City Council - Regular Meeting

And with that... All right, good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us for our closed session. Interim City Attorney Quinn will make a closed session announcement, and then we will welcome public comment on the items listed for closed session.

Public employee performance evaluation pursuant to California government code section 54957B1. The title is council appointees of the employees is council appointees, city clerk, and city manager. And then there will also be 2.2, conference with labor negotiators pursuant to California government code section 54957.6A. The agency designated representative is our vice mayor, Chris Clark. The unrepresented employees will be the city clerk and the city manager. And that is all.

Thank you. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on the closed session items listed on tonight's agenda? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a speaker card to the city clerk. We will take in person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes. Seeing no speakers, we will now take virtual speakers. Seeing no virtual speakers, the council will now recess to the plaza conference room for closed session and return to the council chambers at the close to continue to the regular session.

All right, everyone. All right, good evening, everyone. Welcome to the joint meeting of the Mountain View City Council and the Shoreline Regional Park Community of September 8th, 2026. Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. All right. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Great job, everyone. The city clerk will take our attendance by roll call.

Mayor Ramos? Here. You have a quorum? Yay. All right. Thank you. In recent weeks, the city, along with a few of our neighboring elected decision-making bodies, have been subjected to disruptive racist verbal attacks by anonymous callers during virtual public comments. The City of Mountain View is fully committed to racial, religious, and cultural equity and justice as we strive to create a welcoming, safe, and inclusive community for all. The Council welcomes respectful, non-threatening public comments on matters within our jurisdiction. Comments deemed otherwise pursuant to the Council Code o

Thank you. And then we're going to take a group picture. Sure. Great.

All right, we will now move on to item 3.2. That's a fun one. A certificate recognizing Skye Thompson for winning the MPower Silicon Valley Annual Scholarship Competition. So we are happy to be joined this evening by Cheyenne Lipp, Community Engagement Intern with Silicon Valley Clean Energy, to present the certificate to Ms. Thompson. Cheyenne and Skye, will you join me at the lectern? Yes, hi. All right, Cheyenne, make your brief presentation.

Do we want to take a picture all together?

Yeah. Let me also give her this one, too. Wonderful. Congratulations. High five. All right. And then we're going to do a picture. Okie dokie. Now, would any member of the council like to say a few words? Seeing none. Oh, go ahead, Council Member Showalter.

Yeah, I just wanted to say that this is one of the many, well, first, congratulations to Sky. We really think that your sticker is beautiful, and I know that a lot of people will enjoy it, so thank you so much for taking part in this and for your talent, sharing your talents with us. And I just also wanted to share that at Silicon Valley Clean Energy, we are the energy, we do buy the energy for the area and we buy clean energy for everyone. and it's a very important service and we take some of the extra profits that we get, we're non-profit, but we take some of the extra funding that we get wi

Thank you, Council Member Showalter. Anyone else? Seeing none, we will now take public comment for the presentation items. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on the presentation items listed on the agenda? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes. Seeing none in person, we will now take virtual speakers. There looks like there's one raised hand. Madeline Lusante?

Sorry, you're a bit early. We're still on item three.

No worries. All right. And that seemed to be all the virtual speakers. We will now move on to item four, consent calendar. These items will be approved by one motion unless any member of the council wishes to pull an item for individual consideration. If an item is pulled from the consent calendar, it will be considered separately following approval of the balance of the consent calendar. If you would like to speak on these items or the next item, oral communications on non-agenda items in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk now. Would any member of the council like to

Yes, I would like to pull items 4.4 and 4.5 for a briefing from our housing manager on that.

Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to poll 4.11 for comment and action on the second recommendation specifically, 4.12 and 4.14.

Okay, I have a few that I'd just like to comment on, and I was going to also poll item 4.12, but that's already happened. So should I go ahead with my comments?

Let's get everyone's, oh, actually, yeah, let's go with that, since no one else is polling.

Okay, all right, well, 4.7, that was a item on public engagement, put together a public engagement plan, and I just wanted to say that I really appreciated this report and seeing all the ways that we engage the public, and this is something that changes a lot over time as, social media evolves and different technologies are available. So we really have to evaluate it from time to time. Thanks to staff for doing that. And I hope that we may continue to add some things going forward like We'll talk about this a little later in the agenda, but maybe civility round tables and maybe more surveys. B

Thank you, Council Member Showalter. No other comments or polls? We will now take public comment for the consent calendar, including the items that have been polled. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person would like to provide comment on the consent calendar listed on the agenda? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk. We will take in-person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes.

Thank you. We will, seeing no other in-person speakers, we will now take virtual speakers. I see Rashmi.

Thank you, we will actually go back to one in-person speaker that we missed, Travis Cooper.

Thank you. I will now bring this back to council, I'll bring this back for council action and note that a motion to approve the balance of the consent calendar should also include reading the title of the ordinance and resolutions attached to consent calendar items 4.2, 4.3, 4.6, 4.7 and 4.9. Just as a reminder to everyone, 4.4, 4.5, 4.11 and 4.12 have been pulled.

Wait, which one? Pulled that one. All right, and also 4.14 was also pulled. Do we have a motion for the balance of the consent calendar? All right, Council Member Hicks, go ahead and have the fun reading.

Yes, I'm volunteering to read, but you're going to have to help me as I go through them because I wrote the ones that are pulled on multiple pages. So I motion that we adopt item number 4.2, adopt a resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View fixing the employer contribution at an equal amount for employees and annuants under the Public Employees Medical and Hospital Care Act with respect to a recognized employee organization. Group 001, Safety Fire, to be read in title only, further reading waived, and adopt a resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View fixing

Thank you Council Member Hicks and it is seconded by Council Member Kamei. Do we have any comments on the balance of the consent calendar of everything that hasn't been pulled? Seeing none, let's get ready for the vote. First vote back from summer break and it's unanimous, yay us. All right, so now we're gonna do the pulled consent calendar items. We're gonna start with 4.4. Council Member McAllister.

