Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Like to invite treasurer tax collector, Minnehan, to lead us in the pledge of allegiance.

Please join me in the pledge of allegiance.

Pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it

Thank you. Our next agenda item is the pet of the week. So I would like to introduce our pet of the week. Oh, okay. Here we go.

Can you okay.

Alright. Good morning, Luis. Welcome. Who do we have today? All right.

Our next item is our consent calendar, including special districts. And we have items A through Z. We will be dropping item four gs from the consent calendar today. Do we have any board comments or items to pull off of the consent calendar this morning?

CHRISTIE Chair, I would ask, just given the importance and significance in this first step, I would ask that item 4x be pulled separately for discussion.

Okay.

4x will be pulled for discussion. Thank you. Anything else? Okay. Not seeing anything.

Then is there anyone present wishing to make a public comment on anything on the consent calendar? Is there anyone on the phones? Okay. There is no one on the phones. So may I have a motion and a second to approve the consent calendar items A through G minus four gs, which has been dropped, and minus X.

So moved.

Second. All right. All those in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Okay. That passes unanimously. Thank you. That was a was a motion by Supervisor Ramos and a second by a SPEAKER Oh, motion by Kutrel, a second by Ramos. Thank you. That's why we checked. Okay. So thank you. That's it for the consent calendar. Our next item on the agenda is public comment.

We'll be discussing the item pulled from the consent calendar later on the agenda. But for right now, it's public comment on any items not on the agenda. And that includes also items that are on the agenda in closed session, so items 10A and 10B. 10C let me check the number in here. Yeah, 10 it's the third case in closed session. It will be dropped from closed session today. So are there any comments on the first two cases listed for closed session today? Please come forward.

I'm having allergies and brain fog with medication this morning. So if it's Okay, I'm going to play my recorded message.

Yeah, that's fine. As long as it's under three minutes.

It's under three. Okay. The resident of Napa in District 4. Shelly Viviani. Today, I'm here to speak to the the Hoops Winery lawsuit that's being heard in closed session later today.

Myself and a number of friends have written letters to your board to request you to drop these charges and to enable Hoops Winery to operate with their wine tasting business. As I read the articles and letters to the editor, I'm enraged to know that you've authorized millions of taxpayer dollars to pay for outside counsel to wage war against these small wineries. It makes absolutely no sense. So why am I concerned? We, as a club, dreamed up this project to be interactive with kids in the community in an outdoor living, breathing to go through the seasons and learn about animals and farming.

And we went to the Boys and Girls Club in Napa to ask them to partner. We went to Elders in Youthville as partners, and we went to Lindsay Hoops to partner with her oasis at Farmstead and her farm in this interactive activity to get kids out of their Boys and Girls Club on a minimum day to experience community activity and good healthy practices. She immediately agreed. She said yes, and she's gonna help lead this project with us. That's who Lindsay Hoops is.

She's a community minded, small business owner, homegrown in this valley who gives back to the residents without question. And so I really would like you to consider that because without these community minded small businesses, the heart and soul of Napa goes away when these big conglomerates take over and give nothing back to the community. And so it is with optimism that I plead with you to direct your negotiators to cease and desist on this lawsuit. Thank you. My name is And I apologize that I didn't say this myself, but I I'm just not feeling well.

And I'd like to leave you with a flyer.

If you could bring it to the clerk on the other side. Thank you.

Are recruiting elders for this intergenerational project. And we encourage your participation.

Okay. Thank you for your Are comments there any other comments from anyone on any items not on the agenda or any items on closed session?

Good morning. Wendell Coleman, Napa. So I noticed this morning on the consent calendar, I just briefly saw public employee discipline dismissal release. I'm not exactly sure what that's about. But what I am sure about is the fact that, well, let me lead into this a different way.

I am African American. And I'm also Native American. And I read an article I started to read an article in the Napa Register this morning about the celebration of Black History Month, which is the shortest month of the year, even shorter every leap year. And I was almost enraged because of the fact that I have lived here for twenty three years. And at no point in time prior to moving to Napa and being prosecuted by district attorney Allison Haley have I ever felt such strong and immense discrimination, not only based on race, but based on, economics.

I wanna turn your attention to a confidential transcript of Ryan Cole's interview from 11/01/2019. He was a sergeant in the Napa Police Department until he was terminated for using the word nigger several times during his tenure with the Napa Police Department and faggot. This happened on multiple occasions. He was informally disciplined. And the activity continued to happen.

And he was finally terminated. When I was prosecuted here in Napa from 2017 to 2019 at both of my trials, jurors wrote in and literally stated that racism was observed in the courtroom. One gentleman took it upon himself to reach out to Black Lives Matter, write letters to the board, And he also wrote our congressman about the issues that he witnessed in the judicial system. One juror wrote, I have served on two juries. The first made me question our trial system, and this one caused me to lose complete faith in it.

I found the judge was not impartial and felt forced to bring a guilty verdict because something was technically true. This was in the courtroom of Elia Ortiz, who is an absolute bona fide racist. One of the keynotes of my trial is my ex spoke this on the record. I asked him about it. I said, I want to get pregnant. And I remember laying out a few scenarios of how that could still happen. Would you be offended, for example, I asked him, if I got pregnant and then just slept your life completely and raised this child without you? I didn't have a whole line of men walking up to my door wanting to have a baby with me. Mean, ultimately, her dreams If could were

conclude your comments, Pardon? JACKIE If you could conclude your comments, please.

JACKIE Thank you.

JACKIE Ultimately, her goal was made to fruition thanks to the assistance of Keisha Lind, Allison Haley, and the other operators within the Napa judiciary. I ask this board to engage in a productive dialogue to identify and cope with and deal with the racial situations here that are in existence in Napa County.

Thank you, Mr. Coleman.

You know my name.

Okay. Are there any other people wishing to make a comment in the room? Is there anyone on the phone? There's two on the phone? Okay, we do have yeah, go ahead and come forward. And yeah, three minutes, please.

Okay, thank you. Yeah, kind of funny timing. But good morning to the board. My name is Elizabeth Webb, and I am a deputy DA here in Napa and a Napa resident. I was proud to start my career as a DA here in Napa nineteen years ago where I worked for six years in the Carithers Building.

I returned to the Napa DA's office in 2025 after being away for a period of time for family reasons. It was quite nostalgic for me to return to the Carithers Building after thirteen years away. But it was also a little bit shocking that the only things that seemed to have changed was that there was more case files and more employees and less comfortable space to function in in a severely dilapidated building. During my time away, I worked as a DA for two other counties in places that are notoriously not nearly as nice as a place of as Napa is. Yet the office space provided was significantly more functional than Carruthers.

And I am basically here to express my gratitude to the board and to the county for the opportunity for the NAPA DA's office to work at 1250 Main Street where the space to move and the places that we have to work in are so much better and are on par with other DA offices across the state. So thank you to the county and the board for making that happen.

You. Welcome.

PAUL Good morning, everybody. I am Pat Collins. I'm a deputy DA at the Danfadier's office, along with my colleague, Ms. Webb. I would like to express thanks for everything that the board and the CEO's office has done to move us into our new space. I've worked as a WDA for twelve years, almost all that time in Carithers. And it is a startling difference to see actual natural light. I've never worked in an office with windows before. So we just want to say thank you on behalf of the office. People in our office often deal with very difficult situations, difficult cases.

It can be tough to come to work, even on the best days. But the change in environment has been really wonderful. It's had a great effect on people. The morale in the office has really improved quite a bit. So we just want to say thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Collins. Okay, and I guess we'll go to the phones now. I don't see anyone else in the room wishing to make a public comment on anything not on the agenda. I know a couple of people just walked in. Okay, so we'll go to the phones.

First commenter today is Shauna. Shauna, are you there?

Yes, I am. Can you hear me?

Yes. You go ahead. You have three minutes.

Thank you. Hi. My name is Shoshana Worley, and I also work as a deputy district attorney for Napa County. I have worked for the county now for almost four years after working for five years in the neighboring county of Solano. I work in our office's sexual assault unit, I prosecute sexual assaults of adult victims, physical and sexual abuse of children, human trafficking.

And I also serve as our office's animal abuse prosecutor. I wanted to give great thanks to the Board of Supervisors for supporting our office's move to 1250 Main Street. We appreciate the county's investment in facilities that allow us to do our jobs with dignity and pride. I cannot tell the board how much the move has boosted morale in our office and how happy I personally am, much like Mr. Collins, to have natural light and windows in my office, the ability to have a live plant.

Supervisor Ramos actually happened to ride the elevator with me a couple of weeks ago with my plants when I was bringing them into the office. So I'm sure she saw the big smile on my face. Most importantly, I now feel a sense of pride in being able to bring victims into the office to meet with me and investigators to talk about cases. I didn't feel this sense of pride working in the Caruthers Building. I think it's important, and we are so gracious to have the office that truly feels reflective of the important and difficult work that we do. So I thank you for your leadership and commitment to making Napa County a better place.

Thank you, Mrs. Worley. Is there there's a second person, yes?

Correct. Okay. Next caller is John.

Can you hear me?

Yes. You have are you ready? Yes. Okay, we can hear you. Go ahead. You have three minutes.

I want to begin by congratulating Amber Manfrey. I haven't conferred with her or spoke to her since before she was promoted to the chair of the board. I voted for you twice. I was from 4th District. I'm very proud to see that you're up there and I know you're gonna do great things. I'm gonna move right along to my next subject. In Washington DC, there's an active case before the United States Department of Justice in the federal court. It's John Anaya versus Napa County or County Of Napa at all. There's a case, John versus Department of Justice. And within the next thirty days, the DOJ is presently conferring with the agencies relative to this matter.

And I'm actually pulling into the Eastern District Of Virginia right now to the Federal courthouse where there's an additional case, John Anaya versus County of Napa, et al, Eastern District Of Virginia. What it's relative to is my first wife's father being kidnapped and murdered in his home in San Diego, and I was in the army. And after I left the army, I volunteered to the United States Department of Justice to go undercover for two years. And after two years, I did my best to put my life together, and I moved back to where I grew up in Napa, California and was able to buy a home. Unfortunately, the irony is the action is preferred against the county of Napa to include the district attorney's office for willfully intentionally exposing me as a former federal DOJ asset.

Action has been preferred against the county as providing material support to what is now FTOs, that's foreign threat organizations, specifically cartels, is a violation of 18 USC two three three nine bravo. I'm protected by 19 CFR one six one point one five, and Napa County has consistently violated that because you're not in full to FOIA the information relative to my service to the United States Department of Justice, which the Napa County District Attorney felt it was funny or to put it make it public, as did Christine Persegno and the rest of the in individuals with their overt acts that are being sought after by the acts that I preferred. What you guys have done is placed me in a lethal conundrum, and I've asked for The United States to prefer to hold those accountable for those who do it. You've never placed your life in harm's way, then you wouldn't know what it means and the tear that it feels when cartels and organized crime like the mafias that are connected to the people is at work in the county of Napa and for the county of Napa and that they sought to hide this.

This is public information now, so they wanted it public, and that's a horse that they're gonna have to ride. The DOJ is within the next thirty days, we'll make the decision as to whether or not to prefer action against those responsible for willfully intentionally placing the former DOJ asset in a life and death conundrum. Have a good day.

Okay. So is there anyone else on the phones?

That concludes public comment.

Thank you. That concludes public comment. Okay. So moving on to item six, which is Board of Supervisors Reports and Announcements. I welcome any of my colleagues to oh, I see one. I see Supervisor Gallagher. And then after that, Vice Chair Alessia.

Thank you, chair. As many of you can probably see, we have Dolly Parton joining us today from the Imagination Library. And I wanted to tell you a little bit about this. It's a national program that has been brought to Napa County by First Five and the Napa County Office of Education. And every family that enrolls their child in the program will receive a book every month from birth through their fifth year.

So not only is this a literacy program, but it really promotes the joy of reading together as a family. And we have books in many different languages so that everyone can be exposed to a diversity of both language and culture. So I wanted to invite up our HHSA director, Jennifer Yasimoto. She can tell you a little bit about the partnership that we've developed through sponsorship. And also Catherine Van Trieste and Jesse Raymer from Napa County First Five. And they can tell us just a little bit more about it. And then if I can indulge the board, if we could take a photo, that would be great.

