adjustments and of course our our expenditure control measures that we're taking. So um these again the results of these um initiatives will will be seen in our fiscal year 2526 acter when we next report to you.

Okay. Thank you director unless anyone else has uh council members. Thank you. Um and I just wanted to add we uh heard this item during the audit subcommittee meeting and in much greater depth. Uh but for folks who might not understand what this means, uh the it's said that the city of Santa Monica has received an unqualified slash unmodified audit uh opinion. So could you please clarify for folks who might not be CPAs or stare at financial statements all day what that means?

Yeah, our audit is as clear as it gets, right? We we have an unmodified opinion from our financial statements with zero material weaknesses, zero significant deficiencies, zero compliance findings, zero misstatements, and zero disagreements with management. So overall, the we're operating at a good place. Great. Thank you very much. Oh, Council Member Snell, and can you just tell us uh how long the city has had an audit letter like that? how long we've had the many years. 41 years.

41. Thank you. And and it has a lot to do with our management, our our predecessors and all that and my uh stellar accounting team that's here with me. So, thank you. Great. Um Council Council Hall, do you want to make a motion? Thank you. I'll move the item. I'll second with gratitude to our finance staff. Thank you. Much gratitude. Council members Erneskaya. Yes. Council member Snell, yes. Mayor Timwick, yes. Council member Rascin, yes. Council member Hall, yes. Council member Negrete, yes. And Mayor Terrosus,

yes. Fantastic. We will now be asking Well, let's see. How do we want to do this? 4. Uh, yeah. I mean, so Hall is recusing on Okay, they're leaving. 4 H. Yeah, we just have to do H because that was what Hall and Rascin were accusing and then Raskin, you'll come back for four I Great. Do we need to hear a staff report or does someone want to move the item? I'll make a motion um to move 4 is it? Yep. Second.

You can give it to Negrete. Okay. Council member Negrete. Yes. Council member Hall is absent. Council member Ravskin is absent. Mayor Poten Swick, yes. Council member Snell, yes. Council member Zkaya, yes. And Mayor Terosas, yes.

Great. Um, maybe Miss Council Raskin can return. Council Rascin. Okay. Uh 4 I is authorizing our city manager to enter an agreement with Cumins for overhaul replacement repair of our engines and battery electric propulsion systems for DOT. Great. Um I will move that item. Second. Okay. Council member Negrete. Yes. Council member Raskin. Yes. Mayor Pro Tim Swick. Yes. Council member Snell. Yes. Council member Zernaya.

Yes. And Mayor Terosas. Yes. Great. Um, we will now move on to close session and I'll ask the clerk to read that. Tell me when council councilman hall come back. Oh, he's coming.

Okay. For close session, we have what time is it? 7. Okay. We have um close session items. We have count uh existing litigation. This is the John Doe's five. Sorry. 5B we have conference with legal counsel is existing litigation and this is the city versus ICSOP. Then we have 5C another existing litigation the city of Santa Monica versus Whimo. 5D is another existing litigation city of Santa I'm sorry Santa Monica EV hold Holdings LLC versus the city of Santa Monica. Again we have another one. 5E is existing litigation and this is Whimo LLC versus the city of Santa Monica. And then finally we have conference and this is for real estate and the property is Santa Monica Air Center 3021 airport 3025 airport and um the city negotiator is Oliver Chi the city of Santa Monica city manager and the negotiate the persons to negotiate is with Judy Barker and this is Santa Monica Air Center and that's your close session

and um madam city attorney when will we be back in one hour consistent with um council's agenda management and to the extent it is not completed we will hear the the remainder of the close session at the end of the agenda. Great. So we will be back no earlier than 807.

I thought Uh oh. Okay, it's 8:07. We have no city manager, but we're starting anyway. I guess he'll be coming in one second. Okay. Um, madame city clerk, can you just explain how the uh public comment is going to happen now for the remaining agenda items just because there's some confusion about that?

So, the remainder of the agenda. So, public comment is on the remainder of the regular agenda and then the 116 item on the special agenda. So, do we need a motion to take those together or can we just take them all at the same time? If you want to do a motion, you can. But you called the meeting to order. Okay. We called it a combined meeting. So, okay. So, I would move that we call a combined uh It was just I think it was just confusion with I had a new staff person trying to No problem. So, we're all trying our best. It's already combined. It's already combined. Okay. So, we're combining the special meeting and the regular meeting and we are going to hear public comment on the remaining agenda items both uh special meeting and regular meeting.

And I had a question. Do we have a report out or you is it going to be at the end? Thank you, Madam City Clerk. Um, all items were heard with no reportable action taken. We do not need to reconvene. We're just so efficient today, everyone. Thank you, madam city attorney. I apologize. I did not and this is you're officially our full-time permanent city attorney. So, we're very proud of her. Yes. Not to put you on the spot. Uh, okay. So, I'm going to call the first few names. We have Andrew Hoyer, Claire Thomas, Andrew Hoyer again, Cindy Feifer, Luke Kaine, David Newberg, and just come up and state your name. You don't have to be in that exact order. Mr. Yes. This

Do you want to do your two while you're up there? Uh, since I wrote them together and put them in one minute. Sure.

Uh, good evening. My name is Andrew Hoyer and I'm the president of Santa Monica Mid City Neighbors. I'd love to talk about the realignment plan, but was only informed that it was on the agenda late Thursday night and I already had plans for the weekend. So, why wasn't it on the agenda when it first came out on Tuesday? This seems to be an ongoing trend here where the agenda comes out and then like Friday everything shows up on it. in regards to the grant program revisions. Number one, you all owe Josh Kirpy's a sincere apology. Number two, from the first day I got involved with Mid City neighbors, our purpose has always been to inform the residents of our territory about what was going on in the city and provide a forum for them to interact with city staff and their elected officials. I've been giving that spiel for 15 years now. I'm not sure who came up with this concept of community building, but that was never in our mission statement. Number three, if you limit us to sending mailers to only to our members, you are inferring that you do not want all the residents in our territory to know that our meetings even exist. Is that your intention? If you just added the word community in front of members, that would solve the problem. And uh my 60 seconds are up. Thank you.

Thanks so much. Uh yes.

Hi. Take two. So Hollywood uh good evening. My name is Claire Thomas. I'm president of the Friends of Sunset Park neighborhood organization, but I'm here speaking for myself. And again, I appreciate that Mayor Terosis and council members Hall and Raskin are now aware of the new guidance line that the new guidelines for the neighborhood organization grants do not align with the unanimous decision of city council last September and that they have issued some clarifications. However, some questions still remain. Neighborhood organizations have been in existence for more than 50 years. The parameters for being recognized by the city included having an annual meeting, having at least 50 members, holding election elections, and sending out a yearly newsletter. Help from the city followed with, among other things, the use of Xerox and fax machines here at city hall. Then the city took on the annual mailing of the newsletters and memberships. This then morphed into offering neighborhood organizations a grant of $7,000 a year. To qualify, there was an application for requesting the funds prior to and proof after that the money was spent as requested. Nowhere was the recognition by the city as an official neighborhood organization tied to receiving grant money. Some of our neighborhood organizations did not apply for the grant money every year and they were not then denied recognition by the city. Nowhere in the September city council discussion of the neighborhood organization grants were they tied to city recognition. When did that change? As implied in item seven, only neighborhood organizations who apply for and get the grant will be recognized in sea and on the city website. All recognized neighborhood organizations should appear on the city website and in secape. We are fun. We are functioning within the parameters of a 501c4 organization. We are being punished for not asking for funds that currently come with requirements that we do not accept by being denied recognition by the city and removal from future secape additions and city website.

Thank you, John C. Smith. Um that's okay. Just feel free to Cindy Fifer. Yeah, come come on down. Okay. Well, thank you. Um, good evening, mayor and members of the council. Cindy Feifer, executive director of the Santa Monica Pier lees, businesses that collectively contribute millions of dollars annually to the city through base rent and percentage rent tied directly to our sales as long as well as common area maintenance fees that we do pay. While we support the city's vision for the activated pier and beach both with major events and through the entertainment zone, these events create real and measurable hardships for our businesses. Ocean views a primary reason our customers visit are being blocked and ext for extended periods by staging structures and equipment. Load in andout operations disrupt daily business access and create safety and operational challenges. Amplified music and speaker systems alter the ambiance our guests expect. And most critically, event attendees are occupying limited parking, often without patronizing peer businesses at all. The result is lost foot traffic, lost sales, and ultimately lost percentage revenue for the city itself. We are asking the council and city staff for one thing, a meaningful seat at the table from the earliest stages of event planning and the entertainment zone. management plan through execution. We are on the ground every day. We understand the rhythms of this pier. That experience is an asset the city should be leveraging, not overlooking. Our goal is not to hinder progress, but to strengthen it in a partnership. By working as a team from the beginning, we can help ensure events are structured in ways that complement existing businesses, protect the customer

experience, and safeguard the rental revenue streams the city depends on. We are ready and eager to be that partner. Thank you. Thank you so much. Um AP John C. Smith, my apologies. I called you out of order, but you're still up. You don't you don't need to go next. I'm just saying Luke Kaine, David Newberg, and then John C. Smith, you John C. Smith, you'll be after that. It doesn't Yeah. Go ahead.

Okay. My name is Dave Newberg. Um I will be representing San Lanca Pier Corporation tonight while Jim Harris is in Chicago handling some Route 66 activities. I will be speaking on item 11 C regarding the entertainment zone for events on Santa Monica Pier. Uh, dear Mayor and members of the city council, at its February 9th, 2026 meeting, the Santa Monica Pier Corporation board of your directors, received a presentation from Santa Monica city staff regarding the city's plans to establish and the entertainment zones on the Santa Monica Pier parking deck and west and end venues as part of special events. The Pier Corporation Board of Directors unanimously voted to support this proposal. In May 2025, the SNPC adopted a resolution regarding efforts to support economic recovery in the Santa Monica community which included our support for designating the San Maga pier as an entertainment zone pursued to SB969 with the geographic extent, hours of operation and other parameters to be determined in consultation with peer tenants, stakeholders in the city. We look forward to working with city staff on implementing the entertainment zones during special events in a way that enhances the peer experience for visitors, tenants, stakeholders, and the city. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Luke Kane, Ben John C. Smith, Denise Barton, Matt Goldenberg, Brad Euan.

Good to go. Good evening, mayor, council members, and city manager. I want to address the concern. I know you have. If we reduce the water mitigation fee, are we setting up a precedent that weakens the city's financial position? The answer is no. In fact, the opposite is true. Right now, Santa Monica is the only city in the Hyperion service area that charges a per seat water mitigation fee. Los Angeles doesn't. Beverly Hills doesn't. Culver City doesn't. Every other city uses standard capacity fees that are predictable, lower, and not tied to restaurant seating. So, the question isn't whether we're lowering a fee. The real question is why are we the only city charging a fee structure that actively discourages the very businesses we say we want? At your proposed reduced rate of 400% seat, a small 49 seat restaurant would need to pay nearly $20,000 upfront. Then they face rising wastewater rates, plan check fees, health department fees, and months of carrying costs. The cumulative effect is not theoretical. It is stopping operators from choosing Santa Monica. Keeping the fee high does not generate revenue. It prevents projects from happening at all. A fee that blocks investment produces zero dollars. A reasonable fee produces both revenue and activation. This is not about giving anyone a break. This is about aligning our policies with stated goals. More restaurants, more foot traffic, more safety through activation, more long-term revenue for the city. Reducing the water mitigation fee is not a giveaway. It is a correction bringing Santa Monica back in line with every other city in the region and removing a barrier that has no measurable benefit but very real economic consequences. If we want the prominade to recover, we have to remove the oppos obstacles we created. This is one of the most immediate high impact steps that you can take to support small businesses, increase activation, and strengthen the city's long-term fiscal health. Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. Hey folks, John Cyrus Smith, recreation and parks commissioner, willilmont.org board member. I got to tell you, I'm talking about the neighborhood grant program and this has not been your finest hour and you know and you've you've kind of your actions have kind of hurt a lot of people that I count amongst as my friends and uh I don't know if it was intentional, but I do know this. It's real easy for a city council to be punitive. I think real leadership sometimes calls for a lighter touch and that was not used in this respect. You could have simply simply agreed months ago that any group endorsing candidates cannot get a grant. Then we'd be done. But no, first you tried to kill the program 49,000. Somehow we resurrected it and got a 4-3 vote to save it. And then you started putting all these new restrictions like banning ma mail mailers and postcards. You know, the Wilmont PO box fills up with postcards from the city. The city trying to inform residents about what's going on in their neighborhood. Here's one about the green bin uh compost program. If you guys can spend money sending out postcards to inform residents about issues in the neighborhood, why can't we? So look, uh, I feel like you have punished all seven groups for the actions of one or two. Some on the council have insinuated that group somehow misspent money even though we submitted accurate, you know, uh, closeout reports for decades. Uh, another person wants us to collect personal information about our groups when he has a a blatant conflict of interest. In closing, I just want to say, you know, when you work in news, people tell you things all the time, and I've been asking myself, why does this council want to rush this item to this

dis tonight? And I I'm trying to figure out the answer. Well, I think I know it. And and I don't like the answer. And uh you know, I'll be sharing more of it when I have more time in another venue. Okay. I would just refer to my email on why. Um Okay. Uh Denise Barton, Matt Goldenberg, Brad Ewing, Jerry Rubin. Good evening.

Good evening. On the realignment plan, I would like to take you back to 2017 when Khalib who hid him between the time he was booked and played at the Twilight Concert Series, which resulted in up to 60,000 people attending. with the police chief commenting afterward. I'm concerned this has gone way beyond the capacity of the Santa Monica Police Department, its law enforcement part partners and the EMS partners. Other concerns I have about the parking rates being raised as you know this has to go through the coastal commission that allow allowing sidewalk dining. You know, when the prominade did this, there were a lot of ADA compliance issues. I also still have a problem with tax dollars going to the city's portion of the wastewater fee as well as turning retail into restaurants because the tax dollars could be put to better use like more police instead of making taxpayers responsible for conversion and operational business costs that the taxpayers never see a return from. I agree with bringing all staff back to city hall for three days as a start, but I question the amount of a year of pay for those who choose to leave the city. I also have to question your housing first model due to it previously being found not to work well for the homeless and mentally ill. If you're putting the pleat on the metrop platform, isn't that taking officers away from the community? Also, isn't the problem not supposed to have 14 officers? Then how can I not mention how financially irresponsible to leave the city with a negative balance for two years? And finally, if the residents wanted your emergency overdevelopment to be permanent, don't you think the residents would say so? Aren't you supposed to be representing the residents? Because that's not what the majority of us want. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Goldenberg.

Good evening, mayor and city council members. Matt Goldenberg, co-chair of NMA, speaking on item 11C, the Montana Entertainment Zone. Uh we're not speaking in favor or against, but we are urging thoughtfulness and community engagement on that item. Anma sent a letter today flagging some concerns about the proposed zone's expansion on Montana from sixth street to seven 17th Street, particularly because Roosevelt Elementary School sits directly within this footprint. Uh, as written, the staff report appears to authorize open containers of alcohol 7 days a week from 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. U NMO would like to be included in these discussions if possible going forward for those kinds of reasons. I want I want to acknowledge I spoke with city manager Oliver Chi this afternoon uh and NMA is grateful to hear his clarification that the zone is intended to be an event-based rather than permanent full-time authorization and we're encouraged that staff is actively working to address some of these concerns. That said, I want to share uh the concerns briefly so they're on the record with uh you as the full council. First, we urge any activations maintain a meaningful buffer around Roosevelt Elementary School given that its playground serves as one of the only green and open spaces for families in our part of our city. Second, we ask that the management plan address additional police presence along the corridor and measures to prevent impaired individuals from driving out and otherwise negatively impacting our residential streets to the north and south of Montana Avenue. Nome is grateful for your focus on public safety and neighborhood safety and we look forward to continuing the conversation with you going forward. Thank you all.

Thank you so much. Uh Brad Yuing, Jerry Rubin, Robert Price, Carol Lemline. Uh good evening, Mayor Torosa, city council. My name is Brad Euing, co-chair of Santa Monica Ford, here to speak in support of the realignment plan. Uh very pleased to see the initial results, particularly around safety, that were in the initial staff report. Uh it is a delight to see uh a more than a doubling in traffic citations. As someone whose primary uh way of getting around Santa Monica is on foot, uh I feel that very deeply uh in my heart and uh and on my feet. So, thank you for that. And I I want to emphasize that, you know, to not lose sight of the of improving mobility along with the realignment plan because I think the one thing that's flagging that was that's been uh flagging the report of the realignment is we're still lagging a bit on the economic recovery. And I think that places that are safe streets that are safe to walk around in to kind of spend some time in are naturally more appealing to residents and to people who want to visit our city. Uh so we talked about it a little bit in our letter that we submitted uh earlier, but I would strongly support the appointment of a uh vision zeros within the city manager's office who could kind of work across departments and ensure that that's remains a priority uh as the realignment plan progresses. And then just in my personal capacity, I really want to see an extension of the entertainment zone. I live along Montana Avenue. Please bring it to Montana Avenue. Please bring it to Main Street. Bring it to more blocks within downtown Santa Monica. The free concerts have been an absolute pleasure. I've run into friends and neighbors at them. Council member Hall, we ran into each other at the most recent one. Uh, and it it is bringing people back to Santa Monica. I see people of all ages. I see families enjoying what our city has to offer. I think we can we can continue to do so much more. So, thank you very much and, uh, keep it going.

Thank you, uh, Madame Mayor. And can I speak on the, uh, landmark commission appointment? You may. and the denim run. Real brief. Yeah.

First of all, I can't think of any person in the city who would be more qualified to serve on our landmark commission than Carol Mline, who honorably headed up our wonderful Santa Monica Consery for so long. And she's willing to put in the time. I hope that you appoint her. Now, as far as the denim run in April, I know Lawrence Cohen for years. If you haven't met him, he's one of the best organizers of good causes anywhere. And this is such a good cause. And I just want to say thank you to you personally, Mayor Terrosus, and you personally, Council Member Zenet Skaya, for putting this on the agenda and contributing to this good cause, and I hope the city will help publicize it. Should be a really wonderful event. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Robert Price, Carol Lumline, Joe D. Rosa, Sean Besser, Good evening, Mayor uh Mayor Prom and Council members. My name is Robert Price, and I'm here tonight to further to speak in further support of my application to the Santa Monica Landmarks Commission. Although I'm not an architect, a local historian, an architectural historian, and I don't have a real estate license. Um, I am however a resident of Santa Monica and one that cares deeply about architecture, art history, our built environment and I am also been a practicing art conservator for the past 10 years. I'm currently working at the J. Paul Getty Museum and before that I worked uh for many years at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. As a resident of Santa Monica living on uh 16th Street and before on 20th Street, I truly love my neighborhood. Um, and I enjoy taking long walks to enjoy the streets and buildings. I love the way that Craftsman's, Spanish revivals, mid-century modern buildings all mix to create a unique landscape that we call home. As a conservator, I've been trained in the principles that guide decision-making for both movable and immovable heritage. And I'm a member of both the American Alliance for Museums and the American Institute of Conservation. Because of my training, I'm keenly aware of conservation and preservation ethics and strongly believe in the goal of the landmarks commission to safeguard the city's historic aesthetic and cultural heritage and promote the use of landmarks and historic districts for the education, pleasure and welfare of the people. With the rapid changes taking place in the city, the country, and the world, this mission has never been more important. And although I strongly believe in the need to preserve the connections to our shared past, I also believe that there's a balance that can be achieved in between this goal and the needs of cities and neighborhoods to change and develop. And for these reasons, I believe I would make a good

addition to the landmarks commission and thank the council for the time to speak. Thank you,

Mayor Terosis and commissioners. As an applicant for the landmarks commission, there seem to be a number of us here tonight. I'd like to bring your attention to my long-standing involvement in city land use policy development. Going back to the land use and circulation element and also in the specific of local and national historic and cultural preservation policies as they have evolved sign significantly in recent years. I have worked with local owners, architects and developers to enlarge the housing supply by combining new construction with locally significant structures. And finally, I am a long-standing member of the California Preservation Foundation and the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Um, this predates many of you, but we brought the California Preservation Conference to Santa Monica in 2011 and had one of the highest attendance rates um in recent years for the conference. Thank you.

Thank you, Joe Rosa. Hello, Mayor, City Council. My name is Joe D. Rosen. I'm here to speak for my candidacy for the Landmarks Commission. Uh, I'm a licensed real estate agent. Sorry, one second here. It's I'm a licensed real estate agent. Uh, I've been previously licensed in Pennsylvania and New York. Uh, I also hold an MLS license for mortgages in California. Um, many of you know me from uh a couple of my proposals uh namely for the Sears building which is a landmarked and adaptive reuse into a Los Angeles artist series. I've also proposed one for the Dogtown Coffee Building. Another adaptive reuse, turning it into a museum and skate shop and a restaurant on the roof to try and do um events and birthday parties and stuff like that and to keep the heritage as a surf and skate shop. Um uh if elected to the landmarks commission, I believe I can preserve the heritage of Santa Monica while helping potential adaptive reuse into locations that will increase local and international tourism. Uh I'm also a professional Wikipedia editor. I've worked on the navbar for Santa Monica, so I'm familiar with almost all the landmarks. I've done a number of the pages to try and increase travel and tourism here um for people come visiting the city for events like the World Cup and the Olympics. Um uh if elected uh thank you mayor and council members for your consideration for the candidacy for landmarks commission. My name is Joe D. Rosa. Thank you.