Thank you, Mayor. Actually, we can do 4.4 and 4.5 together because it's a similar request. And I should have mentioned it was not a, I shouldn't have pulled it, it just was a comment. But if you look at this, this is for bonding and funding two projects in the city of Mountain View for a total of $125 million. And that's a great sum of money. And we're only putting in $8 million to get these projects for each one. So we're putting in 16 and we're leveraging it to $125 million. So I thought that's very impressive for the city of our size to do that. And so I wanted to bring the gentleman that w

Thank you. Mayor, if you want, I can make a motion to pass this if possible.

Before Mr. Wayne steps away, I would love to ask him some questions that he provided us ahead of time of the council meeting. What are the safeguards in place to help prevent wage theft in our city, especially in use of our funds being used?

Thank you, Mr. Chen. I do have a council member. I don't know. Oh, yeah.

Council member Kamei. She has a question for you. Great. Thanks. Thanks so much. So I just had a question because my understanding too is when the city has projects on our website, we have a kind of a status page and how the projects are going and so um you know i don't i think that information is readily available so hopefully people will be able to check back there in terms of status on the project if there's any types of concerns that pop up but i also know that we've been working with the county with the office of labor standards enforcement and so maybe you could talk a little bit about t

All right, thank you, Mr. Wayne. Thank you, Council Member Kamei. I'll just say that it's not out of the ordinary. Well, it is a little out of the ordinary for projects to be essentially challenged or flagged during a TEFRA hearing. Famously, Valley Palms in San Jose used a TEFRA hearing for their tenants to get attention from their property manager to fix things. But otherwise, I do hope that this provides a spotlight on the developer knowing that whatever they manage to attempt to get away with in San Jose, they're not gonna get away with it in Mountain View. Eagle eyes, us right there. So w

Can I do four and 4.5 at the same, or are they separate readings?

As long as it's okay with the seconder. It was pulled, yeah. Okay. All right, go ahead.

Okay, adopt. Thank you, Mayor. Adopt the resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View approving the issuance of the California Municipal Authority exempt facility bonds and the aggregated principal amount not to exceed. And so if I'm doing two of them, should it say $125 million?

I think just follow the script on the thing. So it should be.

Okay, I'll read both of them then. For the purpose of financing or refinancing the acquisition, construction, improvement, and equipping of a rental housing project located at 96 West El Camino Real and certain other matters relating thereto to be read in title only further reading waive. Item 4.5. Adopt a resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain proving the issuance of the California Municipal Finance Authority exempt facility bonds and an aggregated principal amount not to exceed $75 million for the purpose of financing or refinancing the acquisition, construction, improvement,

Thank you, Council Member McAllister. And we are ready for a vote. Motion passes unanimously. We will now move on to item 4.11. Council Member Ramirez.

Thank you, Mayor. First, I'd like to... What I'm going to do, Mayor, is I'm going to start with a motion and then for the remaining recommendation, I'll give comments and then make a motion that is different from the staff recommendation. So first, I'm going to move to designate Councilmember Kamea as the voting delegate and Mayor Ramos as the voting alternate for the General Assembly meeting at the 2026 Cal City's annual conference and authorize the city's voting delegate or alternate to cast a vote at the Cal City's annual conference to reflect the position adopted by the city council. And t

Sounds good. Council Member Kamei, did you want to speak on this or the part two of whatever he's planning?

Well, I'll speak now if that's okay, Mayor. Sure. So in anticipation of perhaps what may be happening as the second part of the motion, I just was hoping that we could elevate our Peninsula Division Public Affairs Manager for our League of California Cities. His name is Montana Cruz. I believe he's watching in the audience. I asked him to be available if council had questions. prior to this item. So just like to make sure he gets elevated.

Did we wanna handle this motion and then we can go on to part two and then? Okay, wonderful. All right, so we have a motion by Council Member Ramirez and seconded by Council Member Hicks. This is item 4.1 and a half. 4.11 and a half. Would you like to join us in the vote, Councillor McAllister?

Could you just give me an AI summary of what?

Staff recommendation in recs one and three.

We divided the question up for 4.11, so we're gonna do part two of 4.11. This is supposed to be the non-controversial, well, I wouldn't say controversial, but the easier part of the motion. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor. And thank you, colleagues. So the second recommendation is to adopt a recommended position regarding Cal City's annual conference resolution for 2026. That resolution is League Resolution Number 1, a resolution of the General Assembly of the League of California Cities calling for a working group to consider a state constitutional amendment or other form of initiative to ensure final local authority over housing and land use decisions. And the staff recommendation is to support this resolution. And what I would like to do is persuade my colleagues to take a position that is d

THANK YOU COUNCIL MEMBER RAMIREZ. COUNCIL MEMBER COMEY.

Yeah, thanks so much. So I just thought it would be helpful because I was asking Mr. Cruz kind of how this came forward. It's been something that's been, I sit on the League of California Cities Board of Directors. So there's been lots of different conversations that we've heard on the board. And so now seeing the final agenda for the conference, I asked Montana if he could give some background and perhaps just some information on the item. Because I had asked, it's going to, I think, the housing committee next week. Is that right, Montana? Yeah, so maybe you could give a little bit, because t

Thank you, Montana. Next we have Council Member McAllister.

Thank you, Mayor. I will not be supporting the motion. because Council Member Ramirez kept saying all these bad actors. I've been on council for 10 years and I have never heard the City of Mountain being accused of a bad actor. If anything, I've always heard Mountain View being a leader in building of housing. And so when that came up, I go, Mountain View will do what's best for Mountain View residents. And there's two ways to do it is by policies that we've done. And the second is the electric policy of where they elect people that have those kind of views. And you can control local input on

Thank you, Council Member McAllister. Council Member Hicks.

