City Council - Regular Meeting

It's warm in here, no?

All right, we'll go ahead and call the meeting to order. Thank you everybody for being here. Welcome to our afternoon session of today's council meeting August 4th, 2026. We'll pass it to Clementine to do roll call and to share announcements with the public.

Council member Barber present. Council member Garcia here. Council member Rash here. Council member Smith here. And Mayor Williamson here. And public comment and participation information is provided on this meeting's agenda, which is online at monterey.gov slash agendas. In-person attendees, please keep your electronic devices muted to prevent audio interference. Consistent with the First Amendment and the Brown Act, individuals have the right to speak at public meetings, which includes the right to criticize or support city policies or actions. And the city encourages your uninhibited and robust feedback on public issues affecting the city. Thank you for participating.

Thank you, Clementine. And with that, a portion of this City Council meeting is conducted by teleconference with Councilmember Smith, participating today by teleconference from Coupeville, Washington. In accordance with the Ralph M. Brown Act, his remote location has been identified in the agenda for this meeting. Councilmember Smith, can you hear me well?

I can.

Were you able to hear our proceedings on this end up until now?

Yes, I was.

Do you have a copy of the agenda for this meeting? I do. Was the agenda posted 72 hours prior to this special meeting at your location? It was. Is your location accessible to the public such that any member of the public could participate from your location if they wish to do so?

Yes, it is.

Is any member of the public there with you currently who would like to participate in the public comment portion of this meeting or otherwise address any agenda items for this meeting?

No, there's not.

All right, and this is for everybody here. Can everyone clearly hear Council Member Smith?

Yes.

All right, the Brown Act requires that any votes taken during the teleconference portion of this meeting be taken by roll call. And with that, we'll go ahead and start with our presentation. First item on the agenda is to recognize our DLI quarterly joint service awards. This is always a really exciting opportunity for us, partially and mainly because we are a military community and it's a little small way that we can give gratitude and appreciation to our service members. So thank you all so much for what you do for serving our country. And I'm gonna go ahead and get started here with Staff Sergeant Taylor Arness, Arness? No? Okay, I'm gonna read the one who's here. Is it Grant? Grant, that's you. Okay, perfect, awesome. All right, so this is a proclamation honoring the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center's Quarterly Joint Service Award recipient, Private First Class Grant Kazi. Whereas the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center has established the quarterly joint service non-commissioned officer, petty officer, and junior enlisted board, and whereas a recipient of the board award, Private First Class Grant Kazi has demonstrated extraordinary personal abilities, leadership skills, and knowledge of the history of the Presidio and DLI-FLC, chain of command, world events, customs and courtesies, first aid, code of conduct, uniform code of military justice, military leadership, and the armed forces insignia. And whereas the Monterey community is proud of the country's service members as well as its outstanding relationship with DLI-FLC, now therefore be it proclaimed that I, Tyler Williamson, Mayor of the City of Monterey, on behalf of our City Council and citizens, hereby recognize Private First Class Grant Kazi, United States Army, for a job well done and thank them for continuing contributions to the armed services and to our nation. So please give it up for Private First Class Grant Kazi. Please. And as is typical for our meetings, we always have them come and give a few remarks, typically within their language that they're learning. And so after he speaks, we'll be able to guess. And this is a participation activity. So feel free to shout it out. once he's complete. So please, sir, take it away.

My name is Ghazi. I'm from the United States. I love climbing stairs in Fort Ord. I'm also married. My wife here is pregnant right now, and my father is close by at the Chomp Hospital. Or Salinas Hospital, of course. Also, I don't have the opportunity to speak English. I don't speak it. I don't speak it yet. Okay. I have a question. No idea what you said, but. All right, what say you all?

That's correct. We need like a sub award for the guessies. Thank you for that. Awesome.

First try.

Well, congrats. You want to share with us what you said?

I just said that I like, thank you all for having me here today. And I do like to ride my bicycle in the Fort Ward mountains out in the back. I love walking with my wife on the beach as well. Everything here is beautiful. She is pregnant. You guys picked up on the, which is the hospital. We have it here and then yeah, everything else was thanks a lot to everybody and for having this occasion as well. We really do appreciate everything that the city does. And it's a beautiful place as well. Amazing place and rich in history as well. for the military.

Awesome. Yeah. Well, thank you. Congrats on the award and congrats on the newborn. So soon to be newborn. Please come on up. Let's take a photo.

Thank you. Congratulations.

Thank you, sir.

All right. Open up to the council. Any questions, comments on that item? Okay all right with that we're going to take it out for public comment specifically on this item, so this is not a time for general public comment and for items not on today's agenda, this is specifically to do the deal I quarterly joint service awards how the public comment portion of the Council meeting works, and this is for this item and all subsequent public comment periods. what we do is we identify the public commenters at the beginning of the public comment period once those folks are identified we cut it off and then only those folks will be able to speak so if you raise your hand after the cutoff you will not be able to speak everybody has the opportunity to do so but you have to identify yourself at the beginning of the public comment period so i'll start with folks on zoom you can use the raise hand function as you're navigating your way there i'll check with folks in the chamber anybody in the chamber wish to speak regarding the dli quarterly joint service awards I'm not seeing any takers, so I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. We have one on Zoom. We'll go ahead and take that caller.

Yes, this is our telephone caller, and you can go ahead, please.

Thank you. Nina Petey, resident of Monterey. I don't consent. I don't consent to language and culture being used as weapons of war against other countries to seduce other citizens to betray their countries or to prop up corrupt governments so that U.S. companies can loot the land and natural resources of those countries and harm their citizens. And frankly, I'm shocked that my fellow Monterey residents don't feel the same way. August 19th is the anniversary of the CIA-UK coup against the democratic government of Iran in 1953. The US then installed a notorious Shah. The Pentagon Channel reports that DLI trained personnel trained his security apparatus. That apparatus tortured and suppressed Iranians who opposed the corruption and wanted democracy and freedom for Iran. How many other countries have DLI personnel done this to over the decades? The chance of death to America are because of these horrible things that this country has done. We are one Earth of many nations, each sovereign with national security rights. The only viable future is built on communication, listening, curiosity, humility, mutual respect, accountability, and goodness. If any of us have a future, it is one where we reject the lies and propaganda from the US government that push us to the brink of worldwide annihilation. True warriors serve and protect the good. They don't serve Washington's extremist ideologies against the people of the earth. Thank you.

All right. Thank you, Ms. Beattie. With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment. I'll just wrap up, and I've shared this before in the past. I know that the idea of our defense and how it operates is debated, but I think for all the reasons that Ms. Beattie alluded to, the mission of the Defense Language Institute is, I think, an essential part of our mission, not just for DOD, but for our country. And we only have one military. We can't have another military that defends us And the warfighters are the ones that do that. There might be some questions around some of the values that drive some of the decisions, but that's not these frontline individuals making those decisions. These are the ones that are following the orders to make sure that we keep our country safe. And so I'm proud that we're able to recognize the hard work that they're doing to learn languages, to build relationships, with international partners to make sure that we we're trying to take a more diplomatic approach to to our our defense and in our international relations so with that we're going to go ahead and open it up for general public comment so this is an opportunity for folks to speak on the agenda for non-agendized items so if the item is on today's agenda this is not an opportunity to speak this is for non-agendized items only so i'll start again on zoom for folks on zoom you can use the raise hand function in the meantime i'll check in the chamber anybody in the chamber wish to speak for non-agendized items All right, seeing none in the chamber, I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one. Nobody on Zoom. With that, we'll go to our consent agenda. Staff, has there been anything requested to be pulled? All right, seeing none. Council, do you wish to pull anything? All right, we're gonna open it up for public comment on the consent agenda. So this is for the items on consent only. I imagine that most of you are here for the quick build project that's not on consent. So we'll get to that here shortly, but this is for non, sorry, for consent items only. And if you wish to pull something, we can also pull it as well and have it discussed as a separate item. So I'll start with folks on Zoom. You can use the raise hand function. While you're navigating your way there, I'll check in the chamber. Anybody in the chamber wish to speak or pull something from the consent agenda? All right, I'm seeing none. So I'll go back to Zoom. I'll do a countdown to five, four, three, two, one. We have one. Go ahead and take that caller.

Ms. Beattie, you can go ahead.

Thank you, I wish to comment on item number 4 on the consent agenda, which is about the Cal AM the lease of property.

I miss be real quick I thought we positive that they really miss me I just wanted to check in do you want to pull the item or do you just want to make public comment on it.

I'd like to make a comment on I got pulling or commenting either way.

It's it's up to you just let us know what you want to do.

Okay, pulling it would be great.

Okay. All right. So we'll go ahead and defer your public comment for now. We'll go ahead and pull that from the agenda and we'll come back to you once we get the item pulled. So with that, we'll go ahead and close public comment. I'll bring it back to the council for motion and deliberation.

I move that we accept the consent agenda two through five, accepting four. Second.

All right. It's been moved and seconded. Any other discussion? All right. Roll call, please.

Council Member Barber? Yes. Council Member Garcia? Yes. Council Member Smith?

Yes.

Council Member Rash? Yes. And Mayor Williamson?

Yes. All right. Motion passes. With that, we'll move to item four. Appoint agency negotiators for conference with real property negotiators pursuant to government code section 54956, TAC 8, property a portion of land north of 731 Dry Creek Road. Agency negotiators are Kim Cole, Jenna Aldredi, Andrea Rennie, and Andrew Esterling. Negotiating parties, Shad Thielman, under negotiation price in terms of payment for granting an easement. And so let's go ahead and open it back up for public comment. Let's get Ms. Beattie's public comment. And then if we need to, we can have staff provide additional information. So what I'll do is open it up for public comment for anybody that wants to speak on this item. So we'll start with folks on Zoom. You can use the raise hand function. Anybody in the chamber wish to speak on this item? All right, so we have one in the chamber. Anybody else? All right, so we'll cut it off to the one in the chamber. I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. We have the one on Zoom. Let's go ahead and start on Zoom, and then we'll jump back to the chamber. So Ms. Beattie, please.

You could go ahead.

Thank you. One of the issues with Cal-Am use of property for easement has been to erect HAB-Judy Nogg- antennas cellular antennas to allow private companies to put antennas on their water tanks, so I would want the city to put a provision in this agreement. HAB-Judy Nogg- That there would be no antennas installed on this property that they can install water tanks and water pipes and that sort of equipment, but these are adjacent to homes. And once this, and Cal-Am has different rights compared to the general public. So I just wanted to encourage the city as they negotiate to say that this is strictly for water access and not for antennas of any sort. Thank you.

All right, and then we'll, thank you, Ms. Beattie, we'll pass it to Josh to come forward and provide public comment on behalf of CalAMP.

Hi, thank you for discussing this tonight. First of all, we are in the water business, not in the telecommunications business, so we don't have any intention of putting in any towers of any sort. I just want to say that I was hoping I could just respond if you had any questions. I don't know the direction you've decided to go, but this is critical infrastructure that we've had for over 64 years. We have been working at this site. We are in the process of actually upgrading the site, renovating the site, and improving the site for your community and for our customers. And during this process, it was discovered that there was uh a handshake deal if you will there's a different the goal post kind of moved on this site that we've been actively improving for 64 years so we just want to move forward with doing the necessary upgrades we need to the site it provides critical water infrastructure a pump station that provides service to 900 residents homes it's backup for community hospital water So it's extremely critical infrastructure for the community. So I just want to be available if you have any questions, but also say that we look forward to working with you on this. And we do not have any intention of putting any type of telecommunications towers at the site. So let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you for the public comment. With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment. I'm going to make a motion to approve. Recommendation? All right, so moved and seconded. And the reason why is we're not, the item in front of us isn't to actually make a decision. It's simply appointing negotiators. I think it's helpful to hear the public comment. And I think staff is taking notes. I think we've heard from CalAM seems like that issue that was expressed was mitigated. So with that, any other comments on the council? All right, seeing none, we'll go ahead and do roll call, please.

Council Member Rasch? Yes. Council Member Barber? Yes. Council Member Smith?

Yes.

Council Member Garcia?

Yes.

And Mayor Williamson?

Yes. clementine with that we're gonna go to our public uh public hearing items for the afternoon item six on the agenda is adopt planning commission recommendation to adopt first reading of ordinance to amend chapter 38 of monterey city code to establish minimum density requirements in the multi-family residential overlay district and with that i'll pass it to dante for staff presentation thank you marin i'll pass it to uh levi hill our planning services manager to provide the presentation

