City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, good evening, everyone. We're gonna call the meeting to order, and we will start with our land acknowledgement. We would like to acknowledge that the land we inhabit today was once known as Tavangar, the home of the Gabrielino-Tanva people. We show our respect to the Gabrielino-Tanva people, as well as all indigenous people, past, present, and future, and honor their labor as original caretakers of this land. We commit to uplifting the Gabrielino-Tonva people, invite you to acknowledge the history, and join us in caring for this land. Now please welcome the Monterey Park Police Explorers for the flag salute. Please rise.

Outward face. Present colors.

Please place your right hand over your heart. Ready, begin.

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.

Order. Colors. Outward face. Forward.

Thank you, you may be seated. Madam Clerk, may we get a roll call, please?

Council Member Go? Present. Council Member Wong? Present. Council Member Sanchez? Present. Mayor Pro Tem Lo?

Here. Mayor Yang? Present. We have a quorum. Thank you. Any agenda revisions or additions? Madam Mayor?

If I could please ask and request that we move item 10G up in the agenda. There are people in the audience who are here for this item. I'd hate for them to wait till the very end.

All right. Why don't we do 6B and then 10G?

Thank you.

All right. Any other additions or revisions?

No other changes, Madam Mayor.

Okay, so let's move forward with item 6B presentation. SoCal Pony Interleague Gold Bracket Champions, the MPK Reapers. Does the coach want to come up and say a few words? No? Well, okay, well, on behalf of the city and the city council, we have certificates of recognition for all of the members of the MPK Pony Baseball, MPK Reapers team. Congratulations as you celebrate becoming the 2026 SoCal Pony Interleague Gold Bracket Champions. We commend your outstanding dedication to the sport and acknowledge your athletic abilities and commitment to good sportsmanship and teamwork. Before I call the names, does my fellow council members want to say anything?

I'm just proud of you guys for putting us on the map again.

All right, well, when you hear your name, please come up, and then we'll do one big group picture in the front.

OK. All right, first up, we have Juan Fernandez. And Andrew Medina. Connor Liu. David Rojas. Eric Hernandez Jr. Evan Hong. Gail Orozco. Jacob Morales. Jeremiah Lee. Jonathan Perez. Nathan Torres. Nicholas Ng. Nicholas Camzone. Rosendo Nunez III. Edward Rojas, team manager. Anthony Perez, assistant coach. Daniel Mireles, assistant coach. And Sal Vacca, assistant coach. Let's give it up for the MPK Reapers.

You guys be in the front.

Let's pretend like we're a team. Get all together, nice and close. Come on. One, two, and three. One, two, and three. And then everyone's looking here. Got it?

Awesome. Congratulations, guys. Thank you. Congratulations. We expect you guys here next year again.

Thank you. Good job.

All right, next up, per Council Member Sanchez's request, we're going to move up 10G, National Boys and Girls Club Week Resolution up. Council Member Sanchez.

Thank you, Mayor. This week is, we're here to... Sorry. It is National Boys and Girls Club Week and we have our Boys and Girls Club of the West San Gabriel Valley here today to honor them. If you guys can please stand up so we can recognize you. Please stand. And they're wearing their Kindness is Free shirts. So thank you so much for being here today. You can have a seat this way. Thank you, guys. All of our Boys and Girls Club here in Monterey Park serves as a great resource for our community here in Monterey Park. And we appreciate you and the partnership that you have. Wanted to recognize you. So with the support of the council, I hope that we can pass this resolution. Council Member Wong, you want to add something?

Yeah, and mayor Really just want to pile on to what councilor Sanchez is saying really appreciate the boys girls club all that you do and the youth particularly in engaging with our community events showing up to just about everything that we do here at Barnes Park and throughout the city including our Not this past weekend, but the weekend before helping to organize our pride festival in March every year for the last six years and so many ways in which we're integrating our community services and community outreach with the Boys and Girls Club as well. Thank you so much for all that you do to serve our youth and our community and those that really just are in need in not only our community but in the wider region. And for those who don't know, the Boys and Girls Club here is the headquarters for a number of Boys and Girls Clubs, including in La Puente and East LA. And all of you do so much and I really appreciate the staff as well for everything that you guys do. So thank you, happy to join Council Member Sanchez in support of this resolution and appreciate the Boys and Girls Club and all that it contributes to our community.

Thank you.

Yeah, my kids were a part of the Boys and Girls Club too when they were younger and it was a great place. They really enjoyed their time there. So thanks for providing that safe space for all the kids in our community. Would Council Member Sanchez like to make a motion?

Yes, I think, and then. I'll second. Thank you, Council Member.

Okay, let's vote on this. Approved unanimously.

Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Do you want a picture? No?

Okay.

Let's do a picture. All right, so now let's go back to presentations. Back to item 6A. Let's get an update on the SGV Forward Ad Hoc Subcommittee.

Madam, if I may, so last Monday, both Council Member Sanchez, myself, and City of Monterey Park participated in the second monthly meeting, and this is an ad hoc meeting that consists of City of Monterey Park, City of Rosemead, City of Almonte, and City of South Almonte, and the goal is to work with the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments who is receiving grant funding to look at how we can improve public mobility in the San Gabriel Valley and especially in anticipation of the Olympics and also because Garvey Avenue which is where this project is focusing on is one of the most busiest corridors, and if you, every morning, pay attention to the bus stops. Bus 70 arrives every seven minutes, and so we had, this is our second monthly meeting, and I invite the public, because it's open to the public. They are held, I think, usually at the Garvey Community Center in Rosemead, because it's a centralized location, but I think at this last meeting, again, there was a lot of discussion about consensus because again, this is a proposed project that impacts several cities in San Gabriel Valley. So we all have to be in lockstep agreement. And so I think that in terms of goals and vision, I think that number one, we do want to see how we can increase mobility options, increase commuting options, also allow more choices for people who commute. At the same time, be mindful and respectful of our neighborhoods, our local businesses, our community, and also how do we advance our goals of addressing congestion issues, environmental issues, air quality issues, mobility issues, and so That was, I think, summary of, I summarized the last meeting. And, of course, my colleague, Mr. Sanchez, if you want to add anything else to it, please.

Yes, thank you, Council Member Lowe. Just like Council Member Lowe said, I'm sorry, Mayor Pro Tem Lowe said, this was our second meeting. Our next upcoming meeting is July 20th. and it's at the Rosemead Community Center. It is open to the public if anyone wants to share their thoughts. This is particularly, specifically relating to Bus Line 70. For those of you guys who might be familiar with Bus Line 70, it goes from downtown Los Angeles all the way to the Amani Station. It crosses through several cities, including Monterey Park, down Atlantic, and then down Garvey, until it makes it all the way to El Monte. This particular corridor, as Mayor Pro Tem Lo said, is one of the most highly trafficked and used bus lanes in the San Gabriel Valley. It gets ridership of over 15,000 riders per day. I've had the opportunity to ride it several times now to kind of witness the ridership. And there's a lot of people who use it, especially in the mornings and the evenings. So the idea here is to try to find a way that we can increase mobility here to be able to potentially create a dedicated bus lane that goes through Monterey Park, through Rosemead, El Monte, South El Monte, all the way to the El Monte station to be able to, and what would happen with this also is they would get, if we participated, we would also see an improvement in a lot of our bus shelter areas, which some of them in our city, for example, are pretty run down or are non-existent. So there would be an opportunity to update those bus stops. But also for people who are using this particular line within the San Gabriel Valley, it's an opportunity to get them from where they are going from point A to point B in a much faster way. through a dedicated bus lane that might potentially go through our city. So our meetings have been really focused on how we can find some type of consensus within our cities to be able to potentially do that. And so we are having one more meeting to create some more consensus about how we can potentially create that. I do want to share as a teacher that a lot of our youth use public transport a lot more than we do as older adults and they are a lot more heavily reliant on public transport and so I do want to say that a lot of the people that I saw at least witness using the line 70 are a lot of younger kids college kids high school kids but also a lot of our older a lot of our older citizens who are trying to who might not drive or might not have might not have a vehicle and use public transport to get from different points within the city and throughout the San Gabriel Valley. This is also a very unique opportunity to be able to connect the San Gabriel Valley in a meaningful way. So we do have one more meeting coming up to see if we can find some type of consensus to be able to do something about this bus line. But I do welcome the public, just like Council Mayor Pro Tem Lo said. Just say Henry. Henry said. To be able to, I do invite you to come out and share your thoughts if you have any.

And one more thing just to add, again, which Council Member Sanchez said. I think the go-to is, and I think often we do hear from residents about, you know, how do we make our city, as well as, in general, the area, you know, more pedestrian friendly. How do we address congestion, air quality issues that are related to congestion, and The goal is to also connect residents to the regional metro networks, such as the Metro E Line, as well as the Silver Line, which is where the Amani Station is. And so it's really an opportunity to connect our communities into Metro's expanding regional network of rail, subway, buses, light rail, as well as the regional community system of MetroLink and Amtrak.

one last thing and uh i'm glad uh that uh mayor protemlo mentioned that uh because this is a very uh unique opportunity as the as we look forward to the olympics coming in 2028 um the amani station where line 70 ends will be a major transportation up to to the four uh major events that will be happening in the san gabriel valley So people could take the bus line 70 in a much more rapid way, get to Imani Station, and potentially get to any of the Olympic Games that they might be needing to get to in a much faster and expedient way. So this is a very unique opportunity, not just to fulfill that promise, but also to connect the San Gabriel Valley. I just wanted to mention that.

I know I keep saying one more thing, but one more thing. And I do want to commend... the San Diego Valley COG for thinking of us, because for those who have been involved in transportation policies over the years, I know many of us were disappointed when we were looking at extending the E line that Metro ultimately decided to choose a route in which it goes further south to Montebello, Santa Fe Springs, because I think that many of us were advocating for it to go through Monterey Park, Rosemead. But again, this was a decision made by Metro. But nonetheless, we do have a very, very transit-dependent community. And so I think that this is an opportunity for us to really push for Metro to pay attention to our communities, especially making sure that we get our fair share of public dollars for mobility transportation projects.