So I didn't hear Councilmember Ramirez calling Mountain View a bad actor, although I could have heard wrong. Maybe he can correct me. Maybe that is what he said. I guess I'm... I'm kind of uncomfortable with both sides of this. I'm uncomfortable with some of the examples that Council Member Ramirez did give of building housing. I don't find the builder's remedy projects that we have in our city to be, you know, I'm all for building more housing. I lived in San Francisco and Oakland and was very wary of moving to, thought that this city was not dense enough for me. So I would like taller buildi

Thank you, Council Member Hicks. Council Member Showalter.

Well, I think this is a very interesting discussion. I ran the first time to be pro-housing and I've continued to be pro-housing all the time I've been on council. I'm very proud of Mountain View's record for building. And I think that that's something we should be proud of. But I do think that we, I remember initially thinking, well, we'll build housing and we'll do it right, and we'll inspire our neighbors to come along. Yeah, you're laughing, like, well, I was just very naive. That inspiration that I hoped to happen, hasn't materialized. Now I do personally think that some of the bills that

Thank you, Council Member Showalter. Council Member Ramirez.

Well, I see Vice Mayor Clark in the queue too, so I'll be very brief. I just wanted to say I really appreciate the way that you framed that, Council Member Showalter. I think we all lament the reality that the housing crisis is regional, right? That even if we built a lot of housing, if none of our neighbors are building anything, then we're barely going to make a dent in the problem. And I guess what I didn't mean to say was the builder's remedy is great, right? Obviously there are really terrible examples of misuse of the builder's remedy, right? The examples that you've brought up in the co

Thank you, Council Member Ramirez, Vice Mayor Clark.

So it was mostly a question. So the league meeting starts on the 23rd. It sounds like, based on what Montana said, thank you for the information, there's some meetings happening next week. We have a council meeting on the 22nd, but that packet will probably go out on the 17th, which is the day that some of these conversations are happening. So that's a very long way of asking we've already designated our delegates. Is this a question that we could punt to the 22nd when we have more information about what's going on here or is that just a bad idea and we should just dispose of it tonight? Dispe

Great, thanks. Council Member Clark is reading my mind because I also think as part of it and remind me, Montana, if this is correct, so CalCities has it go to the policy committees and then we'll actually discuss it as a full board on Wednesday when we meet. and I wanna be able to vote on it when we meet. And so I will likely abstain regardless because I wanna make sure I have my Cal cities vote and then the cities vote, but obviously I will vote however my colleagues would like me to. But I would also wanna highlight one of the things I've noticed in my four years on the board is that this c

So I'll just say, if the question tonight is, will I support a resolution? to advance a state constitutional amendment or some ballot-based strategy, the answer is no, I don't think that is the right approach to address this. There are other ways to address this that are more appropriate. And they do say it could be a legislative or policy-based strategy, but it leads with the advancement of a state constitutional amendment. So I think I know who probably suggested this, or I can surmise who suggested this. So my preference is to get more information and have this on the consent calendar on th

Thank you, Vice Mayor Clark. Council Member Hicks.

Yes, so my previous, so I generally agree with what the Vice Mayor said. My previous comments did not mean that I thought a constitutional amendment would be the best solution. But I also wanted to register some, I think that some of the legislation has been very heavy handed and is not leading, I like great cities, it's not leading to great cities. It's gonna make people hate cities and move up to the hills if they can, or out to the suburbs, which are being developed at a very rapid pace. So, and I could say more on that, Good evening. So I would prefer to put it off and then excuse my, as t

Mayor, Council Member Hicks, so no, you don't have to tell them how to vote, but I think typically when there have been issues of great interest or importance, it wouldn't be unusual for a council to weigh in to publicly say whether they oppose, support, or neutral on an item. For this item, As has been mentioned, we do packet the agenda on the 17th. So you have designated your two voting delegates. We can wait and see what happens. We can continue this part of the item until the 22nd and then just receive an oral update about what happens on the 17th if council's comfortable with that. But yo

Thank you. So I will, I, prefer to wait for more information. And so for that reason, I will not be supporting the motion.

Thank you, Council Member Hicks. Council Member McAllister.

I like the idea that the Council Member Hicks mentioned about a neutral. And I don't know if it makes sense, but to me, if we took a neutral vote tonight, It was just Lisa, okay, we got something on the table and then when more information came, we could discuss it on that day and it's going forward. So, I mean, I do like pulling it and waiting, but that's why if we do a neutral, we do have it covered one way or the other. It covers all ideas and then we can confirm it when we get back together. But I do support giving our delegates direction on this particular item.

Thank you, Mayor. So I'm appreciating the likelihood that the September 22nd agenda might be pretty heavy. And rather than relitigate this, I'm happy to change the motion. I clearly do not have the votes. but I'm happy to change the motion to adopt a neutral position so that way we don't have to spend time on September 22nd with the consent of the seconder. So that way we don't have to spend time on September 22nd to deliberate this further. I'll share though, I think like the challenge I have with the neutral position is I personally, because housing is a regional issue and I like the idea of

Council Member Showalter. Well, I would question your ability to count, but given that. I'm counting three. You're counting, yes, three and then some wiggle worm. But I do feel like we wanna be really clear that we don't think that a constitutional amendment or an initiative process is appropriate. So I would like to make a friendly amendment that that's what we change the, and then we can get some more information the next meeting if it changes to that. I think that there is consensus about that and I also would like to ask the questions of my colleagues just for a hand raise. Has everybody t

Oh yeah, and I think Mr. Cruz can help provide an update once the meeting on the 17th happens and let us know. I'd be curious if the housing committee might ask that be removed anyways. I think that's what I'm interested to see if that happens.