Thank you, Mr. Hall. As mentioned, the item before you tonight is going to be a zoning amendment to establish minimum density standards in the multifamily overlay. And the staff recommendation is for the council to approve a first reading of the amendment and that would establish the amendment to the Chapter 38, establishing that minimum density requirement. A little bit of background on this item. As this council remembers, in July of 2024, the council adopted the general plan update for the Monterey 2031 general plan. And included in that update was the update to the six cycle housing element. months later in december of 2024 uh council uh approved our first wave of implementation measures so that's the housing action plan that's included in that housing element which is a series of programs and actions policy actions that the council and the city committed to and to implementing that those policies and goals included in the housing element So in December 2024, that first wave of rezonings came before the Council and was approved. And one of those programs that was approved by the Council was Program 1B, which is amendments to the multifamily overlay districts. If you recall, in 2019, the Council first adopted the multifamily residential overlay on the south side of Garden Road, which is IR zone properties. And applying that overlay allowed for multifamily and mixed-use development to be built on the on those sites up to a density of 30 dwelling units per acre what happened in december 2024 with the amendment to those overlays was the increase of density allowed on those sites from 30 dwelling units an acre to 60 dwelling units per acre and then it also expanded that overlay to other areas of the city to further facilitate housing So this map here on this slide shows the existing multifamily overlay or what was existing in 2024, that south side of Garden Road. This is now referred to our MF1 area for multifamily residential overlay. And so this was that existing area in 2019 that was adopted in 2019 and then was increased density to 60 dwelling units in 2024. Also included in that amendment was the expansion of the overlay, as I mentioned earlier, into other areas of the city, specifically the Pacific Munris CAS area shown here to capture all the commercially zoned properties in this general area. The little carve outs that you see throughout this map are mostly VAF properties. So that's our visitor accommodation facilities, which would not allow for multifamily and mixed use development. So they were not included in the overlay. Additionally, in that amendment, the overlay was expanded to the county courthouse site to further facilitate housing development at the time that the county vacates that site. This site here on Aguajito Road is referred to as our MF3 overlay area. So about six months after that amendment was approved in July of 2025, the state of California's Housing and Community Development Department, HCD, did provide a technical assistance letter to the city. And essentially what that letter stated was, you know, after reviewing our rezonings and our first wave of implementation, they discovered that, or they determined that those rezonings did not include a minimum density standard. specifically citing government code section 65583 that states that when properties are rezoned as a part of a housing element to accommodate low and very low income units a minimum density standard of 20 dwelling units per acre must be applied to those sites and then essentially the letter stated that we needed to further make amendments to the rezoning to apply that minimum density standard so uh following that letter staff did respond to the letter and then set up a series of meetings with hcd staff to further walk them through the development environment in the city of Monterey and kind of bring to their attention that the maximum and minimum zoning standards are rarely what determines proposed and allowed density on sites in the city of Monterey. Under the CDO and the regulatory water constraints the city's under, typically it's existing water credits that are available to the site is what drives the actual density of a proposed development. and that applying a minimum DITSI standard of 20 dwelling units per acre could have a negative impact on housing production for sites that would not have the water credits to meet that standard. So we had a series of meetings starting in April of 2025 until October 7th, 2025. And throughout all those meetings and expressing our concerns as it relates to the water constraints, HCD staff was consistent in saying that the state law did not provide any relief or statutory relief from that requirement and that we would be required to apply that minimum density standard. So in November of 2025, staff brought forward a proposed amendment to the Planning Commission that did incorporate a minimum density standard into the multifamily residential overlay areas. Included in that ordinance at that time was a series of caveats that would allow for some housing production to continue, specifically conversion projects and also phase projects and allowing us to use a full build out and calculating density. And then it also carved out some areas like scenic easements or undeveloped area. Planning Commission still expressed some hesitation at applying the minimum density standard to these overlay areas with a fear that it would further stagnate housing development in the city. And they asked that staff continue to consult with HCD and try to find further relief from that standard. Um, very soon after that meeting, after reviewing that proposed ordinance with those exceptions to the to the density standard, as I just noted, did review that ordinance and then provided feedback to staff, saying, stating that it would not meet the requirements of government code section 65583. and followed up with a corrective action letter on May 20th of 2026, stating the city must apply the minimum density standard blanketly in the overlay areas in order to remain in substantial compliance with housing element law. So that's how we got here today. Essentially is a proposed amendment that's rather straightforward in applying a minimum density standard in association with also the maximum density standard of 60 dwelling units per acre in the multifamily overlay area. We would now also be applying a minimum density standard in these overlay areas. And what this equates to is shown on your table is essentially one residential unit is required per 2,178 square feet of lot area. And on this table kind of provides a breakdown. Obviously, we have pretty large sites in that south side of Garden Road, the MF1 area. So with those large sites requires a very large unit count based on that minimum density requirement. It's a little bit less impactful in the areas like the multifamily area. area because they have re So the density that's re count that's required th more achievable. But we a the potential to impact And with that, staff is recommending that the city council adopt the first reading of an ordinance that would amend chapter 38 to incorporate a minimum density standard in the multifamily residential overlay area. Now, how do you answer any questions?

Thank you for the presentation, Levi. I'm opening up to the council for questions. Please.

really a tangential question. But when the county moves that courthouse, who's who's rented? Who owns that county court or county?

It's the county's own property.

So it would be up to them to develop it to a minimum of 20 units, or they could sell it.

They could dispose of the property, which is probably more likely.

Thank you. I watched the Planning Commission, and I thought it was very thorough, so I don't have any more questions.

Councilman Garcia.

Just to reiterate, so the amendment here is basically setting up a minimum, right? Correct. And then also doing this will put us in full compliance.

Correct. We're technically still in substantial compliance. We did receive the corrective action letter and doing this would relieve us from further compliance action.

Okay. Thank you.

Councilmember Smith.

Yeah, I just appreciate the scrutiny of this for the Planning Commission that worked really hard with this and staff. I know there's a sense of frustration and potential loss of some of the developments that might be ready due to the water credits on the property. So. Again, 1 of those things that we don't seem to have an option to work around this. and if development occurs on those parcels it's going to be again driven only by the water credits but if the water credits are not sufficient they'll fall below the minimum 20 so they will stand still and won't be developed So the frustration that I want the audience and community to know is that I think we all feel the same about this with trepidation. We're pretty much boxed into a corner with state law. And I don't appreciate it. I don't like it. I wish there was some other option to be able to move some development of properties forward and not be bound by this standard currently because water drives everything for our district. And however, the state is choosing to not acknowledge that that is a real problem for our housing needs. So just thank you for staff and the planning commission for having to work through a difficult and an attempt to compromise with the state. And HCD, but it does not seem that there's any pathway with the state of California. Thank you.

Okay, I just have 1 question, assuming that we have some relief from the CDO. How does staff interpret the inclusion of the minimum density requirement?

Sure. If the water constraints were no longer an issue, I think the minimum DITC standard would probably result in a positive impact in housing production in the city. And I think that's why the state requires in a lot of jurisdictions is to ensure that housing as projected and housing elements is actually built up to that level of density that's proposed in the how in the site's inventory so i think it helps kind of keep that accountability there as council member smith mentioned we just happen to be in a unique circumstance that it actually has the inverse effect on us absolutely all right thank you levi of course um with this we'll go ahead and open it up for public comment so for folks on zoom you can use the raise hand function anybody in the chamber wish to speak on this item

All right, seeing none, do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one. And we have one person on Zoom. We'll go ahead and take that caller.

Ms. Beattie, you can go ahead.

I'm very surprised. This is Nina Beattie. I'm very surprised that there isn't comment on this. I'm confused. There were two figures that were used. Maybe it was more clearly elucidated at the Planning Commission meeting, but is the minimum density 20 or is it 60? And 60, for instance, on Garden Road equates to probably 120 cars more per acre than are there now, and with our historic problems with traffic on Highway 68, that's a problem. And this is all minimum density. What is the maximum density allowed per acre by the city? So those are my two questions. Thank you.

All right, we're going to close public comment, and I think I'll be able to respond to Ms. Beattie's question. The minimum that's being proposed is 20, 60 is the maximum. So I'll go ahead and make motion to approve staff recommendation. Second. It's a move and a second. Any other discussion? All right, roll call, please.

Council Member Garcia?

Yes.

Council Member Smith?

Yes.

Council Member Barber. Yes. Council Member Rash. Yes. And Mayor Williamson.

That's a yes for me. With that, we'll go to our public appearance. Item seven on the agenda is to receive feedback and provide direction to staff to halt or continue the Madison-Herman-Larkin Intersection Safety Improvement Project. And with that, I'll pass it to Dante for staff presentation.

Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to frame the issue a little bit, and then I'll turn it over to our Public Works staff to give the presentation. But tonight, the council is being asked whether to move forward with the Quick Build project or to halt it and reject all the bids. As staff will talk in their presentation, we received your direction on June 26th that directed us to go back and talk to the community and come back with the feedback for council to make a final decision. And we're at that point now. Staff met with the community on June, I'm sorry, July 9th, and they provided feedback put together some feedback that's included in your report. Since that meeting, I did have a meeting with the superintendent of the school district and we talked about the congestion during pickup and drop-off times. We spent a good time really drilling down and trying to understand the cause of the congestion and the outcome of that meeting really was there's going to be future meetings scheduled and set up with our technical staff and the technical staff of the school district plus the high school and their administration in really looking at and strategizing on solutions for the congestion that could contain different pickup and drop off points, contain communication with the commuters and the parents to try to change behavior. But it was a positive meeting and more to come as we meet more and we do our walkthrough to try to figure out how to relieve some of the tension and congestion

during drop up and pick off time so staff will summarize a lot of the community feedback that we heard and we just are looking for your direction tonight and so with that i'll turn it over to the engineering staff good afternoon mayor and council members so the item is back before you today to receive feedback and provide staff with direction on the project the madison herman larkin intersection safety improvement project as city manager hall said On June 26th, we were directed to gather outreach by hosting a public meeting, and that meeting was hosted at the Library Community Room on July 9th. Thank you for attending, Councilmember Rasch. The meeting had about 45 attendees, and the response from the public at the time of the meeting was overwhelming opposition to the project. So now we are asking from you for your direction to proceed or stop from the project.

and city manager hall stole most of my thunder so that was really all i had to add it makes it easier thank you for the presentation uh staff opening up to the council for questions uh thank you for the update i

Since the last meeting, I've had an opportunity to also dig into some information and speak to community members. And a question I think that is still unclear for community is the length of this installation. So I think there were a couple of numbers thrown out. One of them I think was two years. Do you all have a better sense of how long the installation would be in place?

so that is definitely a up for discussion item um and so we just have to meet the terms of the grant um and so but with that and i think this was this was the first cycle so they were not totally clear on the full duration that would mean it would probably be about six months maximum um but then after that point it would be whenever the desire was to remove it

That's a great question. There was an earlier staff report, which we included some language that staff intended to bring this back within a year. So at the one year mark, we were going to come back at the next summer break and say, ask council for feedback on whether or not we should keep the changes, make modifications, or remove it altogether. So the intent with this quick build was a one year duration, but council could always agendize it and pull it any sooner if you guys felt like it needed to come back any quicker.

and as a follow-up um have you all had discussions around what would be the minimum appropriate of time to have it installed in in an effort to really capture useful data right really capture the the feedback understand how it feels once it's installed right i mean is that something that the community would be able to really comment on in a six month period or?

Yeah, great question. So there were some guidelines. And as Marissa mentioned, this was the pilot program. So this is the first time they did it. And so some of the rules had been totally ironed out. But there's quick build like best practices, and that's usually about six months to five years. The intent was to do this with relatively cheap material that really wasn't envisioned to last much longer than that. So that gives the community time to acclimate, kind of get a sense for how the project is going to operate, how it feels, and provide feedback. So there is a window, but our intent with this project was to come back within a year.

And another question, so let's say that tonight council decides to move forward and the project is installed, we get good robust feedback, regardless of the outcome, whether community supports it or not, the materials that would be used for this project, would they still stay in place at the end of, let's say, six months? Or what does that look like?

Sure. So that would really be up to Council's direction at that time. The materials are cheaper, and so they would need to be replaced more frequently. But yeah, you know, once we kind of reach that threshold, we'd be coming back to council and receive direction whether or not we make some of these changes permanent, modify the project in some way, or just remove it entirely.

But when you say make the project permanent, it would be with different materials, correct? Or with the same materials? It could be.

So if it was with the same materials, it would have a shorter life cycle and it would need to be replaced more frequently. But the intent is really try something and then make modifications if we need to. If it was well received, we'd come back with more permanent types of solutions. But it's really once we kind of get to that point, we'd be coming back to council to see.

Got it. Okay. Thank you.

So I have a question about the extension. I think we talked about this a little bit last time. So as far as the grant is concerned, is there a possibility of an extension for the grant as far as to have more time to be able to do more community input?

Yes, so actually we just spoke with TAMC not too long ago about this. And so I think the grant funds could be extended as long as we intended to do this type of project, this quick build project. But if the council's direction tonight is to not proceed with this project, then we would communicate that to TAMC and we'd probably walk away from the grant.

So I'm hearing two different things. So no, no, no. I'm just for clarification purposes. So I'm hearing that an extension is viable. as long as you stay within this particular design. Is that what I'm understanding?

Yeah, that's correct. So we've been in discussion with TAMC. As long as we're proceeding with this project and not changing the scope or saying, hey, we want to do something somewhere else, we can probably keep these grant funds alive a little longer. But if the intent is to not do this project or to do something entirely different, then we'll have to return the grant funds.

I just need a clarification because my understanding is with the particular, what is it, the SAFE program? Yeah, the Safe Routes to School program. Part of the goal of the project is to promote the Safe Routes to School program. And my understanding, if it was an extension to that, as long as it's still, actually um uh the results are the same for the goals then it would be fine even if the design was changed because the goals would be to reduce vehicle speeds at the intersection reduce vehicle speeds through the intersection and pedestrian provide better visibility Provide place making opportunity for Monterey high school students and the neighbors. And provide and promote safe routes to school. That particular program maintain emergency vehicle access and gather community feedback and join county wide as efforts. So my understanding is if that's part of the grants goals, as long as the design. It's that that it could still be in compliance with the grant. So that's my question.

Yeah. So.

Here, let me jump in. So you're right. So the grant program has those broad objectives. We were awarded for a specific project, which was the intersection improvement project. So we couldn't try to modify or change a different project that still meets the grant program objectives. We were scored based on this specific project. So I think you're asking we could maybe make some small modifications to this specific intersection of this project, but we couldn't try to proceed with a different project that met the grant objectives.

Okay, so when you had your conversation with Tamsie about the extension, that was just specifically for this project, but not for the goal of the grant, because to me it's two different things, because you have the goal of the grant, but you were scored on this project, not just the goal of the grant, if I'm understanding.

That's correct. So we were awarded these funds for this specific project. It was a competitive process, and so there was other cities that applied with other projects, and we were recommended for these funds for this specific project. effort uh we could apply in future cycles for for different scopes of work of different projects uh but for for this specific project we couldn't ask TAMC to keep those funds alive and try to do something different and at this point i understand that twenty nine thousand dollars were spent thus far what was that spent on on design services so we hired consultant engineers to help put together the plans and specs uh for this one all right thank you

How much staff time do you think you've spent?

The bulk of it has been recently. I'm guessing probably, I don't know, between Marissa, Andrea, and myself, less, maybe 40 to 60 hours between the three of us with the community outreach, the various staff reports fitting this project, probably the ballpark.

So I want to follow down the track of the money. My understanding is that this is originally it was federal regional surface transportation program funds and that somehow those get to the state and then they can be exchanged within the counties within state highway account funds and then TAMC distributes them on this competitive basis that you're doing a good job trying to explain. but they didn't have to be for a quick build project. They didn't have to be for safe route to schools. I'm reading that it could have been capital improvement programs, could have been active transportation plan, could have been short range transit plan, MST service improvement plan, regional transportation plan, or approved transportation impact studies. So there was a wide variety of things that the federal regional surface transportation program fund serves. Okay. All right. So it could have been a wide variety. All right. Um, the last question I have is back to the green decorative markings along the 5. Streets, which is the very 1st question I had when I pulled it. So, ever since. My understanding is that ever since 2011, the Federal Highway Administration has earmarked green for bicycle directions, bicycle accommodation. So does that mean that these green stripes or whatever you call them in the median dividers are decorative and not

traffic control devices yes that was the intent is the the green medians and um painted curb extensions were intended to be decorative features and not uh traffic control devices or pavement markings okay i'll have more to say about that in comments council comments

Councilor Swift, go ahead.

