City Council and Authorities - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon and welcome to today's Stockton City Council meeting on this first day of September. Let's go ahead and do roll call.

Perfect. OK. At this time, I would like to invite up Police Captain Ben Carrillo to go ahead and do our invocation for today.

Thank you. Mr. Teramoto, can you go upstairs to my office and grab the two certificates off my desk, please? We will now move on to Pledge of Allegiance. And I'm looking for the person doing the pledge. Michelle Sherman, are you here? Oh, I can't see. You're behind the column, so I apologize.

I apologize for the delay. I have the certificate sitting right on my desk. And so as soon as it comes down, then we can proceed with the rest of the agenda. I can say that we have no additions to regular session. We will be moving on to recognitions, announcements, or reports. Do you have it?

OK, so Ms. Sherman, can you please come up to the podium? So we do have a copy. I just don't have the real one. So I will turn it over to Gabe.

I would like to ask if you wouldn't mind to explain a little bit about what the civil service commission does and the importance of it because not many people do and I know that there are members out in the audience right now from the police department and how essential that role is for the city of Stockton.

Yeah, I just want to give one reminder that the item referenced is coming up on the agenda. It is item 10.2. This time is for items that aren't on the agenda. Thank you.

Can you pause this time, please? That's an item on the agenda. It's item 10.2. So when that item comes up, you'll have the opportunity to speak on it. OK, thank you. Just make sure that he's in the queue for that.

I'm sorry. It's data centers again. That's item 10.2.

Okay, if you want to focus on water use, focus on water use.

Well, it's supposed to be on items not on the agenda. But focus on the water. But it's not fair. Excuse me. It's not fair. Excuse me. Listen. Remember, everybody gets a right to speak under public comments. It says specifically that it's for items not on the agenda. I realize you have a time constraint. If you can focus on water use, we're good. Okay? Excuse me. This is your warning. Another outburst like that, you will be asked to leave.

Okay, so we are moving then on to the consent agenda. Are there any items that council would like to pull? 6, 4, 5, 6, and 10. 6, 4, 6, 5, 6, 6, and 6, 10? Correct. I think I need to pull 611 as it, I might, or I don't vote on that item.

OK. So I will not be voting on 611. And it is because it runs right by my house. So the bike lane will be going on Lincoln. So I have to recuse myself.

We'll wait for 6-3, 6-4, 6-5, 6-6 and 6-10. People will be able to comment when those items come up. Otherwise, are there other items? If not, I will take a motion. Motion to approve. Second. Oh, okay. I will still, I'm still going to. There's one for 6.8 and that is.

OK. So we have a motion by Councilman Enriquez and a second by Councilwoman Padilla for the rest of the consent agenda. And I am recusing myself from 6.11. So roll call vote. And I'm recusing from 6.3. No. That one got pulled by Vice Mayor.

Except for 6, 11, which is 6, 0. OK. Let's go ahead and move on to item 6.3. Does anybody else need to disclose or recuse themselves from 6.3?

I'll make a disclosure. I don't know if it's a disclosure or not, but we were obviously the nonprofit that I am the chair of was awarded a grant by the state of California, but it's unrelated to this matter, and I won't receive any financial contribution or benefit from discussing or voting on this matter, but I will make that disclosure.

Okay. Thank you for that, city attorney. I don't know if that's an issue or not.

I voted on it the last time it came before, so there's no conflict. I'm not going to recuse myself.

He just said based on the merits of the...

There's no financial benefit to me, so I won't be recusing myself.

Yes. Can staff who are presenting or handling this please come to the podium? The reason why I'm pulling this item, just I think our legislative records need to continue to be recorded. This matter came before the council. That was not on an RFP or any other announcement to the community. We just awarded this person $300,000. We made a commitment. I think we've since asked if the money had been released. I think the city manager had informed me that the money had not been released or somebody in the city manager's office had not been released yet. My understanding, after this award, or when th

I think you asked it of staff. Well that was a question for said, but if if he has information that has a let let staff comment first and then we'll have public comment. OK OK.