And mayor this might be a question for staff can or or the members of the committee, but can someone remind us what the if there is a deadline for some sort of decision on this and what the. The opportunities ahead and what that might look like in the coming months or years, I know it sounds like we're trying to find consensus between the cities that are on Garvey. where this route would be but i don't know if there's a deadline to that any funding tied to that and what decision might if there's a yes or no kind of decision point that we need to arrive at

Thank you for that question. So our understanding is still that they're planning. There are definitely, the COG is trying to get consensus from the cities. Definitely heard from our neighboring cities that there could be concerns if one city doesn't participate that does that benefit the corridor if a city chooses not to participate in that. allowance of a bus rapid transit lane. So I think their goal is to try to have these in place prior to the Olympics, but definitely still in the planning phase. So I don't know if they've given the subcommittee any other detailed dates, but as far as we know, they're still in the planning phase. Like I said, they're trying to get this done ahead of the Olympics, at least this segment.

There is a sense of urgency to get this project done before the Olympics. I think a lot of the money that was granted by Metro for projects like these was with the intention of increasing mobility before the Olympics. So I think there is a strong urgency to try to start these projects as quickly as possible.

And if I can also add, and also a reminder to everyone too that In addition well before even this proposal was offered by the COG you know we've also been working with Metro for our share of money basically the project to again improve mobility on Garvey which also includes the potential to have a parking structure in our downtown Garvey and so again these are all very critical projects especially Again, I know the community has said that they want to see more pedestrian-friendly alternatives into the mobility policy projects. And so I think that, at least for Monterey Park, this is probably an opportunity for us to really, I think, maximize the dollars that we've already are being offered by Metro.

One last quick announcement, just in case any community members missed it. The next meeting is on Monday, July 20th at 6 p.m. at the Garvey Community Center in the city of Rosemead. That information will also be posted on our city's webpage as well.

All right, thank you for the SGV Forward Ad Hoc update. Moving forward, we'll go into public comments. So looks like just five public comment speakers tonight. I'll call the first one, Jonathan Horton.

I know I don't look like Jonathan Horton, so.

But good evening, Madam Mayor, City Council, city staff and audience. As most of you know, I'm Marissa Castro Salvati. I'm the government relations manager for Southern California Edison for this area and have been on the interim for the last couple of years and previously. back in through 2015. But today, I actually am here to introduce our permanent government relations manager who will be covering the city of Monterey Park. Some of you may recognize him. Jonathan Horton is one of the staff members of San Gabriel Valley COG. So he started his career at the COG, and now he is part of Southern California Edison's local public affairs. I am really thrilled to have him start, and I know, what, three weeks now? Seven weeks, okay. He's seven weeks old with Southern California Edison. But I wanted to just make sure and introduce him. I will be shepherding him through the city and working with him as he gets acquainted with what goes on with Southern California Edison. And I will most likely see most of you as I'm still involved in the city of Monterey Park through the East Los Angeles College Foundation. So at this time, I'd like to introduce Jonathan Horton, who is our new government relations manager for City of Monterey Park.

Hello, everyone. It's nice to see you all again. As Marissa mentioned, I was previously with the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments. Some of you might know me from Congresswoman Chu's office a few years back, but now I am the new government relations manager for SoCal Edison. I cover 10 cities in total across the western San Gabriel Valley. and I'm very, very happy that Monterey Park is one of those, not only because it's close to where I live in Pasadena, but because I see a lot of my friends sitting here in front of me and I'm just really excited to hopefully help you all with any energization projects that you might have within the city and any issues that might arise I'll always be here. My phone number is on the comment card, so please feel free to give me a text, give me a call whenever. All of you have my email. Most of you have my personal cell phone number. Just really happy to be working with you all again. So thank you for having me today, and I will see you all soon.

Thank you for being here. All right, next public speaker.

Mayor, if I could, I just wanted to add some comments. Appreciate Marissa for your service the last few years and for many years before that. Not that many years, but many years of service at Monterey Park and really helping shepherd a lot of projects builders and projects here in Monterey Park that have had issues with Edison really appreciate your work there. And good to see Jonathan joining Edison and the local public affairs team. And we will all try to remember to bug Jonathan instead of Marissa going forward. But we'll start with Jonathan right? And there I think there are a few folks here that probably see a couple of developers in the audience that might want to exchange information with Jonathan too.

Yeah, for our residents who have any electrical issues, you know who to contact right now. All right, next up is Dave Jones.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor Wang, Mayor Pro Tem Lowe, Councilmember Sanchez, Wong, Ngo, dedicated staff. My name is Dave Jones, and I live in District 5. At the last meeting, I celebrated the imminent passing of Measure NDC, now with 10,365 votes in favor to 1,367 votes against, an indisputable landslide. The past few months have been hard work, but now the even harder work begins. Looking forward, the city has its vacant to vibrant workshops this month, but we also need to look back to how we got here so we can avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. In project management, we call this a lessons learned review. Mistakes were made. Mistakes like the mitigated negative declaration attached to the initial study, even though it had 892 references to CO2, 1,071 references to noise, 1,361 references to hazardous waste, documented electricity use two to three times the use of the entire city, enough to generate 83,000 metric tons of CO2 every year, diesel generators spewing cancerous exhaust with 168,000 gallons of fuel stored on site without a fire mitigation plan, and equipment generating noise up to 96 decibels equivalent to a motorcycle or power lawnmower. Who slapped the MND on the initial study? The city manager? the city planners, Kim Lee Horn, the consultant? Did anyone from the city even read the initial study? Did any of you read the initial study? I think the answer is obvious because if anyone had read it, I wouldn't be standing here today. These are questions that need to be answered because these are lessons that need to be learned. And why was Kim Lee Horn, ostensibly working on behalf of the city, having ex parte communications with HMC? Why were they at HMC's town hall, speaking on behalf of the applicant and not the city? Who is responsible for making sure consultants hired by the city are working for the city? And why does the city keep hiring consultants that do such a bad job? These are questions that need to be answered because these are lessons that need to be learned. And why did the city council, or at least one member of the city council, when asked why they supported building a data center in Saturn Park, point to the 19 people who voted in favor of including the data centers in the revised zoning for Saturn Park as broad support in the city? That was less than half the people who participated in SPARC in the first place. And why did we read in the New York Times after measure NDC was clearly going to pass that the city council or at least one member of the city council lamented the loss of five to $7 million in revenue from the proposed data center. Revenue that was never guaranteed and highly doubtful considering the number of failed and canceled data center projects across the country. while the cost of the health risk to residents and the well-documented increases in electricity rates would have ultimately dwarfed any financial benefits received by the city. If revenue is really such a problem that we need to make questionable decisions, why not just legalize drug dealing and then tax the heck out of it? Or maybe we could bring back one legacy and residents could line up to sell their organs and then donate the money to the city. That would raise revenue. It's a good idea, right? These are questions that need to be answered because these are lessons that need to be learned. Therefore, I hope you will instruct staff to perform a lessons learned review to answer these questions and more, so the residents and businesses of Monterey Park can have faith in a future that avoids the mistakes of the past. And if not, there's an election in November, and you better believe a significant number of those 10,365 yes votes for Measure NDC are paying attention. I say this as a proud alumnus of the Boys and Girls Club of Monterey Park. Thank you.

Thank you, Dave. Next up is Doris Ho.

Hello, everyone.

My name is Doris Ho. I apologize for having a cough candy because I have asthma. Okay. I just realized that the topic of the Helmand and Hardaway two-house turning into 40 units apartment is not on the agenda. However, we were invited to still speak about it. That corner of the traffic currently during business hours is already backlogged. And Hellman is a two way, three lanes with one turning lane. Hardaway is two lanes. So from thinking about this single family neighborhood of a two family homes turning into a development of 40 units, 66 parking space. Now I may not be accurate because this is information shared by neighborhood. from two homes, To imagine 40 units, that's 2,000% increase. The traffic that you're introducing to that area, and if we recall, someone was already killed, a pedestrian passing that area. There's school children, there's shoppers who go to Atlantic to catch the bus. It's a very busy street. Currently, we have trouble making a left turn or right turn into the 10 freeway. that is already currently a bottleneck. So we believe that development is necessary, housing is necessary, but perhaps this might not be the location for a five-story unit apartment. And if you were to allow 66 parking space to 40 units, meaning that a lot of the people who will be living there in the future will be parking in the streets, making the streets more narrow, making it more difficult for people to turn in and out, and that is already a commercial area with Marriott, and recently the Holiday Inn Suites, and there's a shopping center, there's a lot of traffic already. That area is also the gateway to the neighborhood, the Alhambra area, that in case of emergencies, fire trucks, paramedics going to help the people or fire, increasing all that traffic by putting a five-story apartment building will slow down the response time to anyone who live there who might need help. And also the fire insurance might go up too because weather is dry, more populated area, five story building, more units, more people. So we thank you for the opportunity to listen to us. We appreciate your leadership in taking us in the future, looking into these issues. As that gentleman said, lesson learned. If you put a building there, you're not gonna be a few years down the line and tell the people, nevermind, we changed our mind, this is not a good idea, get out. Once you do that, those are permanent situation, permanent, damages to the environment. There is currently a very nice, beautiful neighborhood. So perhaps the project needs to be going elsewhere, where there is a better location for a five-story, 60-unit or 40-unit apartment with project housing. So perhaps maybe no more than two story high town homes where a lot of people would be very interested in living in that area. So we look to your leadership to looking into it, talking to the planning meeting, addressing these issues, take proactive measure to mitigate the problems. Don't just put one or two stop signs and street lights there. That is not gonna solve the problem. That's just window dressing. So we really trust your judgment and your leadership to help us to resolve this problem. Thank you.

Thank you, Doris. Next speaker is Grace Young. Oh, okay. So she left. Next speaker is L.S. Cito.

Hello Council, how are you?