Thank you, so council, I'm thinking too that another avenue we can pursue besides seeing how it plays out on the 17th, we can bring you the update on the 22nd, is to also engage with our state lobbyists on this issue and work with them on a way that we can try, I don't wanna use the word ensure, but try to advocate for Mountain View to have a seat at the table of whatever comes of this. So if it's clear that the council is not open or isn't interested in a constitutional amendment or initiative, but if there is some sort of committee or some sort of working group to discuss this issue, that at

Thank you, City Manager McCarthy, Council Member McAllister.

So is there a revised motion presented at this moment?

I'LL LOOK TO THE SECONDER WHO I THINK MADE THE BULK OF THE AMENDMENTS, BUT IT WOULD BASICALLY BE OPPOSE THE USE OF A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT OR AN INITIATIVE. AND THEN RETURN ON THE 22ND WITH AN UPDATE, I GUESS IF THERE IS AN UPDATE THAT MAY MEANINGFULLY INFLUENCE OUR DECISION. AND THEN YOU DIDN'T SAY THIS, the city manager's suggestion that we work with the lobbyists to, if such a working group is convened, that we ensure that the city of Mountain View is a participant.

I will not oppose, I will not support this motion. The reason being is if push came to shove and they hear the constitutional amendment, I think there's gonna be more room for compromise that people are willing to go, Let's not go down that path. Let's get some compromises then. And so carrying the big stick might motivate others to come along and say, OK, let's find a solution. And so that's why I would rather keep that in there. Hopefully, it goes down. To Pat's comment about talking with our local legislators, we've been talking for two years. I haven't seen too much movement on the builder

Thank you, Council Member McAllister, Council Member Hicks.

Yeah, I'm weighing this. So I may be in the minority. I definitely oppose a constitutional amendment or initiative. And I like the additions of returning with more information and engaging with lobbyists. I guess I'm not sure, and trying to get a seat at the table, I guess I'm not sure why we're, so we're sending our delegates out with, with we're telling them some things we want them to do. But in my mind, we also, as Council Member Showalter said, we want some tweaks to some of this legislation, and we're not putting that into this motion in any way. So I'm a little uncomfortable with that,

Yeah, it looked like Councilmember Ramirez had a response to that, so I'd stopped waiting for his response.

I don't want to interrupt your train of thought but I think implied in the direction is that we're not opposed to the convening of a working group and I'm looking so outside of the title which is you know so the title of the resolution explicitly says consider a state constitutional amendment or other form of initiative so outside of the title in the fine print it says or legislative policy, and then it says reiterates ballot-based strategy. So I think what we're saying is once you take a ballot-based strategy off the table, we're not opposed to a working group. If a working group convenes, we

So I would like to be clear that that's what I'm voting for.

I think that's what you're voting for. OK.

All right, are we clearing my queue? Yay! So I'm glad that we managed to work that all out. I'm happy, we're such a great council. I'm happy to support the motion. I will also like to add in, I do find, quite honestly, Council Member Kamei is one of the most sophisticated council members in our region. I think she, She will be able to maneuver based on the direction that we will give for the voting unless something goes wrong and somehow I'm magically there too. Not as sophisticated but with good direction can work wonders. So I'm glad that we're taking the major concerns that my colleagues ha

SURE I'LL DO MY BEST COUNCIL MEMBER MCALISTER SO IT WOULD BE TO OPPOSE BASICALLY A BALLOT BASED STRATEGY SO CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT OR AN INITIATIVE BUT ONCE THOSE ARE OFF THE TABLE WOULD SUPPORT A WORKING GROUP WITHIN THE LEAGUE OF CITIES THAT WOULD PURSUE A LEGISLATIVE FOR POLICY FIX That was the first part. The second part was the city manager's suggestion to work with our lobbyists to ensure that if a working group is convened, that Mountain View would have a seat at the table. And then Council Member Showalter, you had another suggestion that those were the two? Okay.

All right, now we're ready to vote. Motion passes 6-1. All right, now to our next consent calendar item. Item 4.12, Council Member Ramirez.

Thank you, Mayor. I think multiple members of the Council wanted to pull this for different reasons. I will share my very narrowly scoped reason, and then I think the bulk of the discussion will occur with John over there. My reason for pulling it was to provide, in addition to approving the work plans, some direction for staff, not before the end of this year, but when there's capacity to think about the roles and purviews specifically of the planning commission and the downtown committee. I think these are things many of us independently or in collaboration with members of those particular a

Thank you, Council Member Ramirez. Council Member Hicks.

WELL, MAYBE SOMEBODY WANTS TO COMMENT DIRECTLY ON THAT. I WAS GOING TO MOVE ON TO ANOTHER COMPONENT OF THIS AGENDA ITEM. I GUESS WE CAN, IF OTHER PEOPLE WANT TO COMMENT ON WHAT I AGREE WITH WHAT COUNCIL MEMBER RAMIREZ SAID AND IF OTHER PEOPLE WANT TO COMMENT ON THAT I GUESS THEY CAN DO IT AFTER I TALK. SO WHAT I WANTED TO BRING UP ABOUT THIS ITEM WAS THE SCOPE PARKS AND REC COMMISSION WORK PLAN. I PUT IN A COUNCIL QUESTION ABOUT THIS AND I'M GOING TO READ FROM IT SO I DON'T LEAVE THINGS OUT. THE PUBLIC HAS BEEN CONCERNED ABOUT A BUNCH OF ASPECTS OF TREE PLANTING IN THE CITY OVER THE PAST SEVER

So we already have an updated work plan with that? Oh, right here. Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Hicks. Council Member Showalter.