It has been shared with us, yes. Can it be shared with council, please? Can we see that?

But I mean in terms of considering this item right now, I think Council needs to be well informed and see it now or we can hold this item and come back later.

He would do that we can do that and we'll just move then down to 6.4 if that's okay. Yes, okay So if somebody can let councilman Padilla know to come back for item 6.4 which is Accept the annual health benefit report and adopt the monthly premium rates for the city's to 2027 employee health plans

So first of all, I want to thank your department for bringing this item so early on in the year, because traditionally we get it towards the time that renewals are due. So I really appreciate you guys working on that. This has always been a concern of mine, because myself has to pay for health insurance, and I know health insurance premium rates are continually rising. So what I hear from employees is that they've asked several times, and I know I've asked City Manager Ford in regards to a percentage-based model. The employees are asking for equality and consistency, and we should all know the

Okay, I appreciate that. And so we're just approving the rates today and From now till three to four months, you'll be working on that model. Correct. Correct. And working with the unions. Okay. I just want to make sure that our city is financially feasible and that we are giving our employees choices. Because I've been a setter insured all my life. And at one time, my spouse then said, I can no longer afford it, so you're going to have to go to Kaiser. And, you know, it was like, oh, gosh. So I would just like, in the future, any way, you know, if we can get some more options for the employee

Okay. What about, you know, there's UnitedHealthcare, there's Blue Shield, Blue Cross.

Council member Pita kind of asked it, but I was just wondering what sort of other options, because I think that's great that you have more things within Sutter and more things within Kaiser, but I'm wondering, you know, what would it take to bring in like a third?

Now, percentage-wise, what percentage of our employees have Kaiser versus the Sutter?

So does that become problematic if it's more and more lopsided, in your opinion, with one of the providers?

Yeah, and it does seem like you'd get to a tipping point where that Sutter would pull out.

If there are no other comments will make a motion we have public comment. We have public comment on this one.

Okay, bringing it back to council, I do have a question. I'd like to know what is the, what's the cost of if we went to a, what if the cost if we went to a percentage base and then that would mean that there are no plans that are funded at 100%?

But I thought if we did the percentage, it would be across the border. It wouldn't be across the border.

OK, so what would the cost then be if we were to go to the percentage rate on the?

I figured you did the calculations while you were back there.

So with that being said, I know we have to have this done by October 1st, I want to say. We have two more meetings in the month of September. Could we bring this back on September 15th when you have those numbers? Is that possible? Because we still have a meeting on the 29th of September.

I would support that if my Council would support that.

I know we were talking about 85-15, but if you could also do a comparison with 80-20 just to give us some options. Absolutely.

Thank you. So I made a motion. Second. Okay, so roll call.

Wonderful. OK, so since we've got the document, we're going to go ahead and go back to item 6.3, which is, I've got to turn to it on my paper here, and that says the, which will be for the service first BCHIP grant change of location as I try to find it.

Yeah. So we'll bring 6.3. Oh, sorry. Councilwoman Padilla has to excuse herself.

And thank you, Alex, for the letter. And I did confirm as I sat here that this letter is one of the requirements that were met. So thank you for that. The second question I had is that my understanding is tonight we're considering accepting the location change. Is that what we're being asked? And so my question is, did the budget, because the 10% match for the grant, I believe at the time was $800,000 based on an $8 million award. If the location is changing, my understanding is the budget is significantly changing for this project, which means the match would change. Are we still saying as a council we're authorizing $300,000, or are we saying as a council we're authorizing up to a certain amount, and how are we managing the amount of money that we're assigning to this if the budget is to change and the cost goes down?

It's okay to find out what I'm confused the city's not buying a building.