Good evening. I'm actually, I'm in District 2. I'm not impacted by 824 Hellman development directly, but I want to share with you last Wednesday was their community, their second community outreach over at the Hilton Hotel. I don't know what they came back and told you about, but I attended. It was very exciting and I'm going to give you the same thing that I told them, okay? So here we go. Okay, so The project at A24 Hellman, your planning department actually needs to go ahead and stop it in the process because there's a couple of things wrong with it. First of all, they didn't measure the vertex of the property to the 10 freeway where it meets Atlantic. According to the meeting notice, everyone, every business and resident within 300 feet were invited. Well, it's 237 feet and three quarter of an inch to Caltrans, to the freeway. So Caltrans should have been invited and they were not invited. Second thing, I did a quick two drive-by and one walk through the property, and what I noticed is that it doesn't meet the 3026 rule. So what that is is the California fire code Is the California fire code I'll find the section for you in any development and developers can I tell you that any development over 30 feet requires a 26 foot wide Street and that is because of the firefighting apparatus because in order to do life-saving and firefighting they need to use the aero ladder and 26 feet is the minimum requirement and here's the caveat you cannot take from parking and So the home inside with the eight feet parking at the legal right away, you cannot take from that. So I did the map and you reduce it. I use the GIS. I did the map. That means you have at the most is 24 feet. So it's two feet shy of the to meet the California fire code. And the reason why that is significant is because let's go back to Caltrans. Okay. You may not be familiar, but Caltrans Division 7, they're downtown LA at 100 Main Street. Go to the first floor, 100. They are very, very protective of the 10 freeway from all the way from eastern Fremont, Atlantic, San Gabriel, New Del Mar, they're very protective in preventing what is called queue spill spill back. And in order to to basically circumvent that you need to get an easement from Caltrans and they will never give it to you. So basically Caltrans should have been invited. The city actually needs to contact Caltrans and you guys need to agree to what is an intergovernmental review in IGR, and then the city planning department should have never taken on the traffic impact analysis. It really had to go through Caltrans. You should have washed your hand of it and sent it to Caltrans, and they would have done it for you, and they would have told you no. In addition to that, if you walk over to the development, what you notice is that power poles, power line, okay? So what happens when you build a five-story, one-level subterranean is you go vertical. Well, when you go vertical, you cross the power line. And the California Public Utilities Commission has general order number 95. It's 15 feet. Guess what? You have to underground all those utility lines. And I did the math for you because currently they are They are 120 to 40 volt, which is basically for residential homes. So in order for you to take those two single family homes and make the energy delivery possible for 48 units, you have to basically upgrade the entire infrastructure. And you can't put those, we call them trash can, transformer on the power pole. You can't put them on there. Number one, the weight. The weight would basically break the arm, the cross arms. And then also, 28 wires going into the apartment would also cause a fire. So again, you'll call the fire department. And in order to do that, you have to do the undergrounding. And you have to do it from circuit to circuit. And the calculation I did for you, it's going to cost the developer, not you guys, the developer, they do not qualify for Rule 20A. They have to use Rule 20C, which is 100% burden on a developer. It's about $5 to $8 million. And then on top of that, in order for them to do that on Hellman, they have to shut the street down. Guess what? Caltrans would never give them a street. They would never allow them to have a permit to shut that helmet and no public director will ever challenge Caltrans So in order to do that you have to do what it's called a night night Construction which is from 11 p.m. To 5 a.m And then they will have to go to you City Council to get a conditional use permit because then you will have noises Does jackhammer at all hours of the night and you guys would never do that to your residents. So So the project is basically The planning department, it needs to stop and take this the best way possible. The planning department, you guys got to upskill them, because I'm seeing a lack of skill. And this should have been recognized right off the very top when you got the plans. So this is where it's at. I have the presentation. Happy to give you a copy of it. Thank you very much.

Thank you. That's it for our public comments. Let's move on to staff communications. First one is City Manager's Department.

Thank you Madam Mayor and Council, Diana Garcia, Assistant City Manager. This evening we wanted to announce a few different heights.

This is not sent out, does not look like it was sent out by Monterey Park. It looks like it was sent out by another agency, but that's what's coming in just so everybody's aware.

All right, the next thing we'd like to talk about and remind the public is about fireworks safety. So as we approach the Fourth of July holiday, we'd like to remind our residents to celebrate responsibly and to follow low-firework regulations to help keep our community safe. Some of those regulations are that fireworks are only allowed on July 4th from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Fireworks are not allowed in any city, park, at any time. And then we just kinda like to remind you to follow basic safety practices. Keep water or an extinguisher nearby. Maintain a safe distance from any home, any vehicle, and any dry vegetation. And kindly be respectful to your neighbors. veterans, children, seniors, and pets that may be impacted by these fireworks activities. Also, illegal fireworks and sales can be reported to the Monterey Park Police Department's non-emergency number at 626-573-1311. And also, I'd like to remind everybody that fines for possessing and using illegal fireworks can range anywhere from $2,000 to $3,000, or $5,000. Next slide, please. Okay, so the locations that we have safe and sane fireworks, they must be purchased from an approved and permitted stand or vendor. If you are unsure, look for the California State Fire Marshal Seal, which you'll see right there in the middle of the picture, And they'll have that California State Fire Marshal ID right there on the bottom. Sales of any fireworks are going to begin at 12 p.m. on Saturday, June 28, 2026. And they're going to end at 9 o'clock on July 4, 2026 in the city of Monterey Park. and the four approved safe and sane vendor sites that we have. The Shepherd of the Hills United Methodist Church will have their stand at 1600 Monterey Pass Road at the 711 parking lot. Mark Keppel High School will have theirs at 2150 South Atlantic Boulevard in the Atlantic Square Shopping Center. And then St. Stephen Martyr School will have theirs at their home site at 320 West Garvey Avenue. And St. Thomas Aquinas Church will have theirs at 1501 South Atlantic Boulevard. And again, these are the only four approved sites in Monterey Park. I'd also like to just mention, if you want to see a great show, our incredible folks at the Brexham Park are putting on their annual Monterey Parks Independence Day Celebrations. Saturday June 27th from 4 p.m. to 9 30 p.m. at the Barnes Park amphitheater it'll be a great show and I just want to remind everybody please celebrate responsibly and help keep our community safe any questions I think thanks chief for the brush fire preparedness workshop are we planning to record that at all I don't know

That's something we could record and make into smaller bite-sized snippets for distribution somehow for folks, because I'm sure not everyone that should attend will probably be attending. If there's ways to help spread that information and the preparedness, I think that'd be great to consider.

Council Member Wong, we can definitely look into potential ways to record. If we can't record the whole thing, because I'm sure they might be doing smaller conversations, but we could look at recording messages so that we make sure that we're getting that important information out to the community.

All right, thank you, Chief. Thank you. And our last staff presentation is from Public Works.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem and members of the City Council, Xochitlipan Public Works Manager. We just wanted to invite everybody to our monthly compost event scheduled for this Saturday at Garvey Ranch Park. We will be distributing compost on a first come first serve basis. We have about 200 bags available. If you're not able to make this event, we also have loose compost available at the park by the service road area, also available while supplies last.

Next slide, please.

There was one more reminder just that the link shuttle will be discontinued as of July 1st. We announced it at the last council meeting. We have also been doing some outreach and informing riders about the discontinuation of the route. But anyone who is looking to take advantage of other transportation options, Route 5 is an alternative and also Microtransit Express. MPK transit, micro transit express is also an option for riders in that area. That concludes my presentation, thank you.

Great, thank you. No questions? All right. Thank you. Thank you. We don't have any old business. Then moving on to the consent calendar. Item 10. We have two public communications for item 10A. Let's call the first one Yvonne Wong.

Honorable Mayor and City Council members, I'm here to speak about one of the items in your budget report for this coming fiscal year, and that is regarding the library intent to procure a bookmobile. I'm for library, but I am not in favor of getting a bookmobile for the city of Monterey Park, because this is a very small city, and we don't really need a bookmobile. due to the cost involved. I don't know what kind of bookmobile you're going to get. A full-scale bookmobile will cost approximately $200,000 and will cost another $200,000 per year to maintain. That will include, let me see, fuel and maintenance, which will be several hundred thousand a month, insurance and licensing, staffing, you will have to hire a driver, a librarian, and a library assistant, and then a collection development, and then to have tech, Wi-Fi on your bookmobile. I have... I want to suggest other alternatives because the library currently already have something called home delivery service, which matches a homebound person with a library staff to select books or whatever for that person. And I would recommend that the library recruit more volunteers and do what they call book deposit at different designated locations so that it can be a senior home, a community center, or even a school. And currently, as far as I know, all schools have school libraries, at least those that Monterey Park belongs to because we are in different school district. And In view of the current technology, e-media is more important. And I think the library should invest more in cultivating more e-books, e-media, such as streaming. There's Hoopla and Canopy for viewing movies. So I don't think, to get a bookmobile for outreach is really very sensible. I mean, it's gonna be obsolete soon enough. And just because Burbank Library had a bookmobile that they show on TV recently, their population is a lot bigger, and that is supposed to be their fourth branch, that bookmobile, they have already three libraries in Burbank. So I think I would suggest city council to look into that and have the staff do a feasibility and sustainability study to see if that is really wise to spend that kind of money. Because once you commit to it, it will be long run. And then further down the road, if you decide you don't want to offer that service, it will be too late. Thank you.

Thank you, Yvonne. Next up is Deb Simone, also speaking on item 10A.

