Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Okay, it's time. Madam Clerk, roll call, please.

Here. Good morning. Welcome to the Tuesday, August 25th, 26th, Meeting of the Fresno County Board of Supervisors. We're going to begin today with the invocation and a flag salute. The invocation will be led by District 5 after the invocation. Please remain standing for the flag salute.

Thank you very much for those wonderful words.

Okay, thank you. Agendas are on the back table for anyone wanting to follow along. Madam Clerk, first item please. Okay, is there a motion and a second to approve the agenda? All those in favor say aye. Passes unanimously.

Okay, these matters are routine in nature, usually are approved by a single vote. Would any board members like an item removed from consent for discussion? Seeing none, would any members of the public like an item removed from consent for discussion? Okay, seeing none, is there a motion and a second to approve the rest of the consent? All those in favor say aye. Approved unanimously.

And Behavioral Health is here to present. Come on up.

That's all right. Thank you very much. Any comments from the board? Any comments from the public? Okay. Good comment. Come on. Why don't you come on up? We'll have a picture with the board.

Okay, and I'll turn this over to Supervisor Mendez.

Right. Any other questions? Any comments from the public, questions from the public? Okay, well, I appreciate you bringing this forward. I appreciate you bringing this forward. And, Assessor Dictos, you being here today, is there a motion and a second?

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, thank you. Board, any? Yes, Supervisor Magnuson.

Just really briefly, thank you for the presentation. And our CEO is right, we did read the presentation. Really appreciate the work that you and your partner did. I think you met with Supervisor Bredefeld and myself a while back. And I also appreciated Chief Hale's kind of just crash course on just the complexities of fire protection. We have such a big geographical area. I've seen it myself up in the mountains when there's people that experience a medical emergency or a broken, you know, foot or people that think they could get up to Pincushion Trail very easily and find out they can't. I've

Thank you, Chief. I appreciate it. The last thing I'll say is I think you introduced me to a lot of people don't know this, but when your phone falls out there, it sends a distress call and you've had your folks respond. I am ready. If I ever need that, I'm going to throw my phone and hopefully respond out there.

Thank you. Any other comments? Yes, Supervisor Michael.

Okay. I just wanna say I appreciate all the work that you and the firefighters do throughout the county. Got a chance to be at your training center and see what you all do and it's amazing work and it's dangerous work and you, like our sheriffs and police officers, do everything you can to make our community safe. So I greatly appreciate what you do every single day. I just wanna say it. Yes, sir.

Can we just do that for direction? Do you need a motion?

Any comments from the public? Okay, I will bring this back. So this is, you have direction, and we will move forward then. Okay, thank you very much, Chief.

Before we start, do any board members need to report any ex parte communications they've had on the matter? Seeing none, okay.

None? Okay. We will now open the hearing to receive public testimony. If the appellant is here, they have five minutes to present. Are they here? Okay.

All right, any other comments in favor of the appeal? Anybody who would like to? Yes, please come forward.

Thank you, ma'am. Any other comments in favor of the appeal? YES, SIR. WELCOME.

Thank you. Anyone else to speak in favor?

Thank you, sir. Anyone else to speak in favor of the appeal?

Thank you very much. Anyone else want to speak in favor of the appeal? Hi, welcome.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wish to speak in favor of it, the appeal? Okay, anybody wish to speak against the appeal? Seeing none, okay. Yes? Okay.

Is there anyone else that wishes to speak?

Thank you very much. Anyone else wish to speak?

Thank you. Anyone else? OK, I'm going to bring it back. Comments, questions?

Mr. Motto, one of the residents said they didn't receive any notification. Do we send notifications out for this kind of thing or not?

Everyone within a quarter mile should have received a notification. That's correct. Okay. Also on this agenda item, they want to split this property into two. Is that correct?

So staff made the file, OK. Did they build a significant portion of this without proper permits?

been done so now they've been out and they've been inspected and then they've passed all of those we haven't completed all the inspections but they do have permits in process and there's other things such as the restroom finish that's a condition of this project my last question it's been stated several times that during the Planning Commission they were asked to stop but it seems other people said they kept going what do what do you know about that

OK. I have one of these in my district. We had similar concerns. We put several measures against that. I'm assuming this, too, is a conditional use permit? What are the ramifications if they violate our conditions? What happens?

OK, my question more specifically would be, how many complaints do we have to get before it comes back?

So if they're supposed to close down by 10 and they stay open until midnight and the neighbor files a complaint, what happens?

