City Council - Special Meeting

Everyone and welcome to the City Council special meeting this Monday October 19th. City Clerk can you please call the roll.

Here. Thank you. And welcome everyone. We're excited to be here in person with options for those who choose not to be in person to still participate remotely. Thank you for your cooperation and for helping us maintain an efficient and accessible meeting environment. There are several ways to participate in public comment tonight. For those attending in person, you may complete a yellow request to speak slip and hand it to the city court. If you're participating remotely, use the raise your hand feature in Zoom. and you will be called upon at the appropriate time. If you're calling in via phone

Okay, then I will close public comment on this item and we will convene in conference room C and then return for the next item on our agenda. Thank you and we'll be back soon.

Good evening and welcome back. We will now resume our meeting and move on to the next item of the agenda, which is item two, city council rules and procedures updates. We have a presentation from our city clerk, Mr. Martin McTaggart.

Thank you, at this time I'll open this item for public comment. So if anyone has any public comment, you may bring a request to speak slip or unmute yourself to raise your hand. Deputy City Clerk, do we have any public comment?

Okay, then I will close public comment for this item, bring it back to the dais and ask if council members have any questions or comments. Okay.

Council Member Newsom. Thank you, through the mayor. Chapter 12, I do understand the idea of two-year term limits. I do have a few concerns, in particular, I think under the roles that we would consider governance and legislative bodies as opposed to ceremonial roles. To use a few examples, I have served on the fire board for our fire JPA for the last four years. It took me three years. Actually, it wasn't until my fourth year that I actually became chair of the fire board. And I think that that is the case as well when you look at CCAG and ABAG and some of these other more governance-type gro

All right. So on chapter seven, I was curious how it works with group presentations. Does that mean that all group presentations must be present in room to make a presentation? Or can there be a hybrid scenario where one person's here and four people are online? Or can the whole group be online?

And I understand that. And I actually support it. I just wanted to make sure we kind of hashed that out. That's all the thoughts and comments I have. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

I appreciate that. Council Member Spierko-Groditsky.

Thank you. Great presentation, Martin. Respectfully, I disagree with your comments because, for example, we're in an election season and in... you know, a couple weeks, there could be three of you that are no longer on the council. And then the way that our appointments are set up today is that it's based on tenure and service on the council. So, for example, Nicole and I, having only been on for two years, have had no exposure to some of these larger joint power authority groups. And then if you're gone, then we have no experience to then go in. and actually like be on those groups. And I did

I completely understand your thoughts. I mean, the other three council members on this council were all for new, you know, two years prior and had no legacy at all. So, so we, we completely, I mean, I'm saying we, but I think we all relate and understand that. I think also that encourages or shows the importance of backups for those. So if we have someone who's on a bag, we have someone who's on C CAG, who's someone who's on fireboard, the alternates should be, if possible, really attending a few meetings. Because, yeah, I mean, not to mention there could just be some act of God where people j

Thank you. Any other? Yes, Deputy Mayor Fernandez.

Martin and city clerk team, thank you very much for a very comprehensive presentation. And I am agreeable with all of the edits that you want to make. I also see Council Member Newsom's point. And actually, I share his point of view that it does seem like for some of the larger policy-oriented positions, we do lose some seniority when we have that overture. I do think that it's important that we sort of line up the, I don't know what the fourth phrasing is, but we line up the alternate to kind of be ready, like pack the bench or whatever and give folks the option of attending in your stead whe

Yes, I appreciate that. And it feels like if we're fighting so hard for certain positions, we have to show up for those positions that we are fighting so hard for and having the presence as a regional body, as a regional leader. And so I would, if we can, I would, and if there's a number of nodding heads on this point, I would love to see us to have a minimum attendance policy.

Thank you. How would we even manage that? Because like right now, like I covered once for Lisa this year as her alternate. Like, would we have some kind of rubric then?

I think that maybe this might create a little bit more, this is just me talking off the cuff, but, you know, we know that like, for example, LPMG has one meeting a quarter, right? That's the Caltrain group. And, you know, we just make sure that, you know, we look at the end of the year or mid-year if we get emails saying your representative didn't attend or we just kind of figure out, like, did we have someone there for all of the months? And if not, then we're going to have to shift things when a new mayor comes in and we do assignments again.

