Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

I think I'm ready. Good morning, everybody. We're about to start this meeting today. Just as a reminder, it's July 28th. We're starting at 9 a.m. Roll call, please.

Supervisor Ramos? Sure. Supervisor Gallagher? Supervisor Patel? Here. Supervisor Manfred is absent today. Excused. Excuse me. Chair Alessio?

Here. Okay. We'll have our public works director, Steve Letter. Oh, he sat down. He's going to ask you to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you for that. And now our favorite part, and this is the pet of the week. And we're going to meet Sophie today. So Sophie, come on down. We have a happy dog here looking for a happy home. Would you like to tell us about Sophie?

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. I'm Megan with the Napa County Animal Shelter, and today we have Sophie. She is a six-year-old pit bull, pit bull mix, we think. She is such a good girl. She loves everyone she meets. She's great with other dogs of all sizes, and she especially loves water. We cannot get her out of the kiddie pool. She's pretty particular with her treats. We're learning this morning, but she doesn't mind a nice sampling. So all of her adoption fees are waived this week. She is spayed. She's vaccinated. She's microchipped and she's looking for a great home. So spread the word. Thank you so much.

And what is your name? Megan. Megan. Thank you, Megan, for bringing in Sophie. She's really sweet. Got a big smile on her face. And I'll tell you, I had a pit bull in my past. It was one of the sweetest dogs ever. Really personable, really loving. So, all right. Let's find Sophie home, everybody. Thank you, Megan.

Thank you, ma'am.

Okay, we love that part. Moving on to approval, proclamations, commendations, which we don't have any for this meeting. So we're going to move on to the consent calendar, which includes special districts. This is item A through AK that the CEO has requested we drop 5J from the consent calendar. So we'll omit that. Do we have any board comments or items to pull from the consent calendar from our board members? I'm not seeing anybody and I don't know of anything being pulled. Very good. Does anyone wish to make a public comment in person on any of these items excluding 5J? Okay. All right. Not seeing any there. So can I have a vote, have a motion and a second to approve our consent calendar items A through AK minus 5J. I'll go ahead and make that motion.

Okay.

We have a motion by Ramos. I'll second it. Second by Cottrell. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. That was unanimous. Thank you very much. Let's see here. Moving on. to public comment. Now we'll take public comment for anyone wishing to speak on items not on the agenda today. Let's start with a phone. Is there anyone on the phone? No, or Zoom? No, okay. Anybody here in the board who would like to make a public comment on any item, please come up to the microphone, up to the stand here. You have three minutes. Okay. Okay. And this is for anything that's not on the agenda. Perfect.

If you don't mind stating your name first. Evan Blassingate. Good morning. Good morning. This will be a lot less than three minutes. Knoxville Road needs fixing. I wonder when's the last time any of you have personally driven Knoxville Road? It's fire season. It needs to be passable by emergency vehicles. That's access to wilderness area for the people of Napa and the North Bay. please drive it before you decide on it because it really needs work. Thank you.

Thank you for your public comment. Anybody else? Okay. Very good. Moving on to board supervisor reports and announcements. Do we have any board reports or announcements? Supervisor Kutrop?

I have one.

Okay. Supervisor Ramos. Okay. Thank you so much. I just wanted to start. I didn't want to pull it aside, but I just wanted to start for my colleagues and to elevate that on our consent item, Measure T, we accepted a sea level rise planning grant, which is incredibly important for the South County and in particular American Canyon and wrapping around and touching those portions of the city of Napa and Stanley Lane. So Um, uh, just thank, thank you to our PBS department for being on the lookout and being the, um, that catch all department that, uh, took this one on for the team. I really do appreciate that. Um, next, I, uh, you know, the public commenter, I just want to say, acknowledge, um, I have driven Knoxville Road. I do not disagree with you. I don't need to drive it again to know that it is a concern. We have raised this before. And I would hope that when given the opportunity, our public works director can highlight what the plans are on Knoxville Road. We already have had some fire incidents out there that do bear attention to the road so that we can have access to the area. The required meetings I need to tell you about are on June 24th. I attended MTC with Supervisor Manfrey and important for we had our regular set of all the meetings for the budgets. We had our BAFA meeting, our MTC meeting, our BATA, our BAFA, our SAFE, our BAFA and our BAHA meetings. Safe is all these funny, funny names, but safe is actually, I think everyone's like, what is safe? We deal with it one time of year. Safe are those tow trucks that are white and that help keep you moving on the roadways. And they are funded through toll revenue and through MTC. So that is the safe acronym. In regards to MTC, one of the things that we did is we approved $8 million in priority conservation area grants, which $440,000 went to RCD here for climate readiness and planning in the resilient Susco Creek. So money coming back. to Napa County. Also, we had a special MTC meeting this last Friday. Again, with Supervisor Manfrey, we placed on the ballot of five counties. So the North Bay is excluded. So no Marin, Sonoma, Solano, or Napa, but we are still voting members of the newly formed district to put on the ballot the Connect Bay Area Transit Initiative. And it is calling for a consolidated special election that is going to fund public transit and rider experience improvements as well, of which we will actually have a benefit of. But the sales tax will not be on the ballot for consideration in this county. And also what I wanted to to highlight is that we have another national we have National Night Out everywhere. And American Canyon has neighborhood parties, which is actually kind of cool. And I just want to say we were the first ones. And the sheriff's office is going to go ahead and have National Night Out at Napa Valley College at Napa. Now Valley College is from 4 to 7. National Night Out in American Canyon, it's from 6 to 8. And the city has the list of publicly open locations for National Night Out. Our next Meet Me in the Street is going to be from 5 to 8 on August 12th. And I invite you to come on down because we'll be celebrating my birthday with Joey Sconchez at our booth. And then I will be entirely consumed over the next week with my kiddos at the Napa Town and Country Fair. The Napa Town and Country Fair opens on Thursday. And the showmanship is for the kids starts on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. My kids are up on Thursday. So good luck getting a hold of me unless it's out in the barn. And on Saturday is the Junior Livestock Auction. And we have a number of great exhibitors, the highest number of animals in a really long time. So please come and support these kids and cheer on their parents and tell their parents that they're almost to the finish line because the parents could use it. Thanks so much. Thank you for all that.

And Supervisor Gallagher?