Yeah, thank you very much. Andrew, do you have a sense and maybe you actually have a count of the comments that we received from the neighborhood? I think those were submitted to staff at some point. Do we have a sense of how many of those comments were in the support versus in the opposition? And then also staff just mentioned and reported back and thank you for. Providing us the input from the meeting and I think it was July. July 9th, the comments were overwhelmingly. Opposed, so do we have a sense? I mean, if we have the 45 that were opposed, some of them might have been still the same people that were. Writing a protest, but do we have a sense of the written protest numbers? Not position.

Uh, so we have public comments that were included in your council member, or that was included in the city courts public comment folder. Uh, last I checked, there was probably about close to 3 dozen by my estimate. Um, most were an opposition to the project. I saw 2 that were in support and I. I'm just estimating based on what I saw, I could be missing someone and that at the meeting there was forty five attendees. Uh, six were in support, uh, two people abstain from. Um, weighing in one way or the other, and the rest were all in opposition to the project. And I, there could be some repeats that were both the submitted comments versus who attended the workshop. And that's the, those are the numbers that we're seeing through our outreach and the received public comments.

Okay. And does the city has the city received some of those that were signed that were initiated from the neighbors collecting signatures that were in opposition?

Yes, that was actually included in the initial reconsideration motion though. So staff received all of those signatures at that time.

Okay. And do you know what the number of those were?

No, we don't have account from that, but we again have the feeling of overwhelming opposition.

Okay, I think you nailed it. Thank you. Thank you.

My only comment right now can staff just share with us a little bit about how we ended up with this project. Um.

So this was really the fi a quick build project. We opportunities and we saw met the goal of the quick is a competitive program. rash pointed out. So yes, given over to Tansy. It's discretion how they want to spend those funds. They do set aside portions of RSTP for TAMC projects. They have a bank of money that if you go mid-cycle and request funds for a project that's in alignment with TAMC's goals, occasionally you will be given funds out of that account. We've had that opportunity in past projects with North Fremont. So with this, they had their normal competitive program. And I believe at that cycle, we applied for improvements at Del Monte in Washington, and we were not successful in the main competitive program. But then we had an opportunity in the quick build. And so we looked at locati at the goal of the projec receiving concerns about We just tried to find something that could work that we would be able to do. Many of intersections that are five leg intersections, we do think of things like traffic circles in order to provide a little direction on who has the right of way because of five leg intersection and five people roll up to the intersection at the same time. And it can get a little rough, especially it can even get a little rough at a four leg intersection. And so we tried to get as much local money back to the city of Monterey as possible.

I guess I'm wondering if you could speak more to chiseling down in regards to how we came up with the project in this specific project. And what I'm kind of hearing a little bit is we saw this opportunity for funding, we saw an issue, and we developed this as a solution to that issue. So when we see when we're looking at the issue associated with this intersection, did staff take the time to look at alternative ways of addressing the issue as it relates to the issues that we're trying to address with this intersection?

Yeah, we considered just We considered actually a traffic circle because an is that the roundabout is We also thought and then the traffic circle as a w going through the interse that who has the right In a traffic circle or roundabout, everyone's making right turns versus having to make right and left turns, and people are not always great at using their turning signals. And so that's kind of where we went back and forth between options and then came back to the traffic circle because we were concerned that going straight to a roundabout was too much of a jump because it would be full yield controlled rather than have the stop control.

okay and i think some of the concerns that i've heard um lean on this idea that there's concern around this creating more problems um and so how does staff receive that and what how would you respond to that like i i'm assuming that there's some There's some engineering processing that's going on in your engineering brain that has determined that this is something that's worth trying. And so how do you respond to those concerns that this might create more? And then I'll add another little piece to this, which is when there is traffic, particularly in the afternoon when school's letting out and traffic backs all the way up to that intersection, How do we think this hurts or helps that?

so and we say the same thing about all of our traffic signals in the city at some point in time when you have a demand that so far strips the capacity of any intersection anywhere in the world you will have issues and you'll continue to have issues um and this we say the same thing about our adaptive signal system is we want to take off like the sharp corners of the problem we want to like mitigate the in and the out as you get to this point of like massive congestion really what with the traffic circle, what can we say this of traffic circles and roundabouts is it's really minimizing the conflict points. Because if you're in a traffic circle continuing to make rights versus making that left hook, that left hook can be a very, it can be a very difficult movement. And especially if you're trying to make a left turn, you're at a five leg intersection, the person that's going across the street isn't using their turn signal. so if you're in a traffic circle everyone's going right or everyone should be going right and so really that was that's the biggest safety benefit of something like a traffic circle or a roundabout is reducing those conflict points so what i'm hearing it's all about safety and is it more focused on the safety of pedestrians

bicyclists, people that are kind of moving around the vehicles? Is it more about vehicles, vehicle collision? Is it a mixture of the two?

It's a mixture of both. And with the right turning movements, they it's you're not having that T bone crash, which is often the most severe crash type. And so really, that's where the benefit is. And it definitely benefits pedestrians, it benefits bikes, and it also benefits cars.

Okay, and the last question, do we have any data as it relates to traffic incidents collisions within this intersection?

Yes. So we have two data sources that have been kind of thrown around. And so one thing is so when there's this thing called TIMS, which is a transportation injury mapping system, which is done by, I believe, UC Berkeley SafeTrek. And so that was specifically what was requested as a collision source on the grant application. It by no means is an end-all be-all of collision sources anywhere in any locations. There are many issues with data sourcing. Another thing that's really important to know about TIMSS is it's only injury collisions. It does not include any property damage only collisions. Also, it's one to two years behind in terms of data. Also, anytime there's a change to any sort of collision, a lot of times they don't get that update in collision. And that was very true of the system back in 2023 when the grant application. They're always improving. So some of these like confidence in terms of numbers are improving every year in terms of our ability to share information. But that's just, I just want to make that point. So when the grant application was submitted, it was for the years 2012 to 2021. And if we look at our own Monterey police database it was eight and tim's had four then we pulled um based on the discussions that we were having we pulled additional information from 2022 to 2026 and mpd was four and tim's was zero um so and i wanted to give it in those time frames because it's really dividing the line between grant application and um post grant application thank you for that um and i'm assuming that there are

are incidents that occur that also don't get reported. So okay, I promise that that was my last question. So thank you, Marissa and Andrew for the presentation and answering the questions. At this point, we're gonna go ahead and open it up for public comment. So for folks on Zoom, you can use the raise hand function. For those in the chamber, just ask that you stand up to the left of the podium. And I'll give folks a second. If you wanna remain seated, feel free to do so. I'll identify hands here once folks finish standing in line to the left of the podium. All right, is there anybody that's not standing that would like to speak? So I have one and then I have the teal shirt in the back. Anybody else that's sitting that wants to speak? Okay, so we'll have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 in the chamber. So we'll go ahead and cut it off to the 19 in the chamber. I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one. We have three on Zoom. I'm just trying to do some math real quick. I can't do math, I'm gonna use my calculator. All right, so I'm gonna limit it to a minute and a half. So we'll go ahead and start in the chamber and we'll go from there. Don't be shy, it doesn't bite. Waiting for this to get to... There we go. Maybe. Hold it. Are we good? There we go. I see it. All right.

Hello. My name is Gabe Sanders. I am a resident of Old Town and trustee for Area 6 and MPUSD. I'd be really curious to know how many folks in this room are parents at Monterey High or members of the faculty or staff that drive up there. or any representatives of the student body, I'm wondering how many of them were consulted. And when it comes to data around opposition or support, how many of those numbers represent folks who have a stake in the experience of being a student or staff member at MPUSD? Otherwise, I think some of that data could be considered anecdotal. I can show up here at 5 o'clock p.m. because I have a job that allows me to work from home. I'm not sure how many parents, students, or otherwise staff, faculty, people involved with that commute can show up to these meetings and provide comment. A few dozen letters of support or public comments in favor or against don't mean a whole lot without input from the folks who are driving in and out of that school every day. All that said, the status quo appears to be pretty difficult. Without trying something new, we won't know if it can be better. Collecting data will show you whether or not it is better or worse. Up until then, it's speculation. I would say that this looks like it could help based on my personal non-engineering brain, but it's worth a shot.

For our broadcasters, we're showing something on the document camera. If you could put that on, please.

Hi, I'm Nancy Soule. I live at the 500 block of Larkin. So this is right down at the end of our street, which would be at Mattis. The photograph that I have here is to show you that the application that you sent saying that this was for traffic calming is not what we in the neighborhood see as the truth of the matter. The truth is total gridlock. Gridlock starts at the Monterey High School and it goes all the way down even to where Hartnell comes in. It is such a matter that I don't believe we have the option to do something that is not neutral. I see as a traffic circle that you are going to have the traffic within the circle at total gridlock two. And that prevents what we now have is a way for people to have cross traffic when there is no opening across Madison on Larkin. When there is no place for a new car to go into removing itself from the circle, that means the circle itself will be stopped. It will be total gridlock. People coming down Hermann, cannot, like they can now, if they see the gridlock and they say, oh my gosh, I forgot about this traffic at this time. Let me turn left on Larkin. Let me turn up Madison. They won't have that option because then it will be total gridlock and it's not allowed.

Ready? Mr. Mayor, members of the council, my name is William Merry. I live at 30 El Caminito del Norte. I drive, walk, and bike through that intersection almost every day. And unfortunately, one of my meetings is at eight o'clock in the morning or a little bit after. There's a lot of traffic. Sometimes when I'm not thinking ahead, I come in the afternoon and there's traffic. But I do need to commend, I don't know who said it today, that you've had conversations, further conversations with the school district. I think that's great. I think there are much better solutions than the one that's proposed here. I'm opposed to this project. And I'll leave you with this thought. There is a bike lane over in Seaside. I know Tamsie was involved in that. I have never seen a bicycle on that bike lane. The thing is elevated. So any money spent on a bad project is wasted money. Thank you.

Mayor Williamson and council members, the intersection of Madison, Herman and Larkin is unique in that is the only place in Monterey where 3 of our 4 council districts meet district 1, 2 and 3. it is also a gateway to old town and Monterey Vista. I hope that the council members representing these 3 districts have read the many letters from their constituents and heard the strong opposition to the quick build project voiced at that at that recent outreach meeting. Tomorrow, Monterey High School will be back in session. With it comes the daily congestion on our residential streets. City staff did not include the neighborhood residents as stakeholders in this project. The lone stakeholder listed on the TAMC grant application was the principal of Monterey High. He did not bring up any safety concerns or complain about how dangerous this intersection was. No, instead he wrote that this project would beautify the intersection. The proposed quick build project will only add to the daily school congestion and increase residents' concern that in the event of an emergency, vehicles will not be able to navigate through this congestion to respond. I urge the Council to reject all bids, decline to proceed with this intersection safety improvement and direct staff to return the taxpayer TAMC grant funds so the funding can be available for a project that is thoroughly vetted and supported by the public. Thank you.

Mr. Mayor is a member of the City Council. This is really a Monterey High problem. They created it. They should be fixing it. We are here again discussing something that by any measure should not even be a topic. This all started when Council Member Garcia proposed a project that is unneeded, poorly imagined, and financially wasteful. It was initiated by a council member for a district he's not even from on an intersection improperly identified as needing quote traffic calming using methodology that defies logic and using taxpayer dollars on a project that by its own definition might not even be permanent and for well over two years all this was done with so much secrecy that none of the neighbors and certain members of city council were not even aware it was being planned. AT LAST MONTH'S CITY COUNCIL MEETING AND AGAIN AT THE CITIZENS MEETING PUT ON BY MONTEREY CITY MANAGER AND PLANNERS, THANK YOU. THIS PROJECT HAS BEEN MET WITH DERISION AND OPPOSITION AT EVERY TURN. DESPITE ALMOST UNANIMOUS OPPOSITION BY MONTEREY CITIZENS, THE MAYOR AND COUNCIL MEMBER GARCIA CONTINUE TO TRY AND RAM THIS PROJECT THROUGH. The effort expended on this so far is embarrassingly wasteful use of city time and taxpayer money. I encourage you to cancel this project and focus instead on balancing our city's budget and on giving your constituents the projects they are asking for. Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Vicki Norton. As many of you know, I'm running in District two, but I'm standing here because I attended that community meeting with our city manager, Dante Hall and Councilwoman Jean Rush. And there were so many people there that really oppose the project. And you see the people standing up and speaking here tonight, and they're very concerned about. What that's really going to present to them and as someone had mentioned. It covers district 1 district 2 and district 3, and there's 3 of the council members whose district. it borders and i think that as the people of the community have spoken many times and i thank staff i heard they put a lot of time into this and i know that they were wanting to get that bid and get that grant but that grant money is also taxpayers money and i think at this time it would be good for the council to consider this is not the project for that area Also, I was a little disappointed that we didn't have anybody from the high school there to really discuss what should be done moving forward. Perhaps they need some people who would help with the crosswalk during those times crossing guards. So I think that this is an opportunity for the council to make a good decision on behalf of the voice of the community. Thank you.

Good afternoon, mayor and council members. My name is Joe Sweeney. I live right up behind Monterey High. So I drive through that intersection at least twice every day. For the past few months during summer break, there's been no traffic. The most I had to wait for was one car to get through that intersection. The problem exists when school's in session, which makes sense because the school's there. So for a short period of time in the morning and another short period of time in the afternoon, we're looking to improve the safety of the students walking through that intersection. That makes sense. But if you look at TAMC's own website that lists accidents reported between 2019 and 23, they show only one accident in this intersection. The intersection of Pacific and Madison listed eight accidents. Maybe we should be looking at Pacific and Madison instead and solve the problem down there. So we're looking at spending a lot of money to test out a solution, but the stated purpose of this project is to calm the traffic going through the intersection, to slow the traffic going through the intersection. That means it's gonna take more time for the parents to drop off all these students or to pick them up in the afternoon. That doesn't make a lot of sense. Why aggravate the situation? Plus, you're gonna put up all these hideous little cones or barricades like they have going into MPC, and the whole aesthetics of the neighborhood is gonna be severely impacted. And it's gonna cost us more money, either to upgrade the situation that's there at the end of the year, or to pull it out. And who's gonna spend that money? The city of Monterey. Thank you.

Good afternoon. My name is Mark core. I respectfully ask you to postpone this project until the city completes the engineering and public process that our community deserves. Before spending public funds, the city should be able to answer some of the basic questions. What's the safety problem we're trying to solve? Where is the five-year collision plan? Where are the traffic counts, speed studies, pedestrian and bicycle studies, emergency vehicle analysis, neighborhood traffic diversions, and on and on. I'm concerned about the process. We have the cart before the horse here. We went ahead with the process, with the circle, and now we're backtracking. If this process is intended to improve the safety of Monterey High School, students and the school district should also have a meaningful role in this. The district should be asked what operational changes it can make to improve student safety, traffic flow. This should be a partnership and not a responsibility. Finally, because this is being as a pilot project, We need to have measurable improvements. What is expected? How will this success be evaluated? Who's gonna collect the data? What's the specific criteria? If it feels good in a year, if it feels good in six months, we need to have clear, specific data. This is an engineering thing. I mean, there are traffic programs that can model this. Thank you.