Okay. I think so. Yes. Welcome, Ms. Giacomoto. Go ahead. Good morning,

Chair Manfrey and board members. Well, thank you for indulging us in a little bit of fun today that's entirely designed to amplify, as Supervisor Gallagher said, free books for any child, five and under. The program advances early learning and makes it really exciting because books are mailed directly to the home of our families. I'm really excited to also be joined by Katherine Van Trieste, who's the program's coordinator, and Jesse Raymer, who's the operations manager at First Five Napa County. This is a program that's made possible because of the partnership between First Five and NCOE.

And just a little explanation as to why we have DALL E. I know when I told people that DALL was coming here, some people actually thought that I had secured the real DALL E. So the next best thing is the cutout DALL E, because everybody loves DALL E. So Health and Human Services is one of the sponsors and also partners in helping to get the word out, get families and kiddos enrolled. And as part of the sponsorship, we get physical possession of Dolly's cutout, which we are happy to have for the months of January and February.

So we brought Dolly here yesterday afternoon to bring her into the boardroom today, and we'll be taking her back to the agency. But this is all part of promoting just something that is pure good that is almost one of those, is this really possible? And is this something that we're doing for all of our residents here? So I've got flyers here that I want to leave in different county department lobbies because even children of our staff can enroll. There's no income or eligibility requirement.

You just have to live in Napa County. And then everybody gets a book, and it can be either in Spanish or English. And they're all the books that we grew up with and know and love and so age appropriate. And with that, I'm going to turn it over to Katherine. And she'll give a little bit more details about this wonderful program. And again, thank you for making time and space for this today because it really helps to amplify. And we want to get our enrollment numbers up and sort of break the ceiling on where we can go with this.

Good morning, Chair Manfrey and members of the board. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. My name is Katherine Van Trieste and I am the programs coordinator for First five Napa County and I'm here to highlight our exciting and impactful local partnership that is helping shape the future of Napa County's youngest residents. The Napa County Imagination Library in partnership with the Dolly Parton Imagination Library. Through this program, more than fourteen sixty five children in Napa County are currently enrolled which means nearly one in four children under the age of five across our County are receiving a brand new high quality and if requested bilingual book delivered directly to their home every month completely free of cost to families.

That is an incredible reach and it speaks to the strength of our community partnerships and shared commitment to early childhood development. And just a side note, this program only started in June. So we're about a quarter of the way there but trying to get all kids under five enrolled and we also have 155 graduates already which are kids who were enrolled in the program and have already aged graduate when they turn five. The Imagination Library in Napa County is administered by First five Napa County and NCOE. We are especially grateful for our founding partners including Napa County Health and Human Services Agency, Child Start Inc, and the Kiwanis Club of Greater Napa whose early support helped launch the program and ensure that these amazing books could reach children across our County regardless of zip code or family income.

Access to books in the earliest years of life matters. Early literacy is one of the strongest predictors of long term academic success, health outcomes, and economic stability. When young children are read to regularly, they develop stronger language skills, better social emotional development, and a lifelong love of learning. Just as importantly, this program strengthens family bonds by encouraging caregivers to spend time reading and connecting with their children. While we are proud that our program continues to grow, we know there is still more work to do.

Every child in Napa County deserves the opportunity to build a home library and start kindergarten ready to learn. Our goal is to reach all eligible children within the county and with continued collaboration and community support, that goal is definitely within reach, which is why we are here today to highlight our friend Dolly Parton as she makes her rounds throughout Napa County HHSA buildings and as she visits the board chambers today. As sponsoring partners, a special thank you to the Napa County Health and Human Services Agency is featured on the back of every book that is delivered to families in the months of January and February as a special community shout out and reminder of their support and partnership. We welcome any other agencies or organizations who would like to join in this movement books to all of our county's children. Thank you so much for your ongoing commitment to Napa County's families and for supporting initiatives that invest early, invest wisely, and invest in our children's future.

We appreciate you. Thank you.

Thank you so much for bringing this wonderful program to us today and highlighting it here. I think it'd be great if we could all take a picture right now. So let's do that, and we'll get back to reports right away.

Her ring is real. Her ring takes her apart.

Okay. Okay. That concludes Jemal Gallacher's comments. Next, Chair Alessio.

Thank you. Well, I think that's a perfect demonstration of how unique it is and, I think, special for an all woman board of supervisors. I don't think this has ever happened in the history of us the coordination, right, on such efforts. So that was really fun. Thank you for bringing that forward.

I'm going to sign my granddaughter for this also. A few updates I just want to share. You know that I've been appointed by this board to be a board member of the Marin Clean Energy Board. And there's a lot going on there. I've been appointed to an ad hoc committee, which represents it's five people, represents the five counties. We're doing work on that. It's a governance assessment of the board and then possibly the agency, too. And we've also established a finance committee. And I am the chair of the finance committee. So more work is going to be done there.

And just for the customers of Marin Clinton Energy, the goal this year is really the board is looking at how can we reduce rates while still maintaining the mission and the programs. The programming is going to be centered primarily around access to EV charging stations, which we know we need here in Napa County. Also, I'm on the Suicide Prevention Council. And I have been. It's something I've personally been on since 2017.

And I want to thank our director, Jennifer Yasimoto, and our epidemiologist, Crystal Milton, thank you, for really doing some work in terms of how we can look at this public health issue with data that comes from several sources. It's really reliable, good data to help direct the efforts of this council. So thank you for that. I love this event. We all get to attend events.

But this event, I really love. This is the Boys and Girls Club event I was looking for their names and the Youth of the Year. And so that was last week. They're all winners. And they also had members of the year. So if you've never been to the annual Boys and Girls Club Youth of the Year, please keep an eye out for it next year. These kids are incredible. And it really shows and demonstrates the great work of the Boys and Girls Club. This year, winner is Mariano Coronado. She was very inspiring, very heartfelt.

Last year's Youth of the Year, Melody Condor got to make the announcement and give her that award. I also attended the Napa County Historical Society. It was the documentary of the Chinese history in Napa Valley. There's a book written by John McCormick, who grew up here. It's kind of a retirement passion project that's turned into a documentary.

It was a sold out event at the Cameo Theater. Keep an eye out to see that if you enjoy history like myself. I want to say I just want to recognize, too, that this month is Black History Month. It's also American Heart Month, National Dating Violence Awareness and Prevention Month, which I know news is doing work on, National Children's Dental Health Month, Library Lovers Month, which is perfect with Dolly, National Check, a Self Check Month, which is about taking care of yourself, and Family Support Awareness Month. On that end, I do want to say in 2020, this kind of connects with some of my comments and the public comment.

In 2020, the city of Napa passed a resolution declaring that systemic racism and discrimination is a public health crisis. And in this time and era, I think it's time that we do that again. And so if I can make a referral, I know we have certain amount in terms of making resolutions. But I think it's time that we do that as a board and make that declaration again. That's it. Thank you.

Thank you, Supervisor Alessio. Supervisor Ramos?

Thank you so much, chair. And thank you to the partnership with First Five and HHSA for bringing DALL and getting our day started off in a very positive way. One of the things I want to say, my family was recently stricken with the flu, and we still have vaccinations available at Health and Human Services this month. And those are continuing on Wednesdays. So I would highly, highly suggest that after, some really rough weeks in in our household.

I would highly suggest, that you visit our Health and Human Services, vaccinations on Wednesdays. And there, we do have that information available on our website. And I really love, and I think it bears reminding, we didn't have a microphone, when Luis came with REBA, And that is that adoption fees are being waived between February 13 and February 15 so you can get your loved ones. Everyone knows I have an adoptable at home, and I think he's the greatest fella on earth. And so just make sure you visit our shelter and get yourself a little furry Valentine.

Many thanks to the library for having a really, really great refreshing grand opening at the American Canyon Library. It was so incredibly well attended. And we literally had monkeys, not like figurative monkeys, like actual literal monkeys that were there doing a little show. They live in American Canyon, and they've been in movies. And it was really, really exciting, it was a great, great twist.

And it was, really a personal pleasure for me, to be reminded that I was on the council when we opened that library at that facility in 2012. So to to be able to continue with that is really, really great. I, yesterday, had the opportunity to go up to St. Helena, a place at the Monte Vista Apartments, a place where I had friends that would live there growing up in St. Helena, to tour the facility.

And one of the great things is in partnership with our town in St. Helena Burbank Housing, FAFSA, the Bay Area Housing Finance Authority, which is run through MTC, provided $3,000,000 to purchase this property and to deed secure it as affordable housing. And it was just a really great opportunity to see what that potential is for having that loan funding in place that can help projects be deed secured as affordable that otherwise don't meet those really competitive requirements for tax credits and other issues. So those dollars that sometimes seem kind of out of reach made it all the way to St. Helena, California.

So I just wanted to share that with each of you. I'll be joining two of my colleagues at the NACO legislative conference. And I'm really excited for that. And then just a couple of things to note from I know it's been very important for all of our community, especially those in District 4 regarding airport operations. And so to stress the fact that we as a board recognize that the current published flight path is impacting our residents, I will say that the 2025 landings had a 22% decrease over 2024.

But the but in 2024, we had 34 noise complaints. In 2025, we had nine fifteen. And so this stresses the importance, and I appreciate the support from all of the board in working with our consultant. And I know the airport staff has been working through the work plan and the deliverables, and we should reach a a conclusion on what those deliverables are this week so that we can get to work. And, again, there is there there is no guarantee that it will work, but certainly these numbers show that we do need to advocate for our community.

And next, if you like soup, I'm gonna say, you need to join me on Saturday. The American Canyon Kiwanis food pantry that works with Community Action Napa Valley and American Canyon to distribute food has a fundraiser from twelve to two at the American Canyon Community Church. And you buy a bowl, and there are about 30 different soups to try. So if you want to join me for soup on Saturday, I'll be having my bowl of soup. Thanks so much.

Thank you, Supervisor Ramos. Supervisor Cottrell?

Thank you. Great to get all these updates. I wanted to share a few things. Last week, I was out at the far, far reaches of North Berryessa on the East side of the lake for a meeting where residents and firewise and Cal Fire and Napa County Fire and many other state and federal agencies were represented to talk about a new fire safe council on that in that part of the county, which not very many people live out there. It's sparsely populated.

There's a lot of land area and it's a place that's burned a lot. So it was really encouraging to see all those residents out there. I want to say thanks to them and also to all the partners who came together. We started looking at maps right away, so I'm encouraged about that. Also, Black History Month celebration has come up.

I was happy to attend that with a couple of my colleagues. Thank you to Crosswalk Community Church for hosting that and to JT Thompson who had the original vision and really has kept that going and it's bigger and better every year. And I particularly want to give a shout out to the Napa Valley College students who spoke and told a little bit about the programs they have at the school. And then a wonderful keynote by Cameron Lipson who I hope we keep hearing from because he did a great job. Up in Calistoga, I wanted to just flag a specific issue but it flags a general issue.

Hearts and Hands preschool is having a tough time. I will be meeting with residents and city leaders up there to try to talk about what the options are. One of the great things in California is the advent of the TK program, which is where four year olds can begin school before they go to kindergarten, which is a great way to get kids into learning environments earlier. But it's a transition for a lot of the traditional preschools we've had. So that will be a community effort up in Calistoga.

I wanted to also flag, you know, I've heard from many residents about smoke from ag burns, particularly when we have this sunny, dry weather. It's a good opportunity for those ag burns and we want to make sure that everyone is doing best practices to keep that smoke low. So we'll have ongoing conversations about that. I hear you and I also am working with industry partners on that as well. And finally in Yountville there was a terrific Mardi Gras parade this past weekend and was happy to see folks from Napa County Library, the sheriff's office, and also Napa County Fire representing there too. So thank you.

Okay, fantastic. Thank you. So for District 4 announcements, I would like to make sure that we highlight that the third round of community workshops are coming soon for the baseline data report. And this is a process that feeds into our general plan revision, which is upcoming. These workshops engage the public to review the public draft and give feedback. So there's a draft which is it out yet or it will be out soon? Okay. Later this month it'll be out. Great. And I do know that staff are working really hard to include every last comment that they can.

