City Council - Regular Meeting

I'd be happy to. Great. The city of Santa Monica is located on the land of Tovangar. With great respect, the city acknowledges the Gabrieleno Tongva as the first people of this ancestral and unceded territory of Curavanga, a village that we know as Santa Monica. We honor their elders, past and present, and the Gabrieleno descendants who are part of the Gabrieleno Tongva tribes. We recognize that these peoples are still here, and as settlers and kuyom, guests, we recognize our responsibility and obligation to care for their land in partnership with them. The City of Santa Monica commits to work

Sorry, question. Was that also to move the special agenda items prior to general public comment? Yes.

Okay, I believe Councilmember Hall is going to read the next proclamation.

Thank You mayor if we could have the representatives from the Filipino Workers Center and Anyone from the coalition of Asian Pacific employees of Santa Monica. I want to come up and stand at the rostrum here So Every October communities across our country celebrate Filipino American History Month and tonight Santa Monica is proud to join them I think for the second time in our history. We're recognizing this and This month marks October 18th, 1587, when Filipino sailors aboard a Spanish galleon came ashore at what is now Morrow Bay, California. It's the first recorded presence of Filipinos in

So October is nationally recognized as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and we have Kaylee Malloy here from American Cancer Society. So I'm going to have her come up. Obviously, this is personal for me. And before I read this, I want to remind everyone that this October, we will be doing the Making Strides Walk at the pier in Santa Monica, where roughly 10,000 people show up to raise much needed funds for breast cancer survivors, thrivers, and current patients and research. All right, so October is recognized nationally as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, a time dedicated to raising awareness abou

No, I mean, please stay. He deeply misses local government.

I don't know how you guys want to handle this, but I would like us to be able to hear public input on that item when it comes up. I mean, we're in the middle of public comment on non-agendized items now.

One of the greatest parts of being here at the Coliseum is the fact that it's such an iconic building.

I am. I also have some recusals, which I think we'll do after we... Yeah, we'll do that after the public input.

Mayor, I just want to say that I don't know if everybody's screen is working, but I can't put myself in the queue.

I can't. I would like. Oh, there we go. Now I can.

I don't see it on my end, but that's fine. I'll make the motion that we suspend the rules to hear public comment on agenda item 4N. I'll second.

If you want it, I hope you come up with it tonight.

I'd like to move the remainder of the consent calendar.

Yeah, I'll state my reasons for recusal on 4A and 4H. On 4A, Tetra Tech, which is one of the proposed parties for the contracts that issue in this item, is a former client of my law firm, Hanson Bridget LLP. Neither I nor Hanson Bridget have any financial interest in this contract whatsoever, but to avoid any appearance of impropriety, I will recuse from that item. And for 4H, I live within 1,000 feet of the proposed contract. subdivision, per the FVPC rules for proximity, I'm going to recuse.

Yes. I will be recusing myself from item 4H related to the approval of a final parcel map for a property at 2134 Stewart Street due to its proximity to my residence.

Are we voting and then I can make my comment? Oh, I'm sure if you want to make myself and I just want to make sure whatever parking issues were concerned that. Is staff going to because that that whole area has that problem is that something that if there's a possibility of adjusting whatever permitting.

Did you want to for him for I'm on the raft tells country yes, if if stuff you just a brief staff report on it, I'm curious to learn more about this. Thank you.

I just had a question about the competitive process for this, because it didn't seem like there was one.

And this is part of this new sort of one SEMO approach to look at how we are operating in a myriad of ways, or?

I can appreciate that and having going through it right now. I think just something that I want to be clear about for the residents of who have emailed and asked a lot of questions myself included. We hear a lot of municipalities spending money to hire outside consulting firms to assess how we're better working. And I think the common question is, can we just do that work ourselves internally? And second, just to be clear where that money is coming from, because residents here were in a deficit. I understand it's important in order to serve the community better and all the stakeholders. We hav

Is that going to be on our website or anything, too, or no?

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Mr. Ramirez, for your report and city manager. She's super helpful. It was really helpful to see that we're going to be looking at peer cities and comparing ourselves there. I have a couple of asks. I think frequently when we get data from staff, it's often a measure of performance. And like, how many times did we do the thing? You know, how many inspections were completed? How many cases were closed? Which I think are important measures to track. But can we also make sure we're doing like measures of effectiveness and understanding, you know, not just how many

I have one further one. Can you you mentioned the lawsuit, but can you explain to the public what the what spot zoning is and what the risk would be if there is any with respect to spot zoning?

New speaker so there wasn't any thought with respect to possible legal risk with respect to doing it that way?

So if I understand your comments, Could we have looked, could we have staff have looked at a geographical basis which would affect both the R1s and the R23 areas geographically? Certainly. That would have gotten us to the 52. Right. Or somewhere close to that point.

