City Council - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon and welcome to the Visayas City Council work session. We're going to go ahead and have our roll call. Council Member Nelson is out today and then I think we are expecting Council Member Soto to be here shortly. We are going to start this meeting by actually having a special presentation. So can we have our speaker come forward please?

Thank you, Tracy, for your many years of service. I appreciate what you've done Anytime we had anything, you came and you were on it. So the city will miss you, staff will miss you, and I hope you enjoy your time off. Please don't worry about any of us.

Yeah, I do have your cell phone number. but thank you for your leadership, for your vision for this position, and just for all, you've set the bar high, and I think we need to keep that in front of us in Visalia, and just because of you, it's a great place to live, so thank you so much.

Thank you, Tracy, for your service. I mean, you answer emails so quick, especially when I have a complaint and how quickly the case has started against somebody and that problem is solved. I mean, like I said, you set the bar really high. I always say you and the fire marshal have the two toughest jobs in the city of Visalia. You probably are the two most popular people because, but you guys are the reasons like problems get fixed and we're gonna really miss you and I wish you the best in retirement.

Tracy, we are very excited for you. You've done a great job. I've known you for a long time. We've gotten to work on a lot of projects. I was writing some of them down. Sign ordinance, shopping cart, sweep, mobile vendor. You're the walking encyclopedia. Anytime I call you, you immediately know it. You don't have to go check. And honestly, I was kind of loving the fact that you were getting a little flustered over there i've never seen you like that i mean you deal with some pretty tense situations and i've never seen you turn red before um and as a councilman was saying uh typically when they

Anybody else wishing to speak who's in the room? Do we have anyone online or on the phone? All right, then we will go ahead and close public comments and we will now turn our time over to the work session and action items and we'll start off with item number one, which is a park and recreation master plan presentation.

In terms of the... This is a public report. Can you just, for the crowd, explain the difference between a mini park and a strong park?

Can you go back to that slide real quick? You know, it's pretty interesting that the national average is that recreation facilities is 42% too far from your home. but in our city it's 6%. I mean, it's pretty interesting. So basically we have recreation facilities pretty close throughout our community, correct?

Council Member Pachigian, any questions or comments?

Yeah, I mean great report. A couple takeaways that I took. I'm saying park up keeps something that I spent a lot of times in parks. I got two young kids and I've been up and down the state from baseball fields to football fields to soccer fields. I've been, I've seen it all. Northern California to Southern California. Where I've been saying is I feel like our upkeep's been kind of lacking a little bit. When I was saying our mowing and maintenance levels could improve, that's the number one complaint I get on our open spaces. especially around like January, February, we switched from twice a we

GREG BRUDNICKI. Council Member Rosado, any questions or comments?

GREG BRUDNICKI. Yeah, no. Thank you. Thank you for the report. Um, I don't have much else to add besides, uh, you know, of course we can always do better and, and I'm happy that we're, we're at least at the average, you know, close to the average overall score overall. And, and, uh, um, yeah, I mean, I, I just hope we can prioritize some of these things that we need to work on and, and, and that we can get this number above average and, and, and, you know, make myself a better place. Thanks. Vice mayor. When,

Yeah, I agree with Council Member Pachigian. As a former sports child chasing parent and now grandparent, you're exactly right on the restrooms. I worry about the safety of the restrooms, not just in Visalia and other facilities that I've been at as well. They tend to be abused. and I'm just not sure what we can do with that. I mean, we could have full-time monitors, I guess, but I'm not sure people wanna pay for that or we have the budget for that. I am really interested in the indoor facilities, of course, but we brought that up as a council already. We brought that up last year, and so Jaso

Okay, the restroom issue as well, yeah. Okay, I am excited to see the results of this, the rest of this report, and I think we'll all get prepared because we're going to need to beef that budget up.