Thank you. Um Sean Besser as you're coming up John Prindle, Robbie Lear, Hunter Hall, Jonathan Foster. I think you can remove Robbie from the list. Okay, we can remove Robbie Lar.

Hello again. Uh Sean Besser here and I'm speaking to item 11C, the entertainment zone expansion. I am a vice chair of DTSM board and the OPA executive board. Uh I am here tonight to share strong support by both organizations of the expansion of the entertainment zone both in downtown Santa Monica and its extension into Ocean Park. I am as someone that's deeply invested in the community in the econ in in the economic health and vibrancy of our neighborhoods. I've seen firsthand how pilot program downtown has successfully breathed new life into the prominade by allowing patrons to enjoy a beverage while while enjoying the vibe we are curating. We aren't just permitting alcohol. We are creating a cohesive, walkable experience that encourages people to linger, explore, and support multiple local vendors and experiences in one evening. The DTSM board is supportive of having another tool in our tool belt to continue to reinvigorate the area that defines our great city. We have a number of new businesses opening and signature events on the horizon such as the World Cup and Beachchella. and it would be valuable to to be able to use to utilize the expanded EZ rules to showcase how DTSM is undergoing a renaissance. However, the benefits of this opportunity shouldn't be restricted to DTSM. Ocean Park is a unique and historic corridor with its own incredible mix of independent businesses that deserve the same opportunity. We are home to many of the city's signature events, including the Fourth of July parade, summer solstice, and Day of the Dog. and extending the zone to Ocean Park will help take these events to the next level while also supporting lo small local businesses, enhancing community vibrancy and drive revenue. Let's build on the success of the downtown pilot and ensure both both these faces of our city have the tools they need to to thrive. I urge you to vote in favor of both of these

expansions. Thank you. Thank you so much. Uh Mr. Prindle.

So, I'm here to ask that you vote yes on item 11, especially part six. We in Ocean Park are looking forward to a future as part of the easy zone and joining with downtown LA and the pier to help drive lingering visitor visitors to Santa Monica. Your yes vote will also give OPA, which I'm here on behalf of OPA today, a chance to self-fund and help us drive a sense of wellness with our residents. We look forward to closing Main Street again. After all, the safest street as a car is a street with no cars. But to the seven council members, I say this. Santa Monica's future necessitates thinking beyond the neighborhood boundaries we inherited from the redlinining era. When you think of Santa Monica's economic rebirth, I ask you to think of downtown, Main Street, the beaches, and the pier as part of the same ecosystem. Uh, these areas are tied together by five-minute walks, and it's already how visitors see our city. I also, on a different note, would like to support Mr. Conn for the Landmark Commission. So, thank you.

Thank you. Um, so Robbie Leer's not here, Hunter Hall, and then Jonathan Foster. I would also just say Lawrence Cohen, Bob Adams, and Joseph Cohen, mayor next. Good evening, council. I did not prepare anything. I'm winging it as usual. Uh, I am just here to express another layer of positivity for the entertainment zones. Obviously, we want them on Main Street. Um I don't think there's been anything since the Alfresco program that we launched when COVID hit that has had pretty universal support in the business community. Um uh we are committed to working with OPA uh to making sure that it's done safely and responsibly uh just like our closed street events are now. And um we look forward to uh proving that this can be done well uh and that it can be done in a way that uh will will benefit everyone citywide because I agree with what John just said. It should be um an entire citywide thing. Uh that's it. Thank you. Have a good night.

Thank you so much. Um Jonathan Foster.

Hello council. Everybody knows I'm not in for this. Um they they don't want discussion by the way. They just want to do whatever they want to do. Uh, so it was Ocean of Fourth, Montana, 6th to 7th in the Pier. So, this is why I'm not in the music business because I don't want to play for people that drink and smoke cigarettes and pot and vape and snorting coke and LSD. I don't want to be in the I don't want to play for those people. And you all have me playing for drunks now. You people are in danger. Very good. Very good. Isaiah 5:112. Woe to those who rise early in the morning to pursue strong drink like a morning, right? Who linger into the evening to be inflamed by wine. Yeah. Woe to those I bec 215. Declare woe on those who make neighbors drunk to exploit them. And it has an emphasis on accountability of the leaders. See, God will not be mocked. And he pre-new there was going to be a sexual assault in Santa Monica. And you were going to pay. And Santa Monica is going to keep paying. As long as you do this, you make people pay. Stay away from me. By the way, I already told you that promotion of what didn't get us here, right? goodness that existed in Santa Monica is gone in this program. The reason Santa Monica used to be great is because it got here sober. Santa Monica became great because it wasn't promoting public intoxication. You have no right to do this to me. And Santa Monica is going to keep paying. You are going to pay. You are never going to pay the bill here. You might pay one bill and you're going to get another bill. It's going to keep adding up. You are never going to pay this off

doing this. This place is going to go down into the dirt. You think it's funny? I'm not stupid. We have Lawrence Cohen, then Bob Adams. Lawrence Cohen, Bob Adams, Joseph Con. If you're I don't know. It's okay if it's not in order, but before I start question because I was told I may have up to four minutes. Is that possible? How many items are you talking on? Um Edgar said I had up to four minutes. So I just want to clarify how much time I have before I jump on jump on board.

How many items are you speak? You have two you have two minutes for each item up to six minutes.

Okay, I have two minutes then. Um, thank you. When I first spoke to you a couple of months ago, I could not believe I'd be standing here when world events have made our event more relevant. When Dolores Werta commented on why she stayed silent for 60 years, it's because of shame and stigma. Our event is about taking the shame and stigma out of this, celebrating people's resilience, their courage, helping them to find their voice. We have at the start line Epstein survivors. We have Weinstein survivors. we have uh high-profile honorary people that are taking the chance to have a voice now. So, my request, well, first of all, I'm very grateful to stay uh for you giving me reason to stay up past my bedtime and and speak with you. And I I know you're considering some funding for our event. And I I absolutely in my heart am deeply deeply grateful for it. Our events are going to be spectacular. It's going to be the first of its kind. April 1st is the beginning of sexual assault awareness month. April 12th is our event. And uh I'm here to tell you it's going to be a flagship event. It's not one and done. We're going to come back. It'll get bigger. and with your support um I can't tell you how grateful I am. So, thank you very much.

Thank you. Jerry wants me to do this. I'm sorry. I'll be okay. Other way. It's upside down. My arms don't go that high this late. Isn't it upside down? Am I hallucinating? Oh, just kidding. It looks up. Okay, just kidding. Don't listen to me. Um, Bob Adams, Joseph Cohen, May, Nina Fresco, Elizabeth Vandenberg, Bob Adam, Bob Adams is signed up twice, by the way. And Bob Adams was supposed to go a first, but that's fine. Go ahead.

Okay. Um, hello. I'm speaking on 16B. Um, my name is Joseph May, better known as Joe Cohen. I'm asking you to consider my application to the Landsmox Commission. As all of you probably know, I'm a housing nod. I didn't see Dave or Paul in this room, so I probably know more about California housing development laws than anyone else here. Um, but I am not, however, a historic preservation nod. Um, my love for historic preservation is something that's much more casual and personal. I simply love old buildings and I think preserving them enhances our quality of life and makes Santa Monica a more beautiful and vibrant city. Despite not having the formal background in preservation, however, I believe my expertise in land use will make it easy to learn um and quickly get up to speed for I would need to be an effective member of the commission. Um I also because my background in in housing and my activism space want to make it abundantly clear that not applying to be some sort of Trojan horse to oppose any preservation. This something I legitimately care deeply about. Um, and I believe there are plenty of places in the cities to build housing that doesn't require um, demolishing landmarks or or doing anything that would hurt preservation. Um, I want to end this with just some fun facts um, related about myself. My favorite modernist architect is Arvin Gil. Um, I've lived in two different buildings designed by John Parkinson, one in college, then one a couple years ago in downtown LA. Um, when I lived in Wisconsin, I owned a house built in 1905. Um, and as much as I love the building one now, my favorite Southern California city hall and council chambers um, architecturally is Culver Cities, which I think is one of the finest examples of postmodern, uh, civic architecture in the country. Thank you.

Thank you. Now, Bob Adams.

My apologies, Madame Mayor. Good evening, honorable mayor and city council. My name is Bob Adams. I'm speaking on behalf of the city's management team asking local 48/19 and uh speaking on item 11 C. Now, we appreciate the work that has gone into the realignment plan and the city's efforts to stabilize operations and improve service delivery. We also support the citywide class and compensation study and concur is a critical step going forward. However, we have significant concerns about moving forward with the proposed equity compensation and benefit adjustments in attachments KL prior to the completion of the study. As currently proposed, the adjustments provide new and enhanced benefits including cost of living increases, paid med full paid medical longevity pay, educational incentives, and expanded executive compensation to selected groups while othering groups receive no comparable considerations. This creates the perception of inequity across the organization at a time when the the city is emphasizing shared values and the unity as one Samo. We are also hearing concerns from members of broader aspects of these proposals that include long-term physical uh physical sustainability and also uh operational impacts especially in departments that require minimum staffing levels and to maintain public safety and essential services. Additionally, we welcome, although welcomed by some, proposals such as expanded leaves incentives may unintentionally increase work pressures, contribute to staffing instability, and result in loss of institutional knowledge at a critical time for the city. Equity cannot mean improving compensation for some groups while leaving others behind. We respectfully request a pause in implementation of the compensation related um changes and instead align them with the class and

comp study. This would allow a more comprehensive, equitable and physical responsible approach. Um

thank you. Uh Nina Fresco, Elizabeth Vandenberg, Tara Barascus. Uh Bob Adams is here again but he just spoke. Council, I just want to say that you are so lucky because Carol Lemline now wants to serve the city of Santa Monica as a landmarks commissioner and you could not do better. Carol has she has expertise in every aspect of historic preservation from understanding the laws. She's read every report ever on city landmarks. She knows the history because of her deep involvement for so many years. There's a seat out there that is imprinted with her because she's been at every Landmarks Commission meeting for about 20 years. Uh she really nobody knows this business like Carol and and it's not an accident. I've recently inherited a lot of her role which I will never live up to at the Santa Monica Conservancy. And in that process, I've been going through our files, and the biggest part of our database is all of the reports and studies and conference notes that she attended over the last 20 years to learn more about preservation on the local, state, and national level. You just can't match her, and you'd be nuts not to appoint her. So, please do. Thank you.

Great. Uh, Elizabeth Vandenberg, can can I speak to two items at this point? Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. Um, council members, Elizabeth Vandenberg, Will Wilmont Chair. I'm speaking on the city grant. There's been an implication that neighborhood organizations have improperly used city funds and therefore require additional oversight. This implication is incorrect. Wilmont cementss a final report every year as do all neighborhood organizations and these expenditures are audited by the city. Our bylaws are publicly posted and we elect our board every two years. City funds are used exclusively for advocacy, education, outreach. Wilmont also collects membership dues in addition to the city grant. Accountability already exists. It is transparent and available to the public. Now to the policy. First, the March 23rd, 2026 motion guidance that I received yesterday via email from our mayor. Section 3B states, "The use of funds for com communications, including mailers, to inform members about meetings, events, and programming is permissible. Mailers should be allowed to be sent to all residents, not just members. Neighborhood organizations play an active role in the civic life, and we cannot expand participation if we are limited to people already on our lists. But also the city has decided to allocate funds by residents. For example, Wilmont has 12,77 residences. OPA has 8,35 residences. Why do we allocate the money by residents unless we can send to all the residents members or not? If you are not allowing members, mailers to residents that I would recommend, then I would recommend that you change the formula back to a standard 7,000 across the seven neighborhoods. Second, again, the March 23rd motion guidance section 3E states, "Any requests for demographic information for participating organizations or their members are strictly voluntary. We are a voluntary organization. Our members join

voluntarily and our board serves voluntarily. We want to volunteer to not collect demographic data. Would anyone on this dis provide their age and income to a neighborhood group?" Thank you. I'd like to move on to the um realignment plan. Um I want to focus on two issues, accountability and transparency. The realignment plan makes major commitments. New spending, new staffing, new revenue assumptions, even hopefully cost reductions and significant policy changes. And it promises big outcomes. Safer neighborhoods, economic recovery, and a balanced budget by 2027. But here's the problem. There's no required reporting, no public dashboard, no defined metrics, no timeline for updates, no requirement to show whether the plan is actually working. So, we're being asked to prove a game plan without any way to track the score. That's not good government. If this plan is going to move forward, it should include quarterly public reporting, clear performance metrics, and actual versus projected financial tracking because without that, there's no accountability, no way for the public or this council to know if these decisions are delivering results. If this is truly a realignment, then we need transparency to match it. Thank you.

Thank you. Stay tuned for the presentation. Tara Barasquez. That's it. That's all we got.

Good evening, Mayor Terosas and members of the city council. My name is Tara Barowskis. I'm the executive director of Community Corp of Santa Monica. I'm here today regarding the rec recommended item to study creating a nonprofit entity to build and operate affordable housing. We're here to offer our organization as a thought leader, a source of experience and expertise to support you in this effort, and a continuing partner in housing production. We've spent more than four decades building affordable housing in Santa Monica. During this time, we've built over 2,000 affordable homes in over 95 buildings in the city, and we've gained long experience and insights into the opportunities and challenges related to producing affordable housing. Community Corp. has been a committed partner of the cities and has helped with innovations such as the first zero net energy building retrofit at 1616 Ocean as well as the first modular affordable housing building, Berkeley Station, which will be cutting the ribbon on Friday. We believe that the city um by working together with community-based nonprofits can expand its offering of services to its residents. We hope the city sees value in the long um that the long-standing nonprofits such as ourselves provide and we hope we can be a resource and partner of the cities for many years to come. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Okay, that concludes our comments on these items. We will now uh ask the clerk uh to call the role for 11 A. Okay, this is a special meeting. Sorry. This is a special meeting of the redevelopment successor agency. When I call your name, please respond. Agency member Negrete here. Agency member Hall present. Agency member Rascin here. Agency member Snell here. Agency members here. Chair Timwick here. And chair Terosas here.

Okay. Okay, the first item is approval of minutes of the redevelopment of successor agency. This is 11A. And I just want to note that staff has pulled the February 11th minutes. So you will just be voting on approving the January 13, 2026 um minutes. I move that we approve the minutes. Second. Okay. Agent Agency member Negrete. Yes. Agency member Hall. Yes. Agency member Raskin. Yes. Chairprompic. Yes. Agency member Snell. Yes. Agency member Zarneskaya. Yes. And chair Terosas.

Yes. Passes. Next we have adoption resolution approving the form a preliminary official statement and continuing disclosure certificate for tax allocation refunding bonds 2026. Uh, and I I think our finance director will give us a staff report. Great.

So, good evening, council, mayor. Um, so tonight we're asking you um to approve the preliminary official statement and containing disclosure certificate for the 2026 tax allocation refunding bonds. We're also seeking your authorization of related actions needed to move the towards pricing and sale of the bonds. This is the final approval required by the assessor agency before we go to market with the bonds and price the transaction. Uh by way of background on January 13, 2026, the assessor agency authorized us to issue and sell the uh 2026 bonds uh for refunding uh prior year bonds 2020 2006 2011 tax allocation bonds. Um this transaction will reduce long-term debt service for us and increase our property taxes um as well as other taxing agencies. the savings to the city is about or the additional um revenue it's about $17,000. That's $11,000 more than when we came to you in January. And so we're seeking your approval for this. Um the POS serves as an offering document for investors that must be deemed to contain all material information required underCE uh rule and the continuing disclosure certificate outlines the successor agency's ongoing reporting obligations after the bonds are issued. Um the next step here is if you approve our um the documents then we'll continue um and take them to market for pricing. That's my report.

Uh caser skaya. Thank you. Um, I just had a quick question and I'm not sure if you would know the answer to this, but it looks like for the 2006 and 2011 bonds, the uh the coupon rate is between 4.5% for some of them up to 5.8725%. Um, I was wondering, do you have an idea based on maybe the current interest rates, uh, what the 2026 bond interest rates might be or the coupon rate? Yes, we can get that for you. I probably had way too much fun on the municipal bond lookup site.

Good evening, uh, council and and and mayor. My name is Sarah Brown. and I'm with the firm Stifel Nicholas. We're the municipal bond underwriter for the transaction. You ask a really good question. Obviously, the market has experienced a little bit of volatility and selloff uh uh given the uh outbreak of hostilities in Iran. So, these are still a moving target, but right now we're anticipating a borrowing cost of around 3.5%. That's great. Wow. That's that's incredible. So that's at least 1% below um some of our bonds and more than 2% below others.

That That's right. That that what I provided to you is sort of the average borrowing costs, weighted average borrowing costs for the propo the anticipated bond sale. And I assume would these be issued kind of different tanches and so they might potentially have slightly different coupon rates? Yep, that's that's exactly right. We serialize them out a yield curve to try to um we offer the um bonds to different types of investors and and maintain a debt service profile that is proportional to the existing debt service. Okay, great. Sounds good. Thank you very much. Uh do I want to entertain a motion?

I'll move the staff recommendation. I'll second it. Great. Agency members Ernest Gaya. Yes. Agency member Snell. Yes. Chair pro Tim Swick. Yes. Agency member Rascin. Yes. Agency member Hall. Yes. Agency member Negrete. Yes. Agents I'm sorry. And chair Terosas. Yes. That passes. Great. So it sounds like we're moving to the main event here. So now we are journinging the special meeting. Okay. Next, we're moving on to the Santa Monica realignment plan update.

Do you want to do I believe the city manager is starting us off.

Sorry. Um I a couple of us have some recusals that we need to discuss and then I have a motion. Um, so for the public, I will be recusing myself from participation in recommended action number 21 related to community outreach for a housing first system of care because at this time the item contemplates relocation of shelter capacity away from Samoshell to outside of the city's downtown. My residence, which I rent, is in the downtown located within 1,000 ft of Samoshell and may be affected by the relocation of shelter capacity away from the site. to confirm. I sought formal advice from the Fair Political Practices Commission or FPPPC on my participation and they determined that recusal is required.

And uh Council Negrete, no. Oh. Oh, I'm sorry. You had your mic on. Okay. Council member Zay. Uh I'll just add as well that I'll be recusing myself from item 22 on the very long item that we're about to take up um because of my employment and its relation to the production of housing. So mayor, I move to divide the question to hear recommended actions number 21 and number 22 individually to facilitate my and mayor promix recusals. Yes, no problem. We will make that motion when we get there. We'll be structuring the conversation in a way to facilitate um both of the recusals.

So, okay. So, um just city attorney, are we actually asking that they walk out of the room and we have any discussions about that? Yes. So, in order to facilitate these recusals, the way that um you will hear this item this evening is the city manager will walk you through recommended actions. Um he will do an oral staff report recommended actions items 1 through 20. you will conduct um you can ask questions um conduct the discussion and take action on those items and then for item 21 council member Hall will leave the room for item 22 council member Hall will return and mayor promswick will um will rec will leave the room okay thank you for clarifying appreciate that now are we ready to proceed phenomenal I believe so

are we doing the division of the question now do we need to make do we need to vote on that I think you can do it I voice vote, but it's probably cleaner just to to vote on that. Just to make clear that procedurally that's how you're proceeding. Okay. So, uh I will move that second we uh consider items 1 through 20 on the recommended actions and then bifurcate 21 and 22 separately uh and have the staff report as such. I'll second that. Great. All those in favor of voice vote. I I. Any opposed? Any abstensions? No. Great. Let's proceed.