Right. So the 10 percent, I understand how this works, but what I'm trying to understand is when this originally came before council, they were given a contribution letter of $800,000 without council approval. Once we brought it to council and we reviewed it, council was then tasked with a decision on what to do. This council voted six to one with me dissenting to award $300,000 to the individual towards the 10 percent match. My understanding is the budget is changing because the location is changing, which means it won't be $8 million. The grant approval will be less than $8 million, which me

Right and so my point is if that amount changes does our amount change and if not then the answer is no no OK thank you. Well that's that's the only questions I have obviously these needs are important to our community and I guess I would want to understand, so when the location changes, has the state accepted that change or what's the next process?

The last question, thank you, is once we submit the letter, What then are we doing to close the loop on this so like what's the vote look like do we then get a letter from the state or can we request a letter from the state confirming that everything is good or what was the process.

OK to the council is fine correct. OK, thank you.

Thank you, Mayor. Sorry, I did have another comment as I was thinking and hearing the comments. I want to clarify, just because the legislative record is important, why I started by saying I want to make a motion to accept this. Obviously, you know, this is a process that I'm familiar with and I know the needs of our community. Our community needs support and getting grants is not an easy task. But I want to slow down a little bit to say I started with the reminder of how we got here and i want to remind the community that this actual grant and the process in which we got here is already under

And so how then, before you leave, how then are we utilizing the letter of commitment of support for this match? How are we holding the funds given the concerns that were raised that were discussed recently in an audit committee, which is going before audit? How are we holding or addressing the funds from being released prior to knowing that the project is going to move forward?

Has the city verified the other $500,000 that was required for the 10% match? Have we verified that? Because here's the challenge, right? If we do give the $300,000, and then they use it to acquire the property, and then they're not able to move forward on the grant, then the city then owns another property that we're not going to use. Because we're not going to just gift them a property.

So given what you're hearing, we give 300,000, it goes into escrow to purchase a building. The building gets acquired by the applicant. The applicant unsuccessfully gets the grant from the state. Now what? How do we recoup our money?

But what I'm saying is you can buy the land and then not get the grant. So what I'm asking is what is our... what can we do as a city in obtaining those resources back? So we give the $300,000, all those documents, it goes into escrow, they acquire the property, the state denies the grant. What do we do then?

Yeah, I think the way this grant works, having gone through it, it's kind of cart before the horse. So I understand the sentiment of not wanting to lose the opportunity. I think we just for legislative record purposes and for the public watching, I think we just need to know, OK, we approve the $300,000 today. It goes into escrow with the paperwork. They secure the property. Now they own it. And then they don't get the grant. Do we now own a property that we can't operate?

Okay, so that would be my only concern, and that is that if for whatever reason, because this is a really interesting process, that they're not able to move forward, that we're able to control those resources. That said, and that caveat, and that's what I'm hearing we're going to do, and what I'm hearing very clearly is we're not going to give the money to a project that's not going to move forward, and that we will have all the legal, the stuff you went to school for to learn how to put in agreements to protect those resources.

Well, based on that, I know there's people that like the project, don't like the process. I share the same disliking for the process. And still, everything I've said before back on November 18th stands true. But I also am somebody that understands the needs of our community. And those needs need to be met. And this is a unique opportunity that will not revisit itself. And so with the caveat from our city attorney's office of making sure that we're protecting those resources and not absolving myself from the referral that I made to the agencies investigating it, I will move to approve.

We have a motion in a second Council will call.

OK, so let us have Councilwoman Padilla return. We are moving on to her next pulled item, 6.5, approve a motion authorizing agreement with Global Retirement Partners, LLC, Chester Advisory Group, a hub international company for investment and record keeping administrative services to support the city's deferred comp plans. Welcome back. Hello.

Thank you. In the agreement, it says $48,000 is deducted from the annual assets, and then it says there is no cost to the city. Correct. So can you clarify who bears the cost then?

So then it's basically coming from the employees' assets?

Okay, so then does this mean that it's no cost to the employees or the city?