Then we'll go supervisor control. All right. Thank you. And welcome and good morning, everyone. The meetings that I'm due to report on, we had our back mid board of directors meeting for July. All of the committees have passed their budgets and are in the new year. Napa Solano Area Agency on Aging. We approved new contracts for the fiscal year. We had the Air District Community Equity Health and Justice Committee when there is a lawsuit between the Air District and refineries. Actually, I should say when refineries are making mistakes and they have to pay fees for those mistakes, those funds collect into the millions and millions of dollars. And it's very interesting, but that money is held in a community fund and then granted to those communities that are most impacted and those generally are refinery communities so we're looking at grant applications and basically how we're going to be distributing money to those communities so that has been a lot of what we've been doing and also the Napa Sanitation District Board also met and we are full steam ahead for this next fiscal year as well I wanted to start the conversation of... I think this is going to be a referral for our assistant CEO today of talking a little bit about the budget workshop that's coming up in October and make sure that all of us, if we want to see certain data, that we probably start talking about it now so that we can make sure that our staff has time to get those things together. So I think in addition... to talking about how we're going to set that up. And maybe that's a discussion that each of us have with our CEO and assistant CEO. It's going to be really important that community members understand which portions of the budget for the departments are actually fixed obligations versus where the board has discretion. So... It would be very helpful if the department heads could address three things for their mandated programs. One, what the mandate requires them to provide. Two, how that mandate is funded, i.e. state, federal fee revenue funding. whether it's actually funded or unfunded. And three, where the county braids or matches funding to fully deliver the mandated service, including the size of the county match. I think that this discussion would be really, really helpful to set the stage for understanding discretionary funding. And we have an opportunity to both not just get input from our community at that workshop, but really do some education and And so I think it would be important for us to start thinking about what kind of information we want to see there. And that's it for me. Thank you very much. And Supervisor Cottrell.

Thank you, Chair. And good morning and welcome to our new assistant CEO, Jennifer Palmer. Great to have you in that chair. I'm reporting out this morning in my role as board rep for RCRC and CSAC. I attended the National Association of Counties Conference in New Orleans. I will not talk about the heat or humidity. But other highlights from that event, we had a great presentation from the acting FEMA administrator, Bob Fenton. Mr. Fenton is from California originally and has served as acting administrator many times. So he's a great resource to have in that seat. And I will say he was very engaged and there was a good set of dialogues with different county representatives. And we talked a lot about where FEMA will go, what the responsibilities of FEMA are, and honestly, what responsibilities of counties are as well. And he really stressed the need for counties to be more prepared and resilient, which I think Napa is really on that track. So that's great to hear from that leader. Also at that meeting, I convened a meeting of the Resilient Counties Innovation Council, which I have chaired for the last year. This meeting, we focused on using AI in disaster response and flood and wildfire resilience. We had a great example I thought I would share from Missouri, where an EMS manager uses an AI agent to review data from all departments across the organization on road work, closures, events in the county and puts together a summary for his team and circulates it and can also share that with the board. And I thought about a recent example we had here in Angwin where we had an important road project which closed the road of college graduation, people getting back and forth to school. So if we can use AI to help us kind of map out things that are happening in the community, I think that would be a win. And finally, two more items from there. Sarah Benatar, who is an elected county official from Arizona, won the seat of second vice chair. She was strongly supported by the California contingent, even though we did not vote as a block. And really looking forward to working with her. And I think several of you have met her at at previous NACO events. So excited to have her in the seat. And then I was reappointed to chair the Resilient Counties Council for the year ahead. And they gave me a tiny gavel too, which I think we'll use as a travel gavel up here. And then two more things to report out on. Thank you to my colleagues for reporting out on National Night Out. Tonight, Yountville is hosting its National Night Out 5 to 8 p.m. And then on Thursday, the 30th, St. Helena will be hosting a community program preparedness and public safety event that evening as well. That's all. Thank you.

Excellent. Great report, Alice. I appreciate that. I just have a few things to report out. On MCE Moran Clean Energy, I'm on the board. I'm appointed by this board to be on that board. I also chair the finance committee and I'm on the ad hoc governance committee. There's a lot of changes happening with MCE right now. I think they're good changes. MCE is the first CCA in California. It just celebrated its 16th birthday, and it's kind of going through some changes. And so being the first, again, to face these different changes. So what I want to let you know is that the last meeting, the board did decide to move forward with a CEO search. We have an acting CEO who's our COO. And so that active search is starting. There's also a grand jury report that came out a couple months ago. We've got an ad hoc team working with staff on response to the grand jury report. which is due, I think, September 18th. We have the governance assessment, which we've hired Leading Resources, Inc. And as I said, I'm on that ad hoc committee. Right now, the first step is really to do an assessment and interviews, both with not just board members, but also key stakeholders there. And there are other things happening. There's the tech committee, the executive committee, and uh so it's a very busy agency right now um working on all things but um it's under great leadership we through the finance committee and then just approved through the board um there we um We had, if you will, a surplus of funds from the previous budget of $80 million, which is significant. And that went back into the operating reserve fund. We had withdrawn about $64 million to reduce rates last year that are existing now, about 14% on everybody's rate. So it kind of fed back into that reserve that we pulled funds to reduce rates. So that is the MCE update. I had the pleasure of being with Supervisor Gallagher for a round table that Assemblymember, Majority Leader, Assemblymember Cicely Agar-Currie put together on behavioral health. I thought it was very informative. And then another round table that Sandra Gabaldon convened with Supervisor Cottrell. And, um, that was really around fire prevention, intervention, investments, uh, partnerships. And I thought that was very worthwhile. Um, and I want to, you know, acknowledge that supervisor, you're really an expert in this area. And so thank you for leading that, not just Napa County, but statewide and, and. nationally too, I'm sure. Last on the Napa Valley Transportation Authority, the Oakville roundabout is moving forward so far. So we've got a couple more meetings, but it's looking positive. And just a heads up that for those who have not heard, Starting on August 6th, there's going to be preparation work on closing westbound I-80 over the Carquinez Ridge. And that's going to be a 53-hour work weekend for them. It's just westbound. The prep work starts on the 6th through the 7th, and then it closes the evening of the 7th and stays closed for 53 hours as they redo that deck. So... I can only imagine the detours. And, um, so please share that with, with other folks.

And I think that's, um, that's it for me. Okay. Yes. I did forget three required, um, report outs. You got it. Um, on June 30th, I testified at this, uh, at the Senate hearing for SB 1195, which is a reforming, um, portions of public records and Brown Act as it relates to the definition of what constitutes a person and actual public comment. And that's at the request of Senator Cabaldon. On July 9th, I toured the PG&E Applied Technology Services facility that is actually managed and led by one of my constituents. And I highly encourage you to go and see the work that happens on shutting off the power lines on the EPSS. It is absolutely, when you see it, you understand its value. So I highly encourage you to do that. And from July 13th through July 16th, I attended the National Association of Latino Elected Officials Conference in Los Angeles, which was absolutely amazing. It was absolutely fabulous. And I think much like all of us, a lot of conversations about AI and its integration, which is just that nudging over to staff and referral that our AI policy needs to get here sooner rather than later that I know is being worked on so that we can start really integrating some of these recommendations that are coming our way. Thank you.