Thank you, Madame Mayor, members of the council. Um the staff and I are delighted to be able to present um a proposed update to the realignment plan. What we are hoping to review tonight. Hey, look at that. It works. What we're hoping to review tonight with the council first is um what have we been working on at the staff level the last several months since excuse me since the approval of the realignment plan last October. Um, we are wanting to provide an update of our 2025 public safety related results. In addition, provide some context for what public safety related um results have look like here in the new year, the first quarter of 26. going to provide a budget update also for the council and also review. Um the council recalls there was prior action directing staff to put together um a realignment plan scorecard that we've been working on and is getting ready to launch. Um all of that then will cycle into a conversation the executive team and I have been having since January of this year. Um once a quarter the executive team and I we get off site, we take a look at what have we done the last quarter, where have we done great, where do we need to improve, what's most important for us to be focusing on moving ahead, and really wanting to um provide the council with insight into this idea of how do we operationalize everything that we've been working on as a project at this moment. a series of recommended adjustments are proposed and then um ultimately want to have a discussion with the council on the pathway forward for Santa Monica. Um first accomplishments. Um the staff deserves so much credit. Um over the past six months we have been jamming on the five strategic priorities the council adopted as part of the realignment plan. If you

recall back in October of 2025, council strategically deployed $60 million of reserves that had previously been allocated. At that point in time, we were thinking about spacing out the use of those reserves over a 5-year period, crossing our fingers and hoping that the economy was going to recover. Instead, the council back in October identified a series of five key strategic priorities related to achieving safe neighborhoods and clean streets. activating econom economic opportunity and growth, pushing forward on affordable, livable and secure housing for all and importantly creating organizational capacity by making sure we built a healthier organization moving forward. Um so how how have we been doing? Where are we at? A couple of key results at a glance as we wrapped up the last half of 2025 moved into 26. You'll hear from Chief Jacobs here in a little bit about where we're at from a public safety perspective. Obviously, council's top priorities, how do we create safety, cleanliness in town? We've seen a 12.5% decrease in part one crimes year-over-year. When you look at what happened in 2025, there's a lot of discussion last year about what is the city attorney's office doing to support those public safety efforts as relates to filing on filable cases. That filing rate was somewhere around 65 to 70% pre-realignment plan. Since that point in time, we've hit nearly an 80% filing rate. Um, so much so that the courts have complained to Heidi that we are clogging up their court system with the number of cases that were filing at this point. Our team in community development has been acutely aware of the need to jam on plan check and plan check turnaround times. our first round building plan check um

times had increased over 40% year-over-year. By December of this year, we were hitting on time plan check turnarounds on first round plan checks 92 and a half% of the time under Chief Jacob's leadership. We have full staffing in the PD for the first time in over two decades. Um other things and elements com u related to the realignment plan, library branches are open. We've been doing all of our maintenance that we've deferred for so long. Over 600 trees pruned in downtown. Um bunch of capital work now engaged downtown. Lot of new landscaping planted, debris removed from city hall um and across the city. And importantly too, if you walk up um you'll see the city hall fountain is now fully repaired and operating. A little bit more detail about the things that we have been working on across each of the five areas. identified in the original realignment plan. From a clean streets, urban forestry and streetscape perspective, um all of the major trees along Second and Fourth Street have been pruned. We're currently working on the pruning trees on Fifth Street. 603 trees downtown pruned to date. We've planted 37 new large specimen trees um across the downtown core. 20% of the tree wells downtown have been um regraded. That's over 400 tree wells complete to this point in town. 7,000 square ft of sidewalks have been repaired downtown. Over 300 native plants planted at key gateway locations. Eight minute major intersections where crosswalk repainting has happened. Um we are absolutely moving forward on streetscape and urban forestry related enhancements from a civic identity and maintenance perspective to really restore the way our public spaces look and feel. Um the city hall fountain is now fully repaired and operational. Um massive kudos to our

public works team. Our host team um has picked up in 2025 436 tons of debris. That's a 72% increase year-over-year when you look at what we did in 2024. We've also activated an agreement with CALR to clean right away along the freeway. Over five tons of debris have been collected at freeway transition locations. Um my son is especially excited. We're getting new trash cans deployed. I'm not sure why he's so fascinated with the new trash cans, but we've been testing um new trash cans um since February. Um you'll see new trash can modernization happening all across the downtown core. We've also um completed repairs to beach restroom 16 and 17 is identified in the plan. On the economic and community progress front, um, massive kudos to our library team. All of our library branches are now open for service at least three days a week for the first time since before COVID. Plan checks are in increasing um efficiency and our turnaround time. 92 and a half% of plan checks been completed on time in December. That's a 40% improvement that we achieved over a 4-month period. The entertainment zone was launched on the prominade, the first in Southern California. Um, in April, we'll be bringing a series of new license agreements, including the Golden Voice Music Festival, um, which is planned, um, for a really spectacular event um, this September. We also, um, with the council support reduced all of our outdoor dining fees. We've got 59 restaurants now participating in the program and we're continuing to attract and retain operators. A ton of work on organizational capacity and housing related efforts. Um vacant property ordinance was adopted. Our community development code enforcement

team is moving forward. We've identified 170 vacant properties, 30 to 40 of which are in serious disrepair, which we're currently addressing. Council adopted the rent registry ordinance. So, we have the authority now to start registering our roughly 15,000 non-renrolled units in town. The reenlightment plan update tonight contemplates activating the ordinance provisions that the council has adopted. Been able to expand our code enforcement staff. We launched our ambulance operator program in February. Our second APU unit was deployed within the last few months. And right now, our public works downtown team is deployed for 7 days a week maintenance coverage. All of those represent hours of work and dedication and commitment by our team. Kudos to everyone on the staff for the efforts to really try to advance the council's objective to bring Santa Monica back, restore the luster of this spectacular community. We all know though that without foundational safety related considerations addressed, the recovery of our city, the economic recovery, the revitalization of our city um will really be challenged. Um the 2025 year-end results again um there is no metric in public safety that we track that hasn't shown substantial improvements. Part one crime is down significantly even against a backdrop where calls for service are decreasing. That means increased proactive patrols. Total arrests are up 23%. Traffic citations year-over-year are up over 102%. Um it's just been a spectacular environment that our men and women in the Santa Monica Police Department have been engaged in to really bring back safety um here in our community. this

point, I'd like to ask our spectacular police chief, Chief Jacob, to come on up to the mic. Um, we have a video that we want to play for everybody that outlines some of the public safety gains that we've seen. Um, a message from the chief and then the chief will get into all of these details and the statistics for 2025, the first part of 26 with more granularity. With that, we can play the video. Okay, Start up. Start with you. I'm asking for a few minutes of your time because when we talk about public safety, numbers matter, but people matter more. Here's what the data shows. Every crime category in Santa Monica is down. And

that's important, but it's not the whole story. Behind every data point is a person. Someone whose life was impacted. Someone who was a victim. And we know this. The fear of crime matters. Feeling unsafe changes how people live and where they go and how they experience the city. So today, we're showing you the work behind the numbers, what enforcement looks like, what accountability looks like, and what it takes every day to keep Santa Monica safe. I want you to hear directly from the men and women who made this progress possible. and then we're going to see where we're headed next.

My name is Lance Lewis, an investigator with the Santa Monica Police Department's Traffic Enforcement Unit. When most people think about traffic enforcement, they think about tickets. But traffic safety is broader than enforcement. It is about presence, prevention, and accountability. The city of Santa Monica and your police department continue implementing the realignment plan and the chief's priorities of crime reduction, traffic safety, homelessness response, and community and youth engagement. Over the past year, we investigated approximately 1,691 traffic collisions, conducted over 400 DUI investigations, accounting for 190 DUI arrests, and issued 5,723 traffic citations. These efforts are not about volume. They are about visibility, accountability, and reducing preventable harm. One investigation this year underscored the importance of that work. On October 24th, 2025, a fatal hit and run occurred in the 1300 block of Wilshire Boulevard that resulted in the deaths of two pedestrians and seriously injured two others. Despite deliberate efforts by the suspect to avoid detection, investigators conducted a detailed and coordinated investigation, wrote and served multiple search warrants, analyzed electronic records, and ultimately identified the responsible driver who fled to Chicago, Illinois. Through coordinated efforts and the assistance of our law enforcement partners in the Midwest, Santa Monica Police detectives track Kursky to Chicago, Illinois. With the cooperation of Chicago Police Department, he was taken into custody at or near Transit Center as he as he appeared to be attempting to flee further. Percy has since been extradited from Illinois and is currently in the custody of the Santa Monica Police Department.

That case reflects our responsibility as a department to investigate thoroughly, act deliberately, and remain accountable to the community we serve through enforcement, investigation, and presence. The traffic enforcement unit remains committed to safer streets throughout Santa Monica. I want to now introduce Detective Isaac Reyes of the Criminal Investigation Division to talk about crime. My name is Isaac Reyes, a detective with our criminal investigations division. When we present crime statistics, it's important to remember that behind every number is a real incident that impacted our community. This year, crime across all major categories in Santa Monica is down, such as burglary, robbery, aggravated assaults, and homicides. While that progress reflects focused enforcement, proactive deployment, and strong investigative work, even a single act of violence requires immediate and decisive action. One case from this past year illustrates that reality. On Sunday, June 22nd, 2025, at approximately 11:30 p.m., Santa Monica police officers responded to a shooting in downtown Santa Monica involving two juvenile victims. Santa Monica police detectives immediately launched a comprehensive investigation, reviewing surveillance footage, and collecting witness statements. Less than 2 and 1/2 days later, while conducting follow-up investigation, I recognized an individual matching the suspect's description near Ocean and Colorado. The armed suspect fled on foot and during a brief pursuit, he ambushed the officer and fired multiple rounds, striking him. The officer sustained serious but non-lifethreatening injuries and was transported to a local hospital. Approximately 4:20 p.m., officers received a tip from a community member and located the suspect near Palisades Park and the firearm used in the shooting was recovered. The suspect has been charged with three counts of attempted murder along with additional

firearm related charges. He remains in custody pending prosecution. The Santa Monica Police Department continues to actively combat crime through focused enforcement, strategic deployment, and strong investigative work. These strategies are implemented to ensure the that the residents, business owners, and visitors feel safe and confident in Santa Monica. I now want to introduce Officer Chad Madrid with the homeless liaison program to talk about our department's efforts with our homeless population. My name is Officer Chad Madrid and I'm a member of the homeless leazison program with the Santa Monica Police Department. At the core of our work is public safety, accountability, and access to shared public spaces. Homelessness within itself is not a crime, and every individual is treated with dignity and respect. At the same time, disorder and unlawful behavior will not be tolerated. by the numbers. Over the past year, the Santa Monica Police Department responded to 124,848 total radio calls, including 1,1 encampment related calls, with 26% of calls related to homelessness overall. Of the 3,446 total arrests, approximately 72% were homeless related. These numbers matter, but they also tell us something important. We cannot arrest our way out of homelessness. That's why enforcement is only one part of our approach. The homeless lazison program works handinand with city departments, regional partners, outreach teams, medical professionals, and mental health providers to the deliver long-term solutions for individuals who qualify and are willing to accept help. An example of this multifaceted approach are community livability operations. These are not one-time events, but an ongoing unified enforcement strategy to address chronic problem areas. During one of these operations, more than 80 city and regional personnel were deployed. Officers made 22 arrests,

issued 16 municipal code citations, conducted 12 drug recognition expert evaluations, and coordinated the removal of 14 truckloads of debris, totaling over 13 tons. Under the leadership of Chief Jacob, addressing quality of life issues is not the responsibility of one unit alone. Every officer is expected to take ownership and address these concerns consistently and in a timely manner. As a result, when comparing 2024 to 2025, we've seen a significant increase in self-initiated activity and arrests, reflecting a departmentwide commitment to proactive enforcement and accountability. Now, I want you to hear from neighborhood resource officer Isabelle Partardo, who will talk about another pillar of Chief Jacob's priorities, community and youth engagement. My name is Isabelle Partardo, a neighborhood resource officer with our community engagement team. When people think about policing, they often think about response. But lasting public safety is built long before and long after a call for service through trust, visibility, and follow-through. In 2025, the Santa Monica Police Department focused on consistent, proactive engagement across Santa Monica. Officers attended more than 100 neighborhood and business meetings, giving residents direct access to information, resources, and ongoing communication about safety concerns in their communities. We conducted more than 50 security assessments, often in partnership with city departments to address neighborhood issues through coordinated problem focused solutions. Santa Monica Police Department also plays a key role in creating and supporting neighborhood watch groups, helping residents organize watches, join meetings, and building sustainable communication networks. At the same time, officers meet community members where they are, both formally and informally by hosting and attending over 50 coffee with a cop and outreach events throughout the year. This included shop with the cop events, PAL and Virginia

Avenue Park activities such as Thanksgiving dinners, back to school events, and Red Ribbon Week. SNPD also hosted three communitymies in 2025, including a Spanish language academy, expanding access, transparency, and understanding of police services. National Night Out is one of the largest annual community events hosted by the Santa Monica Police Department, giving neighborhoods the opportunity to come together with police, fire, and city partners to connect, build relationships, and celebrate a shared commitment to the community safety. I now want you to hear from our city manager, Oliver Chi.

There's no doubt that Santa Monica is one of the coolest places on the planet, but even the coolest of places can fall on challenging times. And what you've just seen really is representation of the city's response to the current moment that we're in. There's certainly challenging things that we going to have to work through if we are to revitalize and create a renaissance in Santa Monica, bring it back to that place we know it can be. But in order for the local economy, in order for the local community to reach its potential, the importance of public safety can't be overstated. We have to invest in public spa safety to make sure that we have terrific spaces and places that people feel comfortable in if we're going to achieve the Santa Monica we all know is possible. The work in the police department and the work that the police department's been engaged in is central to the realignment plan. And we've been absolutely blessed to have Chief Jacob and the men and women of the Santa Monica Police Department lead this effort to revitalize, to renew as we push forward our realignment plan. What you've just heard matters because public safety doesn't improve on commitment alone. It improves when that commitment turned into action. Last August, I stepped in at your engine chief of police. In January, I was sworn in as your chief with a clear responsibility to lead this department with accountability, transparency, and focus. Today, for the first time in 20 years, the Santa Monica Police Department is fully staffed. We've added an additional 10 officers, and we're realigning how we deploy our resources to meet the needs of this city. Right now, not someday, we're using advanced technology, smarter deployment, and increased visibility to stay ahead of crime and respond to when it matters most. And let me be clear, if you come into Santa Monica to harm our residents, our businesses, or our visitors, you will be identified. You

will be caught and you will be held accountable. These numbers matter. What matters most is the trust of the people we serve. Public safety is not the finish line. It's a commitment we make every day. It's the work we do to reduce crime, to prevent serious harm on our streets, to balance compassion with accountability, and to show up consistently for the people we serve. And that responsibility doesn't end with this report. This is our commitment to you. Thank you. And to answer the question, yes, Oliver was standing on a gold crate. Good evening, Mayor and members of the council, city manager Chi, and members of the community. Thank you for taking the time to watch our annual report video. What you saw reflects the work of the men and women of this department and our city partners. The video focuses on outcomes, the investigation, the enforcement, the coordination, and the progress reflected in the data. Tonight I want to focus on something equally important. How the work is being done differently.

The report shows a decrease in major crime categories. But we do not measure success solely by whether numbers rise or fall every single year. Crime trends fluctuate. What does not fluctuate is our responsibility to operate consistently deploy deploy strategically and intervene early. Reducing crime and reducing the fear of crime both require predictability in how we operate. Our responsibility is to build systems that prevent harm, respond efficiently when it occurs, and maintain public confidence regardless of the short-term variations. That responsibility is organized around four pillars I've spoken about um since the beginning of my tenure. crime suppression, homelessness response, traffic safety, and community and youth engagement. They are not separate initiatives. They are one coordinated operating model. This this direction aligns with the city's realignment plan. Realignment is not about structure alone. It's about coordination. Ensuring police, housing, human services, public works, and other regional partners are addressing the same problem in the same location at the same time. Tonight's presentation focuses on the last four months, December through early March, which represents the beginning and implementation of this deployment model consistently across the police department. You will see increases in arrest, officer initiated activity, directed operations, and traffic enforcement. Additionally, you will see increases in behavioral health interventions, service referrals, and and reductions in repeated call locations. These numbers reflect how we are operating, not an increase for demands of service. They show where resources where resources are being placed and how services are being delivered. Over the past several months, the department has reached full staffing

levels for the first time in many years. In part thanks to additional 10 police officer overhires provided by the support of city council. That staffing stability allows us to deploy consistently rather than to react to shortages. With stable staffing numbers, officer initiated activity has increased from about 40% last year to consistently over 50% of calls for service during the fourth during this four-month period. That shift means officers are identifying problems early instead of responding after escalation. When an officer identifies a concern, they address it. They're not simply going from call to call. They are proactively addressing unlawful behaviors whenever present. This increase of self-initiated activity leads to measurable enforcement outcomes. Average weekly arrests increased from approximately 54 arrests per week to last year to over 100 per week through early March. This establishes a new operational baseline reflecting proactive enforcement, not a short-term surge. This is not a target to be met, but rather a baseline that helps guide consistent proactive policing efforts across this organization. Over the past four months, proactive drug investigations have increased by approximately 150 to 170%. Compared to previous years, signaling a clear operational shift towards early intervention and focused enforcement. This is not an increase in reported drug activity, but instead focusing on addressing a major concern expressed by our residents and our businesses. and increased stops and investigation contacts also correlate with warrant compliance and weapons recovery, reinforcing the interconnected nature of our four pillars. Weapons violations increased from 136 in 2024 to 208 in 2025, a 53% increase. This change reflects a more proactive operational approach. Officers are conducting lawful stops, targeted

enforcement, and focused followup, which leads to earlier interventions. As a result, more weapons are being recovered before they're used in violent crimes. The increase in these incidents is not a measure of increased harm, but are measure of increased intervention. As arrests have increased, accountability across the system has also increased. The city attorney's office has has seen a rise in case filings during the same period. Traffic safety is another component of this model. In 2024, the department averaged 240 traffic stops, excuse me, 2 240 traffic citations per month. In 2025, that doubled to approximately 480. During the first four months of full implementation of our plan, December through early March, monthly averages increased to approximately 765 citations per month. That's over,200 traffic stops a month. This is deliberate. Traffic enforcement is not about volume. It's about visibility and prevention. And traffic safety is not limited to citations. It includes compliance with bike lane protections, speed enforcement in our major corridors, and stop sign enforcements near our schools and in our residential neighborhoods. Our data has identified that the major cause of many traffic collisions in our city are speeding, distracted driving, and driving under the influence. This is why enforcement efforts are focused in those areas, particularly in locations where injury collisions are most likely to occur. This is about prevention. Increased visibility and consistent enforcement in those areas were intended um to reduce injuries and save lives, not simply increase traffic citations. Next, I'd like to spend some time talking about homelessness. Contacts with homeless individuals continue to result in not only enforcement but in behavioral health evaluations, service

referrals, and coordinated case follow-up. The data shows the model functioning as intended. Intervention and accountability occurring together, addressing behavior while also addressing the underlying need. Approximately 20% of all calls for service in 2025 were related to homelessness. of total approximately 72% of individuals experiencing homelessness of our total arrests about 72% of all individuals are experiencing homelessness. Those figures reflect how the workload is concentrated in shared public spaces and repeat service locations. They do not necessarily represent the population growth but again where the representation of the workload is happening. Balance accountability and intervention are both required to maintain accessible public spaces. Enforcement and service occurs simultaneously with nine homeless liaison program officers and two supervisors. The team now operates seven days a week at at several historically high demand locations, including our major parks and beach areas. We're already seeing reductions in repeated calls for service following sustained directed patrols and outreach. The goal is not temporary displacement. The goal is stabilization. fewer reoccurring incidents at the same location requiring repeated police response. This balanced approach is particularly important in areas involving homelessness and behavioral health. Enforcement alone does not resolve an issue and service alone cannot maintain accessibility to public spaces. The department's role is to apply both appropriately and uniformly, working with our partners to intervene early while maintaining community standards. To sustain this model, the city and the department are are also investing in infrastructure that supports this coordination. The smart center is already operational and will be soon formally unveiled. It enhances real-time coordination between

patrol, investigations, traffic, and our city partners. The smart center improves situational awareness and allows us to identify developing problems before they become repeat calls for service. It also supports early intervention and coordinated decision-making and reinforces the realignment philosophy, prevention, coordination, and predictability. Another exciting operational change involves new downtown substation. The downtown substation opening soon provides a permanent public safe public safety presence in one of the city's most active areas. It increases accessibility and visibility in the downtown corridor, supporting sustained deployments. Both projects reflect infrastructure investments that support consistent operations with all of our efforts. And when and when deployment becomes more focused, short-term increases actively are expected. The longerterm objective is stabilization. Fewer repeat calls for service, more consistent service delivery, earlier intervention, and predictable deployment across seasons and neighborhoods. The annual report reflects that foundation. The past four months reflect implementation of our four pillars and the next years will reflect continued growth and expansion of that work across the city. Public safety is ultimately measured by confidence. When residents feel comfortable walking in their neighborhoods, businesses feel supported and visitors feel safe when experiencing Santa Monica. It reflects reliability and how services are delivered. That reliability comes from consistency. Consistent. consistency in staffing, deployment, accountability, and coordination. I want to close by recognizing the men and women of the Santa Monica Police Department, both sworn and professional staff, along with my city partners, uh, who make this all happen. The impact of the work is visible. It's felt across the community,

and it's measurable and sustainable. Thank you for the continued support and partnership as we move forward. Thank you, Chief Jacob. And I appreciate you loaning me the box to stand on during our filming activity. Um, terrific work in the PD. It's actually terrific work across all of our operating departments as we've all committed to really deploying the work um needed to implement the realignment plan. If the council recalls um the realignment plan called for the city's budget to be balanced by fiscal year 202728. Um, wanted to let you know if you do recall back in October, we were staring at a roughly $30 million per year general fund operating deficit and unobligated free cash flow, roughly $94 million, um, significant liabilities. Um, a place where it didn't feel as comfortable as, um, I do believe we are in today. Today, we feel a lot more comfortable at the staff level where the city is operating financially in large part due to the work the council's engaged and the work our staff's engaged to mature multiple new revenue streams, programmatic revenue streams over the last several months. Um, in total, since the realignment plan was adopted, we've identified and locked in roughly $28.8 million in new annual general fund revenues. There's a lot of analysis behind all of this, but the parking rate update went into effect January 1st. Um, in January 2026, excuse me. Um, we're going to suggest some operational shifts with the downtown parking structures to