Pat Benza, Monterey resident. I am very concerned about what appears to be the lack of listening to the residents of the districts that are involved, one, two, and three. I mean, it's come through loud and clear. I don't even know why we're really talking about it. If the residents don't want it, We shouldn't have it. We're wasting my tax dollar and everyone else's tax dollars on something that is not wanted. Thank you.

Good evening, I'm Lee Whitney from the Glenwood neighborhood. This is a basic cause and effect theory that goes back to Aristotle. The cause, the school drop off and pick up area should be on the school property, not on the city property. The effect? is putting children, adults, and vehicles into harm's way. The school should have the drop-off and pickup on the school property. What a concept. The so-called roundabout with an unattractive man, M, on it doesn't solve the problem. It adds to it. If you want to put a roundabout, go in my neighborhood. The kids have already done the donuts on Iris Canyon, and they'll think this is fun and challenging. why is the school spending money on it this is a waste of grant monies um so go back to the school instruct them to take the responsibility and move the drop off in the pickup area to their property save the money for the grant money the city doesn't have the money and this is absolutely not on ncip thank you

I live in the Old Town neighborhood. The problem that this intersection has is that the throughput for that intersection is nowhere capable of handling the number of People being dropped off in the morning in the afternoon. I've seen people make U turns. I've seen lots of different dangerous activities where people are passing on the opposite line. So it definitely needs attention. I think the way that it may work is. Dante mentioned meeting with the city or with the school system and. Maybe having different times for drop-off for grades, different drop-off locations would help mitigate that. The roundabout in most cases are very effective. The one that we have on Highway 68 and 1 has miraculously reduced the traffic jams that were on Highway 68. But without having a way to impact the number of people, it's going to be gridlocked no matter what. I think the roundabout concept, at least if it could be the grant could be looked at in terms of assessing the idea is worthwhile. But without having some way of reducing the numbers, it's going to be a funnel going into with a lot of stuff going into it. So it'll be a real challenge. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Tim Eckert. I'm a resident in Old Town. I live on Larkin Street near the intersection. I vehemently oppose this project for a number of reasons, which include, first and foremost, the premise of this project is wrong. Over and over, I've heard and read that this is about calming traffic. As you've seen by slides, this is not a calming issue. This is a volume issue. This is a congestion issue. And the congestion issue, as recently pointed out, is caused by the AM and PM peak time drop-offs, which come from the school. And so to try and modify an intersection to account for that, to allow for that, is just a ready, fire, aim solution. Also to push forward with a project like this for the sake of money from TAMSI is also misguided, well-intended been misguided. It doesn't follow process. It doesn't align with the Move Monterey initiative, safe routes to school. You can improve safe routes to school. You can improve the safety of the kids by reducing the number of cars that come up Larkin come up Madison, all the entry points. The schools should have more skin in the game. They should be working this issue and not pushing it back into the neighborhoods and holding them accountable for what's going on in the intersection. Thank you.

I'm Gary Soule and this will be the brief one. It's been censored all the way through here. I'm a resident of Old Town, most specifically in the 500 block of Larkin. So when I'm at my desk, I'm watching all these guys very slowly. There's been overwhelming opposition to the circle expressed at council and at the library by the residents of the three districts involved. Please remember that council members are elected by district to represent the residents slash voters of the neighborhoods in that district. Thank you.

my name is jeff woodmoyer there's really not much more that can be said on this topic i've lived at 610 larkin street two houses from the intersection in question and i'm not quite sure where the safety data comes from but i've never heard an ambulance i've never really seen the police on site it isn't a safety issue i think the city council needs to be responsive to the overwhelming opposition And I think the concept of free money because someone else is paying for it isn't actually free money. Taxpayers somewhere are paying for it and it isn't free. We all collectively are paying for it one way, shape or another. And the city needs to be responsive to the fiscal accountability that is topical to this specific item. Thank you for your time.

Hello, Tom Reeves happened to be candidate for district 1 from the beginning. I voiced my skepticism about the reasons for this project, especially traffic communism and pointed out many times. That doesn't seem to be the issue in this intersection. I'm all for. Improving safety and on the topic of that, I think 1 of the streets that is in dire need of safety improvements is lighthouse Avenue. A young man was killed last week on lighthouse Avenue. Why aren't we doing something about that? When I was city engineer, we were talking about lighthouse Avenue. If I were to prioritize things in you as a city council have to look at the big picture. Where are your safety issues in your road system here? It's not this intersection. It's lighthouse Avenue coming out of the tunnel. In my time here, there have been 4 deaths on that stretch of road between the end of the tunnel and the Pacific street merge point. So, let's spend the money where it will get the best benefit. Not at this intersection. Thank you.

Go ahead Mr mayor council. My name is Peter boys, and I'm a 36 year resident of Del Norte. I love the city. I want to say thank you to all the residents that showed up to voice their concerns. I don't need to repeat them. I want you to know that I'm vehemently opposed to this. But there's one question that I have, and no one's answered it. What's going to be the continued upkeep of this installation once it's there? How many more city dollars are we going to have to spend to keep it clean, to keep it in serviceable order? How much money are we gonna have to spend down the road to maintain it? No one's answered that question. So, and again, I'm very opposed. Thank you.

Well, this is the third round. My name is Judy Zappa Costa. I was born up on the hill in 1948. My parents graduated from Monterey High School. My brothers graduated from Monterey High School and I graduated from Monterey High School. And the idea of where and how you could move through that campus still remains today. You can easily send your student population down through their own campus to Pacific Street, which is a wider, more easily accessed traffic area. And it's beyond me that you all aren't considering and having a more direct dialogue. It's like, why are we talking to you all? The school district and the school could easily begin to mitigate the issues that are just kind of looking at us. So I would urge you to pull this project. It's not yours. It's the school's. Thank you.

Before you jump in, sir, in the back, if you just want to, you're good?

My name is Jeff Galfin. I live in Monterey Vista. And I'm not going to repeat what everybody said. I want to thank Mr. Hall for going over and talking to the school district because they obviously don't have the stones to come and talk to us. And all I can see here is people from outside the district more concerned about that grant money. We'll just roll over in the mud and stand on our head for the grant money. If you want to spend the money, pave Cass Street. It's all busted up. It's the worst mile of street you can drive on in this town outside of North Fremont with the bike lane to nowhere. Thank you.

All right, and with that, we'll go to our callers on Zoom.

Yes, Ms. Beattie, you can go ahead.

This is Nina Beattie. I request that the council reject the bids and halt the project too. It doesn't solve this problem. It's costly with the public's money, and it's unsafe. I drove up Madison by mistake during school exit time last year, and I vowed never, ever to go near the school. anywhere near let off or arrival times ever again. It was absolute gridlock. I watched people crossing into the left lane, into incoming traffic, oncoming traffic, to drive around, stop cars. The buses for students are something that has to be investigated by the district so parents don't have to go pick up their kids. The reports that you've heard at other meetings of emergencies happening at the high school or near the school that police, fire, ambulance couldn't get to. I mean, that ought to absolutely terrify everyone in the city that this is happening now. And with the new build of the public housing behind City Hall, it's just going to complicate the traffic situation there even more. Traffic circles, trendy, European traffic. They're very faddish, but they're very difficult for pedestrians to cross, and at least a stop sign you can cross the street. You know when it's on or off. It's not a traffic circle that's complete. It's constantly moving. So I join the voices and say reject the bids and halt the project. This is just not wise. Thank you.

And Esther, you can go ahead.

Thank you. Good afternoon, everybody. While I don't live in the district, I do drive it quite often up that street because one of my best friends lives right behind City Hall at Madison. And I've been caught in that traffic. So I sympathize with all of you that have to put up with it. I have heard residents complaining about the traffic for decades as far as I'm concerned. but i haven't heard of a whole lot of alternatives brought up and i wonder how many of the residents that are there you know have been talking to the school district directly about this you're asking staff and the council to which is fine but you guys should be voicing as much to them as you are right here um i also want to mention i agree with gabe that there's no i didn't hear anybody identify themselves as a teacher or a student or a staff member at that high school in this conversation which is kind of similar to how renters don't come out and speak up for themselves so i wanted to point that out because maybe the outreach hasn't been getting all the voices heard not that they may oppose it or want it i don't know I will point out that Gino is a parent of kids that live there. So he has more of an interest than to just say, oh, let's put this in this district, even though it's not my district. And lastly, I wonder if the consideration of when the 100% affordable housing that's going to be built behind City Hall has been considered in how traffic planning for that street is going to be going forward. Thank you.

That was it. I thought there was three. Sorry. Okay. All right. Thank you for all those that provided public comment. We hear you and I hope that you felt. That the council was paying attention to the comments that were given. I heard a few questions in that and I want to follow up with staff on a few of them. There was a repeated claim of traffic coming and I'm. Went back and I looked through the agenda report. I don't see that language specifically being used. So I just kind of wanted to clarify if I can ask staff to clarify that claim about traffic calming.

so a traffic circle is in our traffic calming toolbox and so it can be used for that purpose the intent here was more about conflict points rather than it being a traffic calming device per se and the other thing is it does lower your approach speed into an intersection which is one of the benefits of why it is a traffic calming device And it does mean that it lower the speed, lower th a severe injury. So anyt speed even in a short dis help with the severity of that. And what is it? If that can cause 75% a fat So every progressive lowe more likely for you to be

okay and i kind of asked this earlier but it came up a couple times in the public comment around gridlock in the circle how does gridlock in the circle impact i guess traffic or how does how does the traffic circle help or hurt the gridlock?

So it basically will act in the same way the intersection does now. And we did consult with fire. The traffic circle is fully mountable. So fire could actually drive over every aspect of the project. Um, in the same way we ha on lighthouse, we have pl on Fremont Street by Com those are drivable. And uh over it in a smaller ve have a lot of paint mark

Okay. I think you actually got to the next point that I was going to, the next question I was going to ask. So that's it. Unless you had anything else that you wanted to add based on the public. Okay. Thank you for that.

Open it up to the council for just a clarification while they're there.

Yeah. And feel free. The mic is yours.

Yeah. I'm still very confused about the accident rate. I heard four and eight, and then I heard four and zero. There's somewhere in the report that said 2012 to 2020.

so that's actually not one yeah this is this part the numbers i gave you were not in the report i'd be happy to show you the table that i have um so if you want to do columns it's 2012 to 2021 and that matches the grant application um and then in the row below 2022 to 2026 and that's after the grant application. In your next column, that would be the police database. And so in your first row, it would be eight. In your second row, it would be four. And then when you look at the transportation injury mapping system, in your first row for 2020-12, it would be four, and then from 2022 to 2026. One thing to be very clear on is the Monterey police database includes non-injury collisions. and then as we stated earlier not every collision that is recorded will make it into TIMSS and some of them don't get mapped as well so anytime you look at TIMSS you don't want to look at just the map you need to look to see if there's anything that wasn't mapped but the 2022 to 20

26 TIMSS was zero.

Yeah, because it's injury collisions. So that's really the big difference in TIMSS versus most other databases or like the CHP database. The CHP database will have all collisions as well. Many collisions like the fatal and serious injury collisions, there's a lot of revisions that have to be done for the report. So there's actually quite a bit of lag time from when an accident occurs to when it can be updated in these databases. Thank you.

So, oh, no, you're good. So thank you to everyone who participated, whether you participated at the library or or through the emails. Or through right here at public comments. This is definitely a an issue. I mean, I've been in it myself going back and forth. I've actually experienced it and can definitely understand the frustration. And I appreciate staff and your attempt to address this. I think your heart was in the right place. I think the intention is good. I think we missed it on the approach. And so because we missed it on the approach, I think we need more collaboration with Monterey High, MPUSD, and the community and the city to work together with this. because it's more than just a city issue. It's being worked through because of the high school being able to let out safely and to be able to get home safely. I mean, it's all about safety. We don't wanna hear about anybody's child being hurt. We don't want to hear about any community resident being hurt going through there, whether it's 1 foot. Bike or in a car and so I feel that. With more time to be able to do this. We need to be able to halt. Because even with the money, if I'm hearing correctly from the presentation. Mid year, Tamsie has this opportunity to be able to get more money. So I think we would have other opportunities. Especially if we're showing that we're meeting the goals of what this particular safe program is, it's actually trying to address. So I feel that we need to be able to have time to come back together. I think our city manager has already started conversations with this high school and with MPUSD to start over again. I think we need to backtrack because we should have started with this with the collaboration. I feel like that should have been done first and then we could have moved forward as opposed to having to kind of clean up the other pieces now to be able to go and find out that the city, not the city, but the community still had other questions. And they may have come up with other opportunities that we can do in working with the high school and with MPUSD and with the city manager, with all of us talking. Because I have talked to residents, but I also have talked to MPUSD as well. And I think there's some opportunity there.