Okay, well, I was delighted to see this updated matrix on the dais here, so I just want to thank you so much for that. I do think it's quite responsive to the letters and the comments that we've received, which is good. And also, I just want to thank you One of the things I thought was interesting is kind of how we perceive different things. And when I, you know, I'm sort of inside the city, I'm on the city council, and when I saw that that was on the list for June, that you would have the update of the annual report, I didn't assume that that meant that you were never gonna talk about it at a

Thank you, Council Member Showalter. I'll just mention very briefly, I don't have any prescriptive changes, although I'm supportive of all the prescriptive changes that my colleagues have brought forth. But I do want to kind of highlight that this is a big volunteer commitment that our community members have done, and I want to make sure that they are doing the things that they want to do. that they aren't limited to the work that they can provide to our city, to their community. I don't know if this is something that the, as we look at our volunteer framework, I view them as volunteers, so I

Thank you, Mayor. I'm gonna go ahead and move to approve the updated work plan as recommended by staff and then to add direction to the city manager to return to the council or in whatever capacity she deems appropriate with some recommendations for maybe a revised purview and scope for the planning commission and for the downtown committee. at her discretion, so 2027 probably. Yeah, but Chris will be mayor.

All right, are we ready to vote? Oh, and that was a motion made by Council Member Ramirez and seconded by Council Member Showalter, and it passes unanimously. Yay us. Next, we have item 4.14. I actually did not pay attention who pulled that. Oh. All right, Council Member Ramirez.

Thank you, Mayor. This one... FIRST, I WILL THANK THE COUNCIL FOR YOUR INDULGENCE THIS EVENING AND I APPRECIATE STAFF PUTTING SOME OF THESE TRICKIER ITEMS ON THIS CONSENT CALENDAR BECAUSE THE BALANCE OF THE AGENDA IS PRETTY LIGHT AND I WOULD HATE TO DO THIS TO YOU ON A HEAVIER EVENING. SO I APPRECIATE THE WORK OF THE CIVIL GRAND JURY AND THE CITY ATTORNEY'S OFFICE AND STAFF FOR PUTTING TOGETHER THE REPORT AND THE RESPONSE. speak to i suppose it's um civil grand jury finding seven and recommendation seven that's uh bta board appointing authority group groups two through five have different proc

Another option to consider is maybe have the Council Procedures Committee take a look at these bylaws and make a recommendation checking in with the city manager, whether that makes more sense to look at this process. And then once they have a recommendation, we could consult the other cities in group two.

I would be comfortable with that. So essentially this was the city manager's recommendation. So I'll move to approve the city manager's suggestion for how we might want the city council to weigh in and, approve the bylaws and then formally, if this is what the council wants, formally delegate to the PAC member the ability to vote for the board director.

Do you want to provide more flexibility to have the Council Procedures Committee review the bylaws and make a recommendation and they can? or the CTC, one of those committees could actually.

I think my preference would be give it to, I would rather empower staff to be flexible and determine what you think is the most appropriate process. I'm probably not gonna be in the council when this actually occurs. So if CTC or CPPC makes sense, I'm happy to defer to staff.

Having a little bit of knowledge on how this process works, I'd like to remind Council Member Ramirez that the Council does vote for the PAC member in the past. Once the Mayor, we put up the names for nomination for the Board Director, so from that then the PAC does vote for the Board of Directors. In essence, when you nominate someone, you are giving that person the power to do it. From the council, saying, we want this person to be our representative.

Except you don't have to appoint that person, right? The bylaws also give the PAC members the ability to decline to appoint those. But the deeper challenge, though, is that there was never actually a formal delegation of that authority, right? For everything else, you know... We just voted in a public meeting with the public's ability to participate to select our delegates to Cal cities and to approve a position. That was done here. But the problem with the current process is there was never that delegation of authority to actually vote for a board director. And that is a very important positi

I cannot confirm that there never was authority, because it's been going on for a long time, so maybe at one point there was that authority given, and we just continue to go forward with it. It's a process that has maybe not the transparency that you like, but it has worked trying to get four cities working together, where everybody wants a piece of the power pie. So yeah, maybe it's not perfect, but it sometimes works, and sometimes it works for Mountain View.

Thank you, Council Member McAllister. I'm also supporting this motion. Largely, because I joined you in the northern county, and I remember when we did the vote. Now, I don't think it would be any different, but it did strike me kind of odd that it was in a meeting that I didn't, I don't know if that was actually a Brown Act. like like I literally like pop on on my phone sometimes on that I didn't know if that was like that that formal of a meeting kind of thing and like I've seen like colleague and not colleagues counterparts in other cities either not show up or unclear on who's technically

to clarify what we're voting on now so 4.14 i just want to make sure we are submitting the response the grand jury as drafted by staff and your side quest is a separate direction to uh thank you for the correction yes so a move to approve the staff recommendations and then the additional direction for staff to bring to a council subcommittee um the bylaws for review and then take the other actions necessary to ensure that there's Council formal support for the bylaws and an appropriate delegation of authority to the PAC member, if that's what the council wants for the selection of the group tw

All right, and we are ready to vote. And motion passes unanimously, yay us. So now we have completed our, wait, did we complete the calendar? Yes, we completed our consent calendar. It only took a couple hours. All right, so we will now move on to item five, oral communications. This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the council on any matter not on the agenda. Speakers are allowed to speak on any topic within the city's City Council subject matter jurisdiction for up to three minutes during the session. State law prohibits the council from acting on non-agenda

Thank you. Next, we will now take virtual speakers. Seeing none, that ends public comment and oral communications. What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna actually call this a break and reconvene at 9.05.

All right, I'm gonna call this meeting back to order. It is 21.07. So now we're gonna move on to item six, 6.1, public hearing on downtown business improvement area number one. Council member Clark, do you have an announcement to make?