implement a new rate structure there tonight. That, um, combined total, um, is roughly $8.5 million per year in new revenue. The ambulance operator program that launched in February um is projected conservatively to generate $7 million per year. When you look at the first month's worth of operation in February, um we build um well over a million dollars in um net insurance billing. We're projecting to collect 600 to 800 grand a month right now through the AO program. 7 million is a conservative estimate of that revenue stream. the team in HR and finance have really been scrubbing numbers. We've been looking at um when we operate historically the last several years since COVID and um an environment of scarcity, there is a lot of hoarding of resources across departments to protect what we have. As we've continued to mature internally the different um programs and operations, we've worked to identify over $6 million a year in um ongoing cost savings through revenue expendit excuse me through expenditure controls and hiring management. That's embedded now into the budget. The council um late in 25 approved the new digital sign programs. We have seven signs that are working their way through coastal commission approval based on the current um assessment of where those projects are at. Those signs will be operational by Q1 of 27. Um there's an eighth sign that's being proposed that we're aware of coming to the city soon. All of that totals $4.5 million in new ongoing revenue per year. Locked in user fee convenience fee adjustments. We actually underbudgeted by 1.8 8 million per year based on current actuals. Oscar and his team also recently hired a new investment management firm, Meter, as we've optimized investment earnings. There's

an ongoing revenue stream of a million dollars per year. There's a variety of other budgetary moves that the finance team has been implementing as we've looked at um the different interfund transfers that we've identified to really streamline and professionalize the budget so there is um accurate numbers not numbers that are inflated either to protect or hoard dollars. And when you filter all of that through before any of the changes that we're recommending tonight, here's what the next couple of years look like. by the end of fiscal year 2627. This is inclusive of the um of the reserve dollars the council allocated for 2526 2627 we're projecting a $5 million surplus. Next fiscal year 2728 through 2930 each of those fiscal years we're projecting net surpluses in the general fund. This takes into account um when each of the new revenue streams, programmatic revenue streams come in to the city. It's also reflective of the options that exist with the joint use agreement with Santa Monica Malibu Unified School District. And so today, as we're projecting the city's position without any other adjustments, the fiscal year's 2627 net general fund position is projected to be $5.4 million a year. where you're ahead of schedule thanks to the work of the city council and the team to mature all of the programmatic revenues that we've identified. Really that financial strength um is what is enabling the recommendations we're making tonight. It's giving staff confidence to make these recommendations knowing that we're in a much more solid financial footing than we were a year ago. um mention this also before we get into where do we head the realignment plan scorecard. If you recall a couple months ago the council directed how do we make sure that we are fulfilling the obligations and the commitments made by

the council. How do we monitor the performance of staff? Can we develop a scorecard that identifies and tracks all of the things that are happening within the realignment plan? will identify um some of the um expansion of this effort that the executive team really has thought through. One of the things we need to do maybe beyond the realignment plan identify citywide performance measures that make sense to track across the organization. But as a starting point, what we have done is develop um internally a scorecard that we're finalizing now for posting onto the city website. Um, we've identified 47 measures across the five strategic priorities contained in the realignment plan. Tracks both outcomes and outputs with status indicators to indicators to identify where we're at um with each of the identified measures. The measures span safe neighborhoods and clean streets where we identify eight different outcome objectives um and an additional seven output measures. We've identified those relate to public safety and also capital um related improvements throughout the downtown core. On the economic opportunity and growth scorecard, we've identified a number of measures related to plan check rates, retail vacancy rates, office vacancy rates, and tracking very closely toot and sales tax related performance. Um when you think through um and look at where we're at financially right now, the first quarter of 26, we're starting to see a rebound in our sales tax numbers um and also an improvement in the TOT environment. Um it's a different environment right now that we're seeing the early part of 26 compared with where we were at 2025. Affordable, livable, and secure housing

has a number of measures we've identified. also the organizational capacity measures um are being tracked also and building organizational health. All of this is getting finalized into a public-f facing dashboard we'll be posting on the website soon um and is reflective of the city council's direction to make sure that we don't just adopt a plan but that we execute on the plan and then tell people about the work that we're doing. The next part of the conversation we wanted to have with the council relates to this notion of operationalizing the realignment. It's actually um a phrase that Jing, our CD director, came up with during our most recent retreat this past January. What does that mean? Um the following two sentences are in the actual realignment report, realignment update report. We thought it was relevant to pull it out because it's reflective of the broader conversation the executive teams had. the executive team had during our most recent retreat. And really, it's this that we've added new expectations, new staff, new programs, new investments into the city. How do we make sure that these newer enhanced service levels that are currently being deployed as a project? How do we make sure they become the standard so that we're not just working on a project to execute via a realignment plan, but that rather we establish this is the way we're doing things. We think it's massively important to think about ensuring that what we're building endures beyond just the urgency and the moment that created it. Um, that's going to be important because when you look at the programmatic revenues we've identified, we do as a staff feel much more confident in the city's current fiscal position. But when you look at all of the factors related to economic growth, 2025 was not a terrific year. First

quarter of 26 is pointing to a much better year this year than we had last year. But we've got to be able to create private sector investment into the city to revitalize the local tax base so that all of the aspirations we have can actually be funded and actualized. As the exec team thought through what are the things we need to do to operationalize what we've been working on, six key issues were identified. One, how do we normalize remote work? There's a variety of different remote work schedules that um have proliferated across departments. How do we figure out a standard work schedule that makes sense, balances flexibility with the need for us to be able to execute and provide services? Massively important. Um, we spent a lot of time as an executive discussing the need to reinstitute citywide staff training since COVID when we cut um over 300 positions in the city. Um, staff training has been non-existent. We used to have a worldclass um institute called SMI, the Santa Monica Institute. um we haven't been doing those things um to embed how do we operate um and be really exceptional in the delivery of services. How do we engage our staff better? Similar to training but a different um notion um an important effort we've identified that is a global priority. The realignment scorecard's important to track the programmatic results, but how do we track all of the business results across the city via a data framework that makes sense that doesn't create busy work, but creates actual data that's helpful for the council and the community and identifying how are we doing. Also, there's a lot of highlevel projects that we're tracking, but there's projects every day that we need

more visibility on within every department. How do we create a framework where operationally we're focusing on departmental work plans, departmental improvements that happen year-over-year? Lastly, one of the things that's so cool about Santa Monica, all the tenant protections that we've established here, we're a trailblazer in that regard, but the response for habitability related concerns right now internally. It's a web of different individuals, different departments, different operating units responding to habitability concerns without a consistent process or protocol for how we actually address those issues. So coming up with a better way to think about how we handle habitability um related issues um in a more focused strategic manner um is another key area we identified as the executive team on global priorities that are important. Given all of that we've identified a series of adjustments to help us operationalize what we've been doing via the realignment plan through four um key categories. There's a series of organizational adjustments we wanted to review with the council. Really, those adjustments, if we can make them, enable the city to continue doing the work that is our responsibility to hopefully drive economic growth. There's a series of economic development strategies we want to review with the council as well. continuing to advance on public safety related policies and then um after we finish those discussions having a discussion with the council about housing and homeless related strategies. Those are the four areas we have some recommended adjustments tonight. First on the organizational adjustment, the largest shift that we're suggesting um would happen in the public works department. Really, how do we expand the maintenance and capital related efforts that we've engaged downtown citywide? Um

the overall plan identifies 12 additional positions in the public works department to really rethink how we deliver services under Chris Dishlip's leadership. Um one of the key things we're thinking about doing is a restructuring of reporting structures and alignment of allied resources and public works. So downtown beach maintenance would be combined into one larger department division. the landscape operation, facilities operation, landscape operation would all be rethought. Also, we're looking to expand the corridor, the cleaning that we're doing, enhanced cleaning downtown across all of our corridors with pressure washing, sidewalk cleaning, landscape maintenance extended to other commercial cores in the city. We're thinking of doing that via partnership with Chrysalis. We also have two larger shifts where the mobility function right now in the department of transportation would be embedded into the public works engineering function because of the overlap um and the ability to um utilize resources from engineering to advance mobility related initiatives is another big shift. Lastly, the 311 operation that currently is situated in the city manager's office would be shifted into public works. you know, roughly 70% of our 311 tickets um and calls for service are for public works related items. Um this shift really is intended to um reduce the amount of um calls that need to be routed out of public works. 70% of the calls for service are internal to the department. You're only routing 30% of the calls to other departments citywide. There's also a series of police department enhancements that we're suggesting to help operationalize the proactive policing model that Chief Jacob described earlier. One the council saw a little bit um in the presentation

on the real-time crime center. Um the other thing that we have done is move the dispatch and OEM operation into the police department. We're suggesting those operations combine into a new um bureau within the department where a new captain would provide senior leadership for those operating areas. The dispatch operation has been identified as needing additional staffing support. So, we're looking for two additional lead public safety dispatchers. The PSO program has expanded where we've got 42 PSOs now that are deployed across the city. How do we provide effective on the ground supervision and management of that operation? That's considered here. Lastly, how do we expand crossing guard services and also animal care services? The plan calls for adding additional part-time crossing guards and adding animal care attendants for shelter related operations. There's a series of other organizational investments across other departments that are smaller scale. In the HHS department, we're looking to launch the actual work of collecting the data for our rent registry. Three analysts are recommended to launch the ability for us to start collecting information on our 15,000 non-renrolled units in town. in HR that um opportunity to relaunch all of our training related and employee engagement operations is being contemplated with more investment in resources. The economic development division is contemplated to be restructured into three specific operating divisions. The land development operation, the property management operation, and the business attraction retention operation. The major events team that's allied with the economic development function would also be invested in the code operation and permitting counter support within the community development department also

are suggested for additional investment. The code enforcement operation has staff but the day-to-day leadership um and how we organize the work is what we're looking to enhance with this um proposed adjustment in addition to build on the permitting gains that we've identified. Um, additional counter support is recommended as part of this update. The city attorney's office has a series of adjustments with three additional personnel to handle additional workload that we can bring inhouse and to streamline a variety of um internal operations that need attention. The library operation, the fire department, RAD, DOT, and finance have smaller adjustments um that are all incorporated as part of the plan. One of the other organizational shifts that we have been meeting with our bargaining units about is an adjustment to our remote work um protocol. Currently, we have operating guidelines for how remote works um to be handled in the city across departments that allow remote work. Though the standards of how that work um remote work schedules rolled out um really is inconsistent across departments. One of the things that we are trying to correct is internal inconsistency in terms of how we're coordinating um the remote work program protocol so that we can more seamlessly organize our workplace. What we're suggesting in this protocol is that remote work be modified whereas a general rule remote work would happen on Monday and Friday for those that are eligible. In-person work would happen in the middle of the week. As this program works through, all of the executive team right now is shifted to a fully in-person workplace. Given that roughly 70% of our workforce cannot work remote, we're suggesting an in-person equity benefit so that anyone working a fully in-person schedule would be provided 8

hours a month of non-cashable, non-bankable leave. Um we recognize that given the way we've handled remote work to this point that maybe the shift doesn't fit um the lifestyle for or the priorities for certain folks that have made decisions based on the way that we have been coordinating remote work to this point. And so we've identified an opt out support program for those that decide this can't work that we would provide folks with six months of time to identify a transition plan. These protocols right now aren't being recommended for immediate implementation. What we're suggesting is that the council is good with this overall plan. We continue engagement with our bargaining units to finalize all of the program details so that as we move towards the end of 2026. Um that's when all of this would be implemented. There are also a series of personnel andou adjustments that we're contemplating. Um, if the council recalls, as part of the original realignment plan, we shifted to a model where all of our bargaining units, um, non-public safety bargaining units are provided with a fully paid medical program. The only bargaining unit that isn't provided with that benefit now is the POA. In addition, the firefighters group, a local 1109, gave up a 2% adjustment in order to gain that benefit. We're suggesting that we fix all of that and have one standard for benefits, medical benefits across the board in the city. The other thing that we're seeing as we um continue to identify talent and promote from within is that there are benefit misalignments between different bargaining groups and to address some compaction related issues within the EP group. we're suggesting given that our public safety groups have um different longevity and education benefits is to create a new incentive structure to better align

those benefits across the board so that you don't see um folks with pay decreases as they're moving through and promoting into the EP group as we've been working through the realignment plan. Also, our confidential unit employees um who were one of the first to agree to a newou during our most recentou negotiations. They didn't receive any comparable benefit adjustments that other groups had. So, we're suggesting a small 3% confidentiality premium for that group. Lastly, the citywide class and comp study plus a few interim adjustments so that the department head salaries are all aligned um where our lowest paid department heads would all be brought up to what the standard is for the department head classification. Um that relates to library, rad, comms, um the city clerk and a shift in the community development director top range salary adjustment. Those are recommended as part of the adjustments this evening. Um, all of that organizational shift really is the intentionality of trying to operationalize everything we're doing downtown with the realignment plan into a citywide structure so that the things that are our responsibility as a city are handled by the city so that we can try to catalyze public sector reinvestment into Santa Monica. The challenge locally is still acute. This is some data from HDL, our sales tax provider, um that points back to the middle part of 2025. Um 2025 when you talk to our business community, you talk to our hotels, awful year. Um just awful. Um so many different issues and impacts from federal government interventions, the fires made 2025 a year that was challenging across the

board. When you look at restaurant and hotels um in particular, um the macroeconomic headwinds point to an environment where restaurant hotel sales um declined 4.1% year-over-year. Quicks serve restaurants experienced a 14% decline. Fine dining saw a 9% decline. Fast casual declined 8.2%. Across all sectors, we saw a decline of roughly 1.4%. Um, that's a real issue that we're hoping the city's investment to create an environment that's investable, will adjust, and to that end, there's a series of eight separate economic development programs we're recommending that combined serve as a new economic development strategy for the city. One is to take some of the reserve dollars the council previously allocated and set up a $3 million economic development fund. This would address issues that the council's brought up previously related to restaurant incentives, business attraction. The Rose Parade could be funded perhaps through this fund, prominade studies. Really, it's a fund to identify and utilize to spur economic investment into Santa Monica. Council also recently identified um for any new restaurant that's looking to expand into any space um we have currently a $1400 per seat wastewater fee. We're looking to wave that fee as part of this um economic development toolkit. Um, we're also looking for authorization to launch the study to create a retail to restaurant activation program where former retail spaces. Can we create a program to incentivize restaurant attraction um for sidewalk dining um where there are simple tables and chairs that are

set up. What we're suggesting is eliminate the fee completely. Um the simple um sidewalk tables and chairs program would really benefit up to 59 restaurants we've identified that wouldn't have to pay any fees and facilitates a quicker approval protocol. We're also looking to um expand the entertainment zone to the full downtown core plus create event-based entertainment zones for the pier, for Main Street, and for Montana. Um, in particular, we're not looking for any of the expansions to be authorized as an entertainment zone 24/7. It would only be utilized in conjunction with event activations. One of the other things we've talked about and the council identified in the original realignment plan, how do we modernize our TDM program and maybe create um less regulatory burden for our businesses? We've identified a self attestation model that would replace the mandatory survey program that we currently have for our small businesses that have between 30 and 249 employees. Um a temporary waiver over film permit fees and also the adjustments for our downtown parking program and the downtown parking structures. Um those are the other elements of the economic development toolkit. those protocols, that strategy coupled with what we have in the major event pipeline, um really are, I think, our approach as we enter 26 and look towards 27 of how we spur activity and economic revitalation revitalization in town. This year, we will have the FIFA Cap activation in 2026. Um we secured a $250,000 metro grant. Um, as part of that activation, we're also coordinating um with an event producer to put on a

series of downtown activation events in partnership with DTSM as part of the FIFA World Cup activities. We have the Golden Voice Music Festival that's targeting September 26. The license agreement will come before the council here in April. We're still working to finalize our ESPN broadcast partnership that'll happen in early 27. And obviously um a lot of activity that our team is working on related to Olympic games and all the hospitality houses that we're working to secure. Couple of other things before we get to a discussion um public safety policies. How do we build on recent gains in public safety? There are two primary programs we wanted to address with the council. One is to secure authorization for the city to enter into anoue with Metro that Chief Jacob has been negotiating that would allow for SMPD to conduct enforcement on all the metro platforms in town. The other um protocol that we've developed um our teams have worked together to develop a vehicle habitation and vanlording related ordinance. We have those ready for consideration. Um the challenge we have in implementing right now is that we do believe to bring those both forward, we have to have a safe parking program paired with those ordinances. We had identified a safe parking location and a safe parking operation to partner with. Um we did have objections raised from a neighboring jurisdiction. And so tonight, instead of approving everything, what we want to do is let the council know um we've heard the direction at part of the realignment plan. We do have these um programs and regulations developed. We are working now on a new safe parking option and we think we'll be able to within the next several weeks package all of this together and bring it back to the council for consideration.

All of those adjustments that we just described um are an investment into the work of the city to try to spur economic revitalization to drive what the council's described as a renaissance here in Santa Monica. Um what are the budgetary impacts of the recommendations that we've identified? Um a lot of work by our team in um finance and in HR to get everything um costed out. Um, so kudos to the team for all of that work. For fiscal year 2526, we've identified that all of the changes that we're proposing would result in an approximate $1.4 million increase in expenditures. And then in future years, fiscal year 26 27 through fiscal year 2930, there'd be roughly three to$4 million per year in new costs. When you filter that through our overall budgetary um projections, what you see is that we still have a structurally balanced budget even after all of the recommended investments that we've identified in this report. One of the other important considerations we wanted to share with the council. There are other factors that we aren't including in our budgetary projections to stay conservative. One is all of the major events that we're currently working on. All of the license agreements that our team's negotiating will generate revenues. We're not considering any of those revenues as really earned dollars and the total net economic impact and revenue um impact for the city will be significant. Um the new events we're talking about will generate real dollars for Santa Monica. We also still do have $94 million in unobl unobligated free cash in the general fund. And when you pair that with the work the city attorney's office has done to materially strengthen our overall risk profile, we

do feel like the city is in a terrific position at this point to make these investments and double down on everything that we've been doing the last couple of months. Ultimately, um the path forward we think really is to operationalize everything we have been doing as part of the realignment plan. Crime is down. Public safety sworn staffing is um fully filled for the first time in over 20 years. Um the city attorney's office is jamming. Um community development is jamming. The finances of the city are structurally balanced. Um we do think we have a solid foundation to build off of. Um and at this point I think what we are recommending um we pause have the council consider items 1 through 20 on the recommended actions list that um those actions relate to all of the issues we just identified in this report after we considered that we can think through recommended action 21 and then recommended action 22. So with that we'll pause Madame Mayor and turn it back to you.

Thank you so much for that comprehensive update. I would suggest that we ask questions first and then give direction if that's amendable to my colleagues as we normally do. Okay. So we have council member hall then zernit gaya just just question should uh well I guess if it's just two of us I was just wondering if we should do by department head if if you want

well I mean like instead of having them come up and sit down and then come up and sit down based off of it's fine never mind. That's fine. It's fine. Yeah, it's fine. Um, Chief Jacob, you're up. So, I have to hand it to you and your leadership team. I mean, traffic stop increases, uh, traffic citations, proactive drug enforcement, weekly arrest activity numbers. I mean, these numbers, these increases are substantial in in the 100 percentiles. Um what like what changed?

Um coordination um putting it all together. Um having a plan um having our officers focus on everything that we do around our four goals and our four principles. Everything we do is guided towards that. It's guided by your by your council priorities is guided by the realignment plan. Um it's been present. It's been consistent. Um I have a great team. um who ensure that uh my dream and my ideals are recognized and uh and and we head to it and uh our officers are bought in um our whole department is bought in and uh we're moving in that direction and as I said before um you know it's about consistency um this is who we are um um it's not a surge um it's about setting a culture of this is what our department does this is the expectation and this is the bar

and remind me when did you take over as interim police chief chief. Uh it was late August of 2024. So you and your command team implemented these changes that are producing these results. That is correct. Thank you. So interesting how those numbers shot up with new leadership. Um thank you chief uh director Santiago. So the projections that the city manager just showed us look great and tell a very different story from the time this time last year when we were doing our budget priorities. um where we proposed three of the priorities that became the cornerstone of the realignment plan.

And I think our city manager hinted at it a little bit, but just truly like how conservative are those projections and you know what do we think the upside might be off of those? They're they're prudent. Um we capture all our known expenditures so that that's known. The revenues we know they're going to come. We're seeing some of the results and so they're yeah we're very prudent with our numbers. Okay. Thanks. Yeah. Sorry. I'm just going to rotate through the different department heads here. Uh, is Director Brown here? I don't see her. Oh, there she is.

Good evening. Good evening. Um, I have a question about staff training. Why did, and I know you weren't here for this, but um, just from institutional memory, why did we get away from training our supervisors? So uh when COVID uh hit a lot and we started downsizing training is is one of the first things that went not just in Santa Monica but this is sort of industrywide um which is super unfortunate but it's one of the easy areas to hit and Santa Monica was not uh different in that in that regard.

Yeah. and and you said um well I guess why is investing in learning and development for for our city staff like so critical to delivery for services to the community?