So I really appreciated the question that Mr. Mayor posed, how do we get here? Because I think it's really important to not forget that. I appreciate the input of everybody. I think for me, it's how did we get here? really talks about the process. And I'm fairly confident in when I say that our Public Works Department is not eager to just grab any project that they see in front of them and get to work on it. They they're doing a lot for our city every day and to add just 1 more project. I don't think that that's the intent. The intent here is. They see and hear concerns around a specific intersection. their intent is to address it in an effort to increase our residents' quality of life and increase safety and address the concerns that at least a segment of the community is expressing. I want to clarify a few points. I did not propose this project at all. This is a project that was in the works probably way before I came onto council and I had nothing to do with the design or the process in terms of submitting applications, any of that. I tend to support these kinds of projects because I firmly believe that these projects do bring good to our communities, do bring safety, do bring a higher quality of life. When I heard it, I thought, all right, well, this is something that I think our community could support because of the safety elements. And I still believe that. There was a mention that I have kids going to Monterey High. Yes, I do. That's why I navigate that intersection every day, twice a day, sometimes even more because they do sports and all that. And I have that lived experience also where I have to see with my own eyes the risk of that intersection. I think it's in a way unfair to say because I represent District 4 that I don't have any interest. I'm here in this space because I choose to be here. And while I'm here, I wanna make sure that I make a difference in the best way I can to improve the quality of life of all of us and also the generation that's to come. So yeah, district four, This is my city and I want to make sure that I advocate in whichever way I can to improve it. And if we're going to start saying that I'm from District four, so I don't have a say, then we need to say that to the rest of the Council as well, because we do as a Council address items for the whole city, regardless of what district that we represent. So I want to make sure that we're firmly clear on that. I have nothing to gain by pushing this project forward. in terms of District 4. But I see a value here for the whole population that uses that intersection. So that's why I'm pushing for it. The project has been pushed in secrecy, I heard earlier. That can't be further from the truth. This project does not just come up out of nowhere and then get tucked away so that council can quickly approve it. That's not how it works. Years ago, there was some idea that came up, probably Public Works, there was an application process for this, and then once the application was submitted to TAMC, TAMC just doesn't go ahead and say, all right, yeah, we like this, let's say yes and push it forward. No, that application had to go to the TAMC Board of Directors for approval. Council Member Smith is our representative in that board, and he, along with members of other jurisdictions, also approved for this project, along with a handful of other projects for other cities, to move forward. That was another opportunity for the public to weigh in. And I applaud Council Member Smith for doing that, because these are projects that our jurisdictions, not only for the City of Monterey need, but also for our region. And there was a handful of other cities that got great awards to do great projects, very similar to ours. And then once that came forward to the city, then you've had multiple opportunities to also weigh in. So the narrative that this is being done in secrecy, that's just false. There's no conspiracy here to push a project just to get the grant money, to push a project forward just for the sake of it, no. The folks who have worked really hard to get this project moving forward is because they've had the best intentions for our community to increase safety and keep all of us from getting hit by cars. Gridlock came up. Yes, absolutely. I do agree this and our staff has even said it. This is not the silver bullet. So, yes, we can address some issues with this project at the intersection. But I also agree that there has to be ongoing communication as our city manager has already begun with MPUSD to try to identify other areas around the campus where we can spread out the traffic. So I'm in full support of that. Voice of the community. i'm listening to you but it's uh my responsibility is the council's responsibility to also hear other voices in the community who might not necessarily be able to be present here today to voice their opinion so um i have sat in in parent meetings at the school i've heard from other parents who navigate the intersection that there is concern so i need to weigh that also when i make my decision So that's why I support this project as well. I hear the need for additional data from TIMS, injury data, collision data. And I don't know if folks who are requesting this really understand what that means. The request for additional data from TIMS, what that means is let's wait until somebody else gets injured or is in a collision so that we have more data that would justify this project. For me, one more collision is way too much. So why not start now knowing that there's risk at that intersection to think about how we can improve it because once that injury happens, then the narrative is gonna be, why did the city wait so long to do something about that? All right, so in trying to work with what we are hearing here and with the community. I was able to meet with two residents who I thought, you know, the conversation was good. I walked away feeling like there were some gaps that we filled in each other's information. So a couple of things that I would like to offer also for my colleagues here is that it feels like Part of the community is not very thrilled about the graphics that would go on the traffic circle. So I would maybe propose to my colleagues that if those graphics are not necessary for this installation, maybe we talk about just leaving them out of the design. That's one. And then also, I really think it's important that We guide our staff and again, this is going to be the will of the council, but in my eyes, I think guide staff to. Really create a more systematic. Uh, communication stream between city and to ensure that those conversations are happening around. How do we spread traffic into other areas that might alleviate some of the congestion that we see at this intersection? Um. let's see yeah so all in all I want to thank everyone for participating I know that sometimes these transportation projects tend to be or tend to get a little bit passionate and I can appreciate that and I can respect that understand also that there are different opinions and those different opinions all might have pretty passionate views as well so I'm passionate in this way, and that's what I offer here tonight. Thank you.

Council Mayor Smith, did you want to chime in?

Yeah, I think it's probably the right time. I just I want to thank everybody that's come out tonight to offer your insight. First, I want to start off by saying thank you to our city manager for really picking up and realizing that the important core piece of this that was missing was to get this at a high level at the superintendents level and start the conversations about Identifying the problem and scanning to see what options might be there and develop the right relationship. So I'm going to continue not to support this project. I'm going to try and not repeat other things I said in the previous council meeting, but I want to touch on some important factors about why I support not moving ahead. um first off um we've got overwhelming opposition from those that travel through there live very close by i've read many of the comments and that's one of the reasons why my first lead-off question to staff was to get a sense of all of the the comments the various ways that the comments were made and the attendance in july 9th meeting And it was overwhelming in opposition. I don't think any amount of. Mitigation and redesigning is. Appropriate, nor do I think that it would solve the disconnect between the acceptance. And the necessity to complete a project that has very specific. Achievable goals, so in the Tamsie process. Actually, I don't remember voting for it, but I probably did because I rarely missed the Tamsie meeting. But when I vote for a project like this with many other communities. 1 of the 1st thing that is going to happen is we approve the funding. But we have 0 impact in the design. There was no design. This was simply the qualifications for a grant. And then the rest goes to the jurisdiction that has applied for the grant. Across the county of Monterey, which Tamsie represents. And each of the board members of Tamsie are represented by electeds in all of those cities. So step 1 is to approve of the funding. And then we've received zero back from the staff of the appropriate city when they are moving ahead to try and spend the money, design the project or do the implication implementation. So I saw that side of it when it started to appear and started to pick up and hear that there had not been any great amount of outreach. So when I saw the design. i didn't hear much of the opposition but when we had our first meeting the item was pulled we then heard the opposition and so i acknowledge that opposition and acknowledge that we've also heard many many great comments about things that haven't been yet thought of and are possibly creative solutions So I want to acknowledge the ideas, but number one, the theme has come in over and over with where is the school in their responsibility? And this is not just a city responsibility. So I think that not having the appropriate outreach at the time, brings us to this point where we are hearing from our public who says they are not interested in this yet but many of them have said something should be considered they would like to see the school be involved in this they'd like to have traffic studies they would like to see about alternative other pathways for unloading with the school They'd like to see some alternative timelines for arrival for students, and most important, a huge amount of education that's probably missing on those drivers that are bringing their students to the school. I know the school well because my wife went there, my kids went there, and my grandson has attended there the last three years, and I've delivered him there many, many times. But I don't deliver him to that side of the school because it's too crowded. So we go to the student parking lot area and he gets unloaded there and he walks up to the campus. I think there's a case of trying to figure out what's in the community interest. And to me, this one is an overwhelmingly weighted towards the community is weighed in. They're not interested in this particular project as designed, but I sense that they would be open if there was a future project that was going to go through some weighted information like data and design and school partnership to see if there's a way to mitigate some of this. This 1 is too much and the community has weighed in and convinced me that I think that the issue would be congestion overloading other areas. And it is not for the entire day. It's only for about an hour and a half of the day. so that means that there's some opportunities now i want to address the data and tim's is listed and our local monterey police department is not listed with a great amount of detail but the thing about accidents There's not been an overwhelming number of injury accidents. There's hardly that many collisions that are reported for the volume of traffic that goes through there. And had this been identified as a key intersection because of pedestrian collisions, injured or not, I think that our police department would be here advocating and would be part of advocating for an immediate solution. But that part's missing. So I don't think there's a question of so much missing data that tells us that we don't have a problem, nor is there a significant amount of data that tells us we have a significant problem, so we must act. I think a pause allows us to determine what the real data is. Determine if the data we have that the engineering department is collected is accurate. What's missing is just. The type of collisions, because they can list the number of collisions over a period of time, whether it's a, whether it's 10. We don't know what time of day those collisions were. So, if the majority of those collisions were occurring at. 1 o'clock in the afternoon that has nothing to do with the specific problem of drop off or pickups. So there's a big missing piece of not knowing really what the data is. A pause will help us do that. A pause will help us to advance the collaboration with the school district. Determine if there are other alternative opportunities to mitigate a portion of the volume of the traffic that comes in there and a full on soft roundabout temporary or permanent may not even be necessary. So, again, I don't support it. Like, I didn't before. And I appreciate everybody who is either called or come twice and participated in giving us a list of great ideas to move forward at a slower pace. When we get the data, we get the collaboration with the school. we could always reapply for a new grant opportunity. And when you design something, design it right and don't design it in a hurry and certainly don't do it where there's going to be a case of unintended consequences like making it worse.

Thank you. Next. Oh, I thought you went already.

That was a clarifying question. Thank you. Thank you, Dante, for reaching out to the school. And I sense that with your leadership, we can solve the congestion. And I applaud you for being that leader and proving once again that you are a great selection. Thank you to staff. You composed yourself with grace and intelligence in a really difficult situation that I do not believe was of your creation. So thank you. And keep sticking with us, please. Don't give up on us. The issues of safety still are confusing. It's not clear at all that this is a highly unsafe intersection. I agree with Tom Reeves that there are many other intersections and streets that are of higher concern. Lighthouse Tunnel and Lighthouse is one of them. Skyline, Forest Drive and Route 68 intersection is one of them where people have begged for attention to that intersection. And I have begged for attention to that intersection. And again, with Dante's leadership, we're going to get some amelioration on that topic. Calming and slowing. It just doesn't make sense that calming is the issue at a congested intersection, five way intersection that's not moving at certain times of the day. So it just doesn't hold together. Safety, we have a five way intersection that stops five streets worth with stop signs. So the issue of slowing it down is missing the whole point. I'm really concerned about as I alluded to in my questions, the use of the green graphics down the median divider. With my opening question when I pulled it off of consent calendar, I said, explain to me these bicycle lanes. I had read the whole agenda. I knew that wasn't talking about bicycle lanes, but the conditioning since 2011 that green equals bicycle direction or a bicycle path is getting solid. It was solid in my mind to the point where, hey, it's got to be a bicycle lane. Now, the last thing in the world we want is for children to get confused about that and to get misdirected or drivers to get misdirected. I appreciate your offer to take away all the all the the Decorative and I think this is another example of decorative art colliding with traffic control. Here is a decorative art. We really, we really have to not. Except it's it's going to make that intersection more unsafe. I'm. very concerned that the residents were not included from the beginning. And I understand how agencies work, but I grapple with the residents not understanding agencies and agencies being a little bit not responsive because we only have one, representative per jurisdiction and for residents to watch all that is an unacceptable burden. They shouldn't have to watch their federal legislatures, their state governance, their local governance, and then be attending to agencies. It's just too much. So they have a sense that they were left out of this whole procedure and they were. So, um, that doesn't go down. Well, um, I think a letter came from resident Mary Lee Rockefeller Copa chick. I'm sure I mispronounced your name that and she stated something that really resonated with me. We have compromised the trust of the public with this project in the way it was handled. I'm really concerned about that. I think. I think that's the one thing that I'm hearing the most of is a lack of trust and not being heard and not being included. And we have to regain that trust. We have to solve the problems that we have. We have big time problems. We need to prove to the public that we're listening to them, that we care about all taxpayer money, and that we're including them in the process. And we're hearing back. that they don't trust us they didn't pass d they didn't pass the storm drains and I'm worried if we stay on a path of not listening to them and not respecting what they tell us they want to spend money on that this will continue to be a pattern and then we're really in trouble so I continue to have such concerns for this project that I will be voting to not proceed with it I hope if I'm in the minority, I really hope you take the green decorative art out of the five streets. Thank you.

I think one of the beautiful things about our form of government in our country is the fact that it's democratic. And part of the democratic process isn't to necessarily jump to majority vote goes. There is a system that's set up that allows the minority um to have a voice and it was alluded to in at least one of the public comments that there was essentially unanimous um opposition to this um but as it was articulated when staff was sharing some of the numbers and through some of the public comment today that there is support for the project. And I would just argue that the easy answer to this is to say, yeah, the majority of voices are clearly demonstrating that they don't want this. To me, that's the easy solution from my perspective. I think it's important to speak truth, to... what drives the values in regards to why i'm sitting here why i have chosen to step up and represent the city of monterey and try to make a difference in the community despite the concerns that have been expressed And I think when I break through this a little bit, one of the things that I'm hearing is, I can't remember who on the council articulated this earlier, but there's clearly a desire to want to do something with this intersection, but that this isn't it. um and and kind of what i'm when i'm trying to break through this and what i'm trying to hear what i hear as well is that the issue is more about the gridlock and the traffic and how long it takes me to get through this intersection at a certain part of the day not about the public safety concerns like that's that's not the issue that's being expressed here in fact it's been articulated several times that it's not that big of an issue these numbers are very low um i share councilmember garcia's sentiment that one accident just one is more than what we should be dealing with and the concern that i have as the mayor is that at any point after today's session if we decide not to move forward that the headline is council failed to take action when we have an opportunity to do something. And the interesting part about all this for me is none of us can sit here today, none of us can sit here today and articulate what it will actually be like with the traffic circle. None of us can because it's not there. And we see this in traffic circles and roundabouts being installed in other locations, right? That one on the 68 had a lot of pushback. But once it was installed, it's like all of a sudden everybody loves it. It's easy to make judgments beforehand, and we're all entitled to do that. I'm so proud of staff and what they've done because this was an opportunity to do a quick build, a temporary quick build There's no requirement for us to move forward on it. Something that's relatively inexpensive. One of the areas that I think government often fails is that we're not creative and innovative. And we need to do that because when you get so comfortable in keeping things the same all the time, we continue to deal with the issues that we suffer from in our community all the time. And so here is an opportunity for us to receive some funding to try something out temporarily and see how it can be received by the community. It's disappointing to hear Council Member Smith try to walk around the responsibility, if there was concern around a lack of engagement with the community with this intersection, that could have clearly been brought forward to the council. We have opportunity at the end of every council meeting. Any outside agency that I sit on, if there's something that connects back to the city of Monterey, I always bring that to council comments so that the public and the rest of my colleagues can hear what those concerns are or whatever that is that's connecting to the city of Monterey. So that way you all have an opportunity to be able to provide feedback and input. I'm trying to find a way of focusing on solutions and To me, there's really no other proposal that's being presented today that offers us the opportunity to address the safety concerns that was what initiated the project. I also thank Dante for initiating the conversations with PK Diffenbaugh with the school district. So I think that there's opportunities moving ahead um but one of the things i also heard was that this is a monterey high problem the fact of the matter is this is the public right-of-way within the city of monterey like we are in control of that intersection the city of monterey is not the school district and to point the finger at the school district as if they need to solve all the problems for that coming conflict with the city of monterey is just missing the mark we have an opportunity to engage with them. And I look forward to what that experience looks like. And I'm gonna toss something to Dante real quick as these discussions advance, progress with the school district. My hope is that we insert some kind of opportunity experience for community engagement along with that. So that's, I think, the challenge that I present to staff. And I think the challenge that I present to the community, something to think about is if your neighbor came up to you really frustrated and was in your face about something, just think, would you be willing to like, yeah, let's have the conversation. Let's talk about it. How can we present ourselves in a way that keeps our goals in mind of what we're trying to achieve? so that we can try to actually make a difference and not, I think, turn people off. I can imagine how challenging it's been for the school district to try to engage with the community because of how much raw emotion there is. And it's not to say that that raw emotion isn't fair, isn't... based in something that's driven in experience. But I think it's important for us to think about how do we work in partnership together to be able to actually drive solutions and not create divisiveness. So it's about trying to find a way of all of us coming together. It's not just the neighbors, it's the students and the parents. Because the fact of the matter is, no matter how we move forward here, there's going to be a continual flow of students coming in and out parents coming in and out. And so how do we work together on trying to mitigate those issues? I also just kind of wanted to point out the thing and. Do you know spoke to this a little bit, but. regarding the district's issue, when the city was talking about making the transition to district-based elections, one of the things that was very clear from the beginning from the entire council was that we were not just representatives for our districts, that we would be basing our decisions off of the entire city. So to hear public comment pointing the finger at Council Member Garcia because he's in District 4, to me that is driving us more in the opposite direction. So if we want to be combative, again, staking our claim in the ground and creating that divisiveness, that's the direction that we go in. Or we find a way of recognizing that we are up here making decisions on behalf of the entire city, even though we're elected by certain districts. So I advocate for us working together and finding solutions together. I don't care if a council member is from District 1 and taking an issue in District 4. In fact, I see Council Member Rash as an example in other districts representing the City of Monterey. So I would implore all of us to think about this as how do we work on these issues together and not try to raise district lines. I would also offer, I have two kind of more points here so I can wrap this up. reference to the fact that this is an issue twice a day and although the gridlock the traffic issues perhaps are at peak twice a day um this is an issue throughout the day so i also use that intersection i live in old town um i drive through it i bike through it i walk through it on a regular basis and It's not just during the gridlock times of day where it can become an issue. I've seen people blow past the stop sign. And I can see how a traffic circle can cause somebody to have to move a little bit slower through that intersection. The last point that I would make is, and it kind of speaks to this, I think, fanning of the flames in regards to like creating divisiveness staff has presented as something we're considering this project um in isolation and by the way there's a lot going on in the city of monterey every single day so it's hard to maybe recognize exactly the things that are going to be trigger points i think maybe there's a little bit of a lesson learned here in regards to this particular intersection and what that means for us and so i i know that staff is going to be extra mindful of that um But for some to take the death of somebody that went through the lighthouse tunnel and to sensationalize that as a way for us to not provide focus on the project that's being presented in front of us, I think is just disappointing. It's disappointing to hear. Should there be an effort for us to focus on higher impact intersections? Absolutely. And I know that staff is involved in that. In fact, I sat in meetings, public meetings that they held in order to obtain that data, get feedback from the community in regards to intersections that are concerns and bring prioritization to those. So we can do that while also addressing the projects that are in front of us. That's our job. That's what we're here for. That's what we're responsible for. So that's the reason why I support the project. Despite the fact of the concerns that I hear from the community, I think that there's a great opportunity for us to get additional insight feedback if the quick build was installed and then make a determination on whether or not we wanted something more permanent. So with that, I'll go ahead and entertain a motion.