Yes, I am recusing myself from participating in any discussion or determination about the downtown business improvement area number one due to the proximity of my personal residence to the improvement area.

Thank you. Council Member Hicks, do you have an announcement to make?

Yes, I'm also recusing myself from participating in the discussion and determination about the downtown business improvement area number one because of the proximity of my personal residence to the improvement area.

Great, Economic Vitality Manager Amanda Rotella and Community Development Director Christian Murdoch will present the item. If you would like to speak on this item, please submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk now.

Thank you. Does any member of the council have any questions? Any questions? Oh, Council Member McAllister.

I read in the report that the Chamber decided not to raise fees. Is that correct?

Okay, is that the Chamber's decision or is that the City's decision?

So is the goal of this outside consultant to determine to raise, what fees should be?

When was the last time the fees were thought to have been increased? Well, when was the last time the fees were increased?

Okay. Also, there was another line in the staff report where it says that the goal, the responsibility of this chamber is to supply support. Is there a board of directors for the DBA?

So the chamber is the executive, you're the executive director of the DBA?

And did I hear you say that the downtown businesses want more resources?

WHO'S GOING TO PAY THE CONSULTANT'S FEES?

Do we have any other questions from our colleagues? All right, seeing none, would any member of the public on the line like to provide comment on this item? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone. A timer will be displayed on the screen. Each speaker will have three minutes.

No speakers. We will now take virtual speakers. Seeing none, I will now bring the item back for council questions and deliberation. Please note that a motion to approve the recommendation should include also reading the title of the resolution attached to the report. I see Council Member McAllister has made a motion, seconded by Council Member Kamei.

Okay. I'll read the motion then. Yes, please. Okay. Adopt a resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View approving the annual report of the Downtown Business Improvement Area No. 1 and declaring its intention to levy assessments for 2027 to be read in title only, further reading waived, and set a public hearing date of October 13, 2026.

Once again, that was seconded by Council Member Kamei. We are ready for a vote. Motion passes, five yeses, and then two people recused. We'll now move on to item 6.2. Let's bring back our colleagues, Council Member Hicks and Vice Mayor Clark.

Now there were some questions asked during the last portion that may have, okay, just making sure. All right, item 6.2, public hearing on downtown business improvement area number two. Economic Vitality Manager Amanda Rotella and Community Development Director Christian Murdoch will present the item. If you would like to speak on this item in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk now.

Thank you. Does any member of the council have a question? Council Member Hicks.

Yes, thank you. Well, happily, while I was recused and you were talking about the programming in general that applies to both areas, the television was on in the green room, so I got to see what you were talking about this time. And one of the things you brought up was that some of the downtown businesses were interested in placemaking infrastructure. Can you give me some detail on what that might be?

So mostly art and games, okay. Okay, that was my only question, thank you.

Any other questions? Seeing none, would any member of the public on the line like to provide comment on this item? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone or turn in a blue speaker card. A timer will be displayed on the screen. Each speaker will have three minutes. Seeing no public comment, we will now take virtual speakers. Seeing no virtual speakers, I will now bring the item back for council for questions and deliberation. Please note that a motion to approve the recommendation should also include reading the title of the resolution attached to the

Now I just wanted to comment that this is very timely, very timely discussion because this coming weekend is the Art and Wine Festival, which is when kind of all of us go and celebrate in downtown. And I will be supporting the motion.

Thank you. And we have a motion made by Council Member McAllister, seconded by Council Member Kamei. Go ahead and read the resolution, Council Member McAllister.

Thank you, Mayor. I adopt a resolution of the City Council of the City of Mountain View approving the Annual Report of the Downtown Mountain View Business Improvement Area Number Two and declaring its intentions to levy assessments for 2027 to be read in title only, further reading waived, and set a public hearing date for October 13, 2026.

And we are ready to vote. Passes unanimously. Yes, now item 6.3, fiscal year 2025-2026, consolidated annual performance and evaluation report, keeper. Housing Officer Alec Vibrio and affordable housing manager Julie Barnard will present the item. If you would like to speak on this item in person, please submit a blue speaker card to the city clerk now.

Thank you. Does any member of the council have questions? Council Member Hicks.

So I asked this as a written council question, but I guess I have a follow-up question. The staff report said that the minor home repair program had lower than anticipated utilization. And I asked, can you reallocate that money? And the staff said, that they could and they have in the past. I guess the follow-up question is would you recommend doing that? Are there other, for example, homeless prevention comes to mind? It just seems to me that if there's not much demand for minor home repair and there's a lot of demand for homeless prevention, it might be good to move the money over. Is that s

So when the answer here says that, so that was clear, but when the answer here says that it has been reallocated in the past, that was to some other program that was not at its cap.

So do you recommend either of those, or either or both? Something that there's little demand for, if there's a lot of demand for other things, I wouldn't want to give to things that there's not that much demand for.

Okay, and it looks like maybe Mr. Chen has a comment as well.

Well, it's good to hear the background that you're weighing lots of alternatives and maybe we'll see it reflected in the next year sort of information on demand, whether you're able to drum up more demand or not. Thank you.

All right, next Council Member Showalter.

Hi, I also ask a question. I was interested about where the program income came from, and you responded that essentially it was the payback on loans, and the one you gave an example for essentially was a 30-year loan, and I just wondered if that's standard when we make a loan for affordable housing, or do the periods change, or could you tell us a little bit about how the loan and the loan payback process works?

Yeah, I had a clarifying question on page 12 that you listed leveraging and you say the city separately allocated 171. So you got $239,000 for CDB funds to nonprofits for public service. And then you separately allocated an additional $171,000 from the general fund to supplement. So you're not really supplementing. I mean, these examples here are great examples. So I'm just curious how you classified putting those in the CDB category, even though they're general funds to do all these items. Is this the correct place to present that? So let me understand.