Yeah. So um I mean we see it time at after time when we have a lack of training it has so many different sort of uh results right from an increase in complaints an increase in lawsuits an increase ju just in in a lot of sort of negative you know it's certainly in the managerial areas and then um Santa Monica was also training people in order to move up so not only training their managers but training their line line staff in order to move up which has an enormous impact on morale. Um you know I noticed that you know people are still using uh the their Smi institute training to u qualify for exams which I think is amazing. I' I've actually never seen that before. Um and I think it's amazing but sadly these these things are perishable. So, it's really important that we're able to uh, you know, train up other people, have people get, you know, refresher training so that they can continue to use that. And so, in the limited conversations that I've had with my colleagues and also with, you know, the line staff that I do have the opportunity to talk to, they are wildly ecstatic about the idea that the Smi would come back. So, um, and I'm really excited because like I said, I've never been involved in something quite like that and I'm really excited to see, uh, how we're going to bring it back and, you know, raise that morale.

That's awesome. Thank you. Uh, is Director Reynolds here? Ailen has uh, um, she's out this week with the medical issue she's dealing with. Um, maybe I'll just ask you then, if you don't mind, Mr. city manager. Um, in the report it referenced a habitability response framework. Can you explain in plain English what that means?

Yeah, for sure. Um, we have some of the best tenant protections um, anywhere that exist on in the country. One of the challenges that we've seen though is based on all those regulations, when an issue occurs, the city is the point of contact for a tenant to try to seek relief. Currently, when those calls for service come in, um it's an actual um it's an actual mess internally in terms of who responds. So, those calls go to city attorney's office, they go to community development, they go to code enforcement, they go to building and safety, they go to HHS, and there's no coordinated process. Every single issue is sort of a uniquely um artistal response that you develop based on the feedback we're getting for that issue. it is a massive suck of resources and an overlap and duplication of effort across departments. Um because it's such a core function of the city. One of the reasons it made it to the list of global priorities for the executive team is there has to be a better way of when you get the complaints we we hear them every every other Tuesday from residents on hey nobody responded to me on this issue. There's this habitability issue. There's a construction issue happening. I got displaced. How do we have a more coordinated response at the city, especially when we also have a partner allied agency and the rent control board? Um we haven't figured that out yet in a way that's um strategic enough in our mind. There's a better way to respond. And so, um, the habitability framework really is how do we coordinate a process internally so when those calls come in, it's not multiple departments running around, um, trying to figure out how to respond, but there's a coordinated way that we address those issues.

Got it. And would you say that that um, coordination and getting that nailed right is uh, a building block that we would need to do in order to move towards like a systematic code enforcement program. It will absolutely help because so many of these issues then get stuck. Is it a code responsibility or is it a building responsibility? Is it consumer protection? Is it um HHS with programs and services? Right now, all of those are components of the response, but there's no one person responsible. And so how do we think about that in a way that takes into account all of the regulatory protections we've created but also streamlines the process so that the right you know processes engaged the most effective processes engaged. That's what we're um currently working on.

Great. Thank you. Um very excited about the rental registry going live uh for our market rate units. Do you have a projected like u like when that might happen? that will absolutely happen this this calendar year. This recommendations approved. Um we've already talked internally. HR's got um a recruitment process. They'll have to engage. Um we've been corresponding with our partners in rank control um who have experience setting this up. And so we think with three analysts we can get this launched effectively. And by the end of the calendar year um you'll start seeing real meaningful progress. And we'll be tracking, you know, how many of the units do we have information from? and we'll continue to build that out moving ahead.

Great. Thank you. Um, next up, Director Dishlip.

Can you tell us a little bit more about how this partnership with Crosales will work?

Absolutely. So, you know, one of the things we're looking at is, as um city manager mentioned, sort of that enhanced cleaning services that right now are focused downtown, uh expanding along other major boulevards and business improvement districts. So, um obviously we're starting this from scratch. It's not something we've done before. Uh so we're looking at bringing in right an outside vendor um and working with them in a partnership manner uh to figure out sort of what the right level is, what the frequency uh is. But it's sort of consistent regular pressure washing, street cleaning um uh and sort of just general tidiness and and cleanliness.

Okay. I mean it sounds like this is effectively almost like a jobs program too that the city would be 100%. Yeah. Right. I mean it has that sort of dual benefit that are there like connective tissues that we can make to like Samo Bridge and and um other programs that we have. I I would certainly imagine so. Right. Again, we're just getting into it with with Chrysalis. Um but they are a known partner that we have obviously done work with before. Right. Great organization and so we're working through it together. Okay. Cool. Thank you, city attorney. Uh, one of the things we want to do is bring more litigation in house. Can you tell us why that is?

Sure. I think there's two reasons. Um, primarily um, one of which is there is there has been a large increase in um, complex litigation um, in the Southern California region in general. I think it's one of those things where you end up paying outside counsel um, more than you would pay in in-house counsel. I think the other um aspect of that too is that it um there is a a lot of interaction um with city staff throughout the litigation process. Our office ends up um defending um city staff in depositions and working with them on getting together all the documentation and and really you know obviously def defending the city and those actions. So we think it's much more efficient and um helps build relationships if when we bring those operations in house.

Cool. Thank you. And then last on my round robin of uh city leadership um for the city manager uh departmental work plans um I assume that those being proposed in the future will incorporate past 16 items and future 16 items that the council presents. Absolutely. Okay. Um over the past few months, you've promoted several new directors uh to your executive team from within. I'm just curious like what does what what does that say about kind of your confidence in our city's workforce?

I have never been more impressed with an organization than the one that we have here in Santa Monica. When you look around at Santa Monica is an organization I've wanted to be a part of my entire career because it's a place that has always done massively hard things exceptionally well. And those things don't happen without exceptionally talented people. When you look around our organization, I think um you see it everywhere. there are pockets of brilliance um scattered across spectacularly talented staff. I think the last five to seven years though since COVID um we've lost a focus on the internal operation as we've tried to navigate sort of this external you know world that's been chaotic but a lack of focus on the internal operation is really I think what's led to city not doing the things that are our responsibility and when you look around at the people in the city the talent is still there Um what we need to do I I believe so foundationally is how do we really think about building a unique distinct culture um that's focused on people means there are going to be decisions we make that maybe not everyone likes but we'll be focused on building out the whole and I'm so confident in the people on our executive team that that's exactly what we're doing together.

Awesome. And last question on these recommended actions. Uh tons of really great stuff in this report. Um one disappointing one was the one about the uh safe place to park. Um so it mentioned that a neighboring jurisdiction blocked our use of a site that we had identified. Uh I assume that neighboring jurisdiction was the city of Los Angeles. Correct. And was that CD11? That's correct. Okay. Um, thank you,

Council Member Zerkaya.

Okay. And I too will try to go by department. Um, so first up, uh, Chief Jacob. So, first, thank you. Um, great video. I can I borrow the apple box that Alder was standing on? Um, so I understand that we've reworked deployment schedules for the police department and I assume for uh public safety officers as well to prioritize downtown Santa Monica where most of the calls for service kind of originate. So, does that include the pier? And are we or will we be working with peer stakeholders as we move into hosting kind of larger events on and around the pier so that we can proactively rather than reactively address potential safety concerns?

Absolutely. Um, as you may know, um, before we had a DART team, a directed action res response team that was, um, um, mainly focused on the pier and on the beach area in the oceanfront walk area. We rolled that team into our downtown services unit. So now that entire area is under the command of u, of one lieutenant and three sergeants and 19 police officers. So on a daily basis, they've lost no um um, officers. that has just rolled into the downtown plan and consistent um um officers in the priors. If one of those officers got sick on the dart team, there's only one officer. If they both got sick, you had no officers. Um one of the um focuses that we will always have is a team that is down on the on our pier and on our beaches in our oceanfront walk area. Um um also in the summertime and starting now during spring break, there's always an over um um presence of police officers. Um when when we start up into summertime, we'll have two officers on the north beach, two officers on the south beach. That goes from 10:00 in the morning till 10:00 at night. um uh on our pier um on a daily um deployment schedule will be uh one sergeant and six officers and that goes until that starts about 10 11:00 in the morning time and goes to the pier closes and so there's always a focus and and if there's a special event we always hire for that special event. Um we consistently have um conversations. We we present monthly at the peer meeting uh for our folks on the pier. Um making sure that those folks um um are up to date on our crime stats or any other incidents that may happen on the pier. Um they're direct line into the supervisors and into the lieutenants. Um I meet with them on a quarterly basis um to to have conversations with them. Um so they're engaged and we're engaged uh with those guys down there. And you know, conversely, we get a lot of our calls for service there. We get a lot of

activity down there. We work with our hotel years along oceanfront walk area to make sure that they're secure. Okay. Thank you. And then another question. So, as part of the proposed expansion of entertainment zones for Montana Avenue and Main Street, um the staff report noted that the prohibition against sitting and lying in the or yeah, lying in the public right of way would be extended to those areas as well. So, how will we be making sure that we're enforcing it in a way that connects folks with appropriate services and it and also that it doesn't inadvertently just push folks into the surrounding neighborhoods?

Absolutely. Um, as I stated before in my presentation, um, it's enforcement with service and that's everything that we do. And that that model has worked so well that we've doubled the beds at at uh at the Samuel Bridge. Um we've entered into a new contract uh with the um Red Cross um I'm sorry with the Salvation Army um to do the work that we do. Um our city, you know, our city is, you know, well ahead of others. We have two department of mental health workers who were embedded in our police department, one with our homeless team and then one that actually goes out and patrol constantly and they are working case loads. And so we work with our service care providers um that the city already has. We work with HHS um um going out and in in ensuring and with our with our homeless multi-disiplinary street team and making sure um that all of our folks are receiving services best they can.

Thank you. And I understand our homeless liaison program is kind of a unique thing for police departments to have. I I'm not sure if there's any other police department that has one. Uh but for folks who aren't aware of it or don't know what it is, would you mind giving like a 30 second overview of what what they do and who they are?

Absolutely. Um our homeless leazison um program team, we call it the help team um has been um a staple of the Santa Monica Police Department for the past 30 years. Um other police departments come and copy uh what we do and how we do it. And so we were the first ones, one of the first agencies to to determine that homelessness is not a crime. And we have said that over and over for decades. And how we respond to that um is through these officers. Our officers are specifically trained to deal with our most uh service resistant individuals. Um so their goal is to get folks into um programs. Um our most utilizers, our our high utilizer group of our police department, our fire department, and our hospitals. Um those folks who consistently call calls for service. That's what this particular team does and that's what they're so good at. um on a yearly basis we attend and I have attended several times myself the national homeless conference in Washington DC um and they're always surprised to see a police department there um as partners in that and so we are we've always leaned in um we will continue to lean in and uh um it's it's a staple of our department and and I have to say that um that team is is they are very um specialized and good what they do but all of our police officers deal with homelessness we are all help officers we all deal with homeless people on a daily basis and we touch them with compassion but also with accountability

and my understanding is that the help team also partners with other city departments like um uh housing and human services to the CA's office. Yeah, that's on a weekly basis. Fabulous. Great. So, that's all my questions for you, Chief. Thank you. Uh next up, I I know you're all the way in the back, Chief Hack, but got to get your steps in. I'm sorry. I barely hit my step goal today. I set mine at 6,000. Um, so I So, first my condolences.

Um, that's later, but uh I recognize that a portion of our new recurring revenues are coming from the ambulance operator program. And I recognize we've discussed the benefits of bringing this service inhouse at prior council meetings. So, I don't want to go over that and take up so much time. Uh, but could you just please provide a brief update of how the implementation is going so far and when we expect to be fully up and running?

Oh, well, we are up fully up and running as of today, February 1st, we went live with four what we call 24-hour cars and two day cars. And so, that number that the city manager referenced earlier was in one month we uh transported 603 individuals. It's about $1.6 $6 million in what we call billable uh transports. We won't realize all that, but somewhere in the six to $800,000 range uh just for one month, and that really isn't our busiest month. So, uh we're on track to conservatively hit the the dollar amount, but you know, we hope for more and it's been a home run. And uh the uh the the uh ambulance operators that we've hired have been fantastic, integrated into the department fantastically and have been a true asset to uh the organization. Not just from uh an operational standpoint, but it gives us that kind of pool to hire from. It gives us the ability to uh have that control. And as busy as we are in Santa Monica, having our own transport available, uh, we know where they are. We know how often they're running, and it's it's just been a home run so far.

Fabulous. And do we have all of the vehicles that we'll need, or are we looking to expand further in the future? Well, we have all the vehicles that we need, but uh, we are looking at based on the call volume to add another daycar uh, just because the call volume is there to to justify it. Got it. And I I assume that'll be potentially coming before us in a future meeting most likely. Yes. Okay, great. Great. Thank you. That was my one question for you. Um, so next up, uh, Director Dishlip, did I pronounce your name right?

Yes. Okay. So, uh, the staff report noted that for streetscape and public realm enhancements, crosswalk repainting was anticipated to start in mid-March, and it's March 24th, and that accessible pedestrian signal buttons have been ordered, and that installation is being scheduled. So, would you just be able to provide a brief update on the status of the the crosswalk repainting and clarify which major intersections it'll be for? Um, and then I have a separate question about the pedestrian signal buttons.

Absolutely. So, let me pull up the um so our current timeline is um we believe that we'll be out there with a start date in the middle of April now. So, we had to go through our procurement process, right? Um we had to reestablish some contracts, so it took us a little longer. Uh but we do believe we're now there. Uh and so the majority of the crosswalks are in the downtown area. So second in Broadway, second in Santa Monica, fourth um is Broadway, Santa Monica, Arizona. Um Olympic and Aanino Mazatlon. Um Ocean and Broadway. Um so Olympic, Pico, Santa Monica, all all through the downtown in this first batch. And that's just from the realignment from phase one obviously. And we are setting up new on call contracts. So we'll be able to um jump on these things a lot quicker and we'll be a lot more nimble. So you'll see those contracts coming before you uh in the coming months.

And I assume it's kind of a mix of like the scramble crosswalks and more traditional. Are they going to be high visibility uh crosswalks? Uh abs. Absolutely. Okay, perfect. not just regular. And then in terms of the buttons, so uh we have the contract, uh we're anticipating installation starting April 6th and going through. Fabulous. And we've discussed in prior council meetings uh the importance of the importance to this council of prioritizing pedestrian safety and trying to eliminate beg buttons where we can. Um, so would you just be able to confirm that these are going to be set for automatic pedestrian recall wherever possible?

Absolutely. Okay. And so that means from what time to what time is it just going to be as part of like a regular schedule? Uh, so what we're looking at at the moment, I believe, is 7:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. uh weekdays until 1000 p.m. on weekends. Wait, maybe that's it. Might be the other way around. Okay. But at till later in the evenings is what I'm hearing. And yes, will we potentially have the ability to adjust those times if we need to moving forward? 100%. Okay. So, if we find that there that we have just this huge resurgence of nightife in the downtown area and we need them to be on automatic recall until 2 in the morning, we could do that.

And again, part of this the the logic behind bringing mobility into public works, right? so that we do have the we can own the planning, the design, construction, maintenance, right? All of those tweaks together so that it can all be incorporated um and uh we can implement things quicker. Okay, fabulous. That was all my questions for you. So, thank you very much. Very excited. Uh next up, economic development. So, I'm not sure if I should direct those to you, city manager, or Yeah. And I see Peter and Okay. the team in the audience,

Mr. James and team Miss Taylor. Okay. So, uh I got a little bit confused reading the staff report versus hearing the staff report in person. Uh because it so it contemplates eliminating the Santa Monica portion of the wastewater capacity fee for restaurants for new restaurants and for expansion of ex existing restaurants. Um, and it said that under the change, the new restaurants would still they would still need to pay the city of Los Angeles Hyperion wastewater fee of of $400 per seat. So, I was confused because I saw the $1,400 number and then the $400 number. So, is our city portion 1,400 and the city of LA? How does

the I think it was maybe a misunderstanding. The city of Santa Monica wastewater capacity fee portion is $1,000. Okay. And the Hyperion fee, the city of LA fee is the $400. The way that the resolution is written as the attachment in the staff report, it contemplates subsidizing only the city of Santa Monica fee. And is there, you know, why would we not eliminate the $400 uh city of LA fee? Would we have to basically pay out of pocket for that or what's kind of

We would. it would be another uh subsidy from the general fund. Um I think it's a policy question to council if they want to go that far. Um we did have a question that came in um asking what it would look like if we waved the additional $400. Um we're working that up right now. Um the the cumulative impact of the policy choice for the Santa Monica portion is contemplated to be about $500,000 per year. So comparatively with the 400, it's probably another $200 to $250,000. But if we wave that and and you know, we end up spending the $500,000 and we still have um kind of the the the tax money flowing in uh restaurants being able to open more quickly and easily and a lower startup cost kind of stimulating more economic opportunities is is what I'm understanding. So correct me if I'm wrong.

That's correct. and and uh later this spring we'll be bringing forward the retail to restaurant conversion program which in addition to subsidizing wastewater fees will also contemplate providing financial assistance for things like purchasing kitchen equipment. So taken as a whole that package of incentives will be quite strong and um according to a scan that we did across the region like we will really be in a class of our own in incentivizing that type of use.

Awesome. And so if we wave this one, thou like our city portion in the future, if we decide to, we could always go back and decide to subsidize the additional $400 or a portion thereof if if we find that our actions tonight are not sufficient to to help stimulate the kind of uh economic development we want. The council absolutely has that authority.

Okay. Um, and then one other question for you around the downtown Santa Monica parking rate adjustments. Um, so I appreciate kind of all of the thoughtful engagement that has gone gone into this and trying to develop something that'll work for especially the fitness and wellness businesses in the downtown Santa Monica area as well as the schools that are down there. Um, but could you just kind of could you just speak to what the response and um what the response and where feedback we've received from downtown Santa Monica, Inc. and from the fitness and wellness businesses that this would be designed to help.

Yes. So, um, when the parking rate adjustments were contemplated to be, um, implemented in January, we we did hear a strong response from the fitness community, um, th those folks that have frequent high volume daily visitors that the new rate structure might be detrimental um, to folks that are already paying several hundred dollars a month for gym memberships. Um, so we worked uh handinhand with the parking office and with some policy walks here at the city and with the fitness community to develop the program that's included in the realignment plan. So it really it is um about uh heavily discounted high volume validations um the city fronting the cost of the validation machines themselves. So that initial splurge on the on the ticket mechanism is covered by the city and um with respect to DTSM um they are supportive of of this uh policy choice.

Great. Great. Thank you very much and thank you for your work on this. Um and then moving on to transportation. Um director Gupta, please. Sorry I'm making all of y'all kind of move around so much. After that, I'll I'll have uh human housing and human services and then HR and then finance. So that'll be my last one. Just so y'all are aware.

I can try to Okay. So on the uh transit demand management ordinance adjustments, how does the AQMD air quality impact program work? And how would regulated employers with between 30 to 250 employees be incentivized to continue administering this the average vehicle ridership survey if it becomes optional?

Sure. So thank you council member for the question. I'll take the second one first. Um so the continued incentives the the current uh existing transportation demand management ordinance does provide an incentive uh for employers who are regulated who meet their what's called AVR targets which is the average vehicle wrership if based on their survey based on their submissions annually they meet their targets uh which are assigned in the ordinance they're actually entitled to a substantial discount on their annual TDM fees that they pay to the city and so uh going forward with the amendments that are recommend recommended uh if a business the only way that a business of course could document and demonstrate meeting their AVR target and being eligible for that reduction in fees would be to submit a survey. So businesses that do opt to submit the annual survey to demonstrate they're meeting their target can then receive the corresponding reduction in fees. So that would be the remaining incentive and in fact many of our employers uh in the city um who regularly submit the survey um and meet their AVR targets actually avail themselves of that discount and so that would be the kind of the remaining incentive. Um so that's that piece with regard to the AQUIP program which is administered by the AQMD that currently applies to larger employers that are typically directly regulated by AQMD rather than by the city. So, uh employers who have 250 employees or above and essentially it almost operates uh analogous to a cap and trade program where they would be uh the employer would be purchasing uh credits um as an alternative to um you know u demonstrating compliance uh with the TDM regulations uh through the traditional means and then those credits that the funds received would be reinvested into transportation demand management programs. That is not something that the city currently has. And so what is before you as part of the

TDM amendments would be to direct staff to develop a similar AQIP style program locally for those employers in that 30 to 249 uh size. So to make sure I'm understanding, this isn't us passing like a huge overhaul. It's to direct staff to study and come back to us with options for um adjusting these vehicle adjusting our trans um transportation demand management kind of surveys.

So the the the change with regard to the survey requirement is before you today and that is a change that would eliminate the requirement that the submission be um that the survey be submitted annually for uh employers between 30 and 249 employees. That piece is that amendment to the ordinance is before you as part of the one of the recommended actions, but the contemplation of developing a a QIP style program. That is future direction that staff would have to work on. All right. Thank you for the clarification. Awesome. So, next up, housing and human services. This is going to be a very easy question. Uh, what is the definition of Santa Monica priority population?

Let me answer that. Um, it depends on if it's um a housed SNPP definition or the S SNPP definition for those experiencing homelessness. For hous S&P, it's anyone with a permanent address in Santa Monica. Um, for those experiencing homelessness, we have four categories. Um, full-time employees or those who've lost full-time employment in Santa Monica. Those who've lost permanent housing in the city. um anyone the fire department or police department has frequent contact with or if you've experienced homelessness in Santa Monica for over three years.

Thank you. Uh and then next up, HR uh Director Brown.

Hopefully these will be quick, fingers crossed. Uh, do we have an idea of how many of the new positions that would be created under this plan are restored positions that had previously been cut?