Yeah, because I think the one speaker said they just kept going because there was no teeth or getting slapped on the risk. And I can appreciate that. So I'd like to have a little teeth. The one in my district seems to be operating fairly well. This is definitely more split. We have half in favor, half opposed. So it's a tough, tough call. But for those in opposition, If they are you know, and then for me my only concern I'm willing to give people a chance but it seems like they kind of push the outer envelope and even when they weren't supposed to they pushed anyway, and I don't really appreci

I would. Of course. Yeah, I want an answer to that.

So you as an attorney, what is your justification for even scheduling such a thing when you're not fully permitted? Yeah, how do you justify that?

You're going to state that for the record? Yes. So if I go and bring the sheriff's log in here, and they go out there and had events, you're going to state that didn't occur?

CHRIS JERRAM, I'm sure you're aware that us, the five up here, we have a balancing act. And I believe every one of us believes in personal property rights, and you should be allowed to do what you want with your property. However, those of us in ag also believe you shouldn't interfere with someone else's rights as well. So I hope your applicant, again, this is in Supervisor Mendez's district. So he will have the greatest say, just like we're giving all that courtesy in our districts. So whatever his recommendation is, I'm prepared to support that. if he is willing to give you the conditions to

Just real briefly, I agree with what Supervisor Pacheco mentioned with regards to us trying to balance the property rights of individuals that are trying to make business in their community. What I'm trying to reconcile is, and I checked with our folks from the city of Fowler, there was a couple of references made that the city of Fowler was not supportive of this. I asked them, the city of Peller does not oppose this. I just want to make sure that folks recognize that into the record. And when I checked, they said they had no complaints about this property. I think I agree with what Superviso

I have some questions. Okay. I'm so sorry. No, you can't. No, it's closed. The public portion is closed, but thank you. I share all of the concerns that Supervisor Pacheco said, and also concerns I have is that There have been coded violations, have there not, over three years where they've been operating without a conditional use permit? Is that correct?

So how have they been, if they've been actively violating not having permits, how have we not shut them down for three years?

Do you want to, anybody from code enforcement want to address it?

You filed an injunction to shut them down?

So why is this taking two years? June 2024?

I think we've got to do better than this. We have people here who said they've been complaining and I'm troubled by this, that it feels like we've allowed people to operate illegally And here we are, they're asking to now operate legally after operating illegally for several years. That's quite troubling to me. Feels like in some way we've let down people, and I think we need to own that. In terms of the conditional use permit, oh, let me ask you this question. It says in the staff report that when they went to the Planning Commission, a motion was made to deny the applications due to an inabi

I got it, I got that. On the conditional use permit, what limits are you imposing on them in terms of time, operation, noise, to address the concerns of the neighbors?

OK. I also share the same feeling with Supervisor Pacheco. I'm very supportive of my colleague and what he wants to do in his district. I'm wondering if some of these issues around the conditional use permit and the limitations and requirements of approving a conditional use permit there's some way to have neighbors meet with the property owner to come up with some agreed limitations on the conditional use permit I don't know if that creates a problem for you supervisor no okay well I am concerned about you know this this gentleman having operated for several years without legal permits. I do

CHRIS RODGERS. Yeah, Mr. Hemming, I would ask, I don't recall everything. It was several years ago. But I would put on whatever we did to that, I would put on the same exact thing here to be, one, to be equal and to be fair. And it seems to be working well for me. I've not had one complaint since we've done that. There are neighbors that literally live next door across the street. And they have been great neighbors and have abided by the rules. I would like to put a similar whatever those were on this property based on what we heard today. Yeah. Are you familiar, or do you?

I would imagine. I'm OK with that, Mr. Brennan.

And I think they understand. Yeah, we take that away in a heartbeat. I don't care how much you invested. You either do it the right way or you lose that privilege. It's real simple for me.

All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Passes unanimously.

OK. Any comments from the board? Okay, any comments from the public? They're bringing it back. Is there a motion and a second? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Passes unanimously. Next item.

Any committee reports or comments? Yes, Supervisor Mags.

Okay. So we don't have any... We now move to item number 10, board appointments. Yes, committee board appointments. None. Nope. We will move on to the next one.

Okay, any comments from the public on any matter not on this agenda or any comments from the public on closed session items 13 through 22? Please come forward.

Yeah, thank you, ma'am. Thank you. Next, please.

Thank you very much. Okay. Seeing no one else, next.

Thank you. Anyone else? Okay, we will now close that and move on to the next item.

OK, then we will now go into closed session.

Okay, is there a motion and second to adjourn? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Passes unanimously. We are adjourned.