Go ahead. Okay, so I'll bring it back to council for a motion. Motion to approve. Second. Roll call.

Moving on then to item 6.6, that is the resolution or motion authorizing agreement with Alliant Insurance Services, Inc. for benefits consulting services.

So they've been with us since 2022, and it just says that they've saved the city money. Is there any example of... how they save us in excess of $150,000 a year. Like, are they saving more than we're paying? Does that make sense? So they're consulting services. Correct. And they're a consulting service.

And it says that they're saving us money. So how much money are... they saving us and is it more than what we're paying them i'm sorry can you point to the page that you're looking at on the staff report oh i'll have to so it states that uh we're signing a

So just out of curiosity, we do this because of lack of staff.

OK, thank you. That's all I have. So I'll make a motion to approve.

We have a motion and a second. Roll call.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,

Thank you, Deputy Pierce. This is more of a comment. And just thank you for facilitating this grant. because we are getting constant reminders how bad our traffic is. And this is going to give us additional resources in which we can focus on DUI monitoring, as well as traffic enforcement. So I just want to say thank you, because anything we can do to help keep our streets safer and not bringing you know, not using funds or general funds is a benefit to everyone. So I just wanted to say thank you.

There's no other comments. I'll make a motion.

So with this grant, can y'all come to Western Ranch? Because I'm getting eaten up on Facebook today about the traffic. But it's everywhere. And I say, part of it is that people in the city just need to slow down. But yeah, bring some of that money to Western Ranch.

You know, now that you're promoted, you're so politically savvy. I still want you to bring it to Western Ranch. Thank you. Did you make a motion?

Motion to approve. We had a motion. Second. And a second roll call.

Okay. We are now done with the consent agenda. And we are moving on to administrative matters. Are there any items that council wish to request for a future item? I mean, a future agenda? No, seeing none. Oh, Councilman Villalpudo.

Yeah, Mayor, I would like to formally request that we bring Section 407 on the next meeting or the meeting after to put on the agenda 407 on the charter regarding a council member for a discussion for a potential vote. Can I get a second?

Second. Second. Okay, the staff, if you can look in that, I don't know if that's the city attorney then for that, or city manager, but just so you know it. Okay, any other items? Okay, no unfinished business. We will move on to public hearings. Public hearing for the proposed use of the 2025 Edward Wren Memorial Justice Assistant Grant. I declare the public hearing open and I don't know if Deputy Chief Pierce is coming back out or who's doing the presentation.

Sorry, I was taking notes. Okay. Any questions from council? Any public comment? Okay, bring it back to council then. If you want to accept the money.

Councilwoman Padilla, you have a question? Yes, I do.

My concern is long-term sustainability. So as taxpayers, citywide, we're going to continue subsidizing this neighborhood pool. And I know we talked about giving the pool back or releasing our liability from the pool. Do we have a long-term exit plan? Because I don't want to approve another 200,000 in 2027.

Okay. Any questions from the council? So, again, our options moving forward on this, could we sell it? I mean if they're only putting in.

Any public comment on this item. We have no public comment here. You had to have put a card in if you wanted to speak. Before the item was announced? Okay, come up, state your name for the record.

OK. I will close the public hearing and bring it back to council. Approve the budget or not approve the budget? And a second from Councilwoman Ponce. Roll call.

Okay. Before we go on to new business, if we could take a 10-minute break and come back at 3.05, that would be perfect. So we are adjourned until 3.05. Okay, calling the meeting back to order, we are under new business, item 10.1, approve a resolution authorizing an initial issuance of special tax bonds on behalf of the City of Stockton Community Facilities District, sorry, number 2025-1, Canary Park East, in an estimated amount of $7.65 million and not to exceed the amount of $9 million.