I'm just really concerned about the equity piece though, because this year I wasn't assigned to like right now we're asked as a council to choose our preferences. And then this year for the second year in a row, I wasn't assigned to a single preference. and i take issue with that because for example in my district i'm the third representative ever from the city of san mateo so essentially you have twenty five thousand people for example with what's happening with the freeway expansion that don't have an opportunity to advocate for themselves or have a voice on some of these important joint pow

Thank you. Yes. Council Member Diaz Nash.

Thank you to the mayor and thank you to the city staff for the presentation. I appreciate your concerns, council member. I think I am in line with the deputy mayor's position. I think you and I have tried to work this out. And I think we need to do even more, or the alternates need to be even more actively involved, even if it is a target of a certain number of meetings. I totally, totally support that. I do think, though, that if, you know, for something like the fire board, it's a It's a large cemetery represents the majority of the budget and what's going on. And it's important for us to ha

Thank you. And I think that was the idea behind these changes, right? Like we don't, we're not, you know, these changes are not necessarily requiring a shift after two years. And I think Council Member Newsom brings up a good point in that there will be instances in which it would not behoove us to make a shift. And I would, you know, I would hope that if we were to put in place a system that included a little bit more infrastructure that supported alternates, that supported the council generally becoming a little more informed about what everybody's role is in these bodies, sharing back, we w

Well, I would like to ensure then that if we're asking for council members preferences, then you at least get one of your preferences. Because that seems, why are you asking if you're not even gonna assign it out?

Well, there are only so many roles. And if a number of people pick the same ones, then you have an issue.

But I think the whole point of us reviewing this was to make sure there was more balance and equity in the process. So effectively we're saying that doesn't matter because two years in a row now, I have not been able to get the appointments that I would like. And there's very specific reasons I would like them because there is specific impact to areas of the city in my district that my community doesn't have a voice about. For example, the freeway expansion that is happening in District 4. And so we need to be able to have a seat at the table to advocate when those decisions are made at some o

Council Member Newsom, did you have something?

I would support that at Danielle as well. I would say that, you know, making sure that everybody gets at least one or two of their priorities, I think that would be a good way to find that compromise. Deputy Mayor.

I support what Council Members, I get the point of what Council Member Sierkowiczki is saying. I would perhaps be more comfortable with maybe a statement of values or a statement of goals added to our rules because there might be times due to conflict or due to uh working whatever the case may be that we may not be able to assign somebody their first preference and so maybe a a statement of values or a statement in the rules and procedures i think i might be supportive so it's just a to clarify so that would be just a statement basically principles that the mayor and and deputy mayor would wor

Yeah, that's where I would probably be comfortable landing.

I guess I wonder, Martin, if you see an opportunity to potentially add a little language that might allow for mayors and deputy mayors considering assignments to potentially make alternate decisions based on the preferences as well and maybe give some language that speaks to the idea that there may be situations in which multiple council members have strong preferences for various positions and in those we have existing language that seems to hint that if one is not necessarily in a position to be like advancing toward a chair position or something of that nature, then there could be an opport

Also, perhaps when we submit our preferences every year, if there's a specific reason you want to be on one of these boards or commissions, the council members should say that. Because if there's something going on that directly impacts the community or a certain part of the community that a council member has jurisdiction over, they may want to be holding that seat even temporarily, right?

Yeah, if I might. I think that's a great idea. And I would just ask City Clerk McTaggart, Could we add a bit of some sort of extra column in which people could provide a little more explanatory text for the reasoning behind their positions and preferences?

Thank you. So I just want to check and get a sense of how council members feel about the proposed changes and recommendations and whether anything needs to be added.

I'm good with everything. I did just want to ask about the blue sky process because things do happen in the course of a year that then Trump what's on blue sky sometimes. So I'm just wondering, you know, we, we still need some leeway to make exceptions.

Okay, I appreciate that. In the interest of time, I'll just reiterate. Do we have council members in agreement on the recommended changes?

In that case, I thank you for your report and we'll consider this the end of the item and we will adjourn the special session and we'll reconvene for regular meeting within five-ish minutes. Thank you very much.