I move to approve staff recommendation. Actually, let me read it. To approve the plans and specifications for the Madison-Herman-Larkin Intersection Safety Improvement Project.

I'll go ahead and second. All right, any discussion on the motion?

Yes.

Go ahead, Council Member Smith.

Yeah, I made my answer. I'm satisfied that those that are sitting in the audience and listening heard me. Apparently you didn't. And sometimes your lecture rates bore me. But I understand your position. I have a different position. But as I said, I voted for this at Tamsie when it was the money, there was no design. There was nothing else attached with it and it was at the very infancy of approving money. That was it. So, I don't know what you're trying to throw shade on me for, but look, we have different opinions. and i'm ready to vote i think we were all ready to vote about 15 minutes ago but you went way over but i don't know why you're trying to throw guilt to other people when they simply express their opinion in a minute and a half tonight so let's take the vote

Is that a call to question? Is that what you're doing, Council Member Smith? Yeah, I'm calling a question. Let's have the vote. Okay, so what we're going to do is because the call to question has been asked, we're going to vote on whether or not we go straight to a vote or we continue debate. So I'm going to go ahead and ask for a roll call on the call to question.

All right, Council Member Smith?

Yes.

Council Member Rash? I have one more question to ask, so no. Okay. Council Member Garcia?

to clarify. We're voting on whether we're continuing debate or going straight to a vote. So if going to vote. Yeah. So that's a yes. Yeah.

Council Member Barber. Yes. And Mayor Williamson.

No.

That was two nos, right?

It's 2 nos 3 yeses.

So we do go ahead with it.

So we go ahead with the vote. All right. So now we're going to do roll call on the motion, which is to support staff recommendation.

All right. Council member rash. No council member Smith. Wait a minute. There was no staff recommendation.

It was so but to support your motion which was seconded by councilmember Garcia, my no, I apologize a second it was to support.

I said staff recommendation to approve the plans. Okay, okay, thank you.

No. Councilmember Garcia.

Yes.

Councilmember Barber.

No. Hold on. Hold on everybody.

Councilmember Smith.

No.

And Mayor Williamson?

Yes. Okay, is there another motion? that somebody would like to make.

A motion that we halt the project and give time for Dante, the city manager, Dante Halt, the city manager, to meet with MPUSD in Monterey High. Staff, I'm going to say staff, as well as the community, to be able to come up with a different solution.

Second. So it's been moved and seconded. I just want to ask a clarifying question because I think at this point we're not if we're looking for a different solution, then it's not gonna be this project, right? So then we're basically saying we're gonna reject the funding. And I think that part needs to be clear so that we can have staff move forward with determining whether or not that they're trying to go back to TMC and keep the funding. So I think we just need to clarify that.

Okay, so to reject the funding at this point.

Okay. So, it's oh, please just a little bit more. Yes.

So technically, we're amending the resolution that was adopted previously approving the project to reject the project and also to reject all the bids.

Okay, so I will add, I will amend my, my, um. Motion and add that we will reject the bids and reject the funding at this time to give a space to have our city manager, Dante hall, continue the conversations to give opportunity within and Monterey high staff in the community to be able to come up with alternative solutions.

So, if there's a motion, is there a 2nd. There was a 2nd, and I approve of those amendments. Okay. Any discussion on the motion.

Just clarification as to your intent, Councilwoman. At this time, is that confusing more than me? I mean, we're not going forward with this project. I mean, at this time makes it seems like, well, maybe we'll do this project later or would we reapply?

I was clear in saying rejecting the funding and the actual rejection of the bid. So that would include that.

Okay. Any other discussion, please?

Actually more of a question. So to clarify, if this motion moves forward, and and the bids are all um uh what is it with withdrawn or rejected rejected does that mean that basically if we in the future wanted to move forward with this project it would have to go through a whole application process again yes so it's not a halt

Okay, any other discussion? I'm confused at what you're saying. It is a halt because we're stopping it. We're rejecting everything, including the bid, so everything starts over again. So that's my motion.

Right, so it's basically making this project go away. It's not like there's a pause. It's not a stop. Let's rethink this.

I think I was clear when I said reject. Hold on, hold on.

Hey, hey, hey.

folks in the public, I'm just going to ask that you be patient and allow the council to have the debate and try to allow us to finish the conversation.

Yeah, that's why I preface with clarifications.

So are you good? Okay. Are you good? I'm good. Okay. I see council member Smith's hand up.

Yeah, we think it was going to clarify and thank you Kim for laying that out and I believe you you encourage that a process happen led by the city manager with efforts to possibly mitigate this with the school but but you touched on everything I'm satisfied correct.

Okay, and comes across did you have something you want to add there.

Why would we I'm afraid of confusing everyone and I know we're trying, but if we aren't continuing, why wouldn't we just stop? I mean, the city manager at any time can go over and talk with the superintendent of schools for Monterey. Peninsula unified school district. I'm not sure why we're belaboring this and potentially confusing me and others. I mean, we, we, we rejected the bid. We rejected the project.

I think it's clear that in my motion that I said that we are having the conversation because it's already begun because we already clearly know that this issue that much has even been said about the community is saying that's an issue. So we're still addressing the issue in a different way. So I put that in the motion so that that means that they have clear direction of the city manager continuing the conversations, not only with the Monterey high staff and community. So it could be clarity of how we move from here. okay that's the only reason why there is this poor direction okay that's clear okay and then we're gonna go to councilman smith and then we're gonna go to a vote

Yeah, I was just going to say that I don't see that there's an urgency or a date that's attached to the motion. I think that the opportunity is that we can start dialogue with our partner, the MPUSD, the Monterey High School. This is right at the base of District 3, right smack in the middle of District 2 with Monterey High School being in my district. Safety is always a concern. The public has pointed out a few suggestions. I think it's something that is in the public interest that we continue with looking at potential future solutions. But we have no framework for it. I have no intent to bring back a roundabout. I just would like to see some dialogue with the school and see if there's some opportunities for something that was suggested tonight. I mean, how about crossing guards? How about the school meets with us and tell us where there's another alternative site? But I don't think this is a... An urgent drive, but I think that we've obviously identified opportunities with our partner in the USD. So I'm interested in see what the city manager can do, but there's no time frame for expectation for report back. Okay. With that, we'll go roll call please.

Council member Garcia. No, council member Smith.

Yes.

Council member Barbara. Yes. Council member rash. Yes. Mayor Williamson.

No. All right. And with that, we're going to go to close public comment and closed session items. So closed session item eight is conference with agency labor negotiators pursuant to government code section 54957 tax six for labor negotiations. And this is in relation to, hey, I'm just going to ask, we're continuing business. So I'll just ask if you're going to slide out, just try to be as respectful as possible. Monterey Police Association. And then Closed session nine is closed session conference with real property negotiators. Again, everybody, please keep the conversations at bay. I'm just trying to make sure we get to the end of the meeting here. It's real property negotiators regarding a portion of land north of 731 Dry Creek Road. This is an opportunity for public comments. So for folks on Zoom, you can use the raise hand function. Anybody in the chamber want to speak on closed session agenda items?

all right i'm seeing none so i'll do a countdown for folks on zoom to five four three two one we have one on zoom we'll go ahead and take that caller miss speedy you can go ahead uh this is nina beatty again i want to comment on item number eight um on the monarch police association contract um the city of monterey was mandated mandating COVID mRNA vaccines for employees. If that mandate is still in place, I request the city revoke that mandate now, including in relation to the Monterey Police Association contract. Pfizer compiled a confidential report in 2021 released as part of a freedom of information procedure in the fall of 2021. It wasn't taken into consideration by the city in 2021. The report provided Pfizer's data from the beginning of the vaccine project in mid-December 2020 to the end of February 2021 on deaths and adverse events. In that two and a half months, Pfizer had received more than 1,200 reports of deaths allegedly caused by the vaccine and thousands of reported adverse events, including 23 cases of spontaneous abortions out of 270 pregnancies, so about 10%, and more than 2,000 reports of cardiac disorders. Last year, the US FDA ordered Pfizer and Moderna to issue warnings that their COVID mRNA vaccines carry a high risk of heart damage, particularly for young men. The new warnings state that the highest estimated incidence of myocarditis and pericarditis was in males 16 to 25 years of age. For firefighter and police recruits, this poses an extreme danger and a danger to public safety. Botting risks and so many other health problems were identified in the federal government's VAERS directory. The deadly risk was known to FDA and FDA and CDC from the outset. They failed to act. But I'm asking the city to act. If there's a mandate in place, that needs to be stopped now. And these police, the police association, free from that mandate. Thank you.

All right. With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment and adjourn to closed session. reconvene in our evening session for today's council meeting, August 4th, 2026. We're gonna go ahead and start off with the Pledge of Allegiance. I'll ask Council Member Rashtika to kick us off. 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. Thanks, Jean. With that, we'll do a continuation of general public comments. So this is an opportunity for folks to speak on non-agendized items. What we do is we identify folks at the beginning of the public comment period. Once those folks are identified, we'll cut it off, and then only those folks will be able to speak. So we'll do a check-in with folks on Zoom. Anybody on Zoom, you can use the raise hand function. While you're navigating your way there, I'll check in the chamber. And just for the record, there's nobody in the general public that's in the chamber. right now, at this moment. If that changes, I will let you know. So with that, I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom. Five, four, three, two, one. We have one on Zoom. We'll go ahead and take the caller.

Tom, you can unmute and go ahead.

Yes, hello. This is Tom Braves, and I feel uncomfortable making this comment, but I feel compelled to respond to the mayor's comment about my comment. I enjoy the mayor. I think you're a very smart person. I appreciate you. However, I think your response to my comment was way out of step. I was not in any way, shape or form sensationalizing the young man's death on Lighthouse Avenue. I was merely pointing out a fact that the young man died on Lighthouse Avenue and that we have much, much more important fish to fry when it comes to safety issues on our roads than the intersection that we spent a whole lot of time on. So, you know, if if nothing more comes from his death as well as two young ladies, And another young man who all died in that very, very close proximity on Lighthouse Avenue. That's sad. That's very pathetic. There have been and it will be just a matter of time. I promise you before there's some kind of a crossover accident where somebody hurtling through the tunnel will not negotiate that right hand turn and they won't be stopped by a poll. They'll end up going into the oncoming traffic. And yeah, people might want to rationalize and saying, well, this guy was going way too fast or yeah, their blood alcohol content was too high. That's not the point. The point is, it's a very unforgiving section of lighthouse Avenue when it comes to accidents. And if it's a head on collision, it could be somebody just innocently driving in the opposite direction who gets smacked by an oncoming car. So I really resent you categorizing my comment as sensationalizing because it was far from it. Thank you.

Okay. With that, we'll go ahead and close general public comment and move on to announcements from closed session.

Okay.

Sorry for that feedback. This afternoon council met in closed session on the first item conference was with agency labor negotiators and on the specifically the item of the Monterey Police Association confidential direction was given to agency negotiators on a unanimous roll call vote and on the second item which was the price in terms of payment for granting an easement for the California American Water Company, 731 Dry Creek Road, a portion of land worth of that. It was a consensus to table the item to a date uncertain. And the first roll call vote was 5-0-0. Thank you. Thank you.

With that, we'll go to public appearance item for the evening. Item 10 is to receive update on draft economic development strategy, stakeholder engagement plan. With that, I'll pass it to Dante for staff presentation.