Yeah, thank you very much for the report. For community, a few months ago we were looking at potentially putting in a sales tax or a bond measure or do some type of park funding mechanism. And, you know, we kind of put the brakes on it because we didn't see this data yet. And so this is going to help us plan for the future. It's going to help us plan for our new east side regional park. And then also the other parks are, you know, we're going to be building. We have been a little slow on building parks in the city of Issa over the last decade or so. And we definitely need to step that up. And

I move to receive the presentation of the Visalia Parks Recreation Master Plan and Needs Assessment.

I second. We have first and second. All those in favor of accepting the report, please vote yes. And item passes 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. All right, so we're going to go ahead and adjourn right now. And we welcome everyone to come back to our regular scheduled session at 7 PM. And we will go ahead and adjourn. Good evening, everybody, and welcome to the Visayas City Council meeting. We're going to go ahead and get started. We'll start off with a Pledge of Allegiance led by Council Member Soto, and then we will please remain standing. We'll have an invocation led by Pastor Renteri

Thank you very much for that opening prayer. Now we're going to go on to public comments. Citizens are now invited to comment on issues within the jurisdiction of the Visayas City Council and items listed on the closed session agenda. The council asks that you keep your comments concise and positive. Creative criticism presented with appropriate courtesy is welcome. The city does not tolerate disruptive behavior in our meetings. The council meetings are considered a limited public forum, which means the council can regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. Speakers' comment during public

Okay, seeing no one else, do we have anyone online who wishes to speak? Okay, then we'll go ahead and close public comments. Does the council have any items of interest? I have one item I'd like to propose. I've had two churches reach out to me about temporary parking. and they've asked that we put this on a future council agenda item, so if you guys would be okay with that, I would like to approve having the discussion of temporary parking on a future agenda. Okay, perfect. We'll go on to the consent calendar. Council Member Soto, do you have any items you'd like to pull from the consent cale

We'll make a motion to approve the balance of the consent calendar.

We have first and second. All those in favor, please vote. And the consent calendar item passed 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. Now we're going to go on to regular items in public hearing. And item number one is a proposed elimination of a transit fixed route 17. Staff report, please.

Thank you very much. Do you guys have any questions or you want to hear from the public first?

I just have one question. Could you talk a little bit about the Visalia Economic Development Corporation's response because that is all the industrial users out there?

Any other questions from council? Okay, let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Oh, I'm sorry. Councilor, so did you have a question? Route 15.

I did notice that you can request a by-site airport stop. Would we potentially be able to add this as a potential stop by request only? Or would that be something that we couldn't look at? Since we only have two people that reached out, I figured it probably wouldn't be... often that it's requested?

Perfect. Any other questions? Okay. Let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anybody from the public wishing to speak on this item, please come forward and state your name and city of residence.

Anybody else wishing to speak? Okay, seeing none. Anyone online wanting to speak? Perfect. So we'll go ahead and close public comments and turn it back over to staff. So they're asking about ridership. If I remember correctly, there was on average one rider every three hours on this route? So I mean, it's just not being used. And then I believe there was two questions. One, if we could talk a little bit more about micro transit. And the other question is, where does this route specifically serve?

And so we were spending $800,000 to give one person a ride every three hours? Yes. All right. Any other questions or comments from council?

Yeah, I do. This one would be confirmed because I think the comment was made. This route does not serve the Sports Park area, correct?

Perfect. And you want to give a little snapshot for our micro transit. Here's your chance to give a little plug to the gentleman that asked.

I've used it many times. It's like an Uber ride share.

And Maria had asked about the grant funds. The grant funding is over, so to continue this route would come out general? to fund transit funds, is that correct?

Any other questions? Yeah, I mean, I appreciate the fact that we originally opened this route up because in theory, we have an industrial park that's growing. There's thousands and thousands of people that are working out there. And so in theory, you would think people would be using it. So if they're not, let's not waste our money and let's give people what they actually want and not try to just spend our money. So I appreciate you guys reviewing all the different routes, making sure that they're worth our time, and then also providing great products like the Micro Transit that are a little m

Could you please tell me when the, could you just remind us again when the next presentation will be to council on your study?