Thank you. If anybody out there has heard that this is the hardest working board you've seen, I would say, I think this is the hardest working board we've ever had. So I thank my colleagues for all their hard work and the support of staff for that. And that's with all respect with previous sports. So I'm a little biased. Moving on to item eight, which is really, it would be our consent calendar, any items that were pulled and none were pulled. So we'll bypass item eight and we'll move on to item nine, which is administrative items. 9A is to accept an oral summary and adoption of a resolution. appointing Alexander Alarcon as the director, we call him AJ, it's easier, AJ, as the director of corrections, effective July 28th, 2026, to serve at the will of the board of supervisors. And there'll be a staff report from Jennifer Palmer, our assistant CEO, or it will be our, oh, Christine, okay. It'll be our chief human resources director, Christine Bersaino. We will then have public comment and ask for board questions and then move forward from there. So... I guess, Christine, you're going to start this off.

Yes. Good morning. Good morning, Chair and Board of Supervisors. Government Section Code 23013 authorizes the County Board of Supervisors to establish a local department of corrections to be headed by a board-appointed officer. Government Code Section 54953D3 requires an oral report of a Napa County recommendation for a final action on the salary and fringe benefits of a department head during an open meeting in which the final action is to be taken. Before you today is Alexander Alarcon, who is nominated to be appointed as the Director of Corrections. Mr. Alarcon began full-time employment with Napa County in May of 2008 as the Assistant Juvenile Hall Superintendent. In May of 2020, he was promoted to Assistant Director of Corrections. In September of 2025, former Director of Corrections, Diana Jose, retired and Mr. Alarcon began serving as the Interim Director. The Chief Executive Officer and I, as your Chief Human Resources Officer, recommend that the Board appoint Mr. Alarcon as the County's newest Director of Corrections, effective today, July 28, 2026. Director Alarcon will receive a salary of $233,397, in addition to other fringe benefits outlined in Policy 37C2, the Napa County Management Compensation Plan for Management, non-classified employees. And I'm glad to answer any questions.

Thank you for that. Do we have any questions up here on the board? No questions, no questions. I really just think we have a lot of gratitude, AJ, for the leadership and the hard work you've been doing in the interim. There's been a lot of changes. We have this beautiful facility, but with that comes maybe some growing pains and some things that we learned along the way. And you've really stepped up and really worked hard. So thank you for that. And thank you for, I think, being our next director. Do we have any public comments? I don't see any public comments. Okay. Do we have a motion and a second for this approval? So moved. Okay. We got a motion by Cottrell and a second by

OK, just thanking AJ, but also just, you know, making it very clear to people that this is a really unique position because we are the only state in California where the board actually is overseas corrections rather than the sheriff's office. So, you know, I am looking forward very much. to working really closely with you, AJ. I think that we are in kind of a unique position with you and you working closely with both our CEO, our assistant CEO, and each of us, because we really wanna bring the best possible rehabilitative services to our facility in California. We're in a unique space where we can really dig into programming and look forward to partnering with you to make sure that that happens and that we are outperforming everybody else in that regard. So thanks, and I'll go ahead and second the motion.

Thank you for those comments, too. Okay, so we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Okay, that was unanimous. AJ, do you have anything you want to say? And do you have any family members here we can acknowledge too and maybe take a picture with afterwards?

Yes, thank you. I do have a little something to say, but I do have my folks and my wife in the back today visiting.

There they are.

But I want to say thank you, Madam Chair and members of the board, County Executive Office, Assistant CEO, and other department heads, colleagues, family, and members of our community. I'm deeply honored and humbled by the trust that you have placed in me through this appointment as the Director of Corrections for Napa County. I want to begin by thanking the Board of Supervisors and the County Executive Officer for believing in me. For your confidence in my leadership and for the opportunity to continue serving in the community that has been my professional home throughout the most of my career. I've dedicated my career to Napa County because I believe in this community and the people who serve it. I've had the privilege of working alongside extraordinary professionals who show up every day with integrity, compassion, and the commitment to public service. And I think that's the point that needs to be as public service. We're public service agents. This appointment is not simply a reflection of my journey. It reflects the dedication of every employee who has worked beside me and helped shape the leader that I am today. As Director of Corrections, I believe our responsibility is clear. We must protect public safety while never losing sight of the humanity of those entrusted to our care. Accountability and rehabilitation are not competing values. They are complementary principles. Holding people accountable for their actions while providing meaningful opportunities for change creates safer institutions, stronger families, and a stronger community. No department succeeds in isolation alone. The challenges we face require partnerships. I'm looking forward to working closely with my fellow department heads, board of supervisors, our justice partners, community organizations, and every county employee who shares commitment to serving the people of Napa County. The best solutions come from collaboration, mutual respect, and a willingness to solve problems together. Success will not be measured simply by the absence of problems. It will be measured by the strength of our team. the trust we earn from our community, the safety of our facilities, the care we provide, and the lives that are changed because we chose to lead with both courage and compassion. I accept this appointment with humility, a deep sense of responsibility, and a tremendous optimism for what we can accomplish together. And thank you for your trust. It is my honor of my career to continue serving Napa County, and I look forward to the work ahead. Thank you.

Thank you for those excellent words. We definitely appreciate that. How about we take a picture with your, bring your family up. We take a quick picture. We'll have everybody go. All right. Excellent. So now we're on to receive a presentation of the annual crop report for 2025. We will have a staff report by Tuesday Melito, Assistant Agricultural Commissioner, Sealer of Weights and Meat and Measures.

You can pull up the second slide if you want. Good morning, Chair Alessio and members of the board. I'm Tuesday Melito, Assistant Agricultural Commissioner and Sealer of Weights and Measures. I would like to invite Peter Rumble to come on up and do a presentation with me. For the past 21 years, we have partnered with the Napa County Farm Bureau and we've done the Crop Report Cover Contest. And so, Peter, would you like to say a few words about the Crop Report Cover Contest?

Well, you know, my words are really focused on thanks and gratitude for a wonderful partnership and being able to come before you without, you know, a lot of contention or on policy issues and just focus on celebrating the youth of our community. This is a great example of how we celebrate the intersection of arts and agriculture in our community. So yeah, We have a great program where we're able to award the top contestants for the crop report with the financial award. So it's definitely a pleasure to be here to do that.

And thank you. And just for folks who don't know, Peter Rumble is the CEO of the Napa County Farm Bureau.

All right. So for third prize, that's Estella McCauley. She was a seventh grader at Unidos Middle School, and her artwork was The Rising Sun. So that's third prize right there.