Hello, Mayor Yang, Honorable Mayor Yang, Honorable Mayor Pro Tem, Henry Lowe, and the rest of the council. I didn't get to attend any of the other budget meetings previous to this. First of all, I'd like to say I'd like to volunteer to pick up books for the library. I can do that. I have an electric vehicle. It'll be great. Second thing is... There were two items in the budget, and I'm not sure if they're still there. I only got 325 pages into the city budget today, because I was kind of cramming for this. And I had seen previously that we were going to invest in a new Bearcat armored vehicle. for the police department, and I was going to question how often we use it, and then Yun Wang shared with me a picture on the news of the vehicle being used yesterday. I would like to know from the police department and the chief, and wherever I need to get this information from, how many situations do we use the armored vehicle for? Is there not a mutual aid agreement with other police departments? It was like a $400,000 outlay, and I don't know if it's still there. Secondarily, I would like to, for future meetings, bring up the topic of the license plate recognition cameras, Flock, and whatever other vendors we're using. I think this is something that we need to start talking about in a series of public hearings in terms of just general privacy. And I would like to know also from the chief, and I have a great rapport with the chief about, and then the police department about, how many investigations it actually helps with. There's a rash of catalytic converter thefts going on right in District 5 right now. I get occasional blurry pictures on my ring app about it, but I don't get it. I don't know if we've geo-fenced it. I don't know what's going on with that. I can ask the police department. But in general, in light of our no data center, movement in this town, I think we have to think about privacy concerns going forward for our citizens and for our general, your constituents, because I don't think the Flock Corporation needs to know every time I go to Albertsons. I mean, I just, and I also have a couple of internet cameras at my house, and so those companies know everything about me at this point. They're not inside, but they're outside. But at the same time, I think everyone, I don't know at what level the city needs to start thinking about how much we're interacting with big data in the city and how we can protect our constituents. That's part of what the NDC movement was about. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Deb. Maybe Chief can speak to Deb regarding her questions. Thank you. Any responses or questions about the consent calendar?

One of the speakers mentioned the amounts for the bookmobile. Can we just check that? Because those sound like they're off for me in terms of the annual costs, maintenance, all that stuff. If there aren't any other comments, I'm happy to make a motion to move the consent calendar items.

I'll second.

Council Member Wan moves. Council Member Sanchez seconds. And we're directing staff to look more into the book mobile cost for verification. Let's vote.

Approved unanimously.

All right, thank you.

Okay, so moving on. Excuse me, Madam Mayor. Our city librarian can talk to Ms. Wong. Council Member Wong, you're correct. That would not be the cost of the bookmobile. And there are additional funding sources that we're getting money from, including the Library Foundation and Camino Real. So Kristen's happy to speak with Yvonne. Great. Thank you, Kristen.

She'll be speaking with Ms. Wong. All right. Next, we have our public hearing. So I'm going to open the public hearing for item 11. I have quite a few speakers tonight.

Honorable Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Tem Lo, and council members. My name is Timothy Howe. I'm the director of community development. We have a public hearing tonight to consider adopting a resolution approving a 159 unit condominium development including eight live work units and eight very low income affordable units at 601 Potrero Grande Drive and 2100 Saturn Street. Providing the staff's presentation tonight will be Eliana Munoz, our senior planner.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and council members. My name is Eliana Munoz. I'm the senior planner with the Department of Community Development. Tonight I will be presenting a request to consider adoption of a resolution approving a site development plan, density bonus, and a vesting tentative map for a new development at 601 Portrero Grande Drive and 2100 Saturn Street. The project site is located near the southeast corner of the city. It is zoned Saturn Park Innovation Technology and has a general plan designation of innovation technology. The project site measures approximately eight acres and is currently developed with two vacant office buildings. Currently, the site is accessed via Potrero Grande to the south, Atlas Avenue to the west, and Saturn Street from the north. Surrounding the property are vacant or underutilized office buildings, and south of the property across Potrero Grande is the Edison substation. The SP zone allows for live work units as a principal use. However, an interpretation was necessary to address how the residential intensity and development standards apply to this type of project since the SP zone does not include residential density standards for live work projects like this one. Noting though, that this type of project is something that is contemplated in other parts of the city code, general plan and housing element. To do this, the city planner determined that the project is substantially similar to other residential and mixed-use projects and used the standards from other parts of the code included as attachment two of your staff report. The standards that were used are listed in the site development plan, which is exhibit B of your staff report. The project consists of 159 residential units. Eight of those units will function as live work units and another eight units will be reserved to be sold to households considered very low income. The units will be arranged in 29 different structures and will measure two and three stories ranging from 30 to 40 feet in height. The project proposes 16 different unit types with sizes ranging from 1,107 square feet to 2,655 square feet. And units will range from two to four bedrooms and two to three and a half bathrooms. The slide on the screen now is the view along Saturn Street. This slide shows the central portion of the project, which will feature a community park. And this side shows the Atlas entrance. that will have direct access to the live work units. The project will be accessed via two driveways. One will be located off Atlas and the other along Saturn. The driveway entrings will be gated and will provide enhanced paving. The perimeter will have a six foot tall block walls, except that the units fronting Saturn and Atlas, where the walls will measure three feet, six inches, and enclosed front patios. In terms of lighting, the project will feature a mix of landscape lighting, hardscape lighting, and pole lights across the site. A 13,000 square foot park will be located at the center of the project. The park will include a 1,100 square foot cabana, pergola, fire table, picnic tables, bike areas, and dog way stations. Two conditions of approval are included for the project for the HOA to maintain a barbecue area and to provide Wi-Fi within that cabana. The project will also provide a linear park near the property line facing Saturn Street. This park will measure approximately 8,000 square feet and this area will have a water feature and a landscaped pedestrian walkway. The entire project is substantially landscaped and the applicant will need to provide a final irrigation and landscape plan prior to building finals. This is a rendering of the central park area showing a bird's eye view of the cabana and the green spaces. The project proposes eight live work units that will be directly accessed from Atlas. These types of units will include ADA compliant ground floor workspaces meant to accommodate a business operated by the condominium owner. The workspaces will be separated from the residential portions of those units, which will be on the second and third floors. Separately, the project also includes an option of convertible tech offices. This option will allow a buyer to designate a ground floor area as home office or workspace similar to the live work units in 10 units. Those are found mostly along Saturn. except that those 10 units do not satisfy the ADA requirements. The project will also incorporate a density bonus per the California Density Bonus Law. As discussed earlier, the project was evaluated and its density was interpreted to be similar to those allowed by the housing element, our general plan, and the municipal code. The project will incorporate eight units that will be reserved to be sold to households considered very low income, which according to the latest guidelines is, I have on the screen 75,000. However, as of a few days ago, that went up to 83,300 for a family of four. The California Density Bonus Law allows waivers and applications of reduced parking ratios, which I will discuss in the next slide. Because the SP zone does not establish a complete parking framework, the city planner issued the interpretation to evaluate parking. Under density bonus law, the project proposed that the guest parking spaces function as shared parking serving both the guests and the residential units and visitors of live work units. On this slide is a chart of the type of parking the number required based on comparable standards, the applicants request and the number that will be provided. Overall, the project will provide a total of 318 enclosed garage parking spaces. Of those garage spaces, 58 will include tandem garages, garage configurations, as allowed by the municipal code, and 101 units will include standard side-by-side configurations. The project also provides 33 onsite guest parking spaces, resulting in a total onsite parking supply of 351 spaces. The project also includes a tentative map, which is for air rights for each unit. The project is also required to form an HOA that will be responsible for ongoing maintenance and landscaping of the property. Public Resources Code Section 21080.66 added by Assembly AB130 became effective in July 2025 to streamline the CEQA process for certain housing projects by exempting qualifying urban infill developments from portions of the environmental review requirements. The legislation aimed to accelerate project approvals and reduce delays for developments in already urbanized areas. Because the city determined that this project qualifies for that statutory exemption, technical studies such as air quality and noise analyses were not required. Nonetheless, a traffic study was provided to the city, and per the findings of that traffic study, the city engineer requested that Red Kirby is installed near the driveway along Saturn Street and that the intersection of Atlas and Potrero be re-striped to remove the middle lane. On June 2nd, the Planning Commission held a public hearing to review the project and we had 22 speakers provide comments. Some of the supportive comments included the need for affordable and additional housing and neighborhood improvements, while some concerns involved relatively low number of affordable units and the potential for units to be used as short-term rentals. Following deliberation, the Planning Commission recommended a wider sidewalk along Potrero Grande, for staff to re-examine the median on Atlas Avenue to ensure adequate left turn movements, and requested that the applicant and staff work together to develop an initial preference marketing period for the affordable units to be sold for income qualified Monterey Park residents. In response to the commission's recommendations, two additional condition of approvals were included. So the first one is condition of approval number 17, which requires the applicant provide a 30-day marketing preference to income-qualified residents of Monterey Park for the sale of the affordable units. The second is number 59, which requires the project provide a minimum six foot wide driveway, sorry, not driveway, sidewalk along Potrero Grande. In terms of the commissions concerning the median on Atlas, staff confirmed that there are no issues related to adequate left turns. And so tonight's recommendation is that City Council consider opening the public hearing, receive documentary and testimonial evidence, close that public hearing, and after considering the evidence received during the public hearing, adopt the resolution to approve Site Development Plan No. 25-131, Density Bonus, DRB 2016. investing tentative map number 84935 subject to the conditions of approval contained in exhibit A of the resolution and taking such additional related action that may be desirable. And in the audience we do have the applicant and some of his consultants and staff is also available for any questions. Thank you.

Thank you staff for the presentation. Any questions for staff before we hear from public commenters? Does the applicant want to say anything before we hear from public comments? No? Okay. Well we have about 20 speaker cards and I think they're all for this project. So I'm going to call five names at a time. Maybe you guys can come up here. and say if you're in support or not, and yeah, we'll start with the first five. Yulian, David Hernandez, Maria Morales, Jennifer Perez, and Joshua Reyes.

Hi, good evening.

And please say your name.

I'm Julian. First, I'd like to say thank you for letting me speak. And I just want to say first and foremost, I think that housing is a human right. And with that, I do support this project. And I believe that people who are essential and really important to this community, like our nurses or teachers or firefighters, even are these like essential people, they deserve an opportunity to be able to live close to where they work. Yeah, thank you.

Thank you. And you can just keep coming. Yeah, just remember to say your name.

Yes, my name is David Hernandez, and I live here in Monterey Park. So I support the project for Saturn Park and Pochero Grounded Project, because it really helps a lot. It's an affordable homes, excuse me, sorry. Affordable homes support small local businesses and jobs, which could give a small economic boom to the community and to the city of Monterey Park. Also, a stable economy depends on stable housing in Monterey Park. and any small communities nearby. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, my name is Joshua Reyes and I live here in Monterey Park and I approve of this because I feel like many of us shouldn't have to spend most of our paychecks for trying to live in our own homes. And hopefully this new project will hopefully open new opportunities so that people can hopefully not spend as much for their rent so that they can live more comfortably and hopefully not be able to live paycheck by paycheck. So that's why I approve of this. Thank you.