Thank you mayor members of the council I'll start off this presentation and just do the framing then our assistant city manager is going to walk us through the presentation tonight's item is is really straightforward but it's important what we're asking the council to do is receive an update on the stakeholder engagement plan for the city's economic development strategy And so in plain terms, it's really the blueprint for how we're going to listen to industry partners, business districts, neighborhoods, residents, and then bringing back a refined strategy for the city council to consider. And why this matters now is that economic development is a central part of our fiscal health. And as the City Council reaffirmed when you had your strategic planning session in 2025 and set your goals, fiscal stewardship and economic development were among the top priorities. And Council adopted a balanced budget for this year, and we're working on addressing the structural deficit and the five-year forecast, which begins in 2027. But at the same time, we're seeing intensifying regional competition in hospitality and some of the related sectors. So that combination means that Monterey can't solely rely on the strengths of the past and we need a future focus plan that diversifies our local economy and keeps us competitive and supports the services that our residents rely on and depend on. so the update you're going to receive tonight from um from nat really focuses on that engagement strategy and how we're bringing stakeholders into the conversation um you'll hear and that will go into detail um about the four month uh period that we want to engage the different sectors um in the community um industry clusters you know we we all know and are familiar with our hospitality and tourism cluster, but there's also a defense cluster that we need to talk to. There's an education cluster and so forth and so on. We want to get some information and input from our businesses, our business districts, our business associations. We want to talk to our neighborhoods. We want to talk to our residents. And the goal here is not to just share the draft strategy, But it's really to test the assumptions. We put together a draft strategy that you saw, but we want to test those. What's working? Where are we losing ground? And what practical steps do we need to take to help Monterey sustain its place in our economy, in our economic base? And through this process, that's what we're attempting to do. And so your feedback tonight is really going to help us shape this engagement plan and help ensure that we're reaching out to the right stakeholders. We're asking the right questions and the alignment of the draft strategy is in line with the council values. So with that, I'll turn it over to Nat to walk us through the presentation.

Thank you, Dante, and thank you, Mayor and City Council. As Dante shared perfectly, this phase of the engagement of this economic development strategy is on the engagement piece. All of you as our council, you were here back in March of 2025 when we walked through the draft strategy, and that draft strategy was really just that, a draft document that helped shape where we think before gathering public feedback and gathering feedback from the different stakeholders on how can we enhance and address the future of economic development for our community. As Dante shared, we're behind. We have fierce competition in the region. Since March 2025, we knew there were going to be more hotels in the pipeline, and that happened outside of Monterey. And they've taken market share Sand City with two hotels, the Courtyard by Marriott, as well as the Residence Inn in Pacific Grove. The 101-room Kempton Mirador has been very successful. And while one could argue, okay, Rising Tide lifts all boats, great for the hospitality community, We do have older inventory, largely. Many of our hotels that are great partners with us have made really strong investments, but we also have some challenges. And all of you represent a very diverse group of business districts and stakeholders in our area, and we want to engage all of them in this plan. We look forward to engaging with the Old Monterey, Lighthouse Avenue, Cannery Row, and North Fremont business districts, as well as the Fisherman's Wharf Association as well. And what we're looking to do is implement this long-term economic development strategy. We know there's been comments about how do we enhance the sense of place that exists in Old Town, Lighthouse, other areas. And how do we... promote and ensure that not only visitors, but the region and our residents also appreciate and connect with our business communities. You all know we're in an $11.7 million structural budget deficit. And as Dante mentioned, without economic development, that is going to continue to be a challenge for us long term. The outcomes of the economic development strategy Some of them are short-term, but we're really looking at the long-term picture. I know Kim Cole and her team has done really amazing work with the general plan and with specific plans. We're looking at how, if at all, do we make adjustments to those? How can we help enhance not only visitation, but supporting businesses, which are the economic lifeblood for Monterey? You all know that roughly 40 percent of the city's general fund budget is directly tourism related not just the tot with hotel tax but also from sales tax revenue over 62 percent of sales tax revenues come from non-residents and that's significant and it's very significant for a city like us we're more tourism dependent in monterey compared to any other city in in monterey county let alone most of the state of California. During COVID, you may recall, we were listed by the California State Auditor as being the number one among the top 10 cities in the entire state out of over 400 cities, most adversely affected by COVID because we didn't have the visitors. So how do we support that economic base, but also what other industries exist in Monterey that we can continue to support, and what opportunities do we have to recruit other industries that might help us balance out our economic portfolio? So we're looking at that as well. Clementine will share just a brief graphic that's part of our draft economic development strategy. We're not going to go through the details of the document because I know you all have read it and we discussed this last year. But it's number one, remaining competitive in the hospitality marketplace through quality of place. So how do we foster the modernization and increased appeal of some of the outdated amenities and assets we have that include our business districts, retail areas, hotels? The sustainable redevelopment piece, how do we prioritize redevelopment and adaptive reuse of underutilized properties to meet modern economic needs? Are there funding opportunities that help support those efforts like the enhanced infrastructure finance districts, EIFDs? The third circle is the business retention, attraction, and promotion through partnerships. We have currently very strong relationships with business associations, commercial real estate brokers, business districts, and other industries. And how do we continue to partner even more strongly than we already are? The economic diversification piece is another one. You know, we do lean very heavily on hospitality. Of course, our engagement with our military partners, the Navy, the Army, and others. Education is a big piece with Middlebury, with DLI, NPS, MPC. And then, of course, healthcare, which continues to grow with Montage, Salinas Valley Health, and others. But also, how do we explore those new growth opportunities I mentioned earlier? I know this has been top of mind for all of you over the last several years since you've been on council, and it's time that we embark on this strategy. And the last but not least that affects economic development is the affordable workforce housing solutions. Are there specific things we can do to partner and work with our industries to address that challenge? So as a recap, you may recall back in March when we went through the strategy in detail, The goal was to spend summer of 2025 to embark on this engagement effort, gather feedback, listen to business stakeholders and neighbors. And we decided to pause. And instead of starting the outreach effort, let's go ahead and begin recruitment for the economic development manager position. And so we recruited for the position, went through a nationwide search, posted on not only the California Association of Local Economic Development, but other tools. And unfortunately, we didn't land on very strong candidates during that time period. And so with that, coupled with our budget realities, the decision was made to let's put a pause, let's not hire the economic development manager position, and let's see where we are in the new fiscal year. I'm very excited because, you know, we've got Dante here with his strong economic development experience coupled with our existing team. Our goal is to move the engagement piece of the strategy forward now, begin with three different tracks. So the first one is, as Dante mentioned, the industry specific engagement. So how do we engage with industry clusters, hospitality, tourism, education, military defense, and then marine sciences, fisheries and ag tech. The second track is to engage with the business association. So seven meetings, each focus group meetings with the business associations that exist in Monterey. And we've already begun scheduling these with our stakeholders. Plus, in addition to the business associations, the Monterey Commercial Property Owners Association, MCPOA, and the Monterey Peninsula Chamber of Commerce. The third track, which we heard from council and we know as well on the staff side, just as important is getting feedback from neighbors, neighborhood associations, from residents. So we will have opportunities for residents and associations to share their feedback in different parts of the community and also provide one additional virtual meeting to get resident feedback. In addition to that, we are planning to launch a digital survey that folks can take before, or if they did participate in the focus group surveys, give us that feedback. That way we have that data. So we plan to engage with each of these groups, promote these sessions on our website. It's significant. We have over 17 meetings and workshops planned over the next four months, but we believe that that level of engagement is going to help make the draft economic development study a stronger report and one that will come back to you all in the new year with recommendations. Part of that recommendation will include how do we move forward and how do we actually implement the strategy? You know, one of the questions that has come up in the past and I know staff has grappled with is, okay, what do we do first? Do we have the strategy first or do we hire the manager first? And for us, the answer on the staff side is clear that After going through this recruitment, we need to have an understanding on what the strategies are so that we can identify what type of specific economic development skill set we want to hire for. And that's really critical because, you know, I know Dante's got years of experience in Northern California and Southern California in economic development and redevelopment in particular, pre-COVID. redevelopment and myself, 10 years of experience in economic development in the Bay Area, including supervising economic development offices that had staff, full-time staff. And I will tell you very candidly, there's different types of economic development managers out there. There's ones who focus on relationships, others who focus on the data and the analytics, others who focus on project management and communication. While it's great to have someone who meets all of those needs and is that unicorn, you usually don't find that. You usually ideally have a generalist, but someone who understands exactly what we're looking for in the strategy. So once the strategy helps identify whether the focus will be on that relationship building, or will it be more on the market data and or maybe it was on the financing side, that'll help us identify what that path is, whether it is utilizing an economic development manager, whether it's perhaps a hybrid model that may include a manager or staff along with consultants. There's a variety of different ways to implement the plan. So we're looking forward to gathering the feedback. We've got great experience on the team. Kim is going to be a part of that, Adante and myself as well. And we'll be able to identify after the strategy is adopted, again, are we going to focus on the retention, on the redevelopment piece, on the real estate side, on industry sectors, or on housing? we look forward to to the engagement so that's the overview of of next steps the next four months are going to be a lot of work but we're looking forward to it it's exciting work for us and uh it's what what the community needs so uh happy to answer any questions about the engagement strategy and what we plan to uh do awesome yeah thank you nat and dante for the presentation opening up to the council for questions councilman garcia

Thank you, Nat, for the presentation. And, well, I'll start with this question. In the agenda report, and I just want to get a better sense of the data that was presented here, page, packet page 82, I believe, yeah, figure five is a transit occupancy tax, TOT or hotel tax revenues. It shows five pie charts distributed throughout the city. And what caught my eye was North Fremont with a, let me zoom in here, 6.6%. But my question applies to all of the pie charts. And that question is, does this percentage show simply the amount of TOT coming from these corridors? Or is there any sense of that percentage in terms of like the amount of hotels in that section. Like really what I'm getting at is if I look at North Fremont, 6.6%, I don't know if that's a good or bad number, right? So could you maybe elaborate?

Absolutely. And so this graphic depicts of the total TOT revenue, the hotel tax revenue, how is it, where does the revenue come from? So the source of that. So all these numbers add up to 100%. And so North Fremont represents 6.6% of the total TOT revenue. What will be helpful, and we can gather this data and present it as part, if that's an interest of yours in the report is, what is the total room inventory of the city by sector. So, you know, maybe North Fremont has a higher percentage of rooms, but a smaller percentage of TOT revenue that can help. But we wanted to show for this graphic, the geographical diversity of the hotel inventory that we have in the city, and that it's not just one area. And even though what's classified as luxury hotels are primarily in Kenry Row and perhaps Old Town, that we do have a fairly diverse blend of hotel inventory throughout the city. some of the questions I know folks have asked about like well where's other it's not in the Monterey Bay it's largely it's you know Hyatt is one example is one example that's isolated in a different location so that's that's what this graph tells us and when we talk with each business association in the case of North Fremont we'll we'll have a discussion about what does that look like and with the 6.6 percent what does the room inventory look like what's the future of of what are future plans. I know we went through and attempted to support the Abbott Hotel project and then that fell through due to economic reasons and didn't pencil out for the developer at the end of the day and opposition from residents. So those are the types of conversations we're hoping to have at the business district level and with residents too.

Awesome. Yeah. So I think it would be helpful um to have a little bit more detail to to better build context right for for these numbers so i'd i'd appreciate that and i think i i personally would appreciate it for uh all the various areas depicted on on the uh chart here so so and just one more question about this um figure five um so that pie chart that says other Is that where hotels like the Hyatt would be included? That's right.

Hotels like the Hyatt, the Hampton Inn that is located closer to In-N-Out Burger on Del Monte. There's a hotel 1110. There's ones that are spread 12th Street or 10th Street has some that don't fall into Canary Row, Old Town, Monteros Abrago, or North Fremont.

Okay. Great, thank you. I'm just checking here to see if I have other questions.

And I'll add that this report, we did not update this draft report since March, 2025. So this report, I know there were some comments from the public about some of the data is old. It's like, yes, it is old because we've taken a pause. We did not update the strategy. We want to get the, a lot of the numbers are still very relevant. We'll have the conversations and then we'll definitely update it though when it comes back. So the data will come back with updated figures. with as much recent data as possible, but we did not update it for the purpose of this conversation tonight.

What are your thoughts also and the team's thoughts around stakeholder engagement I saw also on the report. There's a section here, community and industry partners. And I mean, it's a pretty healthy list, but I also noticed that with a couple of different exceptions, nonprofits seem to not be included in this list, right? And I'm talking about, again, I see like the aquarium in here and I think I saw a couple others, but I think, really identifying partners like Community Foundation, Monterey Peninsula Foundation, United Way, Big Sur Land Trust. And I say this because I think there's still opportunity for us to build stronger relationships with nonprofits that could support us a little bit better with say for example programming right programming that we have in the city already or that we could have and for you know whatever reason sometimes financial we can't offer that um so i i guess I mean, is that part of the conversation as well in terms of nonprofits?

I think that's a very good comment, Councilmember Garcia. I think You're right. While we do have some of the nonprofits that tie in with specific sectors or belong to specific geographical areas, whether that's, like you said, the Aquarium Montage and others, an opportunity is for us to maybe have a separate focus group session with the nonprofit that play a large role, whether that's Big Sur Land Trust or Community Foundation. So good suggestion.

And that's exactly why we wanted to come to you, because in this economic development strategy, there are a lot of different elements, right? I think sometimes people think about economic development as just somebody that goes and visits the business and make sure that they're okay. That's only one segment, right? There are other things just about like you're talking about stakeholder engagement. And yes, we you know, if you have suggestions for other nonprofits, because we want to speak also to quality of life issues, housing, affordable housing, there is probably some insight and context that those groups could lend to us as we begin to plan. So that's a very good suggestion.

All right.

Awesome. Thank you.

So thank you for the work. I know this is a lot of work and I really do appreciate that for you and the team and what you've done. I'm just curious. I know you were saying this was back in March 2025 when this was done. Is that what the graph is in figure four? Because I was noticing Marina at 14% and really Sand City, Seaside, Pacific Grove and City of Monterey being at 12. And I was just curious whether that was from March 2025 as well, because I know there's been a lot more development even in Marina. So I was just curious about that.

That's correct. The figure four specifically is rather than a share of the market, it shows the TOT rate. So the hotel tax rates across the board. I don't believe they've changed. Marina is still at 14%. We're still at 12% along with Pacific Grove, Sand City and Seaside. But I think So that's not a share of the market. That's not a share of the market.

So I'm just curious how that would actually compare to that, right? So like if their share is 14%, ours is 12%, along with Pacific Grove, Sand City, and Seaside, how does that compare to the share of the market? I'd like to see that compared.