And so if you can find the time to comment on the drafts and get those comments in, we will work hard to make sure that your perspectives are reflected as much as possible. And you can send your thoughts in any time of the day or night to bdrcountyofnapa dot org anytime, even right now. So no need to wait. And then I also want to highlight that we had a lovely celebration for Black History Month at Crosswalk Community Church last Saturday. And three of us were there.

And it was absolutely heartwarming and healing and just a wonderful thing that goes on in this community. And I encourage you to check it out next year. I heard that they're planning to keep it going. So that's a really great opportunity to go out and just participate in our community. We also celebrated World Wetlands Day on February 2 with a proclamation recognizing Public Works Flood District staff and the Resource Conservation District for their phenomenal world class work in restoring wetlands in our valley.

The Navajo County Bicycle Champion of the Year nominations are open. They'll be open until February 28. So if you know of a bicycle champion in our community, you can nominate them. And questions, if you you can, I guess, contact me about that, about where to go or just Google it, because the link is a little bit long to read? But I'm sure you can find it.

And also, the PG and E Foundation is awarding the Better Together STEM scholarship for up to 60 students pursuing STEM. The applications are due by March 12. And they also have a website where you can find more information. So a great opportunity for students. And lastly, the Citizens Academy run by the sheriff's office starts February 25. And that program is at capacity this year. But I strongly encourage folks to sign up next year. It's a wonderful opportunity to see from a very up close perspective the work that our sheriff's department does in keeping our community safe. So thank you very much. That concludes my comments on announcements.

And the next item we'll be going to is discussions of items pulled from the consent calendar. And so this will be item 4x relating to South Campus Building for HVAC upgrades. So Supervisor Ramos, would you like to kick us off?

Thank you so much, Chair. And I just wanted to take a moment to highlight this. I'm going to go ahead and call it an accomplishment. It has taken years to get to this point where we could find the collaborative space, where we can work with labor in our contracting and in public work spaces. And I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank all of our unions that participated in the building trades and to thank our staff.

You listened. You took our I'm going to say it wasn't even direction. It was more like feelings that we put out into space. And you put it into words. And so I just wanted to take that opportunity and to really highlight that as we do this work on Building 4, we're going to do it.

And it's us looking at this from a pilot perspective of what's this going to look like so that we can understand how we call it a community workforce agreement. Other agencies call it is it a PLA, a Project Labor Agreement. But community workforce, I think, was far more reflective of the intent that we were trying to achieve here at the board. So I just wanted to call that out and thank everyone who is present and those who intend to sign so that we can get this work started. Thank you. And if there's anything that the CEO would like to add to that.

Well, thank you, Madam Chair, through the Chair. Thank you for the opportunity. It was all I appreciate the labor partners. But on the staff side, it was all county counsel, Tom in county counsel's office, Steve, our director of public works. It was all them. So credit to them. Thank you.

Thank you. I also see county council. Is that do you share a button? Okay, it's clear. Thank you. And Supervisor Gallagher, did you have something to say?

I just wanted to echo thanks to our labor groups and to our staff for working really well together to put this together. It is a milestone and a really great opportunity for us as a county to support working families. So I'm proud of our board and proud of the work that we're doing and very excited to see this move forward.

Supervisor Cottrell? Yeah, thanks to my colleagues.

I think you guys really hit the nail on the head. So I will say ditto to that. And then I also just want to, in thanking staff and all of the labor folks who are here today, also just make the point that there's a lot of rhetoric around PLAs and these kinds of agreements. And I'm thankful for this opportunity to have a data point to get some experience to understand what works where there are challenges. So I think this is a great opportunity to build on a good working relationship and compare some notes. And we'll keep improving, too. So thank you.

Thank you. Yeah, and I will just, I guess, further echo the comments. But for some communities, it's a very standard procedure to go through this process. And I'm very hopeful that this will go well and that we can build from here forward. So thank you so much for working with us. And thanks to staff for working with unions. Very good. Are there any public comments on this item? Welcome.

Thank you. Danny Bernardini, Napa Solano, Building Trades business manager. Thank you for your comments. I won't take up too much time. I did want to also thank staff, Tom and Steve and Ryan, everybody that put work in behind the scenes as well and and being able to call you all and and let you know how it's going and answer your questions. So, again, like you said, years we've been before you all. And so we're really we're excited to show you what we can do and hopefully, like you said, build on this for the future. So, thank you all for for putting your faith in us, and we're gonna do what we do. So thank you again.

Thank you, Mr. Bernardino. Yeah. Welcome.

Good morning, board and members of the public. Glenn Lovall, executive director of the Napa Solano Central Labor Council, AFL CIO. Just echoing, of course, what our labor siblings in the building trades have articulated and our great appreciation to this board and staff for the partnership that we are looking at here and taking this great step forward toward all the more equitable and inclusive economic development, uplifting workers, local residents, and all the important collaborations that it takes to move growth forward in the right direction. So thank you again, and we look forward to our next steps in the partnership.

Thank you, mister Lovell. Welcome.

Ryan O'Connell from Napa Solano For Everyone, the local chapter of Yinby Action in support of the Community Workforce Agreement. It's a pleasure because normally there's a lot of tension between workforce agreements and how things can slow down construction processes and public works. But I think it's an excellently negotiated agreement. And then would also recommend that we include even more explicitly partners like the Carpenters in future agreements and that we have a lot more like these in the future. Thank you for supporting.

Thank you, Mr. O'Connell. I don't see anyone else in the room. Is there anyone on the phones? Thank you. Think that sounds like that concludes our discussion on this item. So I will take item 4x to a vote. May I have a

Chair, I'll go ahead and make a motion that we approve item 4x.

I'll second.

Motion by Rama, second by Alessio. All those in favor? Aye. That passes unanimously. Very good.

Okay.

Thank you all for joining us today for that one. All right. So we are going to oh, I have a request for a recess. We will take a recess until 10:10. Let's try to come back here at 10:10 sharp.

Thank you. Okay. Thank you. We are back on air. So we're gonna continue this meeting from our short break.

And our next item will be item eight, which is administrative items. And our first item 8A, discuss and improve for transmission of position letter in support of California Senate Bill two ninety nine related to CEQA review of proposed childcare facilities. I welcome legislative analyst Mys to explain this item to us. Thank you.

Morning. My name is Andrew Mize. I have the privilege of serving as the county's legislative and policy analyst. This matter is before your board upon referral by Supervisor Alessio at your board's 01/27/2026 regular meeting. The referral sought transmission of a five signature position letter in support of Senate Bill two ninety nine authored by Senator Chris Gvaldin, the Democratic member representing, among other counties, Napa County, and principally co authored by Senator Sascha Renee Perez, the Democratic member from Alhambra.

The bill exempts from CEQA review day care centers and family day care homes located on parcels zoned exclusively for residential use. This is a fairly narrowly tailored exemption in that it applies only to residential use parcels and not all day care centers in residential areas. As noted in the staff report, under current law, most child care facilities in residential areas are exempt from CEQA using existing facilities, Class I, and infill Class 32 exemptions, or are likely considered by right facilities, meaning that they are not subject to CEQA at all. But the use of these exemptions requires the project proponent to demonstrate how their project meets the criteria for these exemptions. And this rationale is subject to challenge.

This bill provides a CEQA exemption that has fewer eligibility requirements than the class one and class 32 exemptions. The requirements of this exemption are straightforward and as a result, the exemption proposed by SB two ninety nine would be difficult to challenge. Passage of this bill would substantially restrict grounds for neighbor challenges to child care centers on residential parcels on the basis of a project's non adherence to CEQA exemption eligibility requirements. Challenges would have to stem from other non CEQA grounds. In addition to its broad impacts on the county's incorporated cities, areas of unincorporated Napa County with significant residential development where this exemption could be used include Vichy Springs, Silverado, Circle Oaks, Berryessa, Enguin, and Pope Valley.

This referral seeks authorization of a five signature position letter in support of SB two ninety nine to the committee currently considering the proposal and authorization for future transmissions to other committees which may later consider it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Rice. I would like to open this up for public comment next. Is there anyone from the public wishing to speak? Thank you. Welcome.

Good morning. Alex Peter with Senator Christopher Cabaldon here to speak in support of SB two ninety nine, one of his bills. SB two ninety nine is a common sense solution to prevent the weaponization of CEQA. We've seen CEQA weaponized in our own community, not to protect the environment, not to protect an endangered species, not to protect a unique wildflower native to Napa County, but instead we've seen CEQUA use to keep those people out of our neighborhood, to prevent people from driving down their personal street just because they don't like people driving on their street. We know that we don't have enough childcare in Napa County, and we know we don't have enough childcare across the state of California.

And the childcare that we do have is far too often unaffordable for too many families. Even I struggle, personally. SB two ninety nine will help both with the access of childcare and the affordability of childcare critical to our local economy and just the general well-being of Napa County families. There's currently no opposition to SB two ninety nine and some of the listed supporters are California State Association of Counties, Community Resources for Children, the League of California Cities, the rural county representatives of California, and the urban counties of California, as well as Monterey County. And we hope we can add Napa County to that list.

Thank you.

Thank you. Is there anyone else? I'm not seeing anyone approaching the podium. Is there anyone on the phones on this item? No? Okay. Then I will bring it back to the board for discussion. And any questions for staff? Vice Chair Alasio?

Thank you. First of I thank staff for bringing this back so quickly. I just had made this referral at the last meeting. So I appreciate the speed in which you took this. I also want to thank Alex Peter for being here and representing Senator Christopher Cabaldon.

I need to thank Senator Christopher Cabaldon because last year Senator Weiner included protection of child care centers and child care in his bill. And as it went through the process, it came out exempting child care in all areas, commercial, industrial, I guess agricultural, but all areas except really where these child care centers are needed and where they're located. And that is in the neighborhoods where families live, work, and play. It makes zero sense. So when Senator Cabaldo and I had a conversation, because he was actually congratulating us, I said, well, we took a bite, but it's not done.

And he said, we're going to take care of this. And to my delight, right after the beginning of the year, he had a bill all drafted and proposed and was circulating the bill with great success and invited me to speak on behalf of this. Just to share some things that we might know, but I want to state for the record, a significant portion of Napa residents are child care burdened, with nearly 40% of all families lacking income for essentials, like housing and child care. Over 78% of child care lacking licensed care, meaning families are having to find alternatives of where to place their kids. These alternatives aren't necessarily safe, healthy, early learning, thriving environments while parents are doing their best in terms of earning enough money to keep a roof over their head.

We know child care is the second largest financial burden now for working families. The state in terms of California is even worse. A significant portion of California families are child care burdened, with nearly forty six percent of young children lacking regular care and many households spending over $200 a week, seventy percent, in 2023. Now, this is stats from 2023. It's only gotten more expensive and more difficult for working families.

While millions of eligible and subsidized remain unserved, we don't have enough subsidies. And that really leads to the conversation of one day that I hope we're here writing a five signature letter in support of universal child care. I want to thank our staff member, Holly Dawson, for sending me this article that talked about a study done on universal child care, the feasibility of it. And actually, we know there's an economic development aspect to this. Not only is this the right thing to do in providing the health and safety and early learning for these children and babies, there's also a very important economic development aspect.

And universal child care, based on different studies in well known universities, show a net gain if California was able to get enough political will for universal child care. So I just want to share that also. I do have a potential small minor change. From the second to the last sentence where it's proposed, it says, quote, SB two ninety nine puts the prospect of small in home day care centers on level footing with centers in other areas. My concern is that that's focusing specifically on in home day care centers, which is already exempt.

So what I'd like to do there's a couple of ways we can do this. We can say SB two ninety nine provides a level footing with day care centers in other areas. So we're not we leave out the in home small day care centers. With the public comment from Alex Pater, we add in SB two ninety nine provides level footing providing access and affordability with day care centers in other areas. I kind of like adding the access and affordability.