Thank you. And I'll say a few more names. David Gomez, Juan Romero, Gisela Brigida, Brigido. And I think this one's Kathy and Tammy. OK, go ahead.

Hi, good evening, city council members. My name is Maria Morales, and I'm a resident of Monterey Park. I am here today to voice my strong support for the new Olson Company project in Monterey Park. Monterey Park has always been welcoming to every family, and I think this would be a great opportunity for the people in the area, or even new families, to be able to come to Monterey Park and be close to everybody. Yeah, thank you.

Hi, my name is Jennifer and I'm a resident of Monterey Park.

I'm here today to support this project because it's a great opportunity for working families to be able to buy an affordable home and stay in our community. Thank you.

Good evening, council members. My name is Juan Romero. As a resident, affordable housing is essential for Monterey Park. It's to keep the city diverse and vibrant. Our city is very strongest when everyone can thrive. as I support this measure. Also, it's a great way for people to stay in Monterey Park and live within the community and also be able to have and own their own homes, not just be like a visitor when you're renting in Monterey Park, but you can actually be part of the city by owning a home. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning. Good evening, city council members. My name is David Gomez and I was born in Monterey Park and I am a current resident. I'm here to say I approve of the project. We need housing near transportation, schools and local businesses. Smart planning makes our city stronger and more connected. A mixed use development project in Saturn Park will help move our city towards the future.

Thank you. Thank you.

Buenas tardes, miembros del concilio. Voy a hablar en español. Mi nombre es Gisela Brigido y he vivido en Monterrey Park por más de 20 años. Yo y mi familia estamos seguros que Monterrey Park debería de comenzar a invertir en viviendas que sea para todas las personas de todos los ingresos. Estamos Buenas noches, mi nombre es Gisela Brigido, vivo en Monterey Park por más de 20 años.

Okay, so I will be translating for her. Good morning, my name is Gisela Brigido, and she lives in Monterey Park for over 20 years.

Mi familia y yo estamos seguros de que Monterey Park debería de empezar a invertir en viviendas accesibles para todos los ingresos.

Her and her family believe that Monterey Park should invest in affordable housing here in the community available for all levels of income. She believes that her family, or her family should be granted opportunities to, housing opportunities like this one, and she believes that this project would provide those type of opportunities to afford housing here in the city. Thank you.

Thank you. A few more names, Malik K, Ashley Esqueda, Dave Jones,

Good evening. My name is Casey King, and I live in Monterey Park. Monterey Park showed the group on the way, in the way, that benefit the group resettlement. Now just with the developers, housing must work for everyone. I believe the Olsen company will help us. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Tammy King. Young and adults who live in Montreal should have opportunity to stay and raise their own families here. Affordable housing makes that possible. I support this development for our city. Thank you.

Good evening, my name is Ashley Escueda. The Olson Development Project is beneficial to the city of Monterey Park because it provides more housing to families and people with a lower income. Affordable housing that the Olson Project provides will also help prevent the displacement of senior citizens and anyone else who is struggling with the rising cost of living. Monterey sorry it creates permanent stability for families and senior citizens who do not have to be driven out of Monterey Park due to the rising cost of living. Thank you.

DIRECTOR RIVERA- Thank you. I'm going to read a few more names. Julia Casper Jessica Casper Caitlin Huang Jolene Huang and Savannah Aguilar.

Hello, members of the board. My name is Malik. I live in Monterey Park. I'd like to provide a few words on why I think we should vote yes on item 11a. Affordable housing creates stronger neighborhoods and safer communities. Voting yes on this would improve quality of life for everyone, including the residents. And by prioritizing the residents, we can show why Monterey Park is truly the best city in the SUV. Thank you.

Good evening again, Honorable Mayor Yang, Mayor Pro Temlo, Council Members Sanchez, Wong, Ngo, and my loving dedicated staff. I love you guys. You're great for us. My name is Dave Jones. I do live in District 5. I am here tonight because while I believe more housing is needed in Monterey Park in general and in Saturn Park specifically, I strongly believe we should not be building more gated communities in our city. I believe it's important for the city council to disallow the development of a gated community for the following reasons. One, gated communities do not reliably reduce crime. This has been the major finding of multiple global studies. Gated communities are more likely to provide a false sense of security. Gates do little to deter targeted crime and may also lead to complacency. Two, gated communities promote a sense of fear. This can cause residents to withdraw from perceived threats rather than engaging in the broader community, reinforcing exclusionary strategies and retreating from city social networks and civic participation. Gated communities bolster spatial segregation and social fragmentation. By accentuating class-based exclusion and residential segregation, research shows gated communities create homogenous enclaves divided by wealth, education, and social status. They directly contradict Monterey Park's inclusive civic values and reduce interaction across cultural and socioeconomic groups. Gated communities lead to the privatization of public space. Gated communities privatize spaces that are typically public streets, sidewalks, parks, and replace them with private governance systems. This shift reduces public access and weakens the shared civic realm. The result is a fragmented urban fabric where public life is diminished. Gated communities also reduce walkability and increase car dependency. These are consistent negative outcomes associated with gated communities because they restrict internal and external circulation, disrupting street networks and forcing longer travel distances, which undermines sustainable mobility and increases traffic burdens on surrounding neighborhoods. Finally, gated communities create long-term sustainability concerns. All of these factors demonstrate that gated communities pose challenges for environmental sustainability, equity, and urban resilience. They often require more infrastructure per capita and create governance systems that complicate citywide planning. Gated communities are also inconsistent with Monterey Park's policies and regulations. While there is no ordinance that explicitly bans or regulates gated communities, it's important to note that even though gated communities are defined in the municipal code, the definition is limited to single family residential zones. There is no zoning district that authorizes private gated subdivisions, including the PD zone for Encanto Walk. Streets in Monterey Park are public by default. The city's zoning and subdivision framework assumes public streets serve all residential neighborhoods. New developments must comply with circulation and access requirements. The general plan emphasizes connectivity, not enclosure, and prioritizes circulation, safety, open access, and community cohesion. Emergency response standards and fire and police access requirements limit the feasibility of gated communities. Gates consistently delay emergency response and reduce survival chances during fires and medical crises. Keypads routinely force firefighters to stop their trucks, climb out, enter a code, return to the truck, and then proceed, costing critical seconds or even minutes. In cardiac arrest cases, every six seconds without CPR reduces survival by 1%. Furthermore, Chapter 21, Section 14, governing Saturn Park, neither permits gated communities nor lists them as a conditional use. Therefore, I wholeheartedly believe it is the duty of this City Council to disallow the gated community component of this development. Also, Eight low income affordable units is insufficient for development of this size. The original plan communicated in community meetings and phone calls included 16 affordable units and this number should be restored. We have 19 other people speaking tonight wanting affordable housing. 11 of them have no chance because there won't be affordable units there for them. Thank you very much for your time.

Hello, I'm Julia. I'm in support of this project. I believe that teachers, nurses and first responders should be able to afford to live in Monterey Park. They are essential to our community and this project will make this happen.

Thank you.

Hello, everyone. I'm Jessica, and I support the Olson proposal because it is a good use of property in Saturn Park, which is currently more than 85% vacant. We should build affordable housing when we can, which is why this project is good for our community. Thank you so much.

Hi, my name is Caitlin and I support the Olson proposal because it includes homes that can be used to start a small business that may be perfect for those who would like to affordably begin a business here in Monterey Park. Thank you.

Hi, my name is Jolene and I'm in support of this project because I think affordable housing is one of the most important investments we can make for Monterey Park. And I think that strong communities start with stable homes and that's why I think this city needs this project. Thank you.

We also have Deb Simone and Carla Robles.

Good evening, City Council. My name is Savannah, and I'm asking you to vote yes on item 11A. I support the Olson proposal because it will produce for sale housing that I will be able to afford, which is otherwise not available to me and my family. Thank you for your time.

Hello, Council. Mayor Yang, Honorable Mayor Pro Tem Lowe, and the rest of the Council members, and the vaunted staff, and other elected officials. I was here at the Planning Commission meeting on June 2nd, and I talked with Tim. I wanted to add a general thing that's not actually on the conditional use permit here. There was a traffic study discussed at the Planning Commission meeting, and they didn't require any additional traffic lights on Potrero, and I think anyone who is familiar with that end of District 5 will know that Potrero is a very, very high-speed road because there's just not a lot of anything on there except the substations. After looking at the plans again this week before this meeting, I would like the Planning Commission and the developer to reconsider, as part of the development agreement, a traffic light at the east end of the development on Potrero because I think if we're gonna be marketing these units to families, you're gonna have families and kids trying to cross the street to the marketplace, maybe go over to the gas station or even walk to the store or be on e-bikes. That giant road that Potrero is is going to, I think it's gonna result in traffic accidents. So I think we should think about that before as we're building. And then generally my concerns and I talked about them with the Planning Commission are generally with items 23 I'm gonna look up the California model water efficient landscape ordinance I would encourage once again to the council here, and I talked to the planning commission about it, that we encourage native plants. I suggest Hillcrest Elementary as an example where they use coyote brush instead of other plants that were listed there. I don't know exactly. If those species are native to California or not, they're more drought tolerant if they are. Item 25, in terms of the CC&Rs for the Homeowners Association, I did ask Tim at the time if there's the possibility for a short-term rental prohibition within the condo development. I don't want... someone to come in and buy up three units and turn them into Airbnbs. That's the main concern there. If we're going to be encouraging that all these wonderful young people get to buy their first home there, we're encouraging starter homes, workforce homes. I think we need to prohibit moneyed interests from buying several units. To that end, also in the CCNR is a corporate ownership restriction if it can be done legally, and I'm not sure, or a restriction on the number of units owned by one LLC or corporate entity. would be a great, we should be able to require these things if we wanna foster workforce housing, housing for young families, that sort of thing. Those are my concerns, thank you very much.