Yeah, that's more comments and discussion, but can you just walk us through? What's coming up next if we were to hypothetically adopt this ordinance and? You know through the sbc9 implementation process What flexibility we have in terms of developing our own 2d zones as part of the seventh cycle housing element process and what flexibility we have in? through that process to choose a different mix of units through all the TOD zones.

Oh, sorry, sorry, Council Member Garcetti. I just wanted to know if staff went through, you know, HCDs like the Affirmatively Fair Housing. When we look at that, does staff also discuss with HCD and look at this historical impacts to the Pico neighborhood as well? Because I know we talk about displacement, but there are broad brushes and strokes around just historical harm in a specific neighborhood.

I was just curious if we've, I was just reading some of the stuff and they're like, if we've, if PICO qualifies as, I don't know if it qualifies as a low resource area or.

Yeah. And what does qualify you to be a resource? Well, what does that mean? Low resource?

So they don't take it within the eight square miles and say this area specifically is near all the things you just mentioned?

But in this case, we're not able to protect the Pico neighborhood and it's not applying. It's not applicable. Those same standards.

It's interesting because it's one of the, we talk a lot about homeownership and social justice and the opportunity to own and then we're taking away And in some regard, it feels like in a specific area, but I'll save that for my no vote.

I just have a quick question. You said just right now there's three applications for SB79, but they're not all in the Pico neighborhood. Is that correct?

I first want to thank the residents and also This new neighborhood organization for sending the letter to us, it made me myself as a council member, take a 2nd, look at my decision at our last council meeting as to how we handle this particular temporary. I look at as a temporary issue with respect to 79 the. You know, the information obviously is very technical for a number of residents, but based on my understanding and the research that in the letter that we received, it shows that going forward, we'll have a much bigger decision as to how SB 79 and how we lay out our transit-oriented direc

Yeah, we've talked about this a lot. I don't want to be a dead horse too much. But I think that it's important to recognize this has been an emotionally fraught issue for a lot of people in the community. And it is worth recognizing that the Goddard Park neighborhood has historically been through a lot. You've got a freeway tearing right through it. You've got your metro rail yard right to the north. You're just downwind of our city yards. Yeah, I mean, it's not something we take lightly. I think the core thing for me, when I'm looking at this again, talked about it before, is that R1 has esse

Councilmember Hall Yeah, I just have a quick question for planning staff for the city attorney isn't what Mayor Terose is adding as a Part of her substitute amendment isn't that the work that we're about to begin with the alternative TOD zone So I guess I'm a little confused as to why Like wouldn't that distract from the alternative TOD? It's the same thing

Okay. And City Attorney, do you have any concerns that that, if we were to do that, would put us out of compliance with state housing law and risk things like the builder's remedy or litigation?

Okay, I'm thoroughly confused. We have spent many nights talking about this. The whole goal is to minimize displacement. The whole talk is to minimize the parcels to get to the fine moment. Now we're at this moment, and I just don't want to trick the community into what's happening. We're moving forward with what was already presented to upzone the Pico neighborhood and not choose R2, R3. But then we're saying, but also while we do that, let's please continue to try to upzone the least amount of parcels. Didn't we already say that to begin with that? That's always the goal. Yes So I just don't

And those fewer parcels would have no continuity?

I just got back at the queue to say that that direction or that amendment is at least friendly to me. I'm fine looking at it. I mean, I think, you know, I have some skepticism as to whether or not a non-contiguous zone is something we can find a rational basis for or whether relying on subjective judgments about displacement is something we can find a rational basis for basing a zoning ordinance on. But I'm fine looking at it.

Yeah, I think we're muddying the waters here. I think we need to be very clear that we're proceeding with the ordinance that's put in front of us tonight, and that we're adding additional direction to explore those things. And I hope that what we're saying on the dais tonight does not lead to our residents believing that there may be an out to what is currently before us, because I think we've heard time and time again, unless the city attorney wishes to share additional information that the whole dais is not privy of, I think she's made it pretty clear that this would be like very historicall

Are you ready to vote? Could you restate it for the record?

I voted no because of the additional amendment to ask staff to do the research of how we could effectively spot zone. I feel like it gives folks false hope that we're going to be able to reduce the number of parcels impacted, and as this is a temporary upzoning or downzoning effectively from what is currently allowed, I would prefer for staff to use their time on more pressing matters. Thank you.

I voted no because I voted no the whole time for reasons I've previously discussed. I think the Pico neighborhood and the assessment that we're taking and the ability we have as policymakers up here means that we have to look at things just beyond a map and we're not looking at the historical harms in the way that we should be. And I still think there was a lot more information and work that could have, should have been done. And now we're here. So that's why I voted no. Okay.