Any questions from counsel? I do have a question. So come 2056, when many of us in this room won't be here any longer, people will be able to, I think about Western Ranch. I think about other areas that have had a Melrose or a CFD. It's been paid off, yet they still end up getting charged. If this is paid off, do they then, are they, do they then, the owners have to apply to, Applier vote to get rid of the CFD tax to see if the special bond tax goes away It is no longer. It's written in there that it goes away. So as of 2056 Nobody will be having that attached to their tax bill.

does it go then back down after 2056 or could it potentially just stay that amount because it's for maintenance and continue to go up no i believe it does uh if i remember correctly i'll have to check okay good before i give you an answer i want to let me make sure and i ask that because You know, when people are filling out their loan documents, you know, they often kind of skip over it. They're so excited. They're buying a home. It's the home that they want. And they're signing all these papers. And they don't even realize what a CFD is. And they don't understand that it's on there. But it i

Well, I know there's people even in this audience as well as this city that would love to have streets that were only 30 years old Because we have streets that are much older than that. Maybe a hundred and thirty years old Okay. Thank you any questions from council? Public comment we have been okay bring it back to council Move to approve second we have a motion a second roll call vote

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you for the presentation. I'll say now I appreciate the work that all the staff has done with me over the last year and a half to prepare for the meeting we're having tomorrow with all the developers and the brokers and staff around the future development of District 6 and all the opportunities. And I love the presentation about all the unique and rich opportunities to develop in Stockton. You know, one thing that I will say is repeatedly I've said we need to find a partner to put Stockton someplace special at both sides of the freeway to start changing the narrativ

Thank you, Mayor. I just want to thank Ricardo because the presentation was very uplifting and energetic, which I appreciate, and super excited that we have you here. So thank you to CM Ford and that we have an economic director strictly focusing on economic development. And also, you have been extremely supportive and helpful in my district with the needs that my constituents want. So I want to thank you for that as well. You know, it was kind of funny in the beginning, you mentioned that we really need to promote our city and that's what I've said probably the last two years is that we need

Yes, thank you, Mayor. I as well as want to thank you for the presentation. I know about a few weeks ago we had a meeting downtown discussing. I think Jordan did a great job in highlighting and taking initiative of that meeting regarding downtown and what the community would like to have their inputs and sense to it. I know the last meeting that we did have it was a daytime and and it was very hard for a lot of people to Come to that meeting. So if we could have more of those means maybe have the one After hours five o'clock so other people could come in because I want the community to put the

Yeah, thank you, Mayor. Mr. Nguyen, I appreciate your presentation, and I agree with what my colleagues have shared so far and what they've said, especially the image enhancement and promotion of the community. There's a lot of great ideas, and I appreciate your energy because there's a wide array of things, initiatives, areas of the city you thought of with your team, and I appreciate that you touched on most parts of the city. I'm also thinking, and I have some questions, but I want to hold them off until after the public gives their comments, because I know there's a lot that's specifically

and i appreciate that and and i think what to this presentation i guess that would be my follow-up if there are things in motion then i would like to see that i'm sure my colleagues would like to see what's currently in motion because this is a lot so you know if you're putting st joseph's hospital expansion medium obviously Some of us most of us maybe all of us know that that's happening But I think knowing what's in motion is very helpful and then also in terms of any updates Hey, you know council I met with this partner as you know, we've been connecting with them for four or five months hy

Thank you, Ricardo. I appreciate your presentation. And it's exciting to hear about the potential for things to come. My thought, and Council Member Enriquez kind of hit on this, is just being in the loop of what's going on. I really would like to know, again, what's in the pipeline. But then as new things come, like when you do land that Texas project, Barbecue, you know, we want to know about that. Or Roadhouse, Texas Roadhouse. Ikea, you know, when you can get things like that, and I know there's some sensitivity that, you know, when you're in the negotiations, you can't tell us. But once s

So you weren't here in February when we had our meeting about council priorities. And I can't tell you when we've ever said economic development was a priority for the city of Stockton. But this council has said that. And you have delivered a plan that I hope we see flourish and grow and that it's smart and it is you know we're good neighbors that we are enhancing our community not hurting our community but what I will say is that you know that positive message that's something many of us up here have been saying the positive the positive because vice mayor is right people are scared the numbe