Well, it's hard to say, you know, because when we initially started cutting positions back in 2020, over the years, there have been like various emergencies where this council has restored, you know, those the gamut of not only you know positions that are restored like for example my Smi positions are a clear restoration of services and positions that we used to have but then there are all you know these newer positions and lots of positions associated with for example Chief Hock's program which are things that are not you know related to you know precoid and restoration So, you know, we haven't kept records, great records where that's concerned. Um, so it's hard to say exactly which are which.

Got it. But some are likely restoration and some are expansion of Okay. Absolutely. All right. And then um are we able to somehow quantify the benefits of new positions through the increased level of service like you know more availability for public facing assistance or increased revenues or other benefits through better opportunities for like public private partnerships improved turnarounds times for inquiries increased revenues from proactive consumer litigation. I understand that's a very big question but if you can

all of it you answered it though it's awesome. Um it's all of the above right. So um you know I can speak best for the positions that are in HR and understanding that you know HR was one of the sort of foundational departments that got positions early in order to make this realignment you know plan come to life and um and as as a result as we increase the city's family of of workers we're also looking to increase the level of service and the le the level of uh professional service that we give an HR as well so that people can do less HR type work in their departments and focus on you know the business of their departments and so um for me I'm I'm looking very much forward to that um Oliver has been incredibly supportive in understanding the need for that foundational support on an HR level and so we plan to uh after we get all hired up because that's been the focus right now with just filling the vacancy gency citywide. But once we get all hired up, we really intend to demonstrate uh the changes in HR in terms of taking sort of HR work off of the plates of some of my colleagues in their departments and really uh delivering a fullervice HR uh you know customer service experience for them.

Fabulous. I'm very much looking forward to it as well. So that was my uh questions for you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm trying to limit it. Uh and then finally, Director Santiago, uh could you just quickly go over how did we estimate future new revenues from the sources? And I recognize this answer, this question was partially answered earlier, but how do we estimate future new revenues from sources such as the ambulance operator program and how confident are we in these figures?

Yeah, so we work with Whitman Enterprises, who's our um third billing third party billing agency. Um we used in our calculations um a model that really focuses on the LA County EMS transport rates, the city's transport volume, the payer mix, and then the expected collections and payments to the city. So based on that mix, we um calculated what the revenue would be, and then we also accounted for how much of that revenue is real revenue and how much is just built revenue. And I think the projections are very close. Um like Oliver had mentioned, they're conservative at 7 million. It could be more. Got it. And then um for you know kind of a combination of some of the prior questions I've asked, how are we going to be able to measure the offset of new expenditures from new and reclassified positions, capital improvements, etc. Um with the new revenues that we anticipate coming in. So, I think a lot of the metrics that we're going to have in the dashboard, we're going to create that um you know, for things that are direct uh charge fees or direct revenue generating like the ambulance program, the um large scale events, the parking rate adjustments, that stuff, we can compare revenues to um operating and capital expenditures to see if the ROI is there, right? Is it is it more than than what we're paying? That would be one way to look at it. For nondirect, for the indirect uh support, revenue growth like um public safety, cleanliness, business area improvements. Um we would then measure things like the impact to the economy. So things like sales tax, TOT, is it improving, is it not? These are all like measures that we can use while not directly tied to it. I think we can quantify the economic return of these uh quality of life and um and recovery investments that way. And I assume that's a lot of our investments and um kind of improving streetscape and fixing things up will also hopefully help our kind of liability expenses.

Exactly. Those are things that are not we don't have a direct um revenue source, but we would see the improvements in the economy associated with that. Right. Sounds good. Thank you very much. And that's all my questions. Great. Um Council Member Negret,

I promise I'll do rapid fire. Um, okay. Really quick with our chief Derek Jacobs, I just wanted to ask a couple questions. Number one, on the sit and lie, um, as a business owner myself, my concern is that these corridors don't extend into other business areas, especially those of us that are adjacent to emergency rooms. I have two. And I would say at least once a week, I find the paperwork of folks who were discharged left in front of where they've slept and defecated in front of my business. So for me, um, my concern is that we're just limiting it to this smaller area. Um, and to the extent that people get pushed out, I'm also wondering two things. One, how do we extend it in front of businesses across the city? And two, how will you or do you and maybe the fire department coordinate with emergency rooms upon these releases of people? Because I see it a lot in the mid city area.

Sure. Thank you for the question. So, um, this council took up the doorway ordinance, um, last year, um, and moved, um, and and extended the doorway ordinance, um, through the Wilshire corridor, uh, through Santa Monica. The sit and lie, um, is an expansion of something that was in the only in the downtown area. Um, um, but now, as we're kind of clearing out, we're seeing folks on other areas. So, kind of two different type of of of of issues. Um, one thing that the city attorney will always tell me or our our deputy city attorney, uh, who's back there, Jenna Griggsby, is that we always have to make sure that there's a need for it. That we can't make laws and pass laws, um, and enforce laws when there's not a need and we don't have a recognized um, issue to do it because it comes off as punitive. And our laws are are are are set. um that is what has kept the ACLU um out of Santa Monica and how we enforce our our our very um um kind of lenient laws, but how how how we enforce them matters just as much as what's on the paperwork. And so as we as we continue to grow, we will evaluate um the the sit and lie ordinance throughout the cities and throughout the places that it's um um um set for to go. And then once once um we can establish that there is a a need for it and then we can move it further then we will definitely bring back to this council um an expansion of that but first we have to prove that it's you know in those particular areas and where we need to do one of the things that the police I mean um the police the fire department and the hospital um that's part you've heard me talk about our hugs our our high utilizer group um that is exactly what that group does and that's what our help team addresses that's what we meet with the city attorney's office on and our human services department um specifically to address that particular group that causes um and our fire department that causes um increased calls for service for our police

department or fire department or hospital services. So, um, we do a good job at really kind of focusing on those, but, um, you know, the hospital has their own kind of rules about what they do and when folks folks will sometimes just leave out of the hospital. Um, and so, you know, it's it's a it's a troublesome thing that that that we have to deal with um, on our streets. Um but again I think with our when we talk about some of the the actions that um that the city has thrown at this um our department of mental health workers our our help team our our our service care providers the fire department's APU program um which has um um I'm sorry not APU program but our TTT program or therapeutic transport van which also has department of mental health workers that are that are now being able to be deployed. We throw a lot of resources at that.

All right. And then my other question for you is with all these events coming forward, do you feel confident at your um at the staffing level as it is now that you're going to um be okay when we have potentially 35,000 people in the sandbox?

Yeah. You know, um you know, we're planning for that now and we're planning for the Olympics now. And uh with one of my captains who's back there, that's that's his you know, one of his big jobs that we do. when they meet on a on a on a on a I don't know bi-weekly basis looking at things. And so one of those things is reaching out to our other partners um in other areas. And so I've already reached out to Orange County agencies. I've reached out to Ventura County agencies um specifically already looking for um help with the Olympics. Um we've already kind of proposed um a schedule for our department and this is two years away on how we can get an extra 30 to 40 officers here on a daily basis to deal with these particular items and then also with some help. So um hopefully in the next year or so we'll be bringing someus um um to council um and working with other police departments to um to help and assist us uh during the Olympics and some of our large scale operations.

Will that collaboration be here for the new golden voice? Absolutely. That's where we will start. That's that's the first place where we will start. And then speaking ofUS with the metro, really quick, um are you seeing any um besides that agreement and movement just with the city manager's new direction in giving um the police the confidence and support and authority to kind of work more robustly around the metro? Do you feel that that's already showing um some improvements with folks being during the daytime population and at night when it ends being dumped off onto the streets?

Sure. I think one of the things that we're looking forward to is as you may know Metro has authorized their own police department and so Chief Scott is in the process of building a police department. Um right now they're dealing with Metro Security. They contract with the sheriff's department. We get spotty coverage. Let's be clear. we get spotty coverage. And so our plan is to u because they fill it with overtime and sometimes they can. And obviously everyone knows that the sheriff's department is short staffed. So it's it is what it is. And so our goal is not to um supplant the sheriff's department, but to assist and and assist them in what they're doing and also um by assisting our residents and being on the platform. So we are working right now the um Chief Scott is working on language on his side. we are getting him all of the um um um um required guidelines that we need. We need to prove to him that our officers have been to procedural justice. We there's a lot a bunch of other training things that we have to do that will allow Metro to agree to this um for us to start working on the platforms and onside their trains.

Okay, that's good to look forward to the future. And my last question for you is just public safety officers. a long time ago when I worked I don't know the prominade when I was like 20 running a lucky brand store they were able to zip tie individuals I know that because when we had a robbery it was PSOS then that ability to detain folks went away I'm wondering all-encompassing not just about that specific ability are public safety officers going to be given a little bit more authority to sort of act as um as non-sworn officers but maybe have a little bit more authority to show a presence that's more meaningful Not just like a security guard.

Sure. Um so um our those were CSOS now. Those are CSOS back in the day. Now they're called PSOS. They've merged a couple groups to get theirs. Um and so our officers um through city um municipal code um um only police officers have the power to detain that those other folks. We do send our um our PSOS, our animal control officers and other individuals, our harbor guards to powers of arrest. So they so the way our MUN code works is that um they have the power to detain but only through a police officer. They and I think it's it's meant to um um reduce injury and some type of you know you know um issue a problem to that that they may get hurt out into the field. Um so um while they while we do send them to school for powers to retain and for private persons arrest um they have that ability to do that obviously as citizens um um but right now we're not looking at um giving our folks any type of handcuffs or the ability to to to do anything like that. But our folks do carry pepper spray. They have they have asked for um defensive weapons such as batons that we are looking at getting our folks as well because we know that our PSOS probably touch more um homeless folks and actually get into um a lot more altercations than than sometimes of our officers are at the same kind of level.

Okay. And they'll be more visible I imagine. That's correct. Thank you. Um quick question for Jenna in the back there. Don't um SAML Bridge program has been extremely successful. I've been personally involved um both helping some individuals connect and I've just been so impressed with Exodus. I feel we have a lot of carrots in the systems all throughout California and not enough sticks to give folks um a choice um that is one that they'll take because the alternate choice is going through a judic you know the system incarceration system that we don't want them in. Um my question is when does that program funding stop and when does that program end and do we have plans to try to continue it somehow?

So we were lucky enough to get into a three-year grant cycle. So we are just about at our first one-year mark which will be May depending on when the funer decides we actually opened doors. So what I'm excited about is I think we have overresourced. So, we're actually looking to see will they let us keep the money if we don't spend it so we can maybe extend into a fourth year. Also, I think budget-wise, it's going to be a little bit easier to either come to council or to look at some other lower end grants because the $8 million, you know, I don't know if we'll ever get that again, but we are looking at making sure that we can at least keep the lights on and how much is that going to take. And I think we'll have a better understanding once we hit that one-year mark to see how, you know, overresourced and where we were overresourced so that we know if we come back to council and we can say specifically this is what we spent in a year. So my hope is that we will be able to keep funding at least for a fourth year through the BSC and again after we hit our one-year cycle mark, we'll know exactly what it takes to keep the lights on.

I'll just rec quickly for anyone who's watching. Bridge, unfortunately named similar to another program, um puts individuals and gives uh our police officers the ability to connect someone immediately to a place to get sober enough to make a conscious decision to get help. So there's more of a chance that they'll go to the next step. And I was fortunate enough to witness two um opportunities where someone who was a permanent fixture in front of Gellson's for three months um is now in Fremont in a living situation. Um so I think it's a successful program and I hope we can continue it. Thank you. One last question I wanted to ask you was just this increase and just a quick answer just what would you say overall um for those who say like now why are we prosecuting now? If you could be specific is it is it manager leadership is it like what has shifted that has created this increase from roughly 60% to almost 90% in filable cases

I think it's direction right it's leadership it is when you have a change in leadership you get new marching orders and you can either buy in or buy out right and we are a very collaborative city and we work very closely with our police department and we knew that this was coming and we wanted to make sure that we were giving the police department and the city residents the best service that we could provide. So when you're working hand inand not only on the back end filing cases but we work really hard to make sure the police are are have the information to do the right thing. So before they even had their change we were doing roll call trainings. We were providing them updated information as to how our meeting codes actually work. What is required to write those citations? What is required to write a good police report? Because if we don't get good police reports, we still can't file. No matter the change in leadership, if we don't have what we need, we still ethically can't do our jobs. So, we worked really hard with PD to make sure they understood quality of life crimes. Yes, they're kind of, you know, the lower end of the spectrum, but you still have to do your job. Reasonable. You have to prove things beyond a reasonable doubt. You have to have probable cause. You have to understand that a possession of a shopping cart actually requires the shopping cart to be labeled, right? very specific things that are in our code section that again if we're not there to help PD do their job right, we can't do our job. So I think it's a combination of again the city's really good at collaborating. We work really hard to make sure that we are in the forefront of collaboration because that's how everybody does better at what we're here to do which is provide a service for the residents.

I appreciate it. It sounds like there was a long leadup time to get to those numbers and I just wanted to point out that I I think the talk about filing more cases and being more proactive has been a conversation for even in the last council, but it sounds like there was a lot of other factors that went into getting to things don't happen overnight, right? So, I appreciate that. It it takes it takes a village to make these things happen. So, thank you.

Um Thank you. And Ed, I have a wastewater uh comment question. So th this was an item I brought forward and was told told unequivocally um and shot down on two occasions in 22 and 21 when it was really needed for postcoid for restaurants that we are cannot it's illegal you cannot wave fees we had roundts I brought in restaurants and then somehow we found the way and brought it back and I'm really excited about that but I will say that for those who did pay the fee who did have to pony up the $1,400 a seat what happens happens with them.

The way that the resolution is written, that's part of the attachment for the realignment report is that um anybody that has already paid the fee and been issued a building permit, unfortunately, is not subject to the subsidy that we're proposing. So, their so and folks that are currently in the process but have not been issued a building permit, we will happily um not take their payment. Okay. I understand that's a complicated place to be. I hope that in the future or I mean near future we can work towards supplementing those folks if they need some sort of tenant improvement that they're prioritized since they paid that wastewater fee and we're told that you know we couldn't wait.

I mean the I guess the one saving grace is that um the way that we've written the proposal is that it is for new restaurants but also restaurant expansions. So any future additive net new seats will be covered by the general fund. I got it. Thank you. Sure. I'm not and it's not you. I'm Yeah, I know you have to answer. Well, I was there in 22 so it kind of was me. Yes. Yes. You said no and now you say yes. You changed your mind.

Um all right. The last year for um our city manager physical office space. Uh it's sort of a combined question. Um I'm a big proponent of collaboration. I think we're a city government. Being in person is key. I really don't even understand why we're closed every other Friday because it's confusing. I think we could have an A and B staff. Um, and I think if we're going to talk about economic vitality and repopulating our cities, then we should be here and repopulating our cafes for breakfast and lunch and whatnot. Um, with that being said, two questions. um how are you going to balance and and how and and how is this new work plan going to be measured in terms of productivity with this new work from home model and furthermore do we find now that we have excess office space that we need to learn that we need to figure out how we can I don't know how we potentially get a revenue opportunities from it but it would seem like there's a lot of empty cubicle space and tons of empty office space in our new city hall east and potentially in this building as well. And I'm wondering if there's if you think this change in workforce is going to eliminate that empty office space or if there's some balance of maybe generating some revenue from this empty office space combined with I'd love to know how we think this is going to change um how we're going to be able to show that this is changing um the workforce and the output from having people come in. Certainly the um couple of things on the office space. Currently, we do have um a lot of office space at city hall east and main city hall. Um we're going through a process right now to identify every department how much office space we need and how do we map out and group work teams so they're all sitting close together. Um that's one of the things that's happened. We have teams that are know fairly fractured in terms physically

where they sit. Um the good news is we've identified there's enough room on the existing city hall campus for all of the work units and work teams to come together. We're working through that process. Um Susan is helping to lead that assessment. Um and when everything is said and done um I do think we're going to have um a variety of you know sort of um reoriented we're all going to move to different parts of the building in order to keep teams together. So, I don't know that we'll have any extra office space to lease out, but we'll definitely have everyone um everyone will have a space um as we work through this transition. In terms of outputs, I think that's one of the things we're trying to align right now. Um one of the challenges that we are seeing from an as the executive team has assessed how we're operating. Um given the nature of who is eligible for teleawwork which is primarily our supervisors managers um the leadership needed for frontline staff that aren't providing aren't um allowed or able to work remote the issues related to coordination internally. Um right now different departments even divisions within departments um the same department have different or varying um remote work schedules and then when you dive a layer deeper different departments even have um various requirements for how many hours you need to work when you're in person um where there's a limited schedule. So aligning all of that increases our ability to be able to have consistent language of how we're going to work. everyone knows then how the remote schedule get organized and how we can organize sort of a cadence of work around that. Um I think we're absolutely going to see gains in efficiency, gains in output moving forward.

Okay. Yeah, that was my main question just how we're going to keep track of how it's improving service delivery. Um, I understand we have to be flexible in this modern day to attract quality folks and certain jobs definitely aren't forward facing, but I do want to acknowledge that we are a city government and we serve people and I think there are plenty of folks that work at the city that just don't have the luxury of having that as an option, which I understand what is given the eight hours non-cashable additional for those folks. Um and just for the community because I had a handful of questions last night and this morning just to be clear the um directors or can you just break down really quickly like directors are coming in it's the other management that might have the Monday and Friday opportunity and then those that don't have that opportunity are getting this additional eight hours.

Yeah, certainly all executive team members are working fully in person at this point. That's the base schedule. um the way that um actually that's even another one of the issue every department has a different remote work protocol. So a manager in the library operation for example or a supervisor the library is fully in person. No one works remote there compared with um other departments where you do have the schedule there have been service level impacts um staffing related considerations for public counters. All of that is what we're hoping to get realigned as part of this protocol. Um the way the program is working, anyone who works in fully inperson schedule, whether by choice or by the inability to work remotely, will be provided with the eight hours per month of non-cashable, non-bankable leave. And then the last element of the plan, um it's it's a recognition that this is a transition where two days of remote work Monday and Friday is different than the program we've had previously. Um if this doesn't work for somebody given priorities life shifts um we do have the um support opt out program that we've developed concurrently.

All right. Thank you. That's it.

Okay. Uh three questions. Uh, I'm gonna address them to city manager, but if you think that someone else should should address it, then I'm happy to speak to the relevant department head, I just going to go this way just for time purposes. U regards the parking rates. Um there is a proposal now to move um from a 30 minute um I guess uh grace period to a 90 minute um uh I guess it would be $1 for the first 90 minutes. And I'm I'm just curious uh what is the fiscal impact of that compared to what we were proposing prior? the dollar um for every 90 minutes actually is um actually generates more revenue than the prior 30 minute model. Um what sucks up some of the revenue capacity based on our projections is the validation program. Um given the volume of validations for that and I think it really reinforces why it makes sense to think about um the need to create a validation program for high volume users. um you know just a handful of gyms um that cost factor was going to be somewhere around $300 to $600,000 in additional cost that they would have to bear. So the validation program helps um offset some of that. There's a revenue decrease. We initially projected roughly $9 million in revenue on the parking front. We've revised that down to eight and a half to take into account one the um dollar per 90 minutes um will actually increase revenues. The validation um will cost a little bit of money. It all sort of levels out to an estimated 8 and a half million in total ongoing revenue.

Great. Thank you. Um second question, remote work. Um, I think I I I generally support the the principle that we um get back to being in office. We have line staff that are here every day. We need managers that can be here too to create the culture um that we need. Um I'm curious just there was some mention I believe um that comment I received from some members of staff and then I think something in the presentation related to the those with 410 schedules and and how that could or could not be accommodated.

Yeah. No, there's definitely as part of the program there's additional um details to get worked out. One of the issues that have come up um is we've you know sort of assessed all the potential impacts um how is the 410 is the 410 schedule a viable option for certain folks in certain operations and so that's one of the protocol shifts where department head based on operational need will be able to offer that up as um an available schedule as we move towards this shift. and all of those details um we're going to be working out, you know, over the course of the next couple months as we move towards the end of the year.

Okay. And while I also agree that I think having a set um schedule, which most people are in office makes sense to achieve the goals that we're trying to have, I'm curious just as to whether there will also be some flexibility um related to specific people's um operational needs and schedules.

Absolutely. Um, one of the things we've talked a lot about as an executive team is, um, these are guidelines, right? Be responsible, be people oriented. Um, if someone has, you know, sort of a late meeting the prior night as a supervisor manager, take that into account and thinking about what we do. We've shifted a lot of internal um, regulations. Right now, we used to have a regulation you were were only allowed to spend, you know, a fixed amount of money to celebrate, you know, an employee or a team's um accomplishment. We actually had written it out. It's a specific dollar per employee. Um what we're trying to create is there will need to be a level of leadership provided by managers and supervisors. Exercise that um judgment. That's why you're in the role and be human about the issue. So we're definitely going to create flexibility within this as a set framework.