Beautiful.

AJ Williams, he is not here right now. That is he, they won the second prize. AJ was a sophomore at Napa High and their artwork was Sunny Grapes on a Rustic Road. All right. First prize goes to Victoria Moscone Carrion, a sophomore. She was a sophomore at Napa High School and her beautiful piece was entitled Fall Vineyards. All right. Thank you very much.

Afterwards, after we're done with the report, let's take a picture with our winners. Does that sound good? Okay. Perfect. And congratulations to all and to all who submitted artwork too. Beautiful. Very talented. Thank you.

Good morning, Chair Alessio, members of the board. Once again, I am Tuesday Melito, the Assistant Agricultural Commissioner and Sealer of Weights and Measures. It's an absolute pleasure to be here today to present the 2025 Napa County Agricultural Crop Report. We are mandated by the Food and Agricultural Code to publish and present this report annually to both members, to both the Board of Supervisors and the Secretary of Food and Agriculture. This report provides a vital snapshot of the condition of agriculture in our county, including acreage, production, overall value, as well as our ongoing efforts in pest eradication, exclusion, and quarantine activities. Before we dive into the numbers, I want to highlight, oh, I'm sorry. We have produced over 100 crop reports here in Napa County. We've published one for every single year beginning in 1921. Before we dive into the numbers, I just wanted to highlight one of my favorite things parts of this annual process. For the last 21 years, we have partnered with the Napa County Farm Bureau Ag in the Classroom program. They have sponsored our Crop Report Cover Art Contest for local middle and high school students. This is an amazing opportunity to help students understand the crucial role agriculture plays in our local economy, and it's a wonderful partnership with the Farm Bureau that we deeply value. I'd like to once again recognize our incredible winners this year. Victoria Moscone Carrion for first prize in Fall Vineyards. Second prize goes to AJ Williams for Sunny Grapes on a Rustic Road. And third prize goes to Estella McCauley for the Rising Sun. I'm also thrilled to announce that the county matched the prize amount generously donated by the Napa County Farm Bureau this year. Our first, second, and third prize winnings are now $500, $300, and $200 respectively. We hope this serves as an additional incentive to encourage even more students to participate next year. Okay. All right. Diving into the statistics for 2025. Our total agricultural production value was $974.2 million. This represents a 6% decrease in total value compared to 2024. However, looking at that top line number, we saw some fascinating shifts across our different sectors. The standout mover this year was livestock, which jumped an impressive 107% to $3.25 million. This was driven by the expanded use of livestock for vegetation management and fire mitigation, combined with improved data collection methods that gave us a much more accurate picture from our local ranchers. Poultry and other animal products also saw strong growth. Our local egg producers benefited from supply gaps at larger commercial operations and a steady, robust consumer demand for locally sourced products. Floral and nursery increased by 32%, which is remarkable considering we saw a 49.5% drop in production area. This was fueled by intense demand for cut flowers at local farm stands and farmer markets. We did see a moderate decrease in few areas. Vegetable crops dipped largely due to a decline in direct to restaurant sales. Field crops saw a 32% drop in hay and pasture values, a direct result of below average rainfall and dry conditions that impacted the region. Finally, the fruit and nut crops saw a 6% drop in value. The vast majority of this category is of course represented by wine grapes. As you well know, wine grapes remain our dominant crop. In 2025, wine grapes accounted for $968.7 million out of our $974.2 million total production value. To put that in perspective, they represent 99.4% of our total agricultural value in Napa County. The total value of the 2025 wine grape harvest declined by 6% from 2024. This was driven primarily by a 6.6% reduction in producing acres. However, the impact on the actual tonnage was limited to just a 1.6% drop down to 144,807 tons. Why the difference? Yields on the remaining acres improved. This points to a consolidation of acreage toward higher performing blocks. That efficiency, combined with relatively stable pricing, helps sustain our total harvest value despite the reduction in planted areas. I should also note that white wine grapes were a particularly bright spot this year with tonnage up 5.2%. Looking at our highest planted acreages, the top varieties remain the same as last year, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay and Merlot. Together, these three varieties produce 106,345 tons across 32,088 producing acres. To break that down further, these three varieties accounted for 73.4% of our total wine grape acreage and an incredible 81.4% of our wine grape value. It's always helpful to contextualize Napa's production against the state of California overall. In terms of tonnage, Napa produced 8.56% of California's total red wine grape crush and 2.52% of the state's white wine grape crush. For specific varieties, we contributed at over 18% of the state's Cabernet Sauvignon tonnage and nearly 4% of its Chardonnay. But the real story is the value. Throughout California, Cabernet Sauvignon had an average price of $2,122 per ton. In Napa County, our average was $8,645 per ton. That's a per ton value over four times higher than the state average. For Chardonnay, the state average was $1,011 per ton, while Napa County producers brought in $3,683 per ton. It's a 264% premium over the rest of the state. To give you a broader geographic picture, District 13 in the Eastern Central California region had the largest share of the state's crush, but their average price per ton was $334. District 3, which includes our neighbors in Sonoma and Marin counties, saw the second highest average price at $2,763 per ton. But Napa County, which is its own district, District 4, commanded the highest average price in the state at $6,663 per ton. These numbers are a clear, undeniable testament to the region's enduring legacy of excellence. But protecting Napa County's agricultural future isn't just about celebrating the harvest. It means safeguarding our crops from every possible angle. This starts with our organic program. In 2025, we had 175 organic registrants managing 9,375 organic production areas. The vast majority of that, 6,589 acres were dedicated to organic wine grapes. Protection also means intercepting invasive pests before they ever reach our vineyards and farms. Our insect trapping program diligently monitors for invasive pests in urban, residential, and agricultural settings. If left unchecked, these pests, like glassy-winged sharpshooter, spotted lanternfly, European grapevine moth, and vine mealybug, would cause millions of dollars in damage and trigger a massive increase in pesticide usage across the county. Last season, we placed 5,145 traps throughout the county and conducted over 49,000 servicings, meaning every time our staff placed, baited, checked, or removed a trap. We also conduct parcel facility inspections. We made six visits to parcel facilities this year, sometimes accompanied by CDFA's incredible canine sniffer dog, Birdie, which you can see her in the picture up there. We inspected 83 parcels containing plant materials. Six of those had to be rejected due to pest presence or labeling issues, and one of those contained a regulated pest. In addition to parcel facilities, our staff inspected 2,770 incoming shipments of nursery plants, grapevines, and other host material. Okay. Furthermore, we ensure that the plant products we export are safe. We issued 48 phytosanitary certificates guaranteeing that agricultural commodities leaving Napa for foreign countries are free from injurious pests. Most of these certificates were for barrels, barrel kits, staves, or wood chips used in winemaking destined for 11 different countries ranging from France and Italy to China and Chile. Finally, I want to pivot from the fields to the marketplace. Since 1915, Napa County Weights and Measures has served consumers and businesses by maintaining strict equity in the marketplace. In 2025, our team conducted 4799 scale inspections. This includes computing scales, winery scales, vehicle scales, cattle scales, as well as gas, electric, and water sub meters. Included in that total were 1,313 fuel dispenser inspections to ensure every resident and visitor gets exactly what they pay for at the pump. Our team also performed 7,551 point of sale pricing accuracy inspections at retail stores. We do this to ensure customers pay the lowest advertised or sticker price. These inspections took place at 329 locations across the county. In 123 of those locations, our inspections identified some type of overcharge and our team stepped in to help those businesses get back into full compliance.