Thank you, Mayor. Well, first of all, I feel left out, because I don't know what the MC3. C3 program is, but I, oh, but then now I know it. Okay. No, she said a lot of things there. You know, when you talk about infrastructure, you know, one of the things we have to figure out, because I didn't, when I, once I got an office, I was like, we're going to South Stockton and we're building. They were like, not with them old pipes. You know, I didn't even think about infrastructure and how old the infrastructure in District 6 was. I'm like, what does that mean? So as I've learned and as we've talked

Moving on to public comment, Al-Azhar should be the first one to speak. He was who came up. Oh, press the button, please.

The speaker microphone's off. We're going to take a 10 minute break. We'll come back at 418. So we are coming back from our recess. I just want to remind everyone that council is here to hear everyone. There are 38 speakers that we will be hearing from. We've heard from four. Let's be respectful of everybody's time. When they come up to the mic, we're giving you our full attention, and you have your two minutes. So who is our next speaker?

Okay, so bringing it back to council, are there any questions or comments from council?

Yeah. Come up and speak. But people, please remember, she got to register. Come up and speak.

Okay, so now I'll bring it back to council for any comments. Go ahead, Vice Mayor.

Thank you, Mayor. Well, first I want to start by saying that I heard everybody that spoke, and I listened intently to everybody, including the young man from my district, and I really appreciate your civic participation. Um, I'm a little bothered by the idea that none of us are listening. The decision was already made as you read your phone, ma'am, because we actually came in here very open-minded and very eyes wide open to hear everything. And so it's a little offensive when we are paying attention, uh, and have done lots of meetings to understand how we got here. Uh, uh, this is not an agree

Thank you, Mayor. As a council member, you know, every day you learn something. Even though you're always prepared for what the agenda comes, but the community can always teach you something that you're not aware of. And I'm glad everyone spoke today. Things that we may not have been aware of, but today was a teaching. So I want to thank everyone for coming and speaking their mind today. Just the other day, I went to Niagara Water to get a tour and a cherry factory. And a lot of jobs have been taken away because of AI. And I see how it affected the families. And they're saying, oh, the jobs, t

Thank you, Ricardo. The only thing that I would add to it is that when I was mentioning earlier, we had, there was an event at the Bella Vista. It was an open house for downtown Stockton. We had the community get involved and add in their ideas on what they like to see. And that was just only for downtown. I looked that we can do that again for all of our districts, getting our community involved to see what they like and don't like. So the data center things, community doesn't want it. So I will not be supporting anything that has to do with that. But going on, I think the rest is. But I thin

Thank you Mayor and thank you Vice Mayor and City Manager Ford for clarifying that tonight's presentation is about providing information and just exploring the possibilities that our city can have. It's not about a commitment to bring data centers to Stockton. So I see this as the first step, as providing information. We hear the concerns, and we want to have the questions from our community. So we're going to have town halls. We're going to have listening sessions. But again, this is not about a vote to bring data centers here. I also heard a comment about that there were no youth activities

Thank you, Mayor. And Mr. Noguera, I just want to say, you know, again, just thank you for everything you laid out and just the most recent comment. Before I get to what the public has shared, can you just give some context? So this economic plan, obviously I know this is an initial step to give the council, the public, the big vision, the wide net that we talked about earlier. Can you give an example of in the past, how often do city councils get economic development plans? Obviously we have your fresh new leadership taking over, so this is being presented now, but how often just, or city man

And I appreciate that. And, you know, to what my colleagues have shared about youth, I mean, I saw youth all throughout these slides. I mean, we talk about our sports. We talk about our partnerships with our higher education institutions, our community college. I mean, all that leaves opportunity to be creative and do things with our young people. So I saw it in your presentation, and I'm sure my colleagues did too. So the one thing, you know, so I was taking some notes as you were speaking with what my colleagues have shared about how there's some things in the works, there's some things in t