Okay. And then last question um related to the entertainment zones. When we say that the entertainment zone is expanding to the entire downtown um is that in in a permanent sense or in an activation sense? It's in an activation sense. Okay. It's just like the other areas on Main Street in Montana would be per activation. Correct. The only permanent zone would remain on the prominote. Yep. Okay. And then the open there was some mention of open container laws um changing as well. Is that imply that there's currently no law against open containers? I'm kind of confused why we would need to change that. Yeah,

sure. So, so I can help with that one. Um state law um makes clear that you may by local regulation prohibit open containers on kind of all of your public spaces. Right now it's limited to parks and beaches. So, we're trying to make clear that it is um prohibited in public spaces and really what and then also to make very clear that during the activation of an entertainment zone that you can't have open containers. So, those are the changes and I think what it does is it allows for where we want it to be and then it allows for enforcement outside of the areas where it's permitted. So, those are the changes that are before you this evening.

Everyone can take note of what the law is currently if you you know so interested. Okay. Thank you so much. That's all. Thank you. Um, and I'm sorry I I did wait until last, but I do have a few questions. Um, Oliver, how long until the Santa Monica scorecard is going to go live? Um, we have the spreadsheet ready. We actually have um um all of the internal um there's a cool new display platform that our team's been working on. Gosh, within the next couple of weeks, I think Sergio, in the next two, three weeks, we'll have it up and running

because I know there are some comments about that. Um, and in terms of the coming back in person, uh, I think all of us received several comments and I acknowledge them. Um, but I just want to clarify maybe for Dana, maybe for you. Uh, these we are dealing with represented employees and we do have to follow a meet and confer process. Is that correct? Yes, that's correct. Right. So, this this is not a done deal. It has to be negotiated with the union representation, which we have been engaged in. What we've let our bargaining partners know is we need to go to council. We've briefed them on the plan. We've um let everyone know we're going to come to council. If there is the authorization to move forward, we'll come back, work out the details with all of our marketing unit partners moving ahead.

Great. Because I think that engagement is important. Um on the Metroou, uh can you just ex explain, Chief or Oliver, since we're trying to be efficient here, what specific enforcement authority SMPD is going to have on the platform? Would you like Chief? Go ahead. Is it everything? Is it some things? Can you just explain for us?

Yeah, so we're looking at enforcing their writership program, um enforcing fair evasion, uh enforcing uh outside the county has a um a standard of conduct of rules that they're asking and so and so it's about getting training for that. Um it's all about writer safety um u along our platforms and along the train. And so those are those specific um things that we will be enforcing. And I believe we would be the first jurisdiction to have such anou with metro.

That's correct. That's why it's kind of taken so long with because well other cities like Long Beach has their portion of the train and so they enforce those on their train. Again, we're the only city that does not that we're looking at. We will be the only city that does not have the contract with the county. So we will not be receiving any funds um um for it. but is still enforcing it.

Okay. Thank you. Um so, city manager Chi or our economic development team, uh DTSM indicated tonight that they support the expanded ordinance boundaries, but they need operational deployment to remain at their discretion given the cost and complexity of running the program. Can you just confirm that the ordinance creates authority, but it doesn't actually mandate activation and that that would go to all of the zones that we uh have identified here. Is that correct? That's correct. The um the activation will occur when the event producer, in this case DTSM, if it's downtown or Main Street Bid or Montana, wish to activate it.

Okay, great. I just wanted to make sure because people were saying it's expanding everywhere and we it has to have a plan. Yeah. and and the and the next step post tonight is to work with those organizations to create the management plan that details exactly how that's activated and what are the conditions around which it happens. Okay, great. Thank you. Um and then wait, stay there. Uh on the wastewater fee, uh I I think you know I'm comfortable with moving forward with some direction here tonight, but I know you were I had asked about this in advance of this meeting. You were working up some options for us. Um I assume that we would need to have a follow-up discussion on if we wanted to subsidize more of the fee.

I yeah I would I would like to bring you a more reasoned approach that is backed by data. So today we started looking into uh business licenses to understand what the volume of restaurant openings are or expansions. um working with CDD. We have an upcoming series of meetings with local architects and restaurant tours to understand what the most valued subsidies would be. Like in the grand scale of opening a restaurant, you've got to rent the space, you have to buy the equipment, you have to do the labor. Is the $400 the Hyperion fee, is that a meaningful, right,

subsidy or are there other ways that we could uh provide more relief um that are more significant and impactful? Great. So, I would just love if if you all could return with a a recommendation based off of what you see, but I mean I think heard loud and clear that there's still some concern about I think we can do that when we come back with the retail activation retail to restaurant activation program. We can kind of combine those into one. Great. And can we call it something else? Um I will look for a good acronym and then build the words around it.

Great. Um yeah, just because I think it is important that council at least look at the guidelines um in terms of where we're spending this money and how it's being prioritized from an equity perspective and from an impact perspective. Um and we're not giving direction. So that's why I just asked that. Uh and then um just on 311, Mr. Dishlip, since it's moving to your operation, I don't know that you need to get up, but you or city manager Can you just um make sure that we're going to track response times because I'm concerned that we're moving this out of the city manager's office. Uh we get a lot of people who are asking us questions that pertain to 311 issues. We know what's happening with them. I don't want us to lose visibility or or have a slower response time given this realignment of where 311 is going.

Absolutely not. And again, that's part of why it's coming to public works, right? is if three out of every four uh tickets or issues that comes up is in public works, right? Like let's have full ownership over it, like let let's work through those issues that are causing these these problems. Um and yeah, and I would just say you all have been excellent at responding, so I appreciate that. Yeah. Yep.

Um okay, those are all my questions. Thank you. I I had other ones, but I think we need to move it along here because it's it's getting late and we've spent a lot of time on questions. Uh so now we will move into uh direction and comments and then we will move on to items 21 and 22. So council member Negrete.

Okay. So I just wanted to offer some uh direction if possible and I'll I'm not going to get too in the weeds. I've talked about it um with staff when we came up with the entertainment zone. Um, when it first came out, I discussed having the opportunity um, of having like a QR code where folks would scan at the restaurant when they're purchasing their beverage. It would capture some information that we would know where these folks are coming from, their um, capture their email, and it would give both the restaurant participating in the um, entertainment zone and DTSM and the city abroad the opportunity to invite these people back to more um events that either that independent restaurant's having or the city's having. It would also give us an opportunity to gauge the success if people are eating, dining, um visiting. We could capture demographics um and more importantly um the idea was that this program could then have we could have safe ridership um entities like Uber, Whimo, whatever. they could pay for advertising on there and it would notify folks like 15 minutes before the entertainment zone closes that it's ending. If you'd like a safe ride, please click here. So, think something to consider because what we do not know, we we've seen events happening. We don't know if it's resulting in uh sales um for restaurants or stores. And this might be an opportunity to not only capture the data of the folks that are coming, reinvite them and continue to grow the list of people coming to future events, but really kind of manage and understand whether or not these folks it's turning into new revenue for the city or they're just showing up for a dance party. Um the other thing that I wanted to point out about Golden Voice, what I've heard from I met with a few of the hotels and travel and tourism, they're very concerned that we haven't been specific with the date and people have weddings. I know I got married in a

September and um we were at Kasa or shutters taking photos and I would be mortified if my pictures were ruined because there's a huge blockade thing in the background or there's roadblocks and you've got hundreds of people coming in for whatever whether it's a bot mitzvah or a wedding or a birthday or whatever corporate event. So, I'm hoping that we um orchestrate with the hotels on those dates as soon as possible because if you have to change dates for events, they eat the cost on that. So, I don't know if the teams thought about that, but I just wanted to make sure that that's top of mind that we're working to solidify exactly when it's happening because they're going to have to reach out and tell people and they might have to change their dates. Um the other thing I just wanted to offer up was just um for for the entertainment zone as well like who is in charge is it I know we're working in partnership with downtown Santa Monica but it's sort of I know we're putting policy to allow things but when it comes to like the activation and the coordination of that is sorry to ask that question but

it's um ultimately it's the entity that's sponsoring So in the downtown area right now it's DTSM. They put together the management plan. They put together the staffing plan. We vet it. We approve it. They operate it. Um it'd be a similar setup on the pier on Main Street and Montana. The operator um you know on Main Street Montana likely the bid um would have to put together the management plan that we would vet and then approve. They would be responsible for executing. So I would just say as we move forward with all these activations that we continue like this one Samo mentality and we have a map and we have a calendar where not only can the differing bid groups downtown Santa Monica um even the mall um also see what is happening in and around the city but that we're having a more collaborative effort around planning so that we're not overlapping events all on the same day and we're allowing for a map for people to literally move throughout the city from, you know, say on Fourth of July, from the parade in the morning all the way through potentially whatever events in a drone show or something at night. So, we keep we capture those folks staying in the city. So, I hope we can produce something that's we've talked a lot about it where we're really coordinating with all the different entities so that Montana Avenue is having something, if the mall's having something, we're playing off each other and we're communicating and there's this sort of coordinated effort. I just want to say that um you know for me it's a triangle. It's I ran on public safety, homelessness, and economic recovery. And I really want to uh say that I appreciated seeing public safety at the top of this report because we cannot have economic recovery without public safety. And homelessness is clearly 72% of um the calls uh associated or rather the arrests. Maybe the calls are roughly 20 some oddhat percent, but I think we've we've heard, we've seen and we're making the changes. It takes a while to get there. Um, but I

think there's some swift action since you've been brought on as city manager and we have our new police chief. And I just want to say thank you because this is a very um clean laidout plan that addresses those top two things. Um, and I just want to continue to move forward in that direction because to me, if we don't have a a handle on the folks that are roaming around our street that are putting pressure on our infrastructure, um, and are putting pressure on our economy by way of whether they're in doorways or just maybe not doing anything illegal, but creating an unsafe environment, an unclean environment, we're not going to recover e economically. People won't want to come back. So, I appreciate that everybody's working on all things at the same time. the glow up, making it a clean space and also making it a safe space um so that we can really invite businesses back and keep businesses here. I appreciate the teams working on, you know, taking away fees that maybe were burdensome before. Um I think we're doing all the things at once. I just want to keep our foot on the gas, especially as it pertains um to public safety because I think we're going in in the right direction. Um, I just wanted to, we've talked so much about this behind the scenes and I don't want to do a lot of political theater up here. So, I just wanted to say thank you and also give some of that entertainment direction out loud here because I do think we've got to really understand if these things we are doing are actually resulting in spent dollars in our city and the only way to do that is to capture that data. So hopefully we can consider that along with coordinated efforts around events. That was it. Thank you. Thank you, mayor, and thank you, staff, for the presentation. Um, you know, I think any elected official would say that election night is a really incredible feeling and night. Uh, but I I will say that the amount of pride and gratitude that I think all seven of us

have in the city staff tonight certainly beats that. Um, you know, seeing seeing the changes that have been made since uh our city manager has come on board, our city attorney has come on board or has been elevated, all the department heads that have have come together and um some who are new, some who have been elevated, some who have been here for a long time. Uh it's it's really incredible seeing all this work come together and I'm deeply grateful. Um I hope another thing that the community sees is that uh this update to the realignment plan incorporates many changes that we have uh heard from the community whether it's the parking rates in particular um you know we are open to feedback and are open to iterate. So if something is not working for you in this city, we hope that you come to us, you come to city staff so that we can figure out if there's a way forward. Um as far as direction goes, uh I don't think I saw a lot about like arts uh in our um economic recovery plan. So I would just ask that as we're thinking about economic development, obviously there's major projects that we're contemplating, um major events that are coming, how can we incorporate arts, uh which is very important to our community in in that those efforts. Um, finally, I'll just say, you know, I I think a lot about leadership and how teams are led and and I often quote the definition of leadership that I learned in the army. And that is the process of influencing people through purpose, direction, and motivation to accomplish a mission and improve an organization. And uh, Mr. City Manager, uh, city attorney, um, y'all are doing just that. Uh, and to all the executive team, you all are doing just that. So, uh, on behalf of all seven of us, on behalf of the community, like, thank you for all your work. Um, it's really

incredible to see this come together. Thank you. Council Rascin.

Yeah, I want to echo what, uh, my colleagues have said. Uh this presentation tonight is really the culmination of a lot of hard work, long nights working on on on making uh really tangible impacts that uh we've all talked about as being core to what we want to accomplish in the community. Uh the department heads who've come out here tonight and all city staff uh have really uh shown just just how much talent we have here in our city. Uh I'm just so incredibly proud like like my colleagues have said of the work that we've done here locally. Um you know of of a city of our size that the the depth and sophistication of the issues that we deal with on a daily basis never cease to amaze me and uh I'm really looking forward to the future here. I think it's bright. Uh I'm going to go and make a motion to approve um the staff recommendations for items one through 20 in this item.

Second. And I have just two comments that I don't think necessarily have to be encompassed in the motion, but I think reflect at least if if not I think the consensus of viewpoints here. Um, you know, certainly points that that ring true to me. Uh, one thing that I I I think I heard from from the questions that came out earlier is that I think on the vehicle habitation side and the sit ordinance, I think we're we're all looking for a human centered approach here. um one that does not criminalize uh those who are unhoused. Um you know, I think what we've seen from the latest um almost surveys is that we have a lot of people living in cars in Santa Monica. Uh and I think it's it's yeah um you know it's something we're working towards solving and connecting people with resources but you know chief as you spoke to earlier you know making sure that our enforcement process really connects folks with resources uh and proven housing first solutions that that have been proven uh to be successful. Uh the other point I I I' I'd make which I don't know if there was a consensus that that came out of the questions but um you know certainly with respect to remote work programs um you know my preference would be for us to also take human focused approach here and to the extent that there are compelling needs for folks to have more flexible work arrangements. I I think it makes sense for me for department heads to have a little bit of leeway to find arrangements that work both for retaining and attracting top talent. Um, but having set and clear expectations I think is is is critical to promoting fairness and equity across the board and uh I'm certainly in favor of of working towards that. Um, but you know, life is complicated sometimes and sometimes we have to have a little bit more of a flexible approach.

So, uh, with that, uh, we got a motion on the floor and, um, my time. Can I can I just make a friendly amendment? Um, I would just ask that our cultural affairs division be kind of embedded in the entertainment zone and economic development planning. Um, that was something that we heard and I think we do see arts and culture like as a um, beacon uh, in Santa Monica. That's important to us and it attracts uh, folks around the world. So, making sure that cultural met metrics are in the Santa Monica scorecard and that we're just embedding arts and culture work uh into the economic development work is what I would just as as a friendly amendment. That's a good point. Yeah.

Okay. C um um city attorney, you came in the queue. So, was there something you need to tell us? Um before you vote on the motion, we have a correction to read into the record. So, whenever that suits the council, we can do that. Okay. We have two other comments. Council member Rosenkaya and Council Member

Snell. Thank you. Um, so first, thank you to our city manager and all of our incredible city staff for collaboratively working together to be responsive of our community's needs. Recognizing that there's still a lot to be done, I'm very proud of the work that our city staff has accomplished through the FA framework of the realignment plan, and I'm impressed with the progress that's been made thus far. we've been delivering on what our community has told us is important to them and the actions that we'll be taking today uh will help our city succeed and thrive. um to kind of add on to what some of my colleagues have already uh stated. Uh, so I noticed that there is some direction around um art in in Santa Monica as part of the recommended actions and I would just appreciate that we I would just recommend that we continue to weave in public art into elements of the realignment plan and I'd ask that we continue to look for and take advantage of opportunities to incorporate art of all kinds in the public realm whether it's funding opportunities for art on electrical boxes is partnering with major events producers to develop opportunities for local artists to showcase their work as part of the public engagement efforts or other creative ways to weave in different types of arts um including performing arts into our lives. At a prior meeting, uh we did also update certain city ordinances around allowing more businesses that may offer alcoholic beverages. And as we're expanding the entertainment zones, I want to be um I I want to make sure that we are being mindful of potential risks. So, if my colleagues are amendable, I would ask that staff explore the possibility of developing an ordinance around nightlife bystander intervention training similar to that of West Hollywood, which requires bystander intervention training

for employees of businesses that serve alcohol for onsite on-site consumption, including bars, lounges, and clubs, and probably others as well. Um, and the city of West Hollywood actually partners with the UCLA rape treatment center which is located here in Santa Monica for these train trainings. So, I think that would be a really great opportunity. I am so so excited for everything uh that we're doing to help us deliver on our goals. And let's see what's next. Thank you, Council Member Snell.

I'll be brief. I I want to also um commend city staff and uh Oliver Chief for the report that we received today. It's a really a great first step with what we're doing right now. Uh if I could u also uh just uh echo what Councilman Raskin has said that to have some kind of flexibility when we start talking with our bargaining units about how we're going to set forth with the um bringing folks back and um I I do know that uh this is something that uh is concerning for for some staff members and so I know you're going to be talking with the bargaining units regarding it and understanding that individuals um have been work remotely for some period of time and and so I want I want management to be very considerate of it. Uh in addition to it, I hopefully as we move further with with the plan that we will uh see more uh direction with respect to uh those businesses that are empty and how we're going to interact with our our um our businesses that uh do not have activations at this point and I'd like to see more direction with respect to that. And then finally, um I I'm I'm I've heard many good reports about uh our deployment in downtown and I want to give the chief uh arousing reps with what what's happened with respect to it. Um it's directly affected uh u our nonprofit. Uh I'm just going to be very candid with it. We had incidents with our nonprofit and um immediately the the uh police department was there in no time. And I I'm very uh happy and I want to thank our chief for doing that. And so going further, I I realize that we

still have a lot of work to do. Uh I understand that, you know, the projections with our finances are looking good, but we obviously will talk more when we get to our budgeting in May as to where we head with our financing. This is really an incredible first six months or eight months of your operations, Oliver G. And I I hope to that this kind of information is one that we uh continue to see, but also be very candid with u when we're not meeting those goals to be transparent and open with the community about doing it. So, I want to thank everyone from every department and um I'm going to support uh the motion as it is. Thank you.

Great. Let's have a vote. Oh, councilwick now went in.

Just want to say thank you to everyone. Echo the comments of my colleagues. Um I I didn't think necessarily I' I'd be on the dis seeing the kind of numbers that that we were able to see today, both in terms of our city's finances and in terms of the uh uh way in which we are um u ensuring safety and a sense of ease among residents. And I really hope that those that that have a certain impression of the downtown in the prominade. Um if they haven't been there in a while, check it out. Uh it really feels night and day when I'm there. And I I encourage our our our community to to to take a walk down there if they haven't recently because I've been really amazed. So thank you to Oliver, thank you chief. And thank you to all the department heads. I'm really happy we've made so many um um internal hires and promotions and I think uh everybody is is is really living up to um uh the reputation we have here for having the best staff in the state. So, thank you.

Great. Uh Council Member Zernitzkaya, I just want to confirm with the maker and seconder of the motion that it's inclusive of the direction that we've provided as well. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, thank you for bringing that up. It's a really important point. I'm glad that you said it.

Great. Thank you. So if I if I may just read this quickly into the record. Um the correction is to attachment C which is the ordinance establishing the additional entertainment zones. Um the correction is to Santa Mona comm what will be Santa Monica Municipal Code section 6.44.030e1 on page 8. There are two corrections to that section. The first is to replace Colorado Boulevard with Pico Boulevard. that will establish the northern boundary as Pico Boulevard rather than Colorado Boulevard. That was a that was an inadvertent um mistake. And the other is a um as a drafting issue and it would just would strike the words for the following streets.

Great. And uh I just want to say one more thing. We're we had also directed that uh the economic development department just come back with uh the guidelines for the $3 million and also the wastewater free options. Um so I guess we can take a vote now. Council member Zarnskaya. Yes. Council member Snell. Yes. Mayor Timwick. Yes. Council member Rasin. Yes. Council member Hall. Yes. Council member Negrete. Yes. And Mayor Terosas. Yes. With pleasure. Congratulations everyone. Now we will move on to item 21. Um and that is uh council or mayor promick will be

oh I'm sorry first. Thank you. So this is really brief, right? Very brief. The next two items will be

quick. Um the items number 21 and 22 are more direction to um engage outreach and direction to engage analysis. So with um council member Hall out of the room um the first item um one slide to run through the housing first system of care something is something we've been discussing with the council for a while related to um a potential shift in how we coordinate our homeless response approach. Um ultimately um at a high level what we've been thinking through is um does our current model which relates to um really on homeless response a sheltering model with Sam Michelle and the access center in the downtown core. That's really the only piece of infrastructure that the city operates. We've been thinking about the possibility of shifting our homeless response um design to one that is a housing first model where the city could potentially control and access sheltering, interim um housing, permanent housing. So you can move folks through a continuum as they're ready to be able to drive better accountability and end results um such that we're also prioritizing a Santa Monica priority population. Um we haven't made any final decisions, but there is an overarching framework and a plan that we've discussed with the city council um to transition potentially to this housing first system of care. Um our team in HHS has developed um an outreach plan that if this is authorized tonight, we would start engaging all of our different um community groups um internal boards and commissions, neighborhood associations, service providers, um internal staff over the next couple of months come back to council in June with an assessment of

what we found um and a series of recommendations on next steps. So tonight, that's the direction we're seeking is authorization to start all the outreach process to start identifying how the transition from a current model um that is um funding shelter related capacity to a housing first model might operate. Bring those results back to council here in a couple months that mayor will turn it over to you. Great. Um I I don't I don't see any requests, so I'm happy to make a motion or Okay, great. Did you want to go like to move this item? Great. Uh, fantastic. Let's vote. I'm sorry. Who second? Oh, council Rasan.