Okay.

Before I conclude, I want to take a moment to publicly thank our incredible staff for their hard work, not just in the field, but in compiling this data. Special thanks to Daniela Regan, Barry Seibert, Madeline Wisecarver, and Summer Woolley for their dedication to bringing this report together. As always, the 2025 crop report will be available electronically on our website later today in both English and Spanish. Thank you, Chair Alessio and board members for the opportunity to present this morning. I'm happy to answer any questions or hear any comments you might have.

Thank you, Tuesday. I always am just amazed by the work that comes out of our agriculture department and everybody's effort there. I personally enjoy doing some tours and site visits with staff. Do we have any questions before we open this up to public comment? Yes, Supervisor Ramos?

Thank you so much. Thank you for this very thorough report. And I actually just want to say I really love the graphics. They're really wonderful. I wanted to turn to a couple of items, and one in particular. It's, I think, also for further discussion with our Agricultural Commissioner, Tracy Cleveland. But that is in regards to the vine mealybug and its particular effects that are really taking hold in Coombsville and that we have mapping as to how it's moving around and the disruption that needs to occur in the mating cycle of the vine mealybug to be able to to address that. That intersects with vines being pulled out in order to mitigate the damage that has already occurred to those vines that have been infected by the presence of the vine mealybug. So I would like to kind of understand in terms of we look at the crops in production, what is out of production, And to what extent we are tracking, percentage-wise, the shifts in crop production that are pest mitigation, that are derived from pest mitigation?

Unfortunately, that's not something that we track. We do the trapping program, so we find out where these pests are. But pulling a vineyard doesn't always mean that it has a pest. It could be red blotch. It could be vine mealybug. It could just be, you know, they want to go to a new rootstock or they want to go to a different varietal. So it's not something we could easily track due to pest pressures.

I appreciate that. I think as we move forward, having just met with a group of vintners from Coombsville and to know how many are actively taking out vineyards and making a conscious choice to not replant at this time, I think I do think there is an opportunity here for planning to intersect and a greater deal with the agricultural commissioners so that we can track this. This is a this is a definite shift in the intensity of the presence of a pest. You know, certainly we had our 90s that were out of this world. But in regards to at least specifically Coombsville, it is really a hotspot when it comes to the vine mealybug. And so I think we how we look at this and and have used this as an opportunity for data tracking um as these vineyards are being pulled out and as we are noting that are there going to be dips in production prior to even pulling out those vines there are dips in production and so i think there's a there's a data opportunity for us to collaborate and i feel like i just gave a three-party referral to itpbs and to the Ag Commission office, but I think that that is something that definitely is worthy of us to have. I wanted to highlight, you know, you have the pest exclusion on page 21, but Really just to highlight and thank the work that the Agricultural Commissioner's Office did when that big box store brought us some not so pleasant pests and brought them right into our doorstep. The engagement that the office had with the retailer and with those who purchased those plants was absolutely incredible. And maybe it was a little bit of contact tracing PTSD from COVID that got us all there, but The amount of work that that happened in a very quick fashion is was impressive and I'm incredibly grateful. And so I just wanted to say that. And then also, I really do appreciate that you that the report includes the where is it? That includes on page 15, the rooster ordinance update. That was a lot of work with the sheriff's office and and working working with the Agricultural Commissioner's Office with staff that has since retired and departed and working with Captain Thompson to make sure that we got a meaningful rooster ordinance moving forward. And I was hoping you can touch a little bit about a little update as to have we had people come through asking for the exemptions that have an extraordinary amount of roosters?

I think we've had two applications, but we have had some calls. I know code enforcement has had some calls that turned out to be 4-H or, you know, roosters that were being grown for showing. So, but we've only had two applications for excessive roosters. Excellent. Great. Thank you.

Thank you. Supervisor Cottrell.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you to you and your team for a great report. As you can tell from the dais, there's a lot of interest in this information. I think it's so useful for the community, too. And I want to thank members of the ag industry who are here today. I see Mr. Nissen, Mr. Elsley. I know there's other folks out there, too. So thanks for, obviously, your ongoing engagement and interest here. A couple of observations. Love that this point about the increase in livestock can be linked directly to vegetation management. And so looking forward to watching that grow over time and also understanding more what that means for those operators in terms of how that works. how that functions as a working ag business too. I'm interested in that. And I want to second the referral about just understanding our mapping capability here, whether there are replants for fine mealybug, other pest management, taking advantage of a moment in the market or other long-term transition I think being able to map that out would be great. Even if we can't identify a specific cause on a property, it would be great to compare year over year where planted acres are moving around. I think that would be interesting. Because I also know I'm hearing... and have had some conversations with folks who are planting other crops on a vineyard acreage that has been removed. And I'm curious, is that gonna be a two-year, four-year, five-year thing? And seeing some of those mapping data points will be great. Question for you about we're talking about some of the numbers in terms of volume and value here in the county. And I think it would be great to also have statewide context, which is, again, not necessarily for this. But as we talk about what those numbers look like to have some reference point, because I'm guessing more a higher percentage of vines were pulled out across the state. And we probably saw a larger number. Decrease a larger delta in value change. So any comments you have on that?

We do have a report from the California Association of Wine Grape Growers. They did a mapping of so from 20. August, I'm sorry, vineyard removals were captured for the period of October 1st, 2024 through August 1st, 2025. So there is that work being done by COG and I can easily get some more information to you on that.

Great, great. And again, thanks. It's just a great way to engage and talk about these topics more. Thank you, Chair. Thank you very much.

And Supervisor Gallagher, did you have anything you want to ask?

No, just thank you. And this is really an amazing collaborative effort and brings a lot of people together to bring it to publication. And so thank you for all of the hard work. Definitely second the effort. Thank you around the Costco issue. And that was the nursery's fault, not Costco's. But anyway, I know it was a lot of hard work and it was very done very quickly. And you all managed to handle it incredibly well. And again, another really collaborative effort. And thank you very much to the students who participate. And. gift us their beautiful artwork and congratulations to you as well. So thank you again for a great report.