And then it says, this bill strikes the right balance in providing needed access to infant and child care for working families where they live, work, and play. So actually, second part is mine too. So I'm open to staff thought on this, but let me go back and just say the revision I'm suggesting is SB two ninety nine provides level footing with day care centers in other areas. Keep it short and clean. So we're just taking out that small section.

This bill strikes the right balance in providing needed access and affordability to infant and child care for working families where they live, work, and play. Thank you.

Okay. Are there any other questions or comments from the board? I'm not seeing any. Okay. Well, I have a couple of questions for staff. So counsel, I have not been through the process of creating a five signature letter before. Could you give us a little clarification on how this works, please?

JULIE Sure. So through the chair, the way the letter's been drafted and is in front of you today, it includes a signature line for each of you. As an alternative, a lot of times the letters that go out may just be signed by the chair but are approved by a majority of the board. So happy to answer any questions on that. Okay.

Thank you. I think that's helpful for me to know. And then I also noticed, as you were listening through legislative analyst mice as you were listening through places where this would take effect, I also talked to our planning director about this. Some of the places I think aren't actually so Brian Bordona, Director Bordona, if I could just get some clarification as to whether this will or won't affect Pope Valley, Angouin, and various highlands because those are the places where I wasn't quite clear because I got conflicting information about how the zoning would work.

Sure. My brief read of the staff report in the bill seems to suggest that this is limited or strictly applicable to residential areas, which makes sense because that's where a lot of the people live and the infrastructure exists. In the review of our zoning code, our residential areas are residential country and residential single. That includes Circle Oaks. That does not include various highlands or the estates.

There's nothing in Pope Valley that has that zoning. There are a couple of pockets in Angouin. And then, of course, Silverado and the Coombsville area are definitely zoned for that. But I think by and large, this is a bill aimed at urban areas like most state legislation. But yeah, hope that answers your question.

Yeah, that's really helpful. Yeah, that's really you. And I also wouldn't want people having false expectations for how this might play out in different parts of the community. So I think that's really helpful, just clarifying. Thank you.

JULIE Yeah, Okay.

JULIE Great. So let's see. I support child care generally and the government assisting wherever it's helpful with the provision of child care. It's absolutely a basic need for the community. And I supported Napa County intervening to assist La Petite Elphant in their quest to help provide a significant amount of child care spaces for the community.

I'm struggling with this one because I'm struggling to understand how pertains to the need because the primary things we can do to improve the provision of child care are lowering cost to families and building workforce housing. And I don't know that there's a major threat because of CEQA being weaponized against child care specifically. I'm very open to hearing if anyone wants to provide information on instances of that happening. But for me to sign on to something that's requesting a carve out or a reduction in the umbrella that's going to be covered under CEQA when I'm not quite seeing the benefit, I'm struggling with that. And I'm also struggling where I haven't heard constituents asking for this in the community.

And I know that it will have major or I shouldn't major, maybe, I mean. But it will have more of a relevant impact to the cities. And I think it would be perfectly appropriate for the cities to step forward and advocate in their own interests. And again, I haven't heard anything personally from them on this. I don't know if there's something I've missed, but I'm open to getting information about that. So I'm going to continue the discussion. I see a couple more lights here. I see Supervisor Cottrell. Then

I'm going to pass.

You're going to pass? Okay. And then Okay. So then I see Vice Chair Alessio. And then after that, Supervisor Gallagher.

I'm going let Supervisor Gallagher go first, and then I'll go next, if that's Okay. Yeah, that's fine.

Is that Okay?

Yeah, of course. Of course.

So first I have a question, and I want to make sure I'm reading this right. So residential zoning includes multifamily, correct? Whereas exclusively residential basically refers to single family housing. Is that how you're reading this? Because the way I'm reading it is the exemption is for residential zoning. The exemption is not for exclusively residential zoning.

If I may, through the chair. The way that the bill is phrased is for residential parcels. It does not make distinction as to local variants of what residential parcel means. It is simply residential parcels. So it is not residential areas, which is the carve out in last year's bill.

If the carve out was residential areas broadly, this adds back in day care centers and family day cares on residential parcels without regard to what residential parcel may mean.

JULIE Okay. I don't know. In my reading, felt like it made a distinction between exclusively residential and residential. But

I

just put that out there for if you think there's additional clarification that needs to be made.

I believe it is exclusively residential, but it does not distinguish what kind of residential, I think, the point I was making.

Okay, great. Thank you. So I just wanted to address some concerns that seem to be coming up. It is true that child care homes and centers are generally located in cities. That absolutely makes sense.

And we obviously don't have jurisdiction in cities. But I think there's a precedent for this board supporting critical community services such as child care. A few years ago, we allocated 3,800,000 in ARPA funds to expanding child care in our communities, of jurisdiction, knowing very well that most of those would be in cities, and rightfully so. So I do believe it's incumbent upon us to weigh in on the legislation. It makes sense.

It follows with our values and what we have supported. I don't generally endorse CEQA exemptions. However, because of last year's legislation and how the law stands now, child care businesses in industrial and commercial areas are now really incentivized over residential areas, which doesn't make a whole lot of These services are located in areas where families live, and they can more easily access care within their neighborhood. So it does make sense for us to at least put on equal footing the incentivization of putting child care in residential areas. So I'm in favor of supporting this for those reasons.

Thank you. Supervisor Cottrell, I don't see any or I'm sorry. Oh.

Yeah, I

can just Go ahead.

Okay. Weigh in briefly. I think what Supervisor Gallagher lays out makes a lot of sense that in general, particularly with the board action that has been taken previously with the ARPA funding, I think we did step into this arena, even though we can all agree that most of the childcare options that we have in the county are within the cities, as they should be, because those are the places where we have more residences, where we have services and schools, things like that. Also, really appreciate the point that we don't want to be, I think, as individuals or a board, being generally favorable to CEQA exemptions without very good reason. And I think we do have a good reason.

Supervisor Olescio laid out some of the path of how we got here, that there was a bill in place and a carve out pretty late in the game that made it very challenging for day care centers. So in general, I'm in favor of I'm happy to sign on to this letter. Supervisor Manfrey, chair, I think your question about do we all need to be signatories on it? We don't. So I think it's your choice. Can move forward as individuals as well.

Thank you. Supervisor Alessia?

Thank you. The purpose for the five signatures is just a unified force. As we hear supporting DALL we support other things. It's another way to show another way to emphasize our unified support of this. I from city council for six years.

And I always struggled when and this is in all respect. I always struggled when people put boundaries between what the city did and what the county did. There's too many silos. And because we're caring for our entire community, whether it comes with the city or the county, we cannot silo our governance. We cannot silo what we do for the people we serve.

Personally, jurisdictionally, twothree of my constituents live in the city of Napa. I don't just serve the people outside of Napa. And I just don't serve people in my jurisdiction or my district. I serve everybody in this county regardless of district, city, jurisdiction, county. Is similar to housing.

The reason access to child care is so difficult is because it's not a big moneymaker. It takes money to start one. It takes somebody who has a passion and love and patience to open up a center. We don't have enough. And because of the scarcity, we have a lack of access.

And families are having to pay a lot more than we would if we had more child care centers. As a single mom in the past, I had to have access to child care. I spent a lot, not as much as people were paying today. But it was critical me to keep a roof over my head and not be in a homeless shelter or live with my mother. Mom, not to you, because I know she's watching.

But it falls in all the areas that are important to us as this county in public health, public safety, equity for these families. And it's also in our legislative platform that we just supported. So I think it's important. We have unincorporated pockets within the city that are residentially zoned that we need to consider, too. I don't remember how many, but thousands of homes.

And it's also a statement to say we support child care. I'll also say that majority of our child care centers and in home centers are Latina Hispanic small businesses. And they have headwinds. We talked about a headwind earlier with the TK, that is a fallout with the TK. The way that they design their business and the laws that we have, especially different state laws, there has to be specific space that allows for enough infants to be in these centers.

They just have so many headwinds on them. The climate, the political climate that's out there, there's a lot of fear in our child care centers right now, too, with things that are going on. So they're the unsung heroes in our community as far as I'm concerned. And I just ask that everybody on this board sign on this. And if not, then I appreciate all those who will. Thank you.

Okay, thanks. Yeah, I'm still wondering I mean, yes, absolutely there are headwinds. Yes, affordability is a huge issue. I'm still struggling to figure out how making this exemption in CEQA is what's standing between the provision of child care and not, or in what ways CEQA is derailing the progress of child care right now? Vice Chair Alessio, go ahead.

Well, I'll keep going on unless Steph wants to say. Does Steph have anything you want to say on this? You want me to just talk about I don't want to put you on the spot, then I'll go ahead and say. Is a very important policy. But it's been some years now that people have seen ways to use CEQA, to weaponize CEQA for things that they don't want in their neighborhood.

When I was on city council, it was Heritage House and Valle Verde. It was in my district, actually. There was a lot of pushback from the residents. I did everything I could because I knew that for the public good and well-being for the public and those who are some of the most vulnerable and disenfranchised are the homeless and housed and they need housing so they can move forward with their lives. But that was really important.

But they used CEQA, and it worked for them. CEQA has worked a lot in a lot of different ways to stop projects that are really in the better and the greater good for the community. When we saw this happen in the city of Napa in your district, it was a church, a church that had 1,000 members at one point with a home across the street that was overflow for child care, not child care in the church and child care in a home across the street. You don't need to win a CEQA lawsuit. All you need to do is file a CEQA lawsuit.

These child care providers don't have the bandwidth or the finances or the wherewithal legally to be able to open up a center in that space. There is a legislation SB4, which is the Affordable Housing on Faith Land Act. There's more churches that are looking what they can do with their space schools. There's a Harvest Middle School that's going to be available. But I think that we need to give every opportunity for child care providers to be able to open their center for identified need that we have in this community and not be worried that someone's going to file a sequel lawsuit.

Because again, they don't need to win it. They just need to file it. And anybody can file it. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Mr. Pater, would you like to say a word?

Thank you again for the opportunity and to help address the question. I think there's really two ways that the current CEQA impacts child care here in Napa County. The first is a chilling effect. I am sure that every single child care operator in the county saw what happened to Le Petit elephant. And they were successful, but it took a big community lift.

It took a 7 figure sum from the county supervisors to get across the finish line. You know, even though they got across, I am sure that they are they would be cautious to enter that realm again. This would eliminate that challenge. Secondly, I think there's a direct financial impact in the money that the county put forward. That could have been 100 plus child slots paid for a year, directly paid free for someone or subsidized.

Additionally, La Petite Elephant, they had to pay for their council. They had to pay for the county's council. I'm sure there's a number of other direct costs that they had. I know that they put substantial subsidies for many of their and scholarships for their students that otherwise wouldn't be able to attend. So those are direct slots that would be increased if they didn't have to pay all their legal fees. And that would be expanded upon anyone else that would have further expanded. They could also have put that money into further expansion, more child care slots or another child care facility down the line. We know it's not a high profit margin business. It's really a lot of labor. Thank you again. Thank

you, Mr. Painter. Okay, so I'm not seeing anything else lighting up here. So I'm going to go ahead and ask for a motion to approve the letter in support of California Senate Bill two ninety nine.

So moved.

Second as amended? Oh, indeed, yeah.

Yes. Let me ask, are you Okay with that amendment? Or do you have a way that you want to finish it? Are you Okay with that amendment?

The amendment is fine.

Thank you, Supervisor. Thank you. Thank you for your work on this. Yes, so as amended. Thank you.

Okay, so I have a motion as amended by Vice Chair Alessio and seconded by Supervisor Cottrell. All those in favor? Yes.

Yes. If I may, Chair, make a comment on the motion that is pending. I will say that the California State Association of Counties has already sent a letter of support. And as far as that we are members of CSAC and actively involved in CSAC, that has already been transmitted. In addition, the First Five Association of California, which our First Five division is a member, has also signed on board.

I will say, I understand the desire to support in this space. I will just say well, I will be voting in favor of this. I will say we do need to be cautious and to not enter spaces of writing a letter on everything where our associations have already stepped into that space. Because per our platform, we are to take positions on things that are unique to us. This is not a unique to us scenario.