I do. Actually, last week, myself and our Director of Housing, Aileen Reynolds, our Manager of Homeless Prevention, Allison Crosby, our Housing Manager, Natalia, Verlinch and our human service manager, Natasha Kingscott, had the opportunity to go to Vienna, Austria to be part of a conference on social housing. And it was really an incredible event. We were there with 50 other Californians from San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego, and also the San Bernardino area, all different occupations. And one of the things that was really inspiring is looking at how the government ties transit with

I just have a couple quick questions. One, so you say you got that 4,500 AF gap. Is that projection, how do you relate that to our housing growth assumptions, or has the RH?

And then my other question is, okay, you say you've got this 80 to 85 self-sufficiency estimate. If the Sharnick well underperforms, how does that affect that ratio?

So that's why you're asking for direction. When we look for outside sources, you would take that into play with respect to the outside sources?

Yes, point of preference. I get my water from the atmosphere. I've got a machine that our drinking water that captures moisture right from moisture, and that's how I have my drinking water if more presence did that Would it help it would but unfortunately for municipal agency? We don't we're not allowed to use that but it's not approved for us Put that in there. All right.

Thank you as well for the very informative presentation and very thorough. I was just curious in terms of the potential projected gap and where we are with our conservation efforts. Are there specific types of water uses that are really difficult to model for conservation or that we're having trouble getting folks to areas where we're having trouble getting folks to conserve more water?

Would you possibly see an opportunity for Any sort of state-level action or state-level rebate programs that would help encourage that?

Thank you for that clarification. And then on our long-term portfolio, is there any drawbacks? And I preface this with I have real concerns with desalination and the potential risks of that using that technology and impacts on our oceans and everything. But is there any risk or is there any negative impact to staff time or energies to continue to monitor those advancements at the same time as we do some of these other mitigations.

And is there also an opportunity for us to reclaim more water that would otherwise run off to the ocean? We're already doing that. I know we're doing a lot on that already.

Well, these conversations are not new because I know when I went on that trip these were things that have been talked about so it's Nice to hear them coming bubbling up. My question is a couple of things Selling water back. Is that a possibility? Where we could do something like that if in fact we were to utilize the airport and have recreation on top The water back to a local jurisdiction

And then as far as desal, I would presume that that would have a ratepayer impact.

I think so many people are... That's probably not a good time for looking into that at this point.

And obviously, that's all taken into account with all the development. And then as far as low flow, I mean, that's probably a policy question for us, I guess, going forward and making it standard practice that people have to use certain hardware to continue. Like the water efficiency fixtures? Yeah, water efficiency.

I guess you can't really require it. You'd have to provide just a really good incentive to make sure people want to do it.

I hope that if we look at, like, rent-controlled older apartment buildings, like, having a better system, because I know I've had the experience of, like, it's not on the tenant, the landlord. Right.

And then my last question was just when you were talking about the, I can't remember how it was phrased, but the technology piece of it that's about to be updated, I believe, by the end of this year. You had something back on that screen. I'm assuming it's the app that tells you if you're having like a leak or something.

It was for something for the end of this year or beginning of this year. This thing? Yes. Is that what's being updated to tell you?

Okay, because I remember we had some, like I had a multitude of people who were having these issues that weren't notified before they got like a $1,500 bill.

But if right now if someone's not signed up for it and there's a leak and it's getting to the point where their bill ends up being thousands of dollars, I mean, do we have another means or method of getting

Thank you, and yeah, thanks to you and Mark for great presentations, very informative as always. One thing that we often hear in the social media world is, oh my God, look at this gap between housing and what's available. I think that one important piece of this puzzle that's missing, I'd love for you to take a moment to explain, is the process of a will serve letter is issued before any building permits are approved. Can you just walk us through what that process is?

Right. And there's more detail on this in the the name now, but it was the report that was attached, our water conservation master plan. But in the event that there is periods of shortage, there's a whole series of events that are triggered and come into place, right? Okay. I think the last question I had, sorry, I'm going to flip through my notes here. No, that's all the questions I've got. Thanks. Sure.

I assume there will be intermediate updates along the way. Yes. I'll second that.

Just quickly, you heard the comments from Ms. Lopez. Can you just speak to that? I know you just said that you're in the middle of planning this robust evacuation plan. Is that referring to... Two things, yeah.

And then lastly, just as a, you know, for those of you that remember, I just wanted to make sure, because that we have in there like regular council involvement in as to like what that looks like when it happens, because as you remember, it was We were sort of kept in the dark about the process, and it's good for us to understand and know. So if something happens, we're also as prepared. And I think you have eight items that they're kind of related to that.

You kind of like 75% answered the question I was going to ask about having a handbook for council members. So I was wondering when do we get to see that and get trained on it?