Thank you. My only question is, and maybe first I'll just say whatever we can do regarding the mealy bug. I agree. As a matter of fact, I have a plant that had some weird white sticky stuff in it in my patio. And I took a picture and took it to the nursery and he said, that's what it is. And the only way to get rid of it is for me to throw the plant away. So, you know, it's yeah, it's there. And kind of icky. The other one I don't think you track, but is of great concern here is the Mediterranean oak borer beetle. And because we know what damage it's doing to our beautiful valley oaks throughout Napa County. And it's true that you don't track that at all. who what agency probably state agency actually tracks that and i know there's really no again there's no way to get rid of it other than to remove the whole tree but it's it's a great concern for you know landowners specifically they have these oak trees and they're dying yes

Yeah, when we first were informed Mediterranean oak borer here in Napa County, we did do a trapping program to see if we were infested. And unfortunately, all of Napa County is infested. During that time, we did work with CAL FIRE and the State Forestry Department. So those potentially would be contacts you could work with. And unfortunately, the oak trees are not an agricultural product. So...

Yeah, that's what I thought. Okay. My only other request would be looking at this data in context of historical data. So for me in particular, I'd be interested in seeing how we are looking compared to maybe 10 years ago, five years ago. But I think that historical context would be very helpful to me and maybe some others. That's the only thing that I thought was missing from this exceptional report. Okay. Thank you. On that, do we have any public comment? We have our CEO of Farm Bureau coming up, Peter.

Peter Rumble, CEO of the Napa County Farm Bureau. I just wanted to pick up on a couple comments here and name the pest that shall not be named, the glassy-winged sharpshooter. And to say it publicly, say it so you can hear it, say it so Ag Commissioner's team can hear it. The level of information, coordination, hard work, transparency, partnership with the industry was exceptional. Exceptional. And the level of that quality was all the more apparent with calls with CDFA, frankly. And the The technical expertise, the willingness to partner, the willingness to share information gave such a level of confidence, I think, to myself and other industry partners. I just want to make sure that you understand how great of a job the team did on that issue. And it wasn't just one episode. It was one episode and then another and then another and then another. So thank you so much.

Thank you for that comment. Do we have any other public comment on this item? And we have Caleb with the wine growers here.

Thank you. Caleb Mosley with the Napa Valley grape growers. Let's see. I grew grapes as my profession for 14 years here in Napa County. And I just want to commend the Ag Commissioner's Office, not just for putting together this fantastic report, but they have a really strong role to play in pesticide enforcement and safety regulation. Nobody ever wants to talk about that, but you do an outstanding job of partnering and not feeling like we're under the gun doing things wrong all the time. And there's three people in this report I was just flipping through that I worked with that are retiring, Jen, Greg, and Terry. And I remember during the European grapevine moth era actually having Greg out on the property where I was farming and making sure that the right materials were going out in a respectful way, making sure we were using all the right PPEs. So it's a huge part of what you guys do, and I want to make sure you're recognized for that. This is a great report. It makes me very happy. I like to smile about good news coming out of the wine industry. But as you all know, we're in a different era. What this report speaks to is decades and decades and decades of partnership between wineries and growers to create this level of resilience we're seeing amidst these conditions. And I want to get a little bit about how the sausage is made with that. A lot of folks have entered into evergreen contracts. So instead of saying, every year I'll make a different decision, they'll walk into three-year rolling evergreen contracts. Usually those are capped with like a 3% growth rate. or a 3% decrease based on where the crush report numbers are taking the actual categories, Cabernet, Sauvignon Blanc, whatever it may be, benchmarked with caps up and down. 2023 came around and people were starting to sense some of those changes in the market. And I think what we're going to start seeing here is some of those evergreen contracts expiring. So again, I'm so happy to see these numbers and the resiliency that's there, but it's baked in from decades of success in this business that we're trying to express. We're seeing some cracks, right? And it's not from anything we're doing. You can see how excellent we are in terms of how we grow internationally. Great to see organic acreage remaining strong. But there's signs out there that the marketplace is shifting. And even though we set up all these factors of resiliency, partnership, land stewardship, everything that we do really well, it's important that we look forward and see what's actually happening out there too. So I hope that we continue to see this strength. It's baked into a certain degree. Some of those contracts will expire. So I'd imagine that in future versions of this, we will have a little bit of a different tune to sing. But for now, I'm just really proud to see that We continue to partner together. We continue to build these strength and long-term relationships with growers and wineries to the benefit of our entire county. So thank you again for putting together such a great report.

Thank you, Caleb. That's a very important point too. I appreciate that. Any other public comment? not seeing any here anybody on the phone not having any okay well i just want to close in saying that you know there's on page nine of this beautiful report that has this beautiful artwork here's the report itself um you know it talks about the um economic impact and it's it's it's significant um 11.7 billion local economic impact nearly 56,000 full-time jobs here in Napa County, which is 72% of the county employment, and nearly $4 billion in local income generated. So, you know, I know that Napa County, we are the reason why we're a member of the great wine capitals of the world, which means that we are the place for the United States and represent the United States. in the wine industry and support just really reflects that. And I know our practice in terms of what the growers do in the wine industry and how the Ag Commission partners with everybody and supports that. So I'm just full of gratitude. And as Caleb was saying, we're seeing a bit of a shift, a consumer shift, but I believe in what we do and how we do it. And I think we're going to come out strong. So thank you for that. How about we take a picture with our, our winners of the art contest. And so let's have Victoria. I know AJ is not here and Estella join us up front. We'll take a photo. Okay. Having a very nice meeting today. Lots of good things happening here. We're moving on to 9C and this is a declared elected to offices under its jurisdiction. Those persons having the highest number of votes based on the June 2nd, 2026 primary election certified results. And we'll receive a staff report from John Tudor, our registrar of voters.