Thank you. Thank you. We will now move on to, so no other questions? No other questions. All right, would any member of the public on the line like to write comment on this item? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or press star nine on your phone or turn in a blue speaker card. A timer will be displayed on the screen. Each speaker will have three minutes. First we'll have in person, Melissa Lucan.

Thank you so much. All right, we will now move to virtual public comment. Melanie Favre from upwards.

Thank you. Next up, we have Madeline Musante.

Thank you. Next up, we have Katrina Logan.

Thank you. Next, we have Angie at the Silicon Valley Independent Living Center. I assume that's what the acronym is.

Thank you. Thank you, Angelica. Next, we'll have Georgia Bassel.

Thank you. And our final speaker tonight is Milton Cadena.

Thank you so much. I will now bring the item back to council questions and deliberation. Don't all hop in at once. All right, we have a motion by Vice Mayor Clark with a second by Council Member Kamei.

All right, are we ready to vote? Motion passes unanimously, yay. All right, we will now move on to item eight. No, seven, council staff and committee reports. Do we have any staff? Okay, Council Member Showalter.

All right, well I have sort of a two pronged part I wanna talk about. One is just some of the things I've been to since we were together the last time. I attended the Mayor's Innovation Project summer meeting in Madison, Wisconsin along with a couple of colleagues and I'll talk about it too. It was really interesting and I learned a lot And they gave us a thumb drive with all the information on it, so if anybody would like to borrow that, I would be glad to lend it. And I mentioned a couple of the things that we talked about, such as the surveys and civility roundtables. BOSCA, we had a July m

Council Member Kamei. Thanks Mayor. Thank you so much Council Member Showalter. So I want to voice my support for this, our first time on item seven coming forward. As Councilmember Showalter mentioned, on August 21st, we attended a Zoom gathering from Representative Liccardo. This was after he had held a press conference where he announced the creation of this toolkit. And so as part of that, he has put forward basically an outline of a draft ordinance that would establish a 45-day temporary moratorium on the establishment, expansion, or change of use of detention and custodial facilities. Th

I'm gonna take on this item. Council Member McAllister, would you like to speak specifically on this item or would you like to hold off on your item?

I had a question. Go ahead. Staff, we had quite a few items on the program that a lot of these council members that are gonna be leaving us shortly wanted to get done. So if... how much time you think is gonna be needed to get this, if this motion goes forward, to get an ordinance and to review it and et cetera, and then the timeline of if you present it, then the 30 days, the whole timeline, how's that come about?

Well, we haven't had time. to really put together a work plan or think about what the timeline would be. So the urgency ordinance in and of itself, it's an actual work item but it won't be as significant as the work to adopt an ordinance that would need to go to the Environmental Planning Commission and then to the council. And so that would take a little bit more time. And Mr. Murdoch might have some comments on that as well. So it would have to be a joint effort between CDD and the city attorney's office to put this all together.

But do you have a, you said, but you didn't give me a timeline.

So to bring an urgency ordinance, that gives us the space to actually draft a routine ordinance for you, right? That we could do, relatively quickly like maybe we could do that in a meeting in october and we would really like to see what transpires in september with the city of san jose september 15th and then i noted in the email from lucardo's office they're planning on having another zoom meeting on the 18th and also check in with our neighbors about what they're doing too so if you have something on the 18th

Does it need a second reading or the formality of it?

No, the interesting part of an urgency ordinance is that it's introduced and adopted at the same hearing.

Okay, so it's not a heavy load for the city to take on?

We'd like to be able to review the toolkit and read it and think about it and research it and check in with our neighbors, see what San Jose is doing, but it's something that we could accomplish by a meeting in October.

Council Member Ramirez. Vice Mayor Clark.

So I would just note, and I can follow up separately, there might be another path, which just through zoning text, because I think we already have categories for interim incarceration facility in the code.

One size fits all toolkits typically aren't actually one size fits all, especially if they're geared more toward counties than cities. I appreciate the toolkit, I'm not knocking it. I just think that we might already have some definitions that there might be a simpler path, but I just wanted to call that out. Because there's public safety facility and then there's interim incarceration facility. Why that's in there, I don't know, but apparently it's in the zoning text somewhere.

And obviously we would look at our existing zoning code as part of any urgency ordinance, just to make sure that we don't already have something that would fit the bill.

All right, are you still on the queue? All right, I'm supportive of, is there even, oh, there is a motion. And okay, so a motion by Council Member Showalter, seconded by Council Member Kamei. Yeah, if you could clarify what the motion is.

Okay, I was gonna make it very simple, which is to ask staff to develop an urgency ordinance for our approval as soon as is practicable. And I think it's appropriate with that to take into account all of the things that Council Member Kamei brought up about using the toolkit, seeing what's happening in jurisdictions, comparing to what Vice Mayor Clark said about comparing to what we already have. I mean, to me, all of those things are sort of incorporated that the staff to look at this carefully and come back to us with what you think is appropriate.

So what's going to the San Jose City Council on September 15th is a land use moratorium. And there's a fairly lengthy legal memo that accompanies it explaining why a land use moratorium is appropriate, right? There are... legal restrictions and obligations that the city attorney can explain far better than I could, but you start with a 45-day moratorium, and basically what that buys you is time to develop more precise zoning code amendments. The amendments that we would pursue are probably different from what San Jose would do. But if we need more time, I think it's typically the meeting befor

So I'm just trying to understand the reality of you put this moratorium on the city of Mountain View, but all the federal land around us would be exempt. And so what do you hope to get? the outcome of this if we put this moratorium in place, that ICE is not gonna come to Mountain View and find a plot of land that's as hard to find or an office complex like Shenandoah, well that's federal, that we would prevent them from building a facility in Mountain View?