Good afternoon, city council members. My name is Carla. I am a resident of Monterey Park and I'm here to support the awesome project. I believe that Monterey Park should invest in housing solutions that serve residents of all income levels. Everyone deserves the opportunity. The proposal for the Olsen Company gives people that. Thank you.

All right, that is our final public comment. Anyone who wanted to speak who has not had a chance to? All right, let's go ahead and close the public hearing. and discussion.

Can we have the Olson Company? I have a couple of questions based on the comments and feedback. Please state your name, sir. John Rexton with the Olson Company. Hey, John. Good evening. Good evening. A couple of questions I have based on the comments I heard. I'll start with the one that was toward the end because I wrote it down. CCNR's covenant restrictions for people renting it out or people using it as Airbnbs, I guess if you can share your thoughts on that.

Legally, we can't do that. We can restrict corporate ownership and no LLCs for the affordable units because there are very strict requirements for those families. But we're not able to do that in terms of rentals and Airbnbs. I know a lot of cities have ordinances that restrict Airbnb usage, city of Anaheim. I remember sitting through a public hearing where that was a big topic. So obviously we would be subject to any city restrictions on that type of thing.

The city of Mario Park, and let's correct me and maybe Chloe can help. We do have Airbnb guidelines.

Yes, we do have some, we have a permitting program. Airbnb or VRBO, short-term rental properties, are allowed in Monterey Park. We do have a permitting process. Our permitting process, we don't have restrictions, though, on where Airbnbs are in the city. We don't have restrictions on how many people allowed in the city so the council had requested for some short-term rental restrictions to come back staff's been working on those restrictions however at this time they are allowed in our city with the permit so I guess the question John I have is say someone buys into the unit you need 51% of the units being sold

Wait, this is apartments. or this is condo, so when it's sold, you need 51% before the HOA gets turned over to the board, right?

Yes, a certain percentage. I'm not sure if it's 51%. I should know, but I don't. But yes, after a certain percentage are occupied and sold, it's turned over to the HOA. Otherwise, Olson plays a greater role as we're selling units. Yes, as we're selling units, correct.

Okay. And just from your experience, is that pretty typical where When Olsen is still the controller of the HOA, you can say you can't buy it to rent, and you have those restrictions within?

No, we don't have those types of restrictions. We have to abide by state law when it comes to whether or not a buyer could choose to rent the unit or not. Obviously, we'd be subject to city ordinance for VRBOs or Airbnb, no matter what the situation.

So then once it's taken over by a private inch away, the people who live there, would you say in your experience as a builder that most people want homeowners or they don't want people to rent their units out? Is that pretty fair?

Yeah, I think it's fair to say that folks generally would prefer that the owner live there because you have that pride of ownership. And generally, well, probably in every community, the vast majority of the homes are owner-occupied. The Olson communities do not become rental communities. And one of the big reasons, well, first of all, it can't happen on any of the affordable units. Also, affordability-wise, these are $600,000, $700,000 townhomes, and so the rent would have to be at a very high level in order to cover that mortgage, right? So it's not necessarily economical, at least in the early years, to rent out those units.

And the affordable units will remain affordable for a statute time of? 45 years. 45 years, and that's by law, by?

That would be by agreement with the city. So we're beginning those discussions. But we would propose under state density bonus law, if you just follow the parameter that state density bonus law allows upon the first sale of the home, there would be an equity share based on the amount paid by the owner, the actual mortgage of that affordable unit versus the overall value of the unit. And there'd be a split in the fair market price of that home upon first resale, money going back to the city versus recoup by the homeowner. But generally, cities have asked us, hey, would you be willing to put a longer-term affordability restriction on that unit? And we've always accommodated that. So we would propose a 45-year term. Could be 55 years. We still need to work out those details.

There was another question that was brought up earlier about the gated community. Now, this parcel itself is a private parcel. I mean, it's a whole parcel. It's not cut up. Correct. So you can't say, for example, you can't cut that parcel into four pieces and say the city builds a road that runs through it. Technically, it's still a private parcel that you, the owner, and whoever is the inch away who owns all the sites, you still have ownership interest in that.

That's correct. They're all going to be private streets managed by the HOA with some HOA-owned parcels for open space, et cetera. The rest are airspace units under the condo map.

And typically, if there was the instance of a fire or police, if PD or fire from the city or from the county, because it's whoever gets there first. If they needed to get into the property, typically what happens in the gated community?

Typically, there's a Knox box type of situation, which, of course, the police department and fire department have to approve and authorize as safe in order for us to install the gates.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember. And thank you to Tulsa Company. I really appreciate presenting this. And I know this has gone through a lot of review at the staff level. I'll just kind of keep going on some of the line of questioning that Council Member Goh was going. I share some of the one of the speakers and others probably awareness around gated communities I'd prefer not having gated communities but I understand here particularly in the center park area right most of that neighborhood is still vacant and commercial yeah not resident this would be the first regional residential development in that area and for a little while until your other community that you built more than 10 years ago up the street And across the street is the Mesa substation. So it's it's not it's not a residential community in that sense. So I Concerns are a little less heightened here in terms of that also understand the The gates will be open for pedestrian access from the public for folks who want to walk through one of the concerns brought by one of the speakers was around the right streets and open spaces in public access and But I just want to confirm my understanding of this. All the roads, the existing Saturn Avenue, Pretoria Grande, Center Street, whatever it is, those are publicly maintained. Public roads will continue to be. Any roads that are built within the development are owned and will be maintained by the HOA. Those are not public streets, just like driveways, other things are maintained by property owners. Is that right?

That's correct. And you hit it on the head. And as Olson has been over the years, over decades, we've been a pioneer in many, many communities. First in with new housing where it previously hadn't been built. That's just a part of our history. And in this case, it's a vacant park. And it's near a large street. It's somewhat close to the freeway. And even though we could debate whether or not it helps with crime, certainly there's a perception issue at the very beginning. That's an important one. And we also like to think that the gated community will give a nice perception of a live work mixed use development, something that kind of gives a little added cache at the beginning. And long term, if the residents don't want the gates or the live work units become heavily utilized and make a pitch to remove them for some reason, That's something you might see or your successors somewhere down the line. But initially, we think it is very important, yes.

I appreciate that. And I will say publicly, as I've said in other forums as well, I appreciate the amount of density that's here. I would have supported further density at this site. I would love to see this entire neighborhood go a little bit more dense and become – The more people there, the more vibrant and opportunity for greater vibrancy and potential mixed use and commercial retail elements that can be supported by a population that lives there. But I appreciate your first residential development in this office park. And frankly, the zoning did not allow for this residential development two years ago at this site. And so I appreciate the speed at which you're kind of taking the signals that the council and the city have sent out. on what to do here and what should be allowed and what should be developed here. I hope other developers and property owners in this site or this area will take heed of this and take some signals for what the council, I think, and the city are looking to do in this neighborhood.

To keep going on some of the questions that came up during public comment,

The initial proposal did have 16 units or affordable units. Can you just explain how the 16 became 8? I know that was because they're at different levels of affordability. Can you just detail that for people?

Yeah, there's different options. It was important that this be a community that fell under state density bonus law, especially given the early ambiguity on the zoning and how that was going to come together, which has come together well, and we appreciate it. Also, you have to keep in mind as first in to an office park like this, sometimes it's hardest to be first in. And you compete to buy property. And there's a lot of competitors out there all subject to the same laws under the state of California when it comes to state density bonus communities. And so we had to evaluate what the appropriate number and depth of affordability was here. If it would have been 16 units, it would have been at a moderate income level. We chose because it allows this development to move forward financially to propose the eight very low-income units and just to provide a greater depth of affordability, which is very, very rare. for folks who earn, I guess it's $83,000 now for a family of four, which are your teachers and firefighters and police officers, some of which maybe have a spouse that can't work full-time or they have young children. It's just a very rare opportunity to provide for-sale housing. But most importantly, we would have loved to have done, after seeing all the speakers, 159 affordable units at varying depths of affordability. I mean, that would be wonderful, right? There's such a need. But because we have to be able to buy property, we have to be able to compete, and we're so happy we did here. It's an honor to be before you this evening. We have to carefully consider what will allow the overall community to move forward financially. And based on all those factors, we proposed eight very low-income units versus the 16 moderate-income units.

No, appreciate that. And if I can, correct me if I'm wrong in restating this in clearer language for me, at least, because I'm not a housing expert. But what you're saying is, we'll just confirm if staff want to correct me on this. There's zero public funding, city funding that's going to support and subsidize any of the affordable units here, right? And none of the units here, none of your development is being subsidized by government funding. So what is subsidizing, what's allowing the affordable units to get built here because it costs more to build them than you're planning to sell them for, that's why they're at that affordability level, is the other market rate units there that you're generating revenue from selling to subsidize the cost of building the affordable units. And because you're building or you're going to offer these affordable units at a higher subsidy for lower income than than the original 16, right, that's what we'll pencil out for the project. Otherwise, if you do more, you don't have enough, you're not gonna, the revenue from the sale and the building on the sale of the entire project will not subsidize further units for this project. I don't think that's affordable.

And one thing to keep in mind, if you have 16 restricted homes versus eight, and we are proposing eight, and we're not able to do the 16. And I know this might be getting into the weeds a little bit, but instead of having 143 market rate units, you have 151. If there's any upside, and this is as an equity partner or a lender would look at this and say, what are the opportunities for, you know, if revenues go up to help make this a stronger transaction financially, having eight more market rate units definitely helps in that regard. So for those couple of reasons, the eight very low-income units are being proposed because that enables this transaction to work financially. And it, of course, complies with state law. And it is, obviously, it's voluntary, and no public money is involved whatsoever. And hopefully it will lead to future development that will also provide additional affordable housing at various levels in Monterey Park and perhaps in Saturn Park.

No, appreciate that. And then can you just give us an idea what the range is going to be for the market rate for sale units?