Thank you. So I appreciate, Chair Alessio, your comments about respect for past board members, as I am one. And while we might not meet your level of hard work, I do want to take credit for having been on the board when we created the Department of Corrections. So that Department of Corrections was created in the 70s. We now have a 50 plus year history. And thank you for continuing that. I know AJ will do an incredible job leading you into the future. So I just wanted to say that. So the board had expressed or asked some questions earlier. So in addition, I'm just going to take a couple of minutes to go over some things for you. In addition to recognizing the election of Supervisor Gallagher and Supervisor Cottrell to their next term, which will start in January of 2027. I just wanted to go give some statistics. I know the board, I think Supervisor Gallagher was the primary person asking, was what did the impact of the Postal Service changes have on our election? we made a huge effort, not only myself, but my 57 colleagues across the state, to educate voters to be wary of mailing their ballot too late. And the message seems to have been received. For the first time, we became a Voters' Choice Act county in 2018. June 2018 was our first election, which is many years ago. But This is the first election where more ballots were returned in drop boxes than were mailed. So in all those years, mail's been about 50%. This year, 38% of our voters used our drop boxes. Only 36% of our voters used the mail. And then, of course, we had another 20-some percent who either came to our drive-throughs, which we're one of the counties that have that in the state, and then came actually to our vote centers to deliver their ballots. So I think the message is getting across. No reflection on our wonderful Postal Service, which is one of the best in the world, but they are having their pains. And I do want to go into just a bit of detail, and then I'll be happy to answer any questions. So I think one of the concerns were how many late ballots did we get that were not the fault of the voter? Right. OK, so we got a lot of late ballots, but most of them were not mailed timely. So overall, we had 368 ballots that were received late. But only of that 368, only eight were the fault of the post office. if I can put it that way. So that's not bad. And then there were some others that were questionable that came in even later. So we do a report that I circulated to all of you on the E plus 10, how many ballots we get back, because California allows seven days for a ballot to arrive if it's been postmarked on election day. And the state asks us to go three more days to just see how often that failed. So we had 2,075 ballots that came in on June 3rd. So that's a huge number. We had a turnout of 30-plus thousand ballots, but that's a substantial number. And people have been voting later and later. That trend has gone on since we've been a Voters' Choice Act county. More and more people are getting their ballots in on Election Day. or just before, because when we do our initial count on election night, that's through Saturday. So a lot of ballots come in Sunday, Monday at our polling places, etc. And that we used to be about 52%. We're in that first count. Now we're down around 43%. So you can see that people are waiting until later. So those eight ballots, they were postmarked correctly, but didn't get to us after the seven days. And there's nothing we can do about that under state law. It's not the voters problem. We also had a few ballots come in even a week later than that. But they didn't have a postmark on them. And even though they had a date that the voter had signed it before Election Day, there's no way for us to count those. Even if they had had a postmark, they wouldn't have been counted because of the seven-day rule. But that was a small number, five, I think. So on the whole, those people who used the mail were well taken care of. All but eight of them, essentially. So I think that's a message that I'm not going to push using the post office because of their issues, but I'm certainly going to advise people to use alternative methods if needed going forward. So that was essentially what I wanted to cover. I'm happy to answer any other questions if you haven't.

Thank you very much. Do we have any questions? Not seeing any, not seeing any.

So your action today would be to declare elected Supervisor Gallagher for District 1 and Supervisor Cottrell for District 3.

Exactly. Do we have any public comment? Any on the vote? Okay, great. So can I have a motion to declare elected Joshua Schultz, Napa County Superintendent of Schools, Jewel Gallagher, Napa County Supervisor, District 1, and Ann Cottrell, Napa County Supervisor for District 3. Do we have a motion? Happy to make that motion. I'll second that. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. And that's unanimous. Thank you very much. Thanks, Nancy. And thank you for that presentation. Moving on to 9D, we're going to receive a presentation and an update on two administrative policy manual and adopt a resolution, adopting a new administrative policy manual numbering framework and repealing outdated policy manual sections. There's a lot of words, but not near as much of the time and effort that went into doing this. I know because I've seen the binder. This will be a staff report by Jennifer Palmer, Assistant CEO and Cheryl Bratton. County CEO. Oh, County Council.

Good morning, Jennifer Palmer, Assistant CEO, and I am joined with County Council Cheryl Bratton. We're going to give a quick overview on the Administrative Policy Modernization Project. I have just a couple slides to walk through what we're doing here today. So first thing I want to do is just say a quick word about the difference in the kind of policies that exist and what we are talking about today. So municipal code policy is a kind of law. It is adopted by ordinance and it governs conduct of the public. Then there are procedures and guidelines. Those are things that take administrative policies and implement them at the department level. They have to do with how the policy is implemented. They might vary between departments. Administrative policies, which is what we're talking about today, are internal operational directives, and they are largely meant to guide staff actions and and mostly to promote consistency and equitable implementation. So we are here today to talk about a modernization project for the county's administrative policies. for a little level setting for what the county's policies are right now. There are 112 of them at this moment. They exist on SharePoint, which is an internal county site, so not accessible to the public. Their original organizational structure was by department, and There's sort of a combination in that 112 of administrative policies, historical record and some archiving. So the goal of this project is to do a sort and kind of a culling of those policies to get things that are not policies out. to update all of the policies that we have, and then ultimately to get them online so that they are accessible by the public to increase our overall transparency. So part of the modernization approach is a new organizational structure, removing what we have right now, which is alphabetical by department and replacing that as organized by subject matter, basically just to make them more intuitive. When, if you're a member of the public and you're interested in a policy, you don't think of it by the county's org chart. You think of it by the things that we are doing. And so the subject matter organization is to make it very intuitive for the public to be able to find what they're looking for. And then online access via Civic Plus will result in our administrative policies being a lot like our existing municipal code policies, where the policy is up there and the updates are also available. And so there is a single central place where everyone, public and our staff, can make sure that they're all working from the latest version. So the project that Cheryl and I have been undertaking is a three-phase project. Phase one was to do a complete review of all 112 that are in there, categorize them and assign the right subject matter experts. So ensure that the department who is the subject matter expert on whatever the content of that policy is, is reviewing it. They are working in close concert with county council's office to determine whether this is a policy we need to keep or whether this should be repealed. If it is going to be kept, is it ready to go? Has it recently been reviewed in the last few years or does it need some substantive edits? That initial review is complete. The result of that review is what we're here today to do, which is to repeal 33 policies that currently are listed as policies. Many of them are not in fact policies, they're historical records. For anybody looking at the agenda, when you look at the 33 policies that are attached, I just want to clarify, we are not deleting the sheriff's office. We are not deleting the clerk of the board. These are not actions to remove anything. These are classification systems, and most of what is in there is historical record or recitation of resolutions, that kind of thing. So If there is a resolution that remains effective today, the repeal of what is on SharePoint does not affect the repeal of the resolution attached to it. And so the ask of the board is to adopt a resolution, both repealing these 33 and adopting the new chapter framework. The final phase of this project, we will be back again in September, between now and September 29th. There are 56 policies that need substantive edits. Those edits are underway between the departments and county council's office. Many of them will also require meet and confer actions. So we're giving some time to allow that entire process to unfold and not overwhelm either HR or the union by bringing 56 all at once. But between now and September 29th, we hope to get the bulk of that work done. A smaller number within that 56 will require also coming to this board to get specific individual direction. So we will come back on the 29th. We hope to have a large group of the policies that needed edits that do not need a lot of direction back for adoption. And then between now and the end of the year, individual policies, like as Supervisor Ramos pointed out, the AI policy, That's going to be its own administrative item. We will bring that and support discussion for that. So as we get closer to September 29th, Cheryl and I will again, make sure that we are checking in to find out which policies need discussion and which ones can come back as a group. But the goal is by the end of this calendar year, that this project is complete and all of the policies have been reviewed, adopted and are published online. Oh, I think I've covered all of this. Yeah. So this is just to put a little framework around what I just said. Yeah. Between now and the end of the year, we hope to get this all done. And with that, I will stop and take questions.