I'm so excited. And If we're in comments, I did just want to give also a compliment that during the whole wildfire and everything, when we got daily kind of briefing talking points, that was incredibly helpful. So I'm grateful that we identified both the strengths and areas for improvement through this report. Thank you.

New speaker thank you, mayor, and thank you, Ms. call, for the presentation. Your office, fire, police, all of your work on preparing this after action review as well as the consulting team that supported it. As one of the makers of the motion that asked for this, I'm really glad it was done and done right and it's really nice to see the progress that has been made to date on all the recommendations. I do have my own mea culpa to make and admit my own screw-up during the fires like it was me that put out the bad information about fire breaking into our jurisdiction. We were all acting on infor

Thank you. I'll echo the thanks that people have said so far, and just acknowledging our fire department team in the back there. Thanks for your great work. Just touching briefly on some of the recommendations that are related to something that's of great interest to me about potentially reimagining the 10 Freeway. One of the things that's interested me in transforming that into a surface boulevard is potentially restoring north-south connections through the city and how that could potentially interact with opening up evacuation routes on a north-south basis. And so to the extent that that can

I brought it up because there are some very granular recommendations about, like, slope management on the ITAN and things like that. So to the extent that we're I don't know, thinking in terms of long-term route planning. I'd like to see that.

Okay, great, there. Yes. So I move that we pull 16A for voting, continue 16B until we get a qualified applicant, pull 16E for voting, and then move 16C and 16D.

I want to nominate Julie Stevens and Adam Baddawi and Evan McGee. I'm sorry, I can't hear you. Sorry.

Sorry, let me double check my notes. Yes, yeah. Oh, wait. Yeah, that was the three correct.

One of the names is missing. Oh, here it is. It's fine. We can figure it. We know who it is.

I looked at the results. It had weird numbers as opposed to people's names.

Can we just say ditto? No, just kidding.

On August 26, 2026, I, along with the rest of the City Council, received an email from Kim Curry requesting support for the off-the-hook event at the pier through a 16 item. Worked with miss curry and the mayor and mayor Toros is to place the item on the agenda I did not discuss with more than two additional council members And I was not aware that miss curry had gotten commitments from a total of four council members I am making this disclosure now on the record to ensure transparency and to allow for a full public discussion on this proposed 16 item I

Okay, you want me to go? On August 26th, 2026, I, along with the rest of the council, received an email from Kim Curry requesting support for the off-the-hook event at the pier through item 16A. Although I agreed to support the item, I did not discuss the item with more than two other council members to place the item on the agenda, nor was I aware that Ms. kory had gotten commitments from the total four councilmen. I am making this disclosion now on record to ensure transparency and to allow for full public discussion on the proposed 16 items.

On August 18, 2026, I along with the rest of the city council received an email from Kim kory requesting support for the off the hook event at the pier through a 16 item. I corresponded with her about my willingness to support the request. On September 7th, 2026, I had let Ms. Corey know that I would speak to up to two more council members to place a 16 item on the September 22nd agenda. Ms. Corey then responded by letting me know that she had already received commitments from the mayor as well as council members Negrete and Snell. Because I became aware that at least four council members agre

What was asked in the item and then what was asked during the comments? I think there was like a waiver request, which I'm not clear exactly how much. Is it $8,000 and some change for the city fees for the pier? And then it sounds like there was...

Yes, but I'm just trying to clarify what we're doing versus what was said.

And so I guess the question is if any other council members want to participate, is that allowed still?

I supposed to say this before we take the vote. In the past, councilmember Hall has brought up some concerns about weaving the specific portion of the city's peer fee In retrospect, I I think I share those concerns about that specific portion of the fee for the reasons he's previously articulated You know, this is this is it's a great city event the challenge I'm having here is that it's You know if we were taking this money and donating it directly to Hila Bay supporting a Nonprofit endeavor like that. I I think that's one thing I think backfilling operating costs for events that are not part

I mean, as Dan said before, we have had this signature event program for a reason. And I'm very supportive of the event. I'll spend my money there. I mean, I'm struggling to reconcile how our event framework fits in with this particular event.

I was just going to comment and say that I agree. I also know that there's plenty of people who produce events in the city who may or may not make a profit from it and also feel like they're doing it for the love of highlighting restaurants or a local area and bringing people here. I will just say that Going forward, I know I discussed this with SPIN PR with Kim Curry, that maybe this becomes part of a signature event, and maybe there's some other way that it gets funded. So our money, it's not, there's no waiving. It looks like the money's going to help offset costs, but I would just say that

That passes. Okay. Mayor, I'd like to explain my no vote. My vote no is not because I don't support the festival or its intended beneficiaries. I would just rather see our council discretionary funds go directly to support nonprofits helping send school teams and bands on trips and supporting cultural programming. Thank you.