And so I recognize that one of my colleagues has requested this, but I do not feel that this would be something where NAPA stands out in any unique space. If there is a desire to support, I do believe that it's more in the future, I would say it's more appropriate for us to individually send letters. But we need to be very, very cautious as to not send a letter on everything. We need to look at when do we have money at stake, when do we have a specific policy that is at stake. And while we have supported child care in this space that would have benefited, that issue is moot.

So I would just say I want us to just be cautious for how we proceed with these letters, also knowing while we did include in our platform child care as an economic development that's how I see it. Economic development and child care are not county responsibilities. And so we also need to make sure that while we have the great luxury of having a recognizable name and that we can advocate in this space, we should be judicious in how we do that.

Thank you, Supervisor Ramos. Yeah, and I will, I guess, reiterate or expand that I certainly do support the provision of child care and anything we can do to help with that as an entity of government. I'm certainly open to exploring possibilities in as much as we can fund child care for our employees, child care for our clients. I went to Sacramento just the other week to do something. And I was walking into one of the state buildings.

And there was a child care facility in the building that I passed on the way in. And I was like, how magical is this that everybody knows that they're taking care of kids every time they walk into work, whether they have kids or not, in that child care facility. That's a great way to do it. So yeah, and universal child care is certainly willing to discuss that and explore that further. So I just want to be really clear about my support for child care generally. Okay, so let's see. So we have a motion and a second on the floor. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed?

Seeing Seeing none, that motion passes unanimously. And we are going to move on to item eight 8B, approve and adopt a resolution amending Napa County policy manual part one, section eight, and approve and adopt a list of proclamations slated for presentation in 2026. And Mr. Legislative Analyst Mize, you'd like to present information on this item, you are welcome when you're ready.

You. Members of the board, my name is Andrew ANDREW Mize, county's legislative and policy analyst. This matter is before your board upon referral by Supervisor Ramos at your board's 01/13/2026 meeting. The referral sought that staff return with a list of annually recurring proclamations for approval by the board. Upon further consideration of referral and discussions both internally and with refer, staff proposed amendments to Napa County Policy Manual Part one, Section eight intended to bring greater efficiency and transparency to the board's regular functions.

Staff proposed that moving forward, the board approve a list of recurring proclamations at the first regular meeting of each year, a change that is enshrined in policy. Proclamations presented at board meetings will, by default, include the electronic signatures of all five members, but all five signatures are not required for presentation. Board members may opt out of having signature appear on any proclamation regardless of individual vote. Board members proposing additional proclamations not on the annually approved list may either present them individually signed outside of a board meeting or refer the proclamation to the CEO at a board meeting. Referrals must be supported by a vote of the majority of the board.

Staff have also included in this item, subject to the approval of the change in policy, a list of twenty twenty six proclamations for approval today, which will in future years be approved at the board's first regular meeting of each year. In terms of actions, staff recommend first approval of the amendments to Section eight and then a vote subject to that policy change to approve the list of proclamations for 2026, which will be subject to any amendments from the dais. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mize. Do we have any public comment on this item? Is there anyone on the phones? No. I see no public comment. I welcome any board questions. On this item, I see Supervisor Ramos and then Supervisor Gallagher after that.

Thank you. And thank you so much to to staff for bringing this back. And I do have a couple of questions, I'll just say, and part of the reason why I wanted this to come is that we actually haven't had this list. So it's always a surprise when the agenda comes out and thinking what month is it and what are we recognizing. And it would be I think the purpose here is twofold.

It's one, to know what we are observing and creating these laudatory proclamations for. But also, it's a statement of policy and direction and what we're valuing. And so I think it makes a it's important for us to understand what that is at the front end. And I think the staff's recommendation for review in January is is very appropriate. And so I would ask from staff's perspective, we have this list of various proclamations.

If you could kind of just explain where did this list come from? I mean, there obviously are others. But how did we get to this list? Is this just brought from the prior agendas?

If I could ask the clerk to step in to

sort of

talk about the genesis of it. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Supervisor. And through the chair, I'd ask that if you'd like, I can bring this list to everyone's screens for public viewing. Yeah? Okay. For transparency purposes. Okay. This is the list that the supervisor Ramos is referring to. This list was given to the clerk by the board's board staff. And so we received this list. And not everything that you see here on this list makes it onto the board's agenda.

The requests sometimes come in through the clerk, which are forwarded to the board staff. Sometimes the board staff receives requests for having these proclamations at board meetings. A lot of organizations we have found prefer and like when board members come to the event, social gathering, workshop, etcetera, outside of board meetings. So all these that you see here are different every year. So sometimes we might see them year to year, and sometimes we won't.

So I think to Supervisor Ramos's point that maybe a reoccurring regular list would be more appropriate to have some transparency and some guidance as to what is coming, and no surprises.

Thank you so much. And in terms of our meetings, we have between two and three meetings a month. How do we decide which ones Madam Clerk, how do we decide which ones go on what meeting? Say, the first meeting, the second meeting, do we have a maximum amount of target that we're trying to get at?

So an unwritten rule, a general rule of thumb, is most board chairs have preferred to have three or less. There are some exceptions in the year, which is, I believe, in May, where we seem to have a lot of celebratory proclamations that month. But the general standard, if you will, has always been maximum three. And then we kind of take it from there based on the board chair's preference. Okay.

Then I have just one, question. In regards to the policy, I'm looking at exhibit a. I'm looking at the red line version, where it does say, I think it's e, says the chair is authorized to represent the county at ceremonial functions. There similar events when the board has not otherwise designated one of its members to represent the county. The chair may delegate public presentations at such events.

No, sorry. That's not the right one I'm looking at. Oh, okay. So the the question relates to actually c, and it's that if it's at the board member, all five signatures. However, all five are not required.

Any board may opt out of having their signature. So my my question then comes down to, is that a proclamation on behalf of the county and the board if it's less than five? And how would we and and I'll say this to my colleagues from the perspective of, you know, when we take action here, it's five signatures. It's on be it's an act on behalf of the county. Even if we have a four fifth vote, it's an act on behalf of the county.

And so I just wanna make sure we don't run amok here of Brown Act and representations that we make of the county. How do we handle that if we're dealing with two signatures? Oh, I'm like volleying over to county council. Everyone's involved. I love this.

Through the chair, Supervisor Ramos, because of the Brown Act, we were trying to come up with systems that work. And our thinking was, if the board approves in January the annual list, and it's a majority approval, that we have the green light to go ahead and prepare these proclamations as they come forward with electronic signatures. Because otherwise, there's this signing it. When does a board member actually sign it? And it gets into a Brown Act conundrum.

So you had mentioned, if only two board members approve it, it's not approved as a county proclamation. It takes a majority vote. In the case of two, then two individual supervisors could send on their district a letter ahead their support for a particular celebration. Does that answer your question?

So we do have, say I will say, and maybe, Mr. Mize, you can help me out on this, we have someone who is arriving at an Eagle Scout designation that we get requests for for recognition. That is not something that we typically present here at the board, but we do participate in the individual ceremony. And we do put such a proclamation or recognition on the county standard presentation, how does that get worded and conveyed? Because we still do need to be able to do these recognitions.

For example, we have a retirement. Right? And one of the supervisors may be asked to recognize the retiree. I just wanna make sure that we have enough space to do the ceremonial functions that were asked and also recognizing the importance of five signature proclamations and respecting the Brown Act at the same time. That's where I'm trying to get at.

SPEAKER Supervisor, you've asked a really great question. And I think you've gotten at some of the tension that we struggled with in this. Because when you put a recognition like that on county letterhead, it appears to have the support of the county's board of supervisors. But if that has not gone before the board for a vote, that would not be proper under the Brown Act. So you brought up two different scenarios there.

And I want to address them separately because I think the answer is different for both. In the case where a supervisor receives a request from a constituent as to an achievement by a constituent or a member of a constituent's family, there's a special relationship that exists between members of the board and their constituents. And we wanted to make sure to preserve the ability for board members to continue those relationships. I'm not sure that are properly on the board's letterhead without vote by the board. I think they would have to be on an individual supervisor's letterhead.

And counsel can correct me if that's incorrect.

If I may, Ray, if we look at d, four d, if a board member wishes to present a proclamation that is not included on the annually approved proclamation list, there are two options available to the board member, and it is to individually sign the proclamation. So that would seem that we would need to make sure that we have language that says it is coming from bellia and bellia only or through a proclamation, a commendation, or a special recognition. And so I I just wanna make sure we're clarifying that that's still available as long as it says that it's coming from supervisor Ramos because I didn't take it to a vote and it's only one signature.

Yeah, if I may, Supervisor Ramos to the chair. This was an attempt on the referral to make this process easier. Don't when looking at this list, I see no scenario and your five signatures would be automatic because you had a vote. I see no scenario where, just based on my experience with you all and through these meetings, where one of you would come and say, don't put my signature on that. I will, in full transparency, give you an example of a situation where you may want your signature pulled.

You all work well together. Everything's great. But in the future, there may be a board that doesn't. And you may have somebody that you get a majority vote, and you are in the minority, and you don't like it, and it'll go out with four signatures. You can withhold your signature. It's really to address that. That is not the situation here that we have in the county. On the Eagle Scout, I don't recall in the time that I've been here doing that here. That would be a perfect thing for you to do at the Eagle Scout ceremony on your own letterhead. However, if you want to make a bigger deal out of it, you can certainly do that.

You make a referral to do that. That's a special occasion. We're a small county. Probably pretty rare that we would be doing that. Also, retirements, very rare.

It's really at the department head level. We've had maybe one, two since I've been here, rare. We would certainly work with your board to set that up in advance to make sure that it's done through this process. But look, going forward at any time, wherever this list stands, whether it's just after it's voted on at the beginning of the year or in the middle of the year, If there is something that your board, a member of your board, would like to bring forward publicly, you simply make a referral. You get the support of your majority of your colleagues to others. And we add it and bring it back on the date requested.

Perfect. Those are all my thank you so much. I know that this was a lot, but I just want to make sure we're brown acting at all possible moments around here.

Yeah, I appreciate all those questions. Supervisor Gallagher and then Vice Chair Alessio.

Thank you. Thank you for the clarification. And I think that it makes sense to have this list be comprehensive because, as we know, not everything's going to necessarily come into the meeting. But we want to have pre approved it in case there's a presentation outside the meeting or something like that. So there are a couple that we traditionally do that I just wanted to mention that should probably be on the list. So February, Black History Month March, Women's History Month May, Bike Month and September, Library Card Sign Up Month.

Okay. Thank you for those good suggestions. I'm busy noting them, which is why I'm not talking. I understand Supervisor Alessio, do want to comment? Okay, go ahead.

Thank you. And thank you, Supervisor Gallagher, for bringing those forward. What I want to make sure and it is in here in the red line version is that there is flexibility to add proclamations, recognitions. And it's through the process of making a referral and a request of the board to support something that we might have missed or something that's new that we want to recognize. So that flexibility is there. And that's really important to me.

If I may, through the chair. That flexibility is there. You would bring a referral. And that referral would be voted on by the board. A majority vote would be required. And ideally, part of that referral, you would make a note of when you wanted that proclamation to come back.

Perfect. And I the benefit of having this list, if you will, blessed or approved in advance. It gives staff that at least staff knows what's coming. And then we can add or have that flexibility to add if we want. And we have the support to do so. So I think this supports the staff and it still allows flexibility for us to respond to community recognitions, whether it be Eagle Scouts or retirements or others. So I'm fine with it. Thank you.

SPEAKER Okay, very good. I want to ask a follow-up question on that same subject, actually, which is how much lead time does staff need to get things in order? Because I ran into that recently myself. So how much lead time would you like us to give you?

JACK Supervisor, I think it depends. If I could ask the clerk to indicate how often she typically likes, I think it depends on the topic at issue. If it requires coordination of a lot of members of the community to come in, more lead time is preferred.

Generally, Madam Chair, I would recommend at least a month. At least a month. If you have a big group coming in, maybe a little bit more than that because your board staff has to coordinate everything. I just get to put it on the agenda for you. That's really it. Maybe they would like some more lead time on the bigger ones.

Madam Chair.

Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Clerk Hoskins. You've been waiting. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

GREGORY No, I would just on the clerk's comments, I would say, ideally, best practices, the sooner the better. Obviously, if you make a referral to the meeting before the meeting that you want, we will take care of that and handle it. Best practices, sooner the better. But I would just say that there are several opportunities for you to honor individuals or organizations. Obviously, one is here at this board meeting, and we have just walked through what's required of that.

The second opportunity is for you. You can give out as many you did at, I think, the Wetlands, right? Give out as many you can give out 75, 150 proclamations on your own to any group that you want. And sometimes, I mean, we did that for Black History Month this year. We went to the event. That was very meaningful, I think, at that event. It gives you some flexibility. I would also say during board member announcements and reports, you have the opportunity to really say anything you like. And if there are people that you would like to note and honor during your time on that agenda, you certainly are able to do that.

Thank you. Okay. There's a lot of conversation going on here. So I see Supervisor Cottrell, Ramos, and then Gallagher on the queue. And then counsel, if you're no? Okay.

Thank you, chair. And thank you, Mr. Meiss, for putting this all together. And Ms. Bratton, this is very helpful. A couple questions. So one of the things that we do right now is we get the language for the proclamation before the meeting so that we can read it through. Then we have a vote on that. So will that practice continue?

Yes, that's my understanding. We'll still have the draft proclamation as part of the agenda item. So even though there's electronic signatures ready to go behind the scenes, if a board member ultimately wants to change the language or doesn't support it, we have that opportunity to make those changes that day.

Great, great. Thank you. I think that practice is important because it's one thing to support the general issue, but it's important for us. Words matter, right? So we want to be able to make sure that we can see those going forward. And then on the referral, I think what was just laid out makes a lot of sense that we build in time and there is a board vote on that. I would also just point out that there's a variation too that the board could approve a proclamation that we will all sign and also say, gosh, the month is very busy. Could you please do that off-site? So I think and Mr. Meijs, I guess I don't have the item pulled up, the specific language right now.

But we talked about the fact that the maximum would be three. And the optimal is probably two. Is that baked into this here?

So two questions there. First, it is baked in that the chair can delegate presentation. So the way that I read that is the chair doesn't sign that the chair has the authority to delegate proclamations that are approved by the board. So if the board approves something, but it isn't at a meeting, the chair has the authority to delegate that presentation to an off-site location.

You're doing great, Mr. Mize. I don't mean to I'm complimenting you. You're doing a very good job. Yeah, we work with the chair to delegate meetings, but our practice is about three, ideally two.

We may have four. But I could tell you on this list, there may be opportunities throughout the year with a variety of these different things to maybe a better thing to actually go to an event and make the presentation. And in that case, it would be a presentation of a proclamation that would have your five signatures on it as opposed to you alone doing your own thing. So it may thin out organically because of that any given year. So we will just sort of practice that way.

And in subsequent months and years, your board can always come back to this and tighten it up and do some things to make it something that's a little bit more functional for you.

Yeah. Sorry. If I may, to that end, we don't have a specific number baked into the policy. And that's on purpose because chairs vary, and we don't want to have to come back and change it every year.

Yeah. No, that makes sense. I think I would make the observation that when we do make the time and space for proclamation, it's a very powerful thing. And it's great when we have people come interact. And when we have a lot of them, it dilutes the power of those, right? So we want to make sure that we're making time and also getting on we invite people into this space for a pretty serious agenda, too. So I just want to be cognizant of that as we're having this discussion as well.

All good considerations, yes. Supervisor Ramos?

Thank you. Thank you all for this input. And this is exactly the discussion I wanted to have and I've been wanting to have for years. So I'm going to make a recommendation here for language that there be a section on the agenda under consent for proclamations approved by the board to be presented outside of the board so that we have, for example, bike month. Bike month gets presented at Bike Fest, but we would love to have all five signatures.

So if we add a section in consent that is proclamations approved by the board presented elsewhere where the chair can delegate the presentation of that, that would be great. Another example of that is grower of the year. Interestingly, this is where I think we need to look at the power of our presentation. The chair presents the grower of the year proclamation at the membership meeting of the grape growers, but then it gets done here again. And so we need to look at making sure that the most powerful impact of presentation is there.

I do think that we need to look specifically. I think we need to, one, get to this list and give some inputs on this list. There are some other things missing. But I also think that we need to look at empowering our chair to make the agenda decision as to what's the right amount. I just think that we need to have that courtesy and respect to our chair that our all those that will serve here in this capacity have heard we really don't like more than three.

But, you know, you do what you do you. Beyond that, if we provide that space for consent approval of a proclamation, we meet the Brown Act requirements, we can get all signatures, we see the language, and then someone can present that off-site, I think that's a pretty fair solution to that. Additionally, when

we

through when we look at this list, there are a few spaces where I personally, having been doing this now for nine years, feel like there are certain spaces where we have commissions and committees that are doing the exact work that we're talking about. And I think it is incredibly meaningful for us to meet them where they are at and recognizing that. So for example, like Older Americans Month, not every me not every member of the Commission on Aging is able to come here, but they do attend the meetings. And so that would be very appropriate for that meeting, for the chair to be able to go to the meeting, thank them for the work that they're doing, and present that proclamation. Mental Health Awareness Month, you know, at the Behavioral Health Board to be able to take that on.

And I think that this is where this list we can add to it. And our staff can work with our department heads, I think, to look at what would be most meaningful. I definitely do want to make sure that those proclamations that deal with our own employees are prioritized for presentation at the board. We have Probation Week, Peace Officer Memorial Week, Public Health Week. I think it's important for us to make sure that we prioritize those proclamations here because, as Supervisor Cottrell said, we need to make sure that the power of that delivery is there, that we're valuing our employees.

We do have EMS month that's missing. I do see we have wildfire preparedness month, but there is also fire prevention month, I think, we've done in October as well. So, that coincides, I believe, with the the Great Chicago Fire. So just for us to really look at this list, I don't think this is as has been said to us, it's not set in stone. But it's an opportunity for us to opine our values and include them here.

And I think our department heads should likewise have a say in this. But I do want to just put that out there. If we can prioritize presenting these in the most impactful places, which is not always a board meeting where no public is currently attending.

Okay. Thank you. Supervisor Gallagher.

Just wanted to add a few more. And just remembering that not everything is going to come before us, so not trying to make the meetings longer. But just to have them there, and they're approved so they can be given wherever they are. Thank you, Supervisor Ramos, for mentioning EMS Week, Earth Month in April, and also National Community Planning Month in October.

Okay. Thank you, Supervisor Gallagher. And let's see, where are we? Gallagher and then we're at Vice Chair Alessio. Go ahead.

Thank you. Really getting in the weeds here. My biggest concern is, too. One year under my belt as a county supervisor, I know that our board aides work really hard on these with the help of our public information officer and communications team. We haven't heard from them.

I don't know if Holly or Leah Leah's been mentoring. She's the board aide for Supervisor Cottrell. She's been mentoring my board aide, Victoria. So I don't know if you have anything you want to add, or Holly, you want to add to this discussion. But this is a moment because we're about to make some decisions here. I want to make sure we hear from everybody, especially those who are actually doing the work.

Thank you, Supervisor Alessio. Chair Manfrey, members of the board, Leah Doyle Stevens. As mentioned, I am a board aide for District 3. I've also been working here in this county for nearly six years. I've been the lead aide on proclamations and commendations. I was actually responsible for the redesign and the add of the five signatures. And when I came on, it was a very simple 11 and a half by eight document that was not consistent at all. The county logo was stretched, squeezed. It was just kind of a mess. So in my time here, it was something that I was very proud of to kind of unify it, to make it very consistent month to month.

This list that you see here, I actually put together. This list is based on five and onetwo years of experience in the proclamations that are requested of this board. And as mentioned, not everything is up here. Not all proclamations and commendations are actually asked of this board. So if you don't see it here, and maybe it used to be here, it's because that entity no longer wanted it, such as EMS Week.

We've had a couple of others. So this list is, as I said, not completely comprehensive. But for the most part, it's organizations that want to be here and organizations that the members of this board also have wanted to recognize. In terms of the proclamations and commendations presented outside of this board, those are typically requested of organizations or individual parties. In my time here, I created the I didn't personally. The commendation was a thing in other jurisdictions. I brought it here. It looks just like the proclamation. However, it's less formal. That can be signed by all five members or just one.

And those are for when supervisors will go out to events and choose to recognize the individuals who are doing the work there. To Supervisor Ramos's point, yes, individual supervisors can prepare and present proclamations on their own. And I have a specific wording for that, where it is not on behalf of the board, but rather on behalf of the supervisor representing the district. So there is quite a bit of strategy here that's been put in over the last six years, at least in my experience. So this isn't something that's kind of been willy nilly. A lot of thought and a lot of attention goes to these.

May I ask a question real quick? A follow-up question?

Yes.

How much time do you since you're doing a lot of the legwork here, how much lead time do you like to know?

Thank you. That's a really important question. We technically only need two weeks to get it on the agenda. However, a lot of commendations and proclamations don't make it to the agenda. It's more important that we do them out at the event.

And there are, as I mentioned, there are quite a few that are not on this list that we know that we do annually, or one supervisor takes the lead because it's a priority area of theirs. So, in terms of getting it on the agenda, we'd like to have it in advance. I know that the clerk team puts a lot of time and effort in curating their agendas, but if there are not already three, which has been the past preference of the chair, then technically only two weeks. But if an organization or individual wanted to be sure that it were to get on the agenda on a certain date, the sooner the better.

If there are annual proclamations and they come back, do you basically take the year before, the proclamation was the year before, and kind of update and tweak it, but you have kind of template and majority of the wording done?

Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. It really depends on the organization and the work that they're doing. There are some that it is kind of recycled language, updated numbers, updated entities that they work with. But a lot of work goes into these and sometimes they are rewritten fresh for the year. Sometimes they're recycled language.

I have to say I'm very impressed. I'm always glad that I didn't have to write that because it's very well done. So thank you for your work and the work as staff, the time and effort that you put into the proclamations.

Thank you.

For me, the key word really here is flexibility. I feel like we're coming with so many things that we need to do and so forth. We're boxing ourselves into a corner. And I want to make sure we have flexibility, that the chair has some flexibility. So I don't want us to overthink this or overbake this. I understand the premise to try to simplify it. And so I'm supportive of simplifying without boxing us in and making it so restrictive. We lose that flexibility and aren't able to meet the moment when the moment shows up.

And I think it's really important to keep in mind that the groups and individuals and entities that come here, this is really their five minutes. This is really, really important to them for a year long work or projects that they've done for decades. This is their kind of opportunity to be publicly recognized and I think it's maybe more meaningful than we remember when we do them over and over.

I completely agree. And on the behavioral health board that I'm on, this is the biggest thing of the year. I mean, we have so many committees. When we do a proclamation for them, I know that board specifically, it means a tremendous amount in terms of their recognition of their service and work. So thank you. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. So I could use a little guidance on how we're moving forward with this list because I've heard requests from a couple of people on the board here for additions. I've also heard some conversation about there's a reason why the list is the way it is. So are we voting to approve this list right now? Do we need to amend it if there's going to be changes? What's happening with this list?

Well, supervisor, I've written down the changes with the exception of EMS week because I'm not sure, I don't know that it was mentioned when that is. I've got the list. We can approve it with the additions. I can read those out into the record and we can approve it with the additions. There is a risk that Mr.

Stevens mentioned, could this is just a pre approval. So we need not actually present them. Some of them may not be presented, but we can have the list preapproved so that it doesn't need to come back before the board. And I think that would be in the interest of efficiency. So if you'd like, I'm happy to read the additions into the record.

Yes, please. Go ahead.

Okay. Additions. For February, we've added Black History Month. For March we've added Women's History Month, for April we've added Earth Month, for May we've added Bike Month, for September we've added Library Card Sign Up Month, For October we've added fire protection month and national community planning month. We have an EMS week two but I'm not sure when that is.

Okay. And for

May? May. For May, we've added EMS month as well.

For clarification, I heard fire prevention month. Is it prevention or is it preparedness? Preparedness?