Well, I don't think it's delaying. I think there's a lot of good things already happening here. So I didn't say that. But I would say that in terms of what's already happening, if you're able to come to the next council meeting or let's say a couple meetings from now, I'm not going to give you a date, but give us an update on where you are with the current projects, what's happening. I think that will be helpful for this council. And then have the community town halls lined up. So if you already have some in November, I think as the city manager told me, great. Give us those dates now, because

Okay, so a couple of things. Wake me up before you go-go. Anybody remember that song, Wham? I want to know what love is, foreigner. Like a virgin. I have a point here. $3.35. I'd love to go back to 1985. That's my point. 1985, $3.35 an hour. I did not have a cell phone. We didn't have call waiting. We didn't have an answering machine at my house. We didn't even lock the front door. I didn't have a key to my parents' house until I was 33 years old. We didn't, everything, all the city clerk did, everything was done by hand. Everything was done by hand. And now you have technology. I remember the

Are we having to vote on something tonight then?

Okay. Well, just for the sake, since we're doing community sessions, I make a motion that we take off data centers while we do community listening sessions and then vote on the rest. And then we look forward to an update on Mr. Noguera's update on just the plan and all the ongoing partnerships moving forward.

We have a motion and a second. Roll call.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Absolutely. Could you elaborate? I have no idea what... city website ADA score is?

Does the numbers mean people, or is it a score?

Councilwoman Padilla. Thank you, Mayor. I have seen an uptick in your postings, so I do appreciate that. Could you explain what role you play in the Brown Act meetings?

Okay. And I also noticed that we still don't have our government channel. Yes. And I've been asked a lot because several people have Xfinity and they like to view it on Channel 97. So what's the status on that?

And I am happy to see that you have website on here because it's extremely cumbersome. So I'm looking forward to that.

Yeah, and I did, someone did mention to me, we need to elevate that a lot more, Ask Stockton.

Okay, thank you. Yes, and on that Ask Stockton, the Veterans Post asked for a tutorial on it, and I'm sure there's a lot of different places, even the Senior Center, or just different places around town where we could maybe go out and give them a

I would like to see more live videos. A lot of people seem to enjoy that.

Thank you, Mayor. Tony, thank you. I will say this has been a very bumpy experience. And I'm going to say that in part, probably in large part, it was a lack of leadership. And I think that I'm one that's big on accountability, even when it feels like people are feeling attacked. That's what accountability sometimes feels like. I feel it sometimes. But I want to say that your staff has been nothing but professional throughout this whole experience. They're very kind in the hallway. They're kind to the public. Your improvement in terms of how you deal with the public, I just want to publicly ac

So, okay, no, that's great. And again, I think the content piece for me is the piece that's missing, but is a piece that I think with a smaller group can kind of give some ideas on because when my team complains about, because just looking at this, you know, maybe we're thinking about social media, but we're not thinking about website. We're not thinking about broadcasting this. We're not thinking about all the things, right? I think understanding like my my team gets frustrated It's like there's filler content that we can come up with like what is an ass stocked in? Five pieces of content tha

Okay. And then where are we with, I don't know if this is an optic thing, but where are we with AskDoc and that? Is that an optic project or is that?

So we won't give that responsibility to Optic, but we need to figure that out, too, at some point.

I appreciate that. Okay, no, but in terms of just overall, I mean, this is a great presentation. I just, again, want to commend you and your team for working with the City Manager's Department in response to Council's request and actually working towards that plan. That makes sense. I think, again, a follow-up with Meta. And then also, how are you engaging the public on social channels? Are we communicating with them on social media or no?

Does your department or your division have established policies yet for how you all are kind of conducting business? Are you still developing that?

Again, thank you for the presentation. I look forward to the follow-up. Thank you.