Perfect. Yes, and we can provide that. Absolutely. That's a great suggestion and we'll go through and provide that update. I know we've done some research and it may not be in this draft report that shows our share compared to other cities, but it's old and it certainly has changed, as you say, and there's more coming into the pipeline.

Yeah, that'd be great. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks, Nat. That's really interesting, and it really stimulates the mind, and mine goes to the revitalization of Alvarado Street, which is in there. I mean, it's just a huge opportunity. It would take some investment, which is, you know, a sore topic, but I think there's a lot of interest, and... it could um combine with an area that i think we still have a lot of development in which is music and i was sorry to see that the oco theater area which was going to be more music oriented is now having problems so i would think that might be some place where we should put some attention I was also intrigued by Tom Reeves' comment in his long letter, he really worked hard on that, about retirees. And the reason it caught my attention, and I think you were there at one of the military presentations where they talked about what percentage is the military contribution to our whole economy? It's pretty big, but do you recall off the top of your head?

I don't have that memorized, but it's significant.

It's a significant honk, and I think they said in that presentation i think muir fred muir said that um retirees are 15 of that because they come and they bring their retired pension and they spend it here and so when tom said that um it made me think wow maybe there is something to this and maybe that's a potential um to figure out how retired people spend their money and capitalize on that. And just sitting here, I was thinking, partnering with the airport, I mean, we have some tension around neighborhoods having too many flights, but what I understand is that the planes are getting bigger and the planes are getting quieter because they're more modern. And if we could fill them, that's an area that retired people do, they travel. They eat out. They they want to stay active. So maybe some kind of partnership with park it, which is going to be driving people from Rio Road down to Point Lopez. Maybe there's opportunities for doing a lot of park it where we get people out of their cars. We get them in to more. Community oriented transportation, we get retirees. Together, that's great and going places, which is great with with some innovative ideas. I don't know who through, you know, maybe parks and Rex or something. I know Carmel foundation does a great job with that. So, looking at that at that opportunity, and they, you know. Another thing retirees do is they have pets. We haven't even talked about that opportunity. I'm just stretching to think of things we haven't developed. So those are areas I think could be fruitful. We, of course, always have our mainstays of tourism and restaurants. But you've got me thinking.

Yeah. No, I appreciate it, Councilor Barash. And I saw Mr. Reeves' comments as well. And I think what's interesting is, you know, we've got in Monterey, when you look at our demographic and makeup, we've got retirees certainly as an important demographic, families, military, and others. When typically with the economic development study, It focuses on industries, and so it's the Dakes Code, the North American industry codes, and what are the economic drivers, and because it's about the city's role in providing and supporting those industries that help the economic base. Retirees certainly play a role. They're not an industry, but we'll keep that in mind as we look at the market share in cities like you look down at you know Palm Springs they there's very much targeted towards retirees as a strategy uh for us uh we we look at it from a more of a business and industry sense uh but appreciate the feedback and and I would just add so um all residents will get four opportunities in person um to meet and talk with us plus one additional virtual

opportunity to talk to us and provide us with feedback and context in addition to the survey that we're going we're going to put out so we want it we want to cast the white the net pretty wide and invite everyone including retirees to comment on it the second thing you mentioned infrastructure, transportation kinds of things, that is something that is generally part of an economic development strategy in really assessing transportation, what other utilities, housing that's available, what's needed to attract and retain some of the industries that we currently have and that would help us move into the future.

Good.

Yeah.

Okay, I'm I don't have any questions might have some comments but I'll wait till after a public comment to share those so with that will go out to public comment for folks on zoom you can use a raise hand function anybody in the Chamber was to speak on this item. Seeing none will do a countdown for folks on zoom to 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, we have 3 on zoom going to close colors.

Miss PD you can go ahead.

Good evening, this is Nina be again. Data gathering comes first. Strategy builds on that. Monterey needs to identify where the city actually is, including existing problems, and address those problems and issues as uncomfortable as that is before it launches off to create something new that may not address the actual needs and constraints here, and then hire more high-paid staff who don't know Monterey's history. Planning must be grounded in reality, not magical thinking, or the solutions will fall flat with consultants to pocketing your funds anyway. Hospitality. People don't stay in Monterey because hotel and motel room rates are too high compared to the other areas. People stay in Marina or Salinas because of that, not because they have modernized, swankier rooms. It's not a renovation issue. Room amenities aren't the problem. The suggestion to pay hotels to renovate their facilities isn't practical, and it doesn't solve the problem. This is exactly the problem with not dealing with hard realities, not starting with facts and where we are, The real answer is to put the problem and responsibility back on the hospitality industry and owners to start charging more realistic rates, more in line with the other cities, perhaps finding some way to incentivize them with promotions on the city website, but not spending city funds. I spoke with the city years ago about partnering with the permaculture community in the Monterey Bay to green the city and train staff in sustainable practices and provide programs. I love the programmatic idea. That would draw people here, but people didn't pursue that in the city. Colleges are great for the city images, but they don't pay the bills. If Middlebury is leaving, that land can be repurposed and converted to housing or mixed use with a nice library and auditorium for other uses. Admission taxes seem to be part of this conversation, especially since the aquarium keeps taking over more and more square footage and depriving you of property tax and sales tax. Downtown used to be vibrant. It's frankly seedy now. Did landlords get greedy? I don't know. Need to find out what rents are compared to other areas. There used to be bookstores, movie theaters, a craft store, fabric store, Sears, small businesses for the public to buy things and for the visitors too. All that sales tax has been lost. Real estate banks and investment companies, they don't make sales tax. The public is to blame partially for that too because they went off to Sand City and the big box stores instead of staying and patronizing downtown. The public needs to get involved to revitalize downtown, too. But Monterey needs to stand up for its small businesses, and it has not. The bar downtown, I think it was the Bull and Bear, was harassed by a powerful property owner who you all know, despite abiding by city codes, and the city staff refused to prioritize it, at one point saying that it was in a pile of work that they hadn't gotten to yet and didn't know when they would. And then that situation just deteriorated further. Why don't people stay or return to the Monterey Peninsula? You have to ask that question. How many people are like me? They don't feel good from all the Navy radiation and the cell towers downtown and on the hotels like the Hyatt and the Portola Plaza. You need to deal with that. I have other suggestions too, but that was .

All right. Our next speaker is Esther.

Good evening, everybody. I want to concur with Nina about the affordability factor. We absolutely need to start considering that because we can't just continue relying on the car week billionaires the rest of the year. You know, we cater to all of that group because they, they do have a lot of money, but. We need to try and include some other income levels as well. In a variety of ways, so I think affordability and diversifying that a little bit has to be kind of addressed, you know, families. You know, other other other demographics that we might not be reaching. I also wanted to point out something that should be very obvious at this point. It's going to be really hard for us to attract any new industry without having housing. So, I think it's important for the city to. go back to think about the locations that we had set aside there were three additional locations to the uh that went that came up um with the madison street 104 100 affordable project that we're hopefully going to be breaking ground on soon and we should we should try and start looking ahead and looking at those properties because if we build affordable housing for our current residents and our current workers we could free up some market rate housing for people who could be enticed to come here and work here in other industries. I also want to mention, obviously, Alvarado and Canary Row are always a priority and Alvarado might be looking a little seedy now, but North Fremont has always and still is seedy because it's never gotten the attention that it deserves. Gino I know has made it a priority, but Gino alone can't do it. We attract a lot of people here for the fairgrounds, but we don't have much reason for them to stay on North Fremont once they get out of their shows and their festivals. So Fremont has to become a priority because it has a lot of potential that's never been tapped. I also want to mention that we have a dog park that is an embarrassment and many, many people travel with their animals and that makes places a destination. Carmel, for example, is world renowned for being number one for dogs. And accommodating for dogs, and we have an embarrassing dog park that really would. Be worth spending some time and effort on and lastly. Laguna Grande park is a gigantic bird habitat. That people come to this park just to go birding. It is known around the state at definitely. So that is something that we can also pay attention to on this side of the city and not just stay downtown. Thank you.

Thank you. And then Tom is our last speaker. I do want to note someone else raised their hand after the cut off. So I won't be calling on them. Tom, you can go ahead.

Thank you. It's good to know that some people are listening in to this conversation. To put a little finer point, thank you, Jean, for mentioning my comment about retirees. My comment number four, though, is about if I interpret this report correctly, it seems like healthcare is actually the biggest generator of whatever you want to call it. call it like our gross national product, but the city or whatever the proper term is, but I read it to be 1.5 billion, whereas hospitality is 658 million. So it seems to me like healthcare is one of the greatest economic drivers in our area. And of course, retirees unfortunately avail themselves a lot of healthcare. So that was my nexus between retirees and the economy. And not only that, obviously retirees spend their wealth in the stores in the town. And if we don't have good healthcare in this area, that's one thing that will drive retirees away. And honestly, I don't think that community hospital is on par with many other areas. I hear all the time people who need specialty care for cancer treatment or heart ailments or whatever they might be, generally speaking, they'll either go to Salinas or they'll head up to Stanford or some other more major health organization. And then one last observation since I've been here for many decades, Alvarado Street, and I was Tom Connelly, intimately involved with different iterations of master plans for the downtown and we have some great plans stowed away in the vault somewhere maybe they're up at the airport in the long term storage by now. But the problem always seems to be when it comes time to settle the bill. And then the property owners don't want to cough up the money. The city doesn't have the money. So I think it would be instructive maybe, and I'm sure staff's already done this, but it would be nice to hear from them about what did Seaside do? How did they get the Broadway project funded? That's really been a beautiful project there. And I think it's really turned their Broadway corridor around. And that's something we need to do for Alvarado and North Fremont. I'm not leaving North Fremont out of this whatsoever. It's just that I know more about Alvarado street and that was last done, I think, in 1974. so it's, you know, it's, it's the half a century old. It's far past time for something to be done there. Thank you very much.

Okay, with that, thank you for the public commenters. We'll bring it back to the council for further discussion.

So, any other comments please? So, I think what I wanted to add also is that. I mean, I really like the ideas that I'm hearing and specifically to the economic development position. I, To me, in the pool of positions that we have talked about in the past, it seems to me like the economic development position is the position that could support our efforts to revive our business corridors and also support us in looking at opportunities to increase revenues in certain areas that perhaps we haven't done in the past. But I think also coupled with that position, I think it's also important to really reaffirm our communication strategy and engagement because for a economic developer to come to the city and develop or continue the development of a strategy, that strategy I think is going to require also that there's communication with outside groups, outside investors, outside developers. and there's going to need to be a strategy in place in terms of what that communication looks like right to basically sell the city to outside businesses or or potential partners that could come in and and be a part of that um revitalization of alvarado or or any other um commercial corridor so just wanted to add that as well anybody else

Well, you gave me an idea. And I'm wondering if the people that are revitalizing the Del Monte would have any interest in partnering with the revitalization of Alvarado. Just an idea.

Certainly, they're one of the stakeholders that we've been meeting with, Federal Realty. They happen to also own and operate Santana Row up in San Jose. And so they have plans for Del Monte Center. We've met with them, Dante, myself, Kim, and others as well. I think for a group like Federal Realty, they see other areas as competitors, but also still part of the city. And so we're gonna work together.

Yeah, they're heavily retail.

I'll just share a few quick thoughts. I'm excited to see the conversations being picked back up and we're trying to find a space and moving forward. I hear the thought process in regards to waiting for the recruitment of the economic development manager position. I guess when I hear the list of options as far as the different types, I think the one that makes sense to me is somebody that's like the project manager communication type that you alluded to somebody that can pick this up because i think part of the challenge that i've experienced and we were experiencing here throughout the course of this discussion is that there's nobody that's like the main point person to help lead this through um and so it can be easily put on the back burner because other things take priority but if we had somebody that helped usher this experience through, including the stakeholder engagement, I think that it could prove to be more fruitful. So I would support bringing that prioritization back. In fact, yeah, I'll leave that part there. I also think it's important for us to look at where there might be opportunities to get small wins in. There's a lot in the draft economic development strategy. There's a lot of opportunity. I don't want us to get lost in this space of engagement and idea aiding and trying to think really big picture about the possibilities that can be and not end up anywhere with it. And since we've just started discussing this last year, there really hasn't been opportunities where we can say, look, we've made some progress here. So I think that there's a couple of things embedded into this that i think are clear obvious agreeable things that um we could move forward some maybe are more complex and i understand the challenges associated with that um but one of the things that sticks out to me um pretty strongly is we had a majority of the council speak in support of exploring the idea of um making alvarado street pedestrian only um last year and so What efforts can we do to try to advance that? It doesn't have to be that. I'm just giving that as an example. And then I'll just kind of end with the I guess another example is the business improvement districts, right? Like, I think that's a quick, like, I don't think anybody's gonna argue with that, like, creating more funding opportunities that specifically focused on helping to support economic development. So I'll leave that there. Thank you again, staff for getting the ball rolling with this. And I look forward to seeing how we advance this topic.

Great. And if I can add just one final thing. Yes, this was a draft strategy, so the Council never actually adopted this strategy. And so the goal here is to not only bring forward a strategy for adoption in 2027, next year, but also to couple that with an implementation plan. And that's what's missing, right? And that's the measurable tool for us to get the quick wins and strategize for the long-term things. You have a general plan, but the general plan is mostly policy priorities. There's an implementation plan to the general plan where you get those, what's going on with Alvarado Street, what's going on with the business improvement districts, That's where we want to get to essentially. And so one of the reasons why I believe it may be wise for us to wait on the economic development person is to get those strategies and understand the priorities because they can be very diverse skill sets, right? We can get somebody who's a great communicator, but has no knowledge about land use. and maybe land use, like making Alvarado a pedestrian street, that involves some land use expertise, essentially. And so we'll be better positioned to know what we're looking for as we prioritize the implementation plan. So that's the reason staff is crafting this recommendation.

awesome thank you for that Fonte and look forward to next steps so awesome all right with that council comments I'm not seeing any oh please I went to the Monterey Vista neighborhood Association board meeting um yesterday last night

and I asked them if they would consider endorsing the renewal of measure s and I'm wondering if we shouldn't be working with neighborhood associations to see if they're willing I mean some of them are nonprofits and I'm not sure about that intersection but We could have an educational component to it and ask if they will encourage their residents to support the measure. I mean, we need to get this passed.

ahead i think you guys be careful with them oh yeah we just um uh requesting endorsements of about measure on city oh we can't make comments talk about it yeah right yeah thank you okay i didn't i take it all back okay um all right with that we'll go to city manager reports more reports this evening all right with that we'll go to adjourn at 805 thank you everybody