The range is going to be, I think it's from the low sixes up into the nines. Because you've got some live work units that are 2,600 square feet. We start out around 1,100. So there's going to be a wide range. And what's great about the unit count here and the number of homes and the variety of product is we'll be able to get folks of various income levels into the community. Only eight are going to be restricted by law.

opportunity to buy a new home in the 600s is a great opportunity in this area of LA County great and then for this might be for staff but you may be able to answer this to John the so the deed restricted affordable units those eight units we're good it sounds like we're gonna go shake the actual term for that but I'm just trying to councilmember Wong I'm

If I may, I wanted to clarify that condition of approval number 25A in your staff report actually requires the conditions, the covenant conditions and restrictions to ensure the continued affordability for 55 years.

Which is fine. I misspoke, which is...

Totally acceptable. It's 55 years. So that would mean if someone initially bought it at the income level that qualifies, if they were to resell the property, even with the value appreciation, it would still have to go to, at that time, whatever the very low income levels are for the new buyer. That's correct. For 55 years. Correct. And then we are working at, I don't know if this is finance or the development department or planning department, we are working on audit enforcement programs for our existing affordable units in the city to make sure that these CC&Rs and covenants are actually being implemented and enforced.

And monitored, correct.

Awesome. separate, sorry, this is all over the place, but my notes are all over the place. This is a question more for Carl and for Steph. I would support, not necessarily for list development, but would like for us to look at ways that we can restrict corporate ownership Homes and what what's constitutional what's not I'd love to do a deeper dive into that in terms of the city I know that's become more of an issue with other cities Would love to get our hands wrapped around a little bit what the options are for potentially for us to look at making sure homes stay With families as opposed to corporate ownership, especially single-family homes And see what we can do just like we're trying to get ahead of some of the short-term rental challenges that other cities are facing before they really get out of hand potentially here. And part two is preparing for the Olympics around short-term rentals. I know some of those proposals from staff are going to be coming to council in the coming months. I would love to see about this corporate ownership angle to see what we can do on that. And then I think that's it. I just want to make sure one of the other comments that was mentioned was Petro Grande sounds like some of the concerns on walkability and safety. I imagine and I believe, and this might be a question more for Sean, in public works, we are proceeding with our complete redesign and rebuild of Pretoria Grande, which will include more pedestrian safety and access improvements for people, including those that might live in this potentially new development. along patrera grande to be connected to other other things along patrera grande including the marketplace uh and so if that's wrong please correct me but it sounds like we're already thinking through that in a longer term view to make sure that uh we're making the connections there on patrera grande safer and that will include bike lanes if i'm not if i'm remembering correctly and improved pedestrian access along patrera grande I see the staff are nodding, so it sounds like we've already thought through this.

In a nutshell, yes, that is correct.

Thank you. That's all I've got for now. I just want to express my general support for this proposal. I think it strikes the right balance in terms of what we've been looking for, what we've been talking to as a city. It also helps us meet our RENA allocations, the state requirements that we zone and plan for and facilitate to develop more housing. This would be I think probably since the initial Olsen project back in 20 I think you guys open 2014 2013 2014 I think since then, this would be the first project or development of this size coming online in the city if this is approved if I'm not mistaken. Since that.

If you're describing like townhouse townhome style.

number of units for development, I think. Probably the Holiday Inn project provided. 84 units there. So other than the Holiday Inn condos behind there, we are, right, this is the first project in the pipeline in the last few years that I've been on council that we're really seeing come to fruition and look forward to seeing a project like this move forward and hopefully inspire others in that office park area to rethink what's possible what the future could be for southern park all right

What's great about going next is that a lot of my questions have already been asked. So I just have very brief follow-up questions for you, John. Actually, my next question is dealing with public safety because someone brought up a concern regarding the aspect of the gated community. And I'm not sure if our chief can maybe help chime in on this as well, Chief Weiss. But there's a concern, and maybe you can help elaborate how this works, should there be police or fire wanting to come into this gated community, what I heard was that it would potentially increase the time in terms of when police or fire could enter the gated community. So maybe you can help explain a little bit about how that process works.

I would defer to one of the chiefs on that issue because we have to design and meet all of their standards.

Our police chief, Chief Weiss, is coming down. I'm thinking Jason, our fire chief, might come down too just in case there's another question. But this is in regards to gated communities and how we respond if there's an emergency call.

Scott Weiss, police chief. So you spoke about Knox boxes. We would ask that a Knox box panel be put in for police and fire. Basically, it's a bypass of the gate. Officers would pull up. They would access the Knox box. Instantaneously as soon as they got out of their car it would open the gate and we'd be able to go in other Communities other places in town that have gates all have Knox boxes Fire uses them extensively on businesses. So it's a tried-and-true way of getting through a residential gate. I

So what I'm hearing is that there's no real concern in terms of being able to access the gated community in case of an emergency.

We would stop at the vehicle gate just like a regular car, and we would get it open in a matter of a few seconds. And also, we have access through remote controls. We could ask for or get access to a remote control to open the gate as officers arrive also. There's a lot of ways for us to gain access to gated communities these days.

Okay.

Without having to tear down the wall.

Without climbing over fences.

All right. Thank you, Chief, for clarifying that. Thank you. Do you want to do a follow-up question? Go ahead. If it's related, you should do it. All right, so thank you for that, Chief. I just wanted to make sure that we clarified for people to understand that. I actually really like the idea of live-in units, and I know that you're working on other projects that have live-in units, right? Can you explain a little bit more about your work live-in units?

Oh, the live-work units, yes. We currently have a community in Claremont where we have... 12 live work units steve also steve's project and that was something the city very much wanted it was part of the zoning for the site just like here and uh you know so we've sold uh i think every one of those units are 11 of the 12 and uh and back in the day when i worked for city government for the city of santa ana i worked with the olsen company to develop an artist live work community 88 units, three different sub-products that was extremely successful, and we targeted it to the creative professional community. And that really, it was the right location in the downtown. And location's very important for the live-work concept. Initially, if you're not in a high-traffic, high-volume area, It may take a little bit longer for those units to convert for folks to come in and open a business. In Claremont, we have had a couple of the buyers interested in opening a business. One of the great things here is that there's on-street parking, even though we're not counting that towards the parking requirement, as well as on-site parking, which is a great thing for a potential business. So you see this in a lot of locations. Location is everything in terms of when it really can happen and happen successfully. But it's something that Olson has done on many, many occasions.

Yeah, I think given the location in Saturn Park, I think this is a great place to do a live work unit. So I really do like the aspect of that. And I also wanted to address the eight very low income units. And I think just to kind of help put it in perspective, We have four different school districts in this community. And I'm a teacher in this community as well. And I think a lot of the teachers who live in this community, I think would probably jump on an opportunity like this. And just to kind of share, starting salary for Alhambra Unified is in the 60,000s range. So just to kind of help put it in perspective, very low income is a lot of people who work within our city and within our communities that might have access to a lot of these very low income work units or just units in general. So I really appreciate that option for people like myself, teachers who might have an opportunity to purchase a home. a new home in this area so wanted to make sure that people were aware of just where the salary ranges and that's not just teachers it's also other public safety and first responders that live within the community that want to make a home here so really appreciate that option and it helps meet our council member Wong said our arena numbers in terms of being able to build more housing and I'm glad that some of it is affordable housing so I wanted to I wanted to share my support for this project as well so thank you thank you

Thank you very much. Well, first of all, I want to thank my colleagues for asking very good, comprehensive questions. Certainly saves me the effort. I think what I will say, rather, is I think generally speaking, I think this is a good project, and it's an area that has been blighted for, frankly, decades. And in the last few months, there's been lots of talk about how do we have sensible, meaningful development. And I think that providing more housing is one way to have more meaningful development in areas that have been blighted for so long. And I think that, you know, I do share some of the questions that were raised. I mean, certainly I wish there was more affordable housing, but unfortunately no project is perfect, and I will at least give credit where it's due. And, you know, I've been here on City Council for six years, and in the past, I have voted against housing projects because, frankly, the developer was just upfront and says, oh, no, we don't want affordable housing. And at the time, the project I voted against, they were proposing starting price of a million dollars. Now, I realize maybe in this day and age with inflation, a million dollars seems cheap, but I was floored in the community like an R that someone even proposed building something with a starting price of a million dollars. And I think just to illustrate the crisis we are in with housing, and it is a crisis of affordability, I think it's important that we do all we can to increase the housing stock in this community. And what I find interesting is that in our presentation, the definition of low income is $83,000. Well, when I bought my townhome 17 years ago, yes, that was two decades ago, that was my income. And the home was definitely not even $600,000, which is your starting price. It was less than that. And so I find it shocking, frankly, that that is considered low income because that's what I was making 17 years ago for a home that is actually less than what you are proposing. But I think that speaks to inflation and really how we as a region, not just Monterey Park, but as a region, actually as a state, we have been derelict in our duty to provide more housing for our residents. We talk so much about how we want our community to be family-oriented, and I used to be a school board member before I became a council member, and even 23 years ago, when I ran for school board, yes, I'm that old, back then, we were seeing in Monterey Park a lot of empty nesters. Why? Because a lot of the children of these families who were raised and attended school in the Garvey School District where I was a board member, even back then, they thought housing was expensive and they ended up having to move further away to places like San Bernardino, Riverside, or even to Nevada. And again, that was way three years ago. the situation hasn't gotten better. It's gotten worse. In fact, I even like to tell people, you know, one reason why I, again, you know, when it comes to projects, and again, for record, I've either voted against a project or we've abstained on a project if I didn't think they were at least giving a chance to look at affordable housing as part of development, because we've had developers just say, we won't do it. It's, Like, I tell people that if I were to try and buy my home today, I probably wouldn't even afford to buy my own home that I live in because it is nearly doubled. And yet, one can say, well, wonderful for you because you're a homeowner. But again, from a holistic systemic question, well, if wages are not doubling every 10 years, but housing is, and so how do we expect our children to stay in this community they grew up in with that type of inflation. And again, I am very serious. I mean, I don't think I could afford the home I live in now if I were to try and buy it. And so look, this project is not perfect. I mean, I'd like to at least commend the developer for at least trying to address what has been our concern about having housing stock that tries to be accessible to different income levels. And again, I just find it amusing that that is not considered low-income $83,000. I mean, to me, that's not, but I can think that just speaks to the crisis that we're in. And so, you know, I am going to approve this project and support it. I do hope that if there are any developers in the audience or watching, and some of you who are watching who have said to us that you don't want affordable housing, I think you should look at this example as at least a model before you come back to our city Council with your proposals and hopefully something to consider emulating. And that's it for me.