And I'm your transit rep for Tulare County for the city of Visalia and I will tell you that we are working seamlessly with the county and to make transit much more viable and affordable and just seamless across the whole county. So if you wanna go from Visalia to Larry, Visalia to Exeter, back and forth, they really have a great plan in place and I really commend the staff for working so diligently to make sure that we are covering public transportation and getting rid of those greenhouse gases, Maria. Thank you.

All right, I'll entertain a motion at this time. I make a motion that the city council approve the elimination of fixed Route 17 in order to commit resources to where they can be utilized more efficiently.

All those in favor, please vote. Item passed is 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Council. All right, next we're going to go on to item number two, which is a 2025 public hearing and CAPR approval. Staff report, please. Your microphone's not working.

All right, any questions for Margie at this time?

Thank you, Margie, for keeping track of all this. There's a lot of regulations and red tape, but you're doing a great job. These are a great number of units that are being assisted.

So I had a question. On a few of these, did they use the full amount of funds that we allotted them, like the mobile home repair programs? Was that the total amount? I thought it was higher.

Okay. How much is being rolled over for the 2026 project?

Okay, very good, thank you. Any other questions for staff? Thank you very much for your report. Let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anyone from the public wishing to speak on this item, please come forward and state your name and city residence. Okay, and seeing no one, anyone online? Nope, we will close public comments and I'll entertain a motion.

I move to adopt resolution number 202658, approving the program year 2526, consolidated annual performance and evaluation report.

We'll have first and second. All those in favor, please vote. Item passes 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. Thank you, Margie, for the report. Next, we're going to item number three, which I believe you're also doing, which is a pro-housing public hearing.

Thank you very much for your report. Council Member Pachigian, any questions or comments?

No, my only concern about this are we, I see that we have to do this and we're going to probably want to get future grant funds. It's one of those things are, Not mandatory, but kind of is mandatory if you want any kind of funds for future grant projects. If you don't do this, you won't get any of that. My only concern is are we tying our hands on future items?

No, thank you for the report. It's nice that we'll be able to potentially get $500,000 more for some of these projects, because I know it's definitely necessary to keep them running, so thank you. Vice Mayor Winn.

I just wanna confirm that the 56 points, we're getting that with what we're already doing, what we already have on the books, right? And then the list of projects that you had up there suggested things that we can use the money for, those are just suggestions, we're not tying ourself into any of those, correct? Correct, those are projects that we've already provided funds for. Yeah, that was it. Thank you.

It's not mandatory, but it is mandatory. Yeah, right.

Yeah, I just want to say thank you for the report. It's nice, you know, as everyone knows, we are in a housing crisis here in California. We're not producing enough housing for our people that live here, for the kids that are being born. And it was nice to get a phone call a few weeks ago from Cal City saying that we were the second best community in the state at producing enough housing for all of our of all of our kids, that we actually have a housing element that requires that we have the potential to build enough housing for the children that are born, for the people that live in our commu

Anybody else wishing to speak? Okay, if you guys could fix that on the website and make sure it's readable for our community, we'd definitely appreciate that. All right, any other comments from council? Or I'm sorry, anyone from online wishing to speak? Okay, wonderful. Let's go ahead and close public comment and bring it back to council. Anyone from council have any questions, comments, or a motion? No motions required, perfect. All right, well, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Next, we're going to go on to item number four, which is the urgency ordinance. And this one, we're going to b

We got a question, Paul. Is 45 days enough time for you and your staff? I know you guys are busy already, as I'm sure you would agree with. Is that enough time? Do we need to come back? Should we just extend that a little bit more now?

And how many times can we redo the moratorium?

Thank you so much for that report. Council Member Soto, do you have any questions at this time?

No, I don't have any questions. Thank you for the report. I would just ask that we don't limit it to 15 minutes to allow the public to speak.