Yeah, I'm I'm generally supportive of engaging in a community process to solicit feedback. Um, I'll say for the record that I have some hesitation about um moving away from an access center style model. Um, but to the extent that the motion is just to solicit public feedback, I'll support that. Mhm. That's correct. And I would further add that I think we wanted to see options for um a distributed access center model as well. Correct.

Um, and I does this pertain to the nonprofit housing development corporation item yet? That's the next one. Okay, great. We'll wait for that. Okay, so let's take it was motion by Negrete, seconded by Erneskaya. Council member Zernaya, yes. Council member Snell, yes. Mayor Protemp Swick, yes. Council member Rascin, yes. Council member Hall is absent. Council member Negrete, yes. And Mayor Terosas,

yes. Fantastic. Um, maybe we'll do a changing of the guard and you can tell Council Member Hall to come back. Oh, he's already here. Okay, great. Oh no, I everyone's leaving. I feel lonely. Mayor, I'm totally kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding.

Prom Zwick leaves the room. Um, last item to run through related to action item 22 really is um, authorization to engage a staff um, assessment process related to the possibility of um, developing um, a nonprofit type housing development entity to try to accelerate affordable and mixed income housing production in town. Um, at a high level, there's um, some really interesting models we've assessed across the country, namely Housing Opportunities Commission in Montgomery County, Atlanta Urban Development Corporation, um, that are doing some interesting mixed income affordable housing development where via a nonprofit entity to supplement all of the low-income housing tax credit um, type affordable housing. um really looking at securing private bank financing, taxexempt financing to try to accelerate um using custom income bands, mixed income type housing projects that could link to a larger system of care that a city or a jurisdiction is working to develop um developing that opportunity. I think we've got terrific staff on our housing team that's ready to engage this assessment. We've also got terrific partners in the community like CCSM that we can lean on as part of the process. What we're asking the council for really is the authorization to start that assessment um to study is there an applicable model that might make sense for us in Santa Monica. And certainly as we engage that process, we'll keep everyone informed um and leverage all of the existing resources and and knowledge that we have with um partner agencies here in Santa Monica moving ahead. So, with that, Madame Mayor, we'll turn it back to you. The recommendation is to authorize staff to study this nonprofit housing development model moving forward.

Great. Uh, Council Member Bhal, thank you, mayor. Um, so this proposed nonprofit housing development entity, it sounds like the goal here is basically to create a model of social housing. Is that correct?

Something similar to that. Yes. that where through um a nonprofit model that's set up can um if it is aligned with the city. One of the models that we have seen is um potentially there are members of the council that serve as the directors of this separate legal entity which would have the sole purpose of developing um mixed income affordable housing that links to broader city goals. Is that an opportunity that makes sense for us? Again, there's some great examples across the country and internationally. We think studying that makes sense at this moment. And just can you in plain English explain how social housing works high level?

Yeah, for sure. Um ultimately right now if you're looking um at directly on this model um the owner of the actual land and the developer of the housing that would manage the housing project that would send the rent related um structure. How much affordability do you want to achieve within that particular project? That would be something that's um leveraging public resources, public land, public financing um but developed in a way that has a private sector development model where rent roles would have to justify the investment to acquire construct the actual project. because there's no um ultimate um revenue incentive or profit and motivation for the entity. It allows the entity to potentially develop much more um a larger quantity of housing um much more quickly than you can with traditional um current tax credit finance-based affordable housing models.

So, just to clarify, in our current affordable housing structure using LIHC, it's restricted to a certain income level that's typically low, very low. Um but with social housing, we would have tiers of incomes where higher rents would subsidize the the lower rents. So you'd have mixed income families uh income tiers throughout the building and that's in essentially like kind of the private market is developing the affordable housing.

Exactly. where you would look at again with the goals of you know the entity um and the board of that entity would you say in a you know a project you know 30% would be market rate you know 40% would be um workforce and then the remaining 30% would be low income housing based on income bands that we could describe and create you could crunch all those numbers and figure out can you finance that project based on that um payer mix that rental mix um it creates it's an interesting model. It's shown to be successful in different jurisdictions. It's something we think makes sense to study here. Okay, great. Thank you so much, Council Member Snell.

So, I know it's just conceptual. So, how do you see our um our nonprofit housing um uh advocates being able or companies being able to work with us on this? How do you see what what do you see the relationship with respect to that? I'm just curious.

No, I think that's part of the reason we're recommending we assess like is there a way to partner with um you know local established affordable housing developers using you know primarily LITC based funding to advance affordable housing. Is there a way to partner with a CCSM for example or another affordable housing entity? Um that's what the assessment would really study. You know, there are some good examples again, Montgomery County, Atlanta Urban Housing Development Corporation or two that are often studied and cited. Um, how do we get into the details of what would that look like technically? How do we partner um with, you know, really the knowledge base that's built up here locally with partner agencies? That's what we be what we would be assessing.

Okay. Thank you, Council Member Rascin. Uh, just two questions. So, um, the staff report used the term, uh, workforce housing and, um, I'm hoping we can kind of clarify that the targets at some point and, uh, you know, understanding that LISC financing isn't necessarily available for moderate income or other, you know, close to moderate income um, bands within the affordability spectrum. So um you know don't necessarily have to answer that now but as we move forward you know maybe just focusing on what the targets are of this model. Absolutely.

And um you know obviously we've heard from community partners here who are working in the space. I I don't think that you know that the purpose of this goal of this is to displace any of the important work that's been done but to complement it. And so I I'm hoping that when this comes back with a concrete proposal, uh perhaps we can tweak our usual staff report process and let folks have, you know, at least a few weeks to digest and comment on the models before um taking the action. Absolutely. Okay. Thanks.

Yeah. And I would just say um wholeheartedly agree. I was going to make that point, but can you just explain to me how we initially capitalized this entity? There's a um that's part of what the study would assess. The city's got um some interesting resources. Is that some place that we might invest housing trust fund dollars? Is that something we would partner with uh you know a CCSM to figure out a financing method? Um the startup of such an entity is challenging. um is there city land or publicly owned land that could be contributed to help start the um process um and the pro the entity up? All of those things will be what we study here moving forward.

Okay. And then I would just ask that we ensure that we're consulting with kind of regional housing development experts and LCASa who in order to capitalize the entity had to actually levy a sales tax. That's why and they did look at the Montgomery County model. So, I just want to make sure that we're doing something that is uh you economically feasible, which I know you have a lot of experience in having done this. I think it's great. Um just want to make sure that we're consulting with people outside of the city. Yep. Absolutely. Okay. So, I'd like to make a motion, right, to uh give direction uh motion with the nonprofit housing uh development entity.

That reportation, right? Yeah, I'll second that. Okay. Ready to vote? Council member Negrete member Hall. Yes. Council member Rasin. Yes. Chimick is not here. Council member Snell. Yes. Council members. Yes. And Mayor Terrosus.

Yes. Great. Thank you um so much. Well, what a great ending to the realignment plan update. Um, I don't know if council members Wick can attend or can come back, but we do have uh I think we will hear the appointment first and then the special meeting item. I'm sorry.

The appointment first and then the special meeting. Sorry, the I've been, by the way, I've been told that unless we're literally talking on the microphone, it's hard to hear us. So, uh, we will hear. Okay, people are taking a bio break, which is great and necessary. Um, but let's do the the appointment first. Okay. So, we're going to be doing the appointment for the landmarks commission. And all of you should have your the barcodes. I've never done this, so be patient. Okay. And we're doing the rank. So, we're going to do the rank voting for this.

I believe we need to do our nominations. Nominations first. Hold on a second. Let me open it up. Okay, so we have four applicants. Joseph D. Rosa, Joseph May, Carol Limley, and Robert Price. Do we have nomination? There's one. There's one seat. Yep. Council member Hall. Wow, we have a lot of people in the queue. Council member Hall like to nominate Carol Limlin and Robert Price. Council members Swick. I'd like to nominate Joe Cohen. Great. And I will nominate Joseph Joseph D. Rosa.

Okay. All right. Go ahead and vote. Did you guys vote?

Yeah. There's five of you. So, two still need to vote. Okay, there you go. Okay. Okay. So, Carol Carol Limley She has one tour. She won.

Okay. Congratulations, Carol Lemline. You've been appointed to the Landmarks Commission. Um, and we appreciate everyone because it takes a lot to step forward. Um, all right. I think with that, we have um moved the the other appointments. Correct. Yes, that is correct. And I just want to make sure um Council Member Zernesky, did you want to say anything about uh 16I?

Yes, I would love to. Um so, as we've seen, we've had um Lawrence Cohen come from um come to promote the Dunham run in April. Previously, we had gotten a request to support funding for it. Uh so thank you mayor for joining me in helping allocate some funds to help make that event a reality. And um as April is uh sexual assault awareness month, it's very important that you know we make sure we're making folks aware of this issue in in light of um kind of the news of last week uh with I don't I don't have to specify but um it's around us more than I think we know. And I would also just like to ask if any of our colleagues would like to help contribute uh from their discretionary funds as well. Um we're each contributing $1,000 from our discretionary funds. The the total amount requested was I believe closer to 6,000. But uh you know if anybody would like to contribute I invite you to do so. And with that, I'll move the item unless anybody

if anybody else wants We're at 2,000 right now. This is like an auction. Um I'll see your 2,000. Are you guys just putting like a thousand? Thousand each. I'll put a thousand. Great. Thank you. We're at three. All the women putting in the money. Just saying. Women councilwick. Well, I had requested to put in a thousand, just didn't call on me. Oh, I'm so sorry. Council member Zwick also wants to put in a thousand. Council Rasan. Yeah, I'm uh happy to support this. Uh it's a really important program. Happy to also add a thousand. Okay, great. We're at five.

Council will put a thousand in also. We're at six. We're at six. I think that was great. That was their request. Okay. Who's going to make them make as well? Okay, we're up to seven. Wait, 7,000. No, wait. Sorry. You're putting in one. So, we've all contributed one. We're now contributing 7,000 Sergio to the Denim run if I don't know if you're the one who's going to be okay. What? Okay. Can we do I'm sure they'll take We still need to We still need to vote on the original thousand. We need a We need Okay. I will move the item with the amendments that each other of the our other colleagues have contributed a thousand second.

And in the event that they deny taking $7,000, Dan Hall, who came in last, will get his $1,000 back. That's my just point of order. I hate to be a stickler about this, but I mean, we did not agendaize an item that covered $7,000. Is this okay? Yes, I think it's drafted in such a way that it could reasonably be understood that other council members may be contributing as well. Okay. Thank you. But in the future, we can take a look at that with your um with your contribution items um to make it more clear that there could be some amendments like this on the dis. We can do that going forward. Okay. I feel better about that. Thank you.

Can we take a vote on this? Yep. Okay. Council members, yes. Council member Snell, yes. Mayor Timlick, yes. Council member Raskin, yes. Council member Hall, yes. Council member Negrete, yes. Mayor Terosas, yes. Okay, great. Before we go to the next item, I'm sorry, we skipped an item that I need I need to have a vote on on 16H, I know it was um I'm sorry, apologies. 16H. I know it was it was probably going to be moved, but this is

this is for the measure GS residents oversight committee and there's um they want to have the seat become absent. They want to have it vacated because of absentism. Great. Um I will move that we remove Anujan Jivie Prakash from the measure GS resident oversight committee due to point of order. Do we need to reconsider the item and bring it back out since we removed it already? Well, no. We didn't remove it because the appointments. Okay. I apologize. I thought we had removed it. Yeah, we had only moved moved the appointments. Thanks. So, who second it? I will. Okay. And you guys can do this by voice vote. All those in favor?

I I Any opposed? Any abstensions? Okay, that passes. And I would just say um for the next meeting, I would like to actually do all of the appointments because we've put these off for a while and I think people have been waiting. Yeah, no problem. Great. That was the plan. Okay. Um, okay. So, then we have a special meeting agenda item which is request of the mayor and council member Hall and council member Rasin to direct staff to review and clarify neighborhood organization grant program um guidance.

Great. I will just quickly introduce this. Um, I think many of you heard on Sunday it came to my attention that some of the uh feedback or excuse me, some of the uh requirements in the neighborhood association grant application uh appeared in discrepancy with the original uh intent and guidance that was given unanimously by council. Uh and so I just want to clarify nothing in our original direction is changing but we are seeking to further clarify uh what we originally had directed. Uh questions were raised rightly so by members of the community about how that direction was reflected in the current application and I this action is simply about resolving that confusion. Um it would align the application and the guidance that with what the council has already directed. Uh and also it adds an additional element of an FAQ. Uh it's come to our attention that there have been a lot of questions about interpretation of the application and we just want to make it as simple as possible. Uh so again it would reaffirm the guardrails that public funds cannot be used for political advocacy. Um, it would not change our policy uh and not expand or restrict the original intent and not alter the rules around political activity, but neighborhood organizations should not be discouraged from applying because the guidance was unclear to them or they felt it it contradicted original guidance. I also want to clarify that um there's been a lot of discussion about mailers and postcards. We tried to clarify it in the letter of the motion here. Um just want to say that again the original intent and original direction of the council was that mailers mass mailers could not be used for uh list building but it is perfectly acceptable to send a mailer to people other than those in the neighborhood group to educate your community. Just like if I'm in Sunset Park and I am a resident of Sunset Park but not a member of Friends of Sunset Park, it would be acceptable

that I would get a postcard or mailing at my house to educate me about the events that are coming up in my neighborhood so that I could attend those events for community building purposes. Um, and again, we just want to promote civic engagement as well as compliance. So, simply that is it. And if anyone else wants to say anything, that's fine. Just offer one quick clarification. Uh you referenced political activity. The the policy decision we made was about endorsing political candidates. Um you know it wasn't a broad ban on political activity in general but candidates candidate specific action was where we drew the line. Correct.

And I just uh I I sincerely want to thank staff. I know that there's been a lot of back and forth. I apologize that this process has been less than clear for folks. Um, and we would direct that the application just be further refined. Uh, and I don't know if the city manager wanted to add anything.

I was going to just offer um, apologies for the confusion. Um, the interpretation of what the council directed. Um, certainly I think as we've reviewed everything further is on on me. Um, I didn't catch some of the wording in the actual application. Um I think that's what created some of the confusion. So certainly if this is um what the council approves tonight to clarify the determination um we'll certainly um update all of the um application materials and protocols, create the FAQ such that it reflects the council's direction much more clearly. Move the item. I'll second.

All right. Is there is there something written here?

Yeah, there is. I'm so sorry. It's right. It should be there. But I'll just I will just clarify that we want to explicitly state that neighborhood organizations may conduct education outreach related to ballot measures because there is some confusion about any of that related to ballot measures provided that those activities areformational in nature. Um the use of funds for communication including mailers to inform members and I would say to inform the public about events, meetings, programming is permissible but not for list building and uh membership building. Uh, organizations are required to submit a proposed annual budget at the beginning of the grant period, but uh, consistent with prior practice, as has been the practice since the program has been in place, they're not required to obtain pre-approval for each individual expenditure. There's some lack of clarity around that. Um, and also wanted to clarify that neighborhood organizations may host meetings between their members and individuals running for office, not candidate forms, but they can host meetings. They are allowed to talk to candidates provided that such activities are conducted in a neutral and information sharing manner and again any requests for demographic information is is strictly voluntary.

Okay. I just want to make sure you're we're just repeating the same there's no change literally what's in the um document. Yeah. I have I have a question. So those those uh neighborhood groups that have sent and opted out, they have the opportunity to go back in now. Correct. Correct. Okay. I just When you say that the requests are voluntary, you mean that the responses are voluntary. I mean, yes, we're not mandating that every single person fill out the demographic information. It's voluntary to fill that out. But they have to still seek it.

I mean, yes, they would. Uh Um, city manager chi or Mr. Ramirez, do you want to explain how we're planning to do that? The protocol that we'd um develop talking with neighborhood groups would be that the city would develop demographic election form that could be accessed online and that the neighborhood groups participating would have to ask um and request that um their members, their board click on the link, fill out the information. It would not be required, but the only requirement be that they ask for the information. Councelor Negrete. Oh, is anyone interested in modifying it? If it's not required, why put that extra pressure on having them ask that question?

Well, I think just to clarify, it's to the board. You said members be members of the board is what the intent item was. The original intent was the members of the board. So, the original intent was just to have the board members identify. Well, I yeah, I assume that as I remember it, we have access to census data on the demographics of neighborhoods. The question was comparing the composition of boards to the demographics of their respective neighborhoods. And I don't see why board members wouldn't be able to do that.

Ultimately, you guys are repeating what's already in there. You're just bringing it forward because people are asking questions. There's no change to anything. Well, there there were some discrepancies in the actual application, which is why we brought this forward and that couldn't have just been handled not here tonight as a special item because it's confusing that we're taking a vote on something that's already been voted through. I don't understand why we're voting.

Uh well, I felt like it was important because there was a lot of misinformation about what was required because there was certain wording on the application that had it inc that was incorrect. and uh we want to make it clear that the the application process which is currently closed can get be reopened to clarify this. I just my only comment would say that respectfully I think staff works with the neighborhood groups and it's I don't want to I don't know feels like throwing them under the bus a bit like about the wording and just that this clarification probably could have happened just directly with the neighborhood groups because now we're up here redising it and there's do we need to vote on this if this is not what action are we taking? Uh the way that the item is word is that the action would be to affirm that this is the clarification

and reopen the application, right? And to reopen the application, right? So it's basically saying that we if you know the mayor can speak to this but there is a recognition that there was some confusion based on the application that there was some questions out in the public that the application period would be extended through this clarification as well in case anybody wants to re like opt back in. Is that correct? Yeah. And I thought I felt like it was important enough to not wait 3 weeks until our next meeting to do that as the questions have continued to come in on how to interpret some of these things,

right? And I guess the folks dropping out, I don't know that it's going to change that, it sounds like, but it's up to that's their prerogative. Yeah, I would just say that my I know the goal is not to silence the neighborhood groups and for them to continue to attract people to be more involved in city government. Um, so I know some have said that they found advantageous to raise more funds by not opting in. Um, I just hope that regardless of who does what that these organizations are, whether they're not recognized here, that they're recognized as valuable organizations that um, still represent our community.

Of course, just like we would recognize issue advocacy organizations who also have, you know, different expertise and opinions. Um, council member

Hall test test. Um, I do just have one operationalizing question that I don't think I've heard a straight answer um from staff. So, in the budget allocation, we allocated $49,000. Um, several groups have indicated, at least under the previous round, that they were not interested in participating. Um, if upon closure of this new reopening, uh, we do not have all seven, we have some mix of of the neighborhood organizations, will that $49,000 then be divided amongst the groups that do apply based off of our rules on uh, rep proportional representation of of residents.

The um, I think

we can handle it that way. Actually, that's a good clarification point. What we had originally thought was um we've heard from other um individuals that have said that if um a group that currently exists doesn't form, could they apply to you know coordinate and utilize dollars for that particular neighborhood group via a new program or a new group that's getting coordinated. Um and so we were only planning on these are the neighborhood groups as they exist today. We weren't going to divide the 49 between all of the groups. But if the council feels like that makes sense, whoever applies, the full 49 is divided amongst those that do apply. We can handle it that way. For sure.

If I understand, I was going to ask the question as to whether other um whether other groups could apply for for that that fund. And I I would prefer that that be left open. So, it would be uh the $49,000 would be allocated based off of the current representation of households as was presented to us back in September, I think it was. Correct. And if a group chooses to not accept the grant uh for whatever reason, then that frees up that those funds for potential uh if if folks are forming other neighborhood representative representative groups to access that freed up fund, then

they would be allowed to apply for that. we um or if there was an event for the neighborhood that didn't actually apply um you know and an individual or group wanted to apply to create community gathering a block party that would be allowable use of those dollars and we would open it up for that particular use. Okay, that's helpful. Um I would say that I I I think that that is an acceptable use of of how we'd run that. Um and can we just make sure we include an FAQ on that FAQ? Thank you. Great. Okay, the there's a motion. Oh, council member Wick, did you want to talk again? No. Okay, there's a a motion and a second, I believe. You can voice.

Okay. All those in favor? I opposed. Opposed? Okay, no problem. Um, so that's six to one.

Okay. Uh, I believe moving on to adjournments. We have uh one adjournment. We are adjourning this evening's meeting in memory of Roger um who was our first four-legged employee of the city and the fire department. In recognition of his extraordinary service and lasting contributions, this meeting is adjourned in honor of the retirement and passing of Roger, the Santa Monica Fire Department's first peer support K9, whose gentle presence, loyalty, and compassion brought comfort and strength to many. Roger served with distinction supporting the mental wellness of firefighters, city employees, and community members during both everyday moments and in times of crisis. His ability to provide calm, connection, and reassurance made a lasting difference in the lives of those he encountered. We honor the care, dignity, and thoughtfulness shown to Roger in his final days, as well as the deep bond he shared with his handler and the fire department. His service reflects the very best of commitment and public service. Though his time was too short, the impact of his work will continue to be felt. Roger's legacy will live on through the lives he touched and continued support, continued efforts to support wellness and resilience within the department, and he's on the other side of the rainbow bridge now with all of our

beloved pets who have passed on as well. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Um, our next meeting will be in three weeks and we will see you all then. Thank you all so much. We're adjourned. And I'm still It was here