And I just had a point of clarification because when I open Ask Stockton, it says GoGov, powered by GoGov. And I know when I've went and visited other cities and they're like, man, we just can't keep up because there's a person actually answering the phone to take in all this. And I said, oh, let me show you what we've got. And, you know, I know it's not perfect by any means, but I think that it has been a very useful tool. We just need to tweak it. And so I don't know what part GoGov has in it. If we can develop our own, I don't know. I'm not trying to, again, we're not trying to get you to d

Oh, OK. Jasmine, is that who it is? Yes. Because I see you're up.

we need to work on that as soon as possible thank you okay like I said it's not an action item thank you so much and we will move on to item 11 city managers update on behalf of the city managers office I'd like to present the city managers report

Okay, thank you. Okay, now we will move on to council comments. Seeing none, we will go then on to, oh, darn it. Go ahead, Councilman Blower.

On this past Saturday, we had a park beautification event at Anderson Park. I want to thank Supervisor Paul Canepa for joining me on that effort. And I was just blown away by the amount of people. I've done quite a few of these over the years. And we had almost 100 people there. I mean, it was a great, great turnout. There was, like, a team from Amazon, just a lot of people, a lot of youth that turned out. We did things such as there was painting, planting trees, picking up garbage, a lot of time and effort put into cleaning it. But with that many people, gosh, we got it all done. I think ever

Thank you, Mayor. First, thank you to all the city departments who gave out information and participated in my community event. It was a huge success and very well received. I appreciate those that are using Ask Stockton in my district. I have had some positive comments with regards to how easy it is to use and how things are getting done quickly. So I did receive comments, positive comments. Yes, Chick-fil-A opened last week, and now one of the biggest questions is when is In-N-Out opening? So that will be coming soon, and we'll notify the public once we have that grand opening date. Another

Thank you, Mayor. So I'll start off really quick just to, again, just thank everyone that came out today. I know I personally appreciated everyone's comments and thoughts on several issues, but especially seeing our young people rally together on something, just feeling the passion and and just having the courage to come up to the podium. I know there was some that said it was their first time here, so I just want to say thank you to all of you that showed up today. In terms of events, the last two weeks, I want to just give a shout out to University of the Pacific. We did a day of service whe

thank you mayor okay no well first of all I appreciate tonight's meeting was a lot of stuff to talk about and lots of public comment and I just want to thank the mayor for allowing us to have all that debate and taking a break when we needed it because the Lord Lord knows I needed it and thank you to everybody that came out I want to address one of the public comments somebody said that there was there was a comment made that the meetings in the corridor aren't being organized we broke down our district in district six in three parts and have regularly monthly meetings of the constituents in t

So while I was No problem digging there Also want to thank you everyone for coming here tonight First want to start with thinking our city manager Johnny Ford for everything. He does our community. I want to thank our our chief of police and our chief of fire as well and everyone they're doing every day and as well as i know we don't recognize them but also just want to thank the security guards they're here every day watching us they're very respectful and they take care of us take care of our city hall so i just want to say thank you guys every day for what you do um So some new updates that

Okay. So I was notified that a member of our community passed away today. Yes. Bruce Giudici, that's how you pronounce it in Italian. He was the one who started Earth Day. He had connections, which was a newspaper and he was part of the peace and justice nonprofit organization, but he devoted countless hours to The city of Stockton the people of Stockton and if I want to close in a moment of silence for him I also want to say, Don and Johnny, don't forget that the grand jury response, I think it's September 23rd. Just please put it on your calendar. And then I found out, too, that Senator McNe

Because I thought we settled all our contracts.

Okay. Well, with that, before we go to closed session, but I will announce it.

Okay. 14.1, Conference with Labor Negotiator. This closed session is authorized pursuant to Section 54957.6A of the Government Code. We will be recessing to that. If there's something to report out, we will come back. I doubt there is, but anyway, if I can have a moment of silence in memory of Bruce Giudice. Okay. We will recess to closed session.