So I could probably take this answer. I actually just had, Congressman Liccardo just had a North Santa Clara County leaders meeting earlier today, right before this meeting, and he met with the mayor's, North County mayor, so it was me, Mayor Vinker, Mayor Meadows, and Mayor Bajee. I asked, particularly that was a concern for me and Tom Myers was also in that meeting with me. We're like, hey, what about Shenandoah Square and what about Moffett Field? And the way Congressman Liccardo was kind of framing it is that it's almost like creating like this, we are just covering the land that we can. A

But I also heard the city attorney say that she would like to gather information from other cities and get a better idea of what's happening. So is the motion negating her being able to get more information? Okay, I just wanted to, because you're saying an emergency and so bring it back and I just want to make sure that.

Well, I said for our approval as soon as is practicable. So to me that includes all the appropriate research that our trusted staff feels they need to do.

I'm happy to support this, I just wanna, you specifically said urgency ordinance and I just wanna make sure we're giving the, the city attorney's office the leeway to pursue whatever the most expeditious path forward is.

If it ends up being something slightly different, I'm fine with that too. I just don't want to be so prescriptive that they feel like they can only pursue this particular path, even if it's not as expedient as we think it will be.

No, I think we want to, you know, what we're really asking is our staff to go and research this and come back with the appropriate thing. Okay. And I mean, we could wordsmith it a little more if we wanted to. We don't need to, as long as it's an appropriate vehicle. But I think that, you know, I think we've had this discussion and that provides guidance.

Yes, I understand that we have flexibility that if in our opinion that a moratorium isn't the best option for the city or there are multiple options we think are worth the council considering we can bring those and just to clarify too that the moratorium is just the beginning of the process. So it's direction to staff to come back at a later meeting with the moratorium to start the process of enacting a permanent ordinance. And at that time we could give you the timeline for being able to complete that.

Great, thanks. And just to clarify, cities are working on it, but counties have already adopted it. So San Mateo County, Napa County, and maybe Mayor via the clerk, we can share the links to the toolkit and to the whole package if colleagues haven't already seen it. Representative Liccardo's office has been sharing widely, but that way people can see all the different resources. that are available and I would say the growing number of both cities and counties that are moving in this direction and taking steps.

All right, with that, I'm assuming Council Member Ramirez, this is not for this item, it's for your, all right, we're gonna take it to a vote. Passes unanimously, yes. Council member, are you done with your item eight reports out or do you want to? Let's let Council Member Ramirez go.

Very briefly, I just wanted to also, like Council Member Showalter and the Mayor, attended the Mayor's Innovation Project Conference in Madison, Wisconsin in, I think it was in July, is that right? July, yeah. It feels like an eternity ago. And like Councilmember Showalter reported, I found many of the presentations or the panel discussions very enlightening. And I think you may have alluded to this. THE NATIONAL CIVIC LEAGUE, I THINK, PROVIDED A PRESENTATION THAT INCLUDED A DISCUSSION ABOUT WORK THAT THEY'VE DONE WITH OTHER JURISDICTIONS ON CHARTER MODERNIZATIONS AND CHARTER AMENDMENTS. AND S

Thank you, Council Member Ramirez. Council Member McAllister.

I would like to report that I walked in the footsteps of my fellow Council Members that have visited the Diablo Grande Nuclear Plant. I went down there and I enjoyed it and I got a very good education about the safeguards and what takes place there. But I also got to better understand the importance of nuclear energy, even though there's some drawbacks that it provides 9% of the electrical energy for clean energy for the state of California. And so that we got the awareness that we need to keep our minds open to how we get our clean energy. And it was interesting how the federals have given th

Yeah, how did you arrange that? I went with Silicon Valley Clean Energy. How did you get to go?

I just said, how can, no, the PG&E new government relations person, Maria, I sat down with, talked to her about it, and I said, hey, she goes, I said, well, you know, we started talking about nuclear, and she said, would you like to go?

Oh, well, that's great. Well, anyway, I would just, you're right. But I'm glad, so there's a way for everybody else to go. And I just want to urge everybody to go. I mean, it really is, for one thing, it's a beautiful part of the coast, but it's fascinating. And then the other thing I wanted to say is, when you guys always hear me talking about sea level rise, right? When I was there, one of the things that really struck me was how high up all the facilities are. They're above all of the sea level rise projections for, you know, certainly for this century by many, many feet. and i don't know t

And I also want to add that my wife was allowed to attend. So that was nice. And there are two chambers there. That area was designed for six towers. They got two now. So if need be, they can expand that. But there's all kinds of fun facts that you can do. Interesting. Also, if you're an abalone diver, it's protected. There's abalone down there all over the place.

How do you follow that? All right. I know, I know, but I have to disclose my conferences. So in July, I attended NALEO, the National Association of Latino Elected Officials annual conference. I had my Cal City's board director summer meeting. And then I also attended the annual AAPI lead, the Asian American Pacific Islander lead conference. In August, our Cal Cities met. So we had our legislative committee as well as the board meeting. I think for just an update for everyone on the LAC meeting, it was trying to talk about a lot of the bills that were going to come forward for the end of sessio

All right, we'll close this out. It was a very busy B summer. We haven't been able to update all the wonderful things we were doing. So on July 4th, the New Frontiers had a 4th of July celebration. They used our, and Council Member Kamei was with me on that, they used their neighborhood grants fund for that, They're so, I love that community, it's wonderful. I also attended the Mayor's Innovation Project in Wisconsin. I got to do, as mayor, I got to present at the Mayor's Showcase, where I presented about our language leadership academies, and everyone's so jealous of us, as they should be, be