I have one follow-up question. Staff, can you kind of clarify, because I wrote down here that this project went through the planning, they went through public review, then the planning commission, they had a couple meetings, they had at least one, maybe a couple, and then they, can you repeat again how they voted and if there were any stipulations?

Yes, happy to. So I'll quickly walk through some of the steps that this project took before it came to this hearing tonight before our city council. So the applicant conducted two community meetings, which were noticed to various radiuses, actually up to, I believe, 1500 feet from the project site. with mailers, notifying them of these community meetings to provide information on the projects. Then the project went before the Planning Commission. Planning Commission was a public hearing, which was noticed as well, with mailers going out to addresses within certain radius of the project site I believe 500 feet at the Planning Commission hearing the Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend approval to the City Council with the three items mentioned which were discussed those were just to reiterate I recommended that the applicant and staff evaluate whether the proposed five-foot sidewalk along Potrero Grande could be widened to six or seven feet. As was provided earlier, the determination there in agreement with the developer was to widen the sidewalk proposed, which will be built out by the project, to six feet width along Potrero Grande Drive. Second recommendation was that the applicant and staff re-examine the median on Atlas Avenue and whether modifications may be necessary to accommodate adequate left turn movements out of the project. So this was during the deliberation of the planning commission, there was a question of whether or not the median provided enough space for left turn egress out of the project driveway. Staff engaged with Public Works and made a pretty clear determination that there was no potential conflict there, so no further action on that. And then lastly was the recommendation that city staff work with the applicant to develop, and implement a voluntary priority marketing period for Monterey Park residents for the affordable units, and that culminated in the condition language which we shared and described earlier, condition of approval number 17, which was agreed to by the applicant as well.

Thank you for the update.

All right, thank you to my colleagues for asking such detailed questions tonight regarding the project, and thank you to all the folks from the public who came out to make public comment. I know a lot of the folks who spoke in support, some of them seem nervous up there, maybe it was their first time, so acknowledging them for their courage to come up to the podium. speak in support of the project. I had some concerns about Airbnb regulations, the gated communities issue that Dave Jones brought up, and also the number of affordable housing units that got reduced down by half, but I think the applicant and staff has already addressed and answered all my questions. And I do want to appreciate the applicant for reaching out to me beforehand to to give me a presentation about the projects So with that said does anyone want to make a motion I'll make the motion to adopt staff recommendation second a motion. All right, let's vote on this Approve unanimously Oh

Approved unanimously. All right.

Mayor, if I could, I just want to, well, one, thank the applicant again. Look forward to the next step. Please do let us know, and I'm sure staff will keep us in the loop, the council in the loop, on progress and construction and all that stuff. I know it's a current vacant property, so there shouldn't be those kind of delays in terms of clearing the site and beginning construction. I don't know if staff have an idea of what the construction timeline might be, and can you confirm that there will be notification of some of the neighbors in terms of those construction impacts?

construction duration I would defer to the applicant we hope to begin demolition in August and after that site grading and we will notice we will notice our neighbors we will also one of the things we do as a matter of course is site superintendent will give his personal phone number to it wouldn't be residents in the area it'd be businesses if there are any issues or concerns and obviously if any if you hear of anything you can call me directly and we'll follow up and be good neighbors great no and I just want to not you're good but for the council and everyone else I I want to do a little bit of victory lap here because this this project being approved tonight is the culmination of a

extraordinary effort by this council the city staff that started uh even right before this the spark process and i see dave uh jones in the audience and others who were participating in the spark conversation the saturn park advisory review committee that was put together back in 2024 we had residents and neighbors here this saturn park area did not allow residential development at all for decades until we've resolved through the process of the spark getting a lot of input and engagement with neighbors and community members from from this area and from the the Saturn Park area and South Mark Park and throughout the city being able to allow rezoning to allow for residential in this area and seeing this project come through now and with the approval now today tonight big deal in my book I just want to note that and appreciate staff and everyone's efforts that went into this making this a reality and really reimagining what the Saturn Park area can and could be and will be in the future. And this is just one relatively large step, relatively large property in the Saturn Park area. but really hope that we can continue to see progress and redevelop and revitalizing all of saturn park and other parts of the city that continue to be vacant in our struggling with post pandemic and even before the pandemic a lot of vacancy issues uh in the city and so hope that we can continue these kind of efforts in the city i think this is what the community residents our business community as well expect and we want to continue and incentivize and uh to send these kind of signals to property owners that this is what the city wants to see happen and we want to be and we are serious about revitalizing parts of our city especially parts like southern park that have been vacant and experiencing continue to experience high vacancy rates and have experienced those those kind of conditions for a decade plus and so i want to echo what the city managers report out, department report out earlier around our vacant to vibrant workshops that are happening. I think they're happening next week. Some more are happening next week. Encourage residents and those who are interested in seeing this happen. This is the result of a lot of conversations we've had in the community. We want to continue to have these kind of conversations through our vacant to vibrant workshops and encourage community members who are interested in seeing Seeing and have been asking and working on and reaching out to the council members Myself included around addressing vacancies in our city to engage in this process and to help us Right move forward and make progress on revitalizing some of these parts of our community. So, thank you

All right, thank you. We're very excited that Saturn Park is going to have some progress finally after all these years. So good luck on the next steps. And with that, our public hearing is complete. I don't believe there's any new business. So City Council Communications.

I will start. Just last week, we saw the last of our local schools get out on summer break. I think Garvey School District, they had their school promotions. Mar Vista, Hillcrest, and Garvey, I was glad to attend some of them. And I just want to wish all the kids a happy summer. For those who don't have summer school, but for those who have summer school, summer school is only a couple of weeks. You get a little break, then we go back to the fall. Stay cool in the summer. On June 6, we had our San Gabriel Valley Mario Park hosted Pride Parade. I'm not going to steal the thunder. I'm going to have my fellow council members talk about that a little bit more. But it was an active participant for all of our council members here, as well as many of our staff. And then going back even further, Friday, June 5th, the Chinese elected officials had a board installation at NBC in the city of Mario Park, so we were glad to host about 400 people, elected officials from the entire Southern California into Mario Park. That's all I have.

I'm good. Thank you.

I just wanted to share two things. First, I wanted to thank Parks and Rec, police, and FIRE who were out for our MPK campout, our very first MPK campout, which was an amazing success. Thank you, Robert, for all of the efforts. I got a chance to camp out with my family in one tent. That was quite the experience. And so thank you for that experience. I heard nothing but positive comments from all of the families that were there. I had at least three or four different families that came to me. It was like, I don't know whose idea it was to come up with this camp up, but it was great. Can't wait till next year. Can we do this more than once a year? I said, I talked to Robert. Robert has all the answers. So Robert was the brain behind it. But anyhow, but it takes a village, right, Robert, as you know. Plus, we had the big screen. We had the USA and Paraguay game going on. Then afterwards, we had, just to kind of give you a glimpse of what you missed out if you weren't there, and maybe you can get a tent next year, right, Robert? We had a cartoon. We had... Lilo and Stitch, thank you. And we had a performance from, we had a performance before the Lilo and Stitch, Hawaiian performance, right? Dancers, before the movie. My daughters go to sleep pretty early, so they only made it, I think, through like 20 minutes through the movie. I was the only one out there watching the movie for a while, enjoying my popcorn and the peace and quiet. And I think by around, actually 10.22, exactly i remember they told us it was lights out and started getting ready for for that and then um we were up just like this i felt like it was morning and we were already um and there were still activities in the morning including breakfast um and uh book reading from the uh libraries i appreciate that so it was a full event lots of fun uh thanks to police for keeping us safe and fire for the s'mores uh thank you so much for for being out there uh i think that was one definitely one of the highlights of the camp out event

So looking forward to it next year, unless we do it more than once a year, Robert.

And so I wanted to thank you for that. And then lastly, for all of the fathers who are out there or other people who fill in for fathers, I wanted to wish you a happy Father's Day this Sunday. And that is it for me.

uh thank you uh well um i'm assuming when councilman gold said he'll let others talk about the pride event i guess he'll look at me but um you know what i mean this is our sixth annual pride event and again i want to thank um our parks and rec staff working with boys and girls club and the alhambra teachers association for um putting together another successful event um you know six before six years ago i mean we didn't even acknowledge pride um um and and so i think that you know one more step of us being a more inclusive city. And I just want to thank everyone involved and continue to be involved. And I will conclude my report tonight by also giving my congratulations to our soon to be outgoing mayor, Elizabeth Yang. Thank you so much for serving as our mayor and for leading the city for the past few months. Certainly, it has been very exciting the last few months. And again, you had just been barely sworn in to the council when you assumed the position. So thank you very much for connecting yourself with poise, with grace, and with a steady hand in running our meetings. And again, just thank you so much for your leadership.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Lo. We're very excited to be swearing you in in a couple weeks on June 30th. I wanted to thank staff for assisting with hosting a really successful State of the City last Tuesday at the Courtyard Marriott and for assisting with all of those community awards that went out to some great businesses and service providers in our city. That was a really wonderful event. And... also we had the ribbon cutting for a new business marvel car wash uh two days ago on monday um so i know they're doing some free car washes for um chamber of commerce members but i just went there yesterday i got my car washed and it was like a five minute process so if anyone's in a rush to get a car wash there's There was no line when I went there at like 2.30 p.m. in the afternoon. And they're also donating funds, a percentage of every wash to currently three nonprofits, the Monterey Park Foundation, the Alhambra School Board, and the Garvey School Board. And if new nonprofits in the future decide to participate, they will add new nonprofits for that donation. And with that, anything else? No? Okay, then I'm gonna adjourn my final meeting as mayor at 9.07.