Great report, Paul. Like I said, I asked to put this on the agenda and I think the council supports this because we want to set a record that we don't think this is a good fit for our city and we want to be the first municipality here in Tulare County to kind of say we don't want this in our community. I don't think it's a good fit and that's why I think this is a great way to get this accomplished and a great job to your staff.

Perfect. I just had one question. We met with some folks who are proposing the one at the fairgrounds in Tulare. And they kind of told us about what theirs is, and they're saying it's different from a data center There's data centers that are, you know, hundreds of thousands or millions of square feet, and then there's some that are smaller, you know, C-train or portable, movable. But an equipment building, let's say the hospital or the sheriff's 911 operating center or our 911 operating center, if we needed to put in, like, an equipment building with all the servers and everything in there, w

Wonderful, yeah, we wanna make sure we're not, prohibiting those uses from our hospitals and police and fire and everyone else. Okay, so let's go ahead and let's open this up to the public. You can come up to the podium and speak. We don't take questions from the audience. Ma'am you can come up to the podium we're opening up public comments at this time.

Thank you Okay for the record real quick. It was unanimous the whole council supported this to be put on the agenda Okay seeing if there's anyone else who wants to get up there go ahead and form a line, please I

Okay. Seeing no one else, is there anyone online wishing to speak?

Thank you. Do we have anyone online who is wishing to speak at this time? We've already gone past more than our 15 minutes.

actually only had 13 minutes i've been keeping track so we have two minutes if we're going to keep the 15 minute limit okay is there anyone online yes we do hi caller named joe delgado your line is open you have three minutes

Okay, we're going to go ahead and close public comments, and I'll turn it back over to Council.

I'll turn it back over to Council with any further comments.

Like I said, I think everyone's I'm pretty supportive of this. I'll make a motion. I move to adopt Orders Number 2026-10, an interim urgency ordinance placing a temporary moratorium on the acceptance, processing, approval, or issuance of permits and entitlements for new data center developments within the City of Visalia pursuant to California Government Code Section 65858. Second.

We have first and second. All those in favor, please vote. Item passed is 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. Thank you very much. Next, we're going to item number five, which is a public hearing on development of the five-year PLHA plan. Staff report, please.

MARTHA, YOU HAD A BUSY NIGHT TONIGHT. GREAT REPORT, AS ALWAYS. YEAH, NO QUESTIONS. I'LL BE SUPPORTED TONIGHT.

Thank you, Margie, again. And of course, more great projects that we're working on here in the city. Thank you.

So Margie, I did have one question. So these are obviously organizations that we've been supporting in the past. But in the survey, in the top categories was senior housing. Were there any options for senior housing to be able to assist with senior housing?

And the homeless, If they're a homeless senior, they're eligible for those as well, correct?

And do they have any specific to veterans? Was that the case?

And seniors and veterans are all eligible for Eden House Navigation Center, right?

So how did they end up on this list. Did they request to receive these fundings. Did you assign them on there. I mean how did we end up with the three navigation center emergency shelter in the house.

So the only way that they'd be able to receive funds from us would be through the PLHA? Yes.

Okay, wonderful. All right, let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anyone from the public wishing to speak on this item, come forward and state your name and city residence. Seeing no one, we'll go ahead and close. Actually, anyone online who wants to speak on this item?

Thank you. We'll go ahead and close public comments and we'll turn it back over to council with any further questions, comments, or a motion.

I move to proceed with proposed activity allocations for the five-year PLHA plan for fiscal year 25-26 through 29-30 and direct staff to return with the plan to council on September 21st, 2026 for consideration of adoption.

Go ahead, first and second. All those in favor, please vote. Item passed is 4-0 with Council Member Nelson absent. Thank you very much, Marjorie. Appreciate it. Any closed session report items? Nothing to report this evening. Wonderful. We're going to go ahead and adjourn, and we welcome everyone to come back at our next meeting, which will be Monday, September 21st, 2026 at 7 p.m.