I wrote down Fire Prevention Month because it's related to the Chicago Fire, which would be

Okay, great. Then Sam, I heard National Community Preparedness Month, not Planning Month. But was it planning or preparing? Planning? Okay, it's planning. Thank you. Okay. I really want to make sure before we

We can make it approved as fire preparedness and prevention month.

Then we have a preparedness month Okay, in

great. Thank you.

Madam Chair, if I May, I'm hearing from Leah back there that in California, it's preparedness month. Okay. Fire preparedness month. Is that right? Okay. Thank you, Leah. I just want to put that on the record so we get this list right the first time.

Yeah, I would like to get it right the first time. So any Googling that needs to happen.

If I may, I understand preparedness month to be an all hazards month, not just fire. So it is flood, it is high winds.

See Ms. Soil Stevens nodding emphatically.

And then there is a specific additional request that was made for, it sounds like more of a domestic fire prevention, so residential fires, that sort of thing. And that coincided with the Great Chicago Fire anniversary, I think, in October.

Okay.

Thank you. Do we have enough clarity around that? Yeah?

Yes. Thank you.

Okay. Well, I really appreciate all of staff's work and for this lively discussion on an item I did not realize would have such. Oh, yeah, go ahead. Supervisor Gallagher,

go I just wanted to reflect back on what something Supervisor Ramos said. I think it would be good. Let's go ahead and approve the list, but then ask the department heads for anything additional. And then maybe we can just bring them back and add them. I think that would be helpful.

Okay. I'm Okay with that. And I also just want to just say out loud, I support the additions suggested by that have been suggested and that the language suggested by Supervisor Ramos on five signatures needed for off-site presentations. I really appreciate how you suggested rephrasing that. So thank you. Okay. So with that, we already did public comment, right? Yes. Okay, great. So I will ask for a motion to approve the resolution and adopt the list of proclamations as amended for 2026.

With all the additional instructions that we have given to Mr. Mize, I make that motion.

I'll second that. Okay. So motion by Supervisor Ramos, second by Supervisor Cottrell. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right. That motion passes unanimously. Thank you very much. All right. Item 8c, I welcome oh, I want to check-in on the time. Are people Okay continuing on right now without a break? I'm not seeing anybody. Okay. So yes, Director Yasmota, I welcome you to join us for a presentation item 8c on the Health and Human Services Agency, Be Well Mobile Services program and how that's going. Whenever you're ready.

Morning. Jennifer Yasmato, Health and Human Services Agency Director. And I'm pleased to be joined here with Casey Rockwood. He's a Health and Human Services Management Analyst, and we are really excited to be before you today. Thank you for the time.

As your board knows, we launched Be Well Mobile Services on we had ribbon cutting, and you were all there on 09/29/2025. And although it's been four months, we thought it would be a nice thing to bring a presentation for your board. We actually had an all staff Health and Human Services Agency meeting, and we did a variation of this presentation. And it was, to say, heartwarming and uplifting probably is an understatement. We know there's a lot happening right now directed at the safety net that is regressive, regressive.

And we want to highlight things that we are doing to counterbalance that and be progressive and show how that we're caring for our community by increasing access to foundational benefits and services in a person centered, equitable, and thoughtful way meeting people where they are. As your board knows, over the years, health and human services has increased, the extent to which we're embedded in various locations throughout the county, from Up Valley to down in American Canyon, nested with family resource centers, and also in many of our partner locations from probation to law enforcement, etcetera. B Well Mobile Services is a really good example of partnerships and also the really hard work of staff. And I think through the presentation, you will see it literally takes a village to operationalize this, but also really proud of the way in which we're working in a truly integrated way. Somebody made a point earlier in this meeting around working in silos versus working integratively, and Health and Human Services is definitely leveraging our status as a super agency.

So with that said, I'm going to turn it over to Casey, and he's going to walk you through our presentation that includes a really lovely video, too.

Thank you, Jennifer, and thank you, Chair Manfred and the Board. Be Well Mobile Services was inspired to meet the challenges of NAPA's unique geography and to increase access to health and human service programs by meeting people where they are at. Core HHSA services are provided out of our 34 foot mobile office delivered by bilingual staff from across our programs. Be Well became a natural name for the program linking to HHS's Be Well newsletter and to our mission to serve our community and support its health and well-being. HHS AB Well Mobile Services advances several HHSA strategic plan goals and objectives, particularly related to place based services and increasing access, as well as objectives from our Aligned Community Health improvement plan that focus on serving undocumented individuals and mixed status households.

Clicker.

So

to develop the programming and service locations for Be Well, our team engaged community based partners through our Live Healthy Napa County forum. We developed a subcommittee of community partners to seek input on program design and location development. We met with other mobile service providers in the community to get an idea of best practices for operating a mobile program. We looked at our data to see where our clients are residing and where best we can reach them and through this input from our partners and through our data we are currently at seven different recurring locations. This doesn't include one off events we might get invited to and be present at But we are at seven regularly occurring locations.

In many of these locations, we partner with trusted messengers and other service providers to maximize reach and impact. For example, at St. Thomas, we're co located with Puerta Saviertas and St. Adventist Hospital Foundation for their food distribution event, reaching a predominantly Spanish speaking population. We are at two permanent supported housing facilities operated by Abode, Heritage House and Valley Lodge Apartments.

We're co located there with Olay Mobile Health Clinic as well. We partnered with Up Valley Family Centers during their holiday assistance distribution at the Calistoga Community Center and we're looking to partner with Canvi at a food distribution site in American Canyon in March. In February, at February 20, we'll be at Crosswalk Church and at St. Thomas, also adding the flu clinics to those locations and from there on out. At each location we operate really as a mini HHSA so anything that you can access at one of our campuses, South Campus or at CSOA you can access at our B Well mobile office.

We have staff there that connect you with Medi Cal, EBT cards, CalFresh, CalWorks. We have behavioral health staff on board doing outreach and screening and connecting people to access but we also have the ability to remotely to connect people to any one of our lobbies in case we don't have staff directly there providing a service. They have and can connect through telehealth to one of our lobby locations. Here's a snapshot of our services that we provided since opening September 29 so through February 3. We have reached 120 people.

We've done 36 events. You can see that we are reaching a high percentage of our Spanish speaking and Latino population. We're able to reach a much higher proportion of this population through our Be Well mobile services than we are at our campus locations and so we're really meeting that desire to meet our most vulnerable populations where they are at. We also have incorporated client feedback on board so and happy to report that our clients are very satisfied with the services they're receiving. They're finding our locations convenient.

We are able to connect them and help them with the services that they are reaching and we are very close to a five star rating. So I want to share a short video that we've prepared here just to kind of give you an idea of the impact of our program.

HHSA Be Well Mobile Services brings Napa County Health and Human Services programs directly into neighborhoods and community gathering places across the county, reducing barriers and expanding access to health and well-being.

Growing up, I would see my mom struggle to find reliable transportation. So being part of this project and having the opportunity to be out in the community, reaching all those people that truly do need our services is extremely rewarding.

My family, we've grown up here and just being a part of this community and receiving just that extra little push that you need to be able to meet your basic needs and be able to create a healthy and fulfilling life. It's made all of the difference and I feel like that should be shared. Don't know Napa has something special and I'm so happy that I get to share it.

Through Be Well Mobile Services, HHS a bilingual staff help residents access many of the same services available at County offices right in the community.

So what we are we're available here for you for services in which if you want it or need to apply or just get information general information about general assistance public assistance will be Medi Cal, Cal Fresh, Cal Works, general assistance, that we are able to refer you to mental health services. We have the eligibility worker inside. They can process and accept application at any time when you're willing to apply for the service. If you just want to walk by and say hello and get that information we're here for you.

For many residents BUL mobile services is their first connection to help.

So this is the second time I see it, and I was wondering what it is. I wonder if they can help me. I was almost about to lose my my EBT money for next month, so I believe they were able to help me. I believe they are approachable. They're trying to help me, and I think it's it's good for me to find so I don't have to go anywhere else. So it was easy for me just to come here and have this on-site. I would encourage for

you to come, you know, all of the people that are here. It's not always the same group of people, but whoever is here is more than willing to help and answer questions. Don't feel like you have to provide information first. You can always come in and inquire. You can always come in and ask questions. We'll answer anything that you have questions about. We have a whole bunch of flyers. We have our website. We'll help you how to navigate it. It is accessible in multiple languages. We'll provide all of the information you need. You don't have to provide anything to us.

Yeah.

It's we're here with open arms, and we're here to help to the extent that you allow us to.

By meeting people where they are, HHSA BeWell mobile services reduces barriers, strengthens trust, and expands access to critical safety net services across Napa County. Services are available at multiple locations countywide, including 3rd And Coombs in Downtown Napa every Monday. Visit our website for the full schedule.

Thank you. That was lovely. Here is there

Just to acknowledge, so it obviously, it takes an entire team of staff to make all this happen. I had a just an acknowledgment slide that takes it from our from our program staffing, delivering actual services to the drivers, to the setup team, to our data collection team, communications. It just takes a lot to put this together. I want to acknowledge all the staff that that make that happen. On behalf of director Yasmin, I also want to acknowledge our county partners, director Letter and deputy director Sharp at public works.

Director Reagan and the communications team at ITS, Mark Witzo and Catherine Bales at the airport for helping us with a parking solution, and of course the board for supporting this innovative effort ensuring continued and increased access to critical safety net services for for all Napa County residents.

Just

in closing, we know that there are many requirements that are coming for staying and retaining and benefits and programs. And so the timing of bringing Vuel mobile services online, I think, could not come at a better time. And we continue to get the word out. So the marketing piece, we're canvassing neighborhoods in the days beforehand and have been really appreciated of your board and your newsletters and getting the word out through your reach, because marketing still is and getting people to know where we are remains an ongoing challenge. But through videos and outreach and social media, we are doing our very best.

And as in the first four months in the launch, and we as we add locations, again, using data to source the most ideal locations. This is sort of one of our anecdotes to the times that we're living in right now. So thank you very much.

Okay. Thank you. I will go to public comment and then bring it back to the board for discussion. Are there any public comments on this item? I don't see any in the room. Is there anyone on the phones? No? Okay. Then I welcome my colleagues to comment. I see Supervisor Cottrell followed by Supervisor Gallagher.

Thank you, Chair, and thanks to you both for the presentation and for the whole team for the video. And just you anticipated my question which is about locations. And, you know, it's a balance between consistency, right? We'll always be here. And then also optimizing the place.

So how do you give yourself an on ramp to say, course, when you first open the doors in a new location, you're not going to have the same traffic? And then the second part of that is how, again, can we support you in that? Is it helpful to actually list dates and times? And so that we can start to drill down on it will always be the second Thursday, you can always see. So any thoughts on those topics would be great.

Yeah. So on the first one, one of the reasons for being really rigorous in our data collection at the front end is to really look at the locations that we have started. And are those locations ultimately the best locations? And so we're going to have to have a period of time, we think at least six to twelve months, where we're at a location to really know and also weather dependent. We're in the middle of winter right now.

People are just maybe not out and about as much, so I think we do need to really look at, and that's why we're tracking it by location as well, and also using data to go to places where we know we have a concentration of clients and also location. So Walmart was a new location that we sourced. Obviously, people don't live at Walmart, but they're going to Walmart. So it's a combination of where people reside, but also where they normally exist in their day to day lives. So the team's being really thoughtful about that, because we know we can't be everywhere all the time.

It takes at least an hour and a half to two hours just to mob and demob the vehicle, so we have to sort of make our our bang for our buck. And then we keep a live calendar. It is always available online. It is regularly updated as we add locations, but we're not taking down existing locations so that the public can always find it. We have it in flyers. We have QR codes that will launch to the schedule. Is there anything you wanted to add, Casey?

No, I think. Okay.

Great. And just one follow-up question. When you're doing that survey asking people about the services, great, that's amazing, a 4.8. But can you embed a question in that gives you some feedback about the location? Because again, it's where you are that's better than not being anywhere. But I'm wondering too, I bet we'll learn some things we didn't know, right? Like, oh, this location is handy because it's near a school. Actually, at this location, I don't feel so comfortable, or things like that. I don't know how we tease that stuff out.

Yeah, I think we've developed a survey and can obviously add data fields to it to have open ended text for, by the way, something else we just haven't thought about or a location that you think would be great. And then we're getting direct client feedback.

Thank you, Supervisor Cottrell. Supervisor Gallagher. And then Alessio.

Thank you. Thank you so much for the presentation. The video was great. So great to hear from real people we're serving and see that we're actually having that great impact and how important it is to go where people are. Thank you for reminding me of the live calendar. I think we can probably help by taking a look at that each day and maybe promoting through our social media, here's where we are today. You guys probably already do that. We could probably repost. So that's a good reminder. Do you census data in thinking ahead about where you might want to go in terms of places in the community, neighborhoods?

Yes.

Okay. I mean, I thought you did. And if there's time and there's a way to let us know if something's coming up in our district, I think that's great because then we can help promote that within the neighborhoods where we are and where we represent and do maybe a little extra outreach in those areas.

That would be great. Thank you so much for amplifying and honing in on just the messaging we need.

Okay, thank you. Vice Chair Alessio and then Supervisor Ramos.

Thank you, Director Yasmato and Casey Rockwood. Congratulations on the continued expansion and touch you're making in the community. Looking at your strategic design, I love the words increase access. As we know, access is such a key area, especially when it comes to health, right? Expand, reduce barriers, enhance language access, creating welcoming spaces, inclusitivity thank you, I can say it and belonging.

I mean, those are great parameters in terms of how we're going to reach and meet these folks. We know that intervention and prevention is best practice. It hopefully meets people where they're at in terms of human dignity. And it really prevents real serious critical situations, whether it be behavioral health issues or physical health issues, to get much bigger to the point of there may not be a return to that. So what you're doing cannot be understated.

I was happy to see the Queen's Children's Mobile Unit because they've been doing this for a long time. And they've already vetted and figured out where families are with children that are low income, that are underserved, and that need access to health. And oftentimes, it's not just the children, it's the family. So continue to talk to them and get the data back in terms of what they're doing. I have a couple ideas, but they can tell you.

My information is probably dated at this point. I do want to ask you about Do you have or have you thought about having kind of a confidential community hotline? Like where people can call you while you're out in the field. You may not be in their neighborhood, but where they can reach you. We do enough advertising so you know, then you can do we have that?

Because we you know, having a hub, I mean, what brought me to mind is the, testimony about her mom didn't have transportation. And we know that transportation, having a hub for people to know how to get transportation, is really important. But you're a hub of all health and those areas. The biggest thing, which seems so simple because we're in this work and I've been in the nonprofit area field since 2008. And so I have just the knowledge of being it for so long, very few people really even know where to start and where to go is a very daunting, overwhelming kind of question that people have.

So I'm wondering if there's, you know, of course there's a calendar, but is there a phone line or something that they can reach to get directed?

So I think there's two things. One, if you're at BUIL Mobile Services, obviously we can't shove 100 programs into the vehicle. But as Casey had indicated, if you come up to the vehicle and it's not a service that there's a person who can directly connect you and serve you right then and there, we do have the capability because it's sort of hardwired with computers that patch into different lobbies so we can have a virtual experience. So that's the great thing about the vehicle. You come there, you can be patched into any of the locations and lobbies and navigators too that will help connect you to what you need, whether it's something we provide or something that a community based organization provides.

So that's one piece. The other piece is we do have system navigators, and we developed a flyer that I think I shared with one board member recently that are system navigators who are really knowledgeable about all the resources in the community, and they will help anybody and navigate you. So that would be it's not a hotline, but it is a resource that's just sort of baked into what we provide to our community.

Okay. I'm just going to say I do think that having a central line or a hub would be great in terms of where to direct people, most likely to nonprofits, whether it be the emergency, the domestic shelter, or Koch Family Center. Because again, we've been in this so long that there are folks who are in this community. They have no idea where to start. And there's no one place for them to go to other than nine eleven.

I mean, people know about 911, but they don't want to call 911 if they have a hungry baby or they've got an issue. You know what I mean? So anyways, just a thought not to add that on to you because I know this is a big lift already, and I want to congratulate you on this. And thank you for also the reminder of adding it to my newsletter and social media. In terms of other outreach, have you worked with Can Do with their food bags, the food bank, and the Salvation Army in terms of getting the flyers out or information out to those folks that they serve?

We have engaged with all of our so the good thing about how we've gone about this is we've engaged with all of the partners who are part of Link and also partners that we've met with specifically in implementing and launching Be Well Mobile Services. So I think we pretty well canvassed, and all of our partners know We have flyers available as well, QR codes. So I think it's a matter of getting of the word out to the individuals that we're trying to reach and also to our existing clients. Because one of the things you probably noticed there, you can apply for CalFresh and get your EBT card right on prem. Wow. There is an EBT technology that we've installed.

Yeah, that's amazing. Thank you again. And again, Link, I want to say it's living healthy Napa County. So for people, that's a great place to go to. Thank you very much. Congratulations.

Thank you. Supervisor Ramos?

Thank you. I will just say I appreciate the vision that this all started with was exactly what was repeated back in the video, and that is that we meet people where they're at. And I think that that's incredibly important to what our responsibility is here at the county. So thank you.

Okay. Wonderful. Yeah, I'll just add that this was an incredibly helpful update. I really appreciate that you're proactively coming to us with updates and we're not necessarily having to do referrals to find out what's going on with our program. So thank you so much for bringing this to us today and also for bringing this incredibly meaningful improvement to the level of service we can provide in the county. Wonderful.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, so we will move on to item eight oh, no, nine. We're out of yes. Okay, we're moving on to item 9A, public hearings, adopt an ordinance consider the adoption of an ordinance amending water conservation regulations for landscape design. And I welcome a presentation by planning staff, Emily Hedge. And you. Yes. So go ahead whenever you're ready.

Good morning, Chair and Supervisors. Emily Hedge presenting. Today, I will go through a brief introduction to the state requirements, a little background on the current county code, followed by what we are proposing in the text amendment, and then the Planning Commission recommendation you received, and the actions for you to take today. The California Department of Water Resources, DWR, has a state model water efficient landscape ordinance, often referred to as the MWELO. It is a statewide water efficiency regulation for new development and retrofitted landscapes.

It applies to development projects that require a building permit, plan check, or design review. It provides a model for local agencies to enforce minimum standards related to landscape design efficiency and water use. All local agencies must adopt, implement, or enforce the MWELO or a local WELO that is at least as efficient. In 1992, the supervisors adopted ordinance number ten twenty nine, which added Napa County Code chapter 18.118, the water conservation Regulations for Landscape Design. This local program was implemented through the landscape guidelines, which was adopted by resolution at the same time.

County code and the landscape guidelines have not been amended since 1992. But during that time, DWR has amended portions of the state MWELO in 02/2015, and most recently in January. Since the county code hasn't been updated, there are portions that are no longer as efficient as the MWELO. In order to comply with the state standards, county staff currently directs people to use the MWELO as opposed to the specifics that are listed in county code.

The

proposed ordinance, you have in Attachment A, a red lined version, shows the recommended edits. And proposed B is the clean version, which shows the final ordinance, should it be adopted. The primary proposed change is to include direct reference to the state M. Wheelo, which is found in the County Code of Regulations. This will ensure continued compliance with state standards.

The direct reference ensures that we don't become inconsistent with state standards, and we also do not have to return for these zoning text amendment changes in the future. This also results in a more concise code section because a number of the individual lists that are currently in the code and the guidelines are replaced by the direct reference to the MWELO, which has that same information. Additionally, the standardized document simplifies the review process for staff and our annual reporting. Under review for the California Environmental Quality Act, the proposed action is categorically exempt under class eight, actions by regulatory agencies for the protection of the environment, and also under the general rule. At the Planning Commission hearing on December 17, the commission considered the item and recommended that the Board of Supervisors adopt the proposed revisions.

Today, staff's recommendation to you is to find the proposed amendments categorically exempt from CEQA and to adopt the ordinance amending chapter 18.118. And this will also repeal the landscape guidelines which were adopted under that separate ordinance because that information and direction is also included in the MLE law. And that concludes my presentation.

Okay. Thank you so much. I welcome any public comment on this item at this time. I don't see anyone in the room. Is there anyone on the phone? No? Okay. Then I will close the public hearing and ask for any board questions about this item. Oh, and noting that this item did have a correction memo. Thank you. Yeah. Oh, Supervisor Alessio and then Supervisor Cottrell.

Thank you for this update. I appreciate it and the work that goes into this. At the Planning Commission meeting, happened, like you said, happened, I think you said, in October. Was that a five-zero unanimous vote by the Planning Commissioners? And did any of them have any comments or input or changes that you recall?

It was five-zero and they did not recommend any changes to what we had proposed.

Perfect. Thank you.

Okay. Supervisor Cottrell?

Thank you. Thanks for the presentation and the update. This makes a lot of sense to me that it's making for more efficient ordinance language too. And then when there are changes, they can happen. You know, we don't have to do a text amendment as you pointed out.

I have a question more about the fact that this is triggered when someone walks in the door for a building permit for the list of things that they need from the county. Can you tell us a little bit how we're tracking the properties that aren't walking in for that? Do we have any education outreach? If there are helpful conservation updates in the MWELO, how can we get those out to the general public too?

So if a building permit were to come in and show landscaping which triggers the requirements of it, then we would ask for a landscaping plan and ask for the WILO documentation to go with it. In our permit tracking system, we note the projects that have a WILO document associated with it and we collect the data on the square footage for that. And then annually, we report a total of the number of building permits that had this associated landscape plan and also the total square footage or acreage that was completed.

Thanks. Let me try to ask the question in another way. What I'm interested in hearing about are the properties. We have a lot of properties out there that are not knocking on the door to get a building permit, so may not be going through the exercise here. So I'm asking a question that's kind of outside the four corners of this ordinance language, but about how the department is or how we as a county can educate folks about water efficient landscaping, perhaps using this as a guide. It's not required, right? But we're all working for water conservation. So just interested in that topic.

When we do have discretionary projects that come in through planning and there's landscaping involved, we have the opportunity at that time to share with them. And depending on what it is, it would be required to meet the WELO. So at that point, you know, that requirement is provided to them. The state has a number of it includes formulas and calculations and water data. It has sort of best quality, you know, standards.

So all of that information is in their calculations and what they present. So as I said, currently, we direct people to use that. And we're always supportive of, like you said, water conservation. Don't think we currently have any sort of active practice of presenting that information. But if a project comes in that meets the requirements of it, then we would direct people to that.

Got it. Thank you. Okay.

Thank you. I don't see any other comments from the board. So I would ask for a motion to adopt an ordinance of the Napa County Board of Supervisors, State of California, amending chapter 18.118, water conservation regulations for landscape design of title 18 zoning of the Napa County code to achieve consistency with the California code of regulations title 23 division two chapter 2.7 model efficient model water efficient landscape ordinance and repeal in its entirety resolution number 92 dash one six one Establishing the Existing Water Conservation in Landscape Guidelines.

So moved.

Second. Moved by Vice Chair Alessio, seconded by Cottrell. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Nay, that passes unanimously. Thank you so much for your presentation. And I'm glad to know that we have aligned our policies. That's great. So very good.

Our next that concludes the public hearing section of our meeting today. And our next item is closed session. And we'll be taking up items 10A and 10B in closed session and with the note that we have dropped the third case in item 10A from our agenda today and will not be discussing it in closed session. And we will return after closed session for a report out. I would like to recess to closed session at this time.

Thank you. We have returned from closed session. And before we adjourn, I would like to ask County Council to report out.

Thank you, Chair Manfrey. The Board met in closed session this morning under item 10A. Name a case of Napa County versus Hoops Family Winery Partners. There's no reportable action. The board also met today in closed session under the name of the case Hoops Vineyard LLC at All versus County of Napa.

There's no reportable action. The board did not meet today on the third case under 10A. The Board also met in closed session today under 10B, public employee discipline, dispenser release, pursuant to government code section 54,957. There is no reportable action.

Thank you, counsel. We will now adjourn to the next Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday, 03/10/2026 at I didn't have my mic on.