Thank you. That's outstanding and impressive. You can do all that within this calendar year. Do we have any board questions? Not seeing any. Okay. Oh, we do have one. Okay. Supervisor Gattrell.

I just want to thank you, Jennifer and Cheryl, for working through this. This is mind-numbingly detail-oriented and so important, right? And I like that we're moving toward more transparency and less duplication. And it just makes sense. It's logical how things will flow. And so I think it's helpful for departments, but also the public to understand why, what rules and guidelines we're following. So thank you for the work. Thank you for those comments.

Okay, do we have any public comment? And I don't see any there. So then I'll bring it back to the board and ask for a vote. Can I have a motion to adopt?

Oh, sorry. Do you have a comment? I do have a comment. Oh, okay. Thank you. I just wanted to, uh, first of all, say thank you. Um, we've had some extensive conversations and with other departments over the years of, um, how, uh, tired our policy is of carrying decades of decisions and in a not so well organized fashion. And so I do appreciate that. And just to say, I think that This is an incredibly important undertaking and that it really does require the board's full attention as we go forward. And so at the risk of my colleagues being upset with the suggestion I'm going to make, I suggest that when it's time for us to have a full-scale review of updates of what is happening, that it be separate and apart from a Tuesday board meeting, that it be treated much more like a workshop so that we can see where we've been And we can talk about who we are and three, where we want to go in terms of these policies. And I think that that is a really great time at, you know, we, we did our, our, our, strategic visioning session. We've said what we want. We want an excellent workforce. We want excellent service delivery. This is our opportunity to utilize these policies to create that foundation and the guidance for that very excellence. And in addition to the meet and confer process, Some of these policies do have retirement CalPERS calculation implications as well, in particular on the compensation policies. So to also keep that in mind, some do require an actual standalone policy as opposed to an incorporation by reference. So I think that that is an additional to do in that sense. And... With that, I can go ahead and make it easy for you. And I'll make a motion to approve, to adopt the resolution, adopting a new administrative policy manual numbering framework and repealing outdated policy manual sections.

I'll second. Okay, so we have a motion by Ramos and a second by Gallagher. All in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Okay, that was unanimous. And I do think, I just want to say on that too, I think that at least for this first batch, if you will, it's really kind of housekeeping, cleaning up in terms of distinguishing what really is a policy and what really isn't. And as we get to the more meatier kind of things that do have some more consequential effects impacts, there'll be a bit deeper dive and some of it may even go into general plan. I would think kind of discussion maybe if we change our vision and whatnot, but thank you for that. Okay, moving on to our public hearings. Item 10A, we're going to conduct a public hearing and adopt a resolution pursuant to a revenue and taxation code section 99.02, approving the transfer of fire protection tax revenues collected within the city of Calistoga tax rate area to the city of Calistoga. They should be happy about that.

Maybe.

Are they happy about that? I would think so.

So I'm going to go ahead and take this one as well. Again, Jennifer Palmer, Assistant CEO. So this item is a public hearing on a resolution to transfer the fire protection tax revenues collected within the city of Calistoga to the city of Calistoga. So the action is brought before the board pursuant to California Revenue and Taxation Code section 99.02. which allows the county by resolution adopted at a noticed public hearing to exchange property tax revenues with another local agency within the same tax rate area, provided four findings can be made. The first is that the revenues are available for this purpose. The second is that the transfer won't change the ratio of fees, charges, or assessments relative to other county assessments, that it won't impair the county's ability to provide existing services, and that it won't reduce property tax revenues to school entities. By way of background, the fire protection tax allocation in the Calistoga tax rate area dates back to Proposition 13's AB8 factors established in 1978. At that time, the structural fire protection tax in the city of Calistoga, the structural fire protection in the city of Calistoga was rendered by Napa County Fire. So the tax revenue that was collected was allocated accordingly. Since then, the city of Calistoga has built out its own fully staffed fire department, and the two agencies operate under service agreements. The most recent service agreement was a 2024 agreement for first responder services, under which the county paid the city to provide first responder services to certain county areas. Following discussions between the Calistoga city manager, the CEO's office, and both fire chiefs, it was determined to be in the best interest of both jurisdictions to terminate that 2024 agreement and replace it with an automatic aid agreement where neither party pays the other for first responder services in a designated area. And as part of that arrangement, both sides agreed that the fire protection tax collected within the city's tax rate area should follow that service and be redirected from the county to the city. That amount is approximately $500,000 per year. If the board approves the resolution, the county's fire fund, Fund 2100, would see a corresponding reduction beginning in this fiscal year adjusted annually for assessed valuations under the AB8 methodology. I want to note that this is budgeted, it's a discretionary fiscal impact, and the general fund is not affected. The resolution is required under the tax code section 99.02. If adopted, the Calistoga City Council will also need to adopt its own resolution under 99.02 accepting the transfer, after which the auditor-controller would establish a new tax code and begin allocating the revenue directly to the city. And our auditor-controller is also here to answer any technical questions.

Thank you. I was going to say that too. And I want to go ahead and formally open this public hearing. I did not do that. So this is the public hearing is open. Thank you, Jennifer, for that staff report and acknowledging that Tracy Schultz, our auditor controller, is here for any questions. Tracy, did you have anything to add to that? Okay. Do we have any board members with questions? Yes. I see Supervisor Cottrell.

Yeah, I would just make a comment as, you know, Calistoga is in my district and this is what I see as the end of a series of cleanup items, right? That brings the working relationship between Napa County Fire and the city of Calistoga into alignment and consistency with how we provide service and our belief in mutual aid across our jurisdiction. Exactly. I'm glad to be moving forward on this, and I'm happy to make a motion in support.

Thank you. Do we have any other supervisors? I'm not seeing anything here. Okay, we have a second by Gallagher. Do we have any public comment on this? Nobody here in the chambers. Anybody on the phone? No public comment. So we have a motion by Cottrell, a second by Gallagher. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. And that is unanimous. Okay. So today we do not have any closed session. And so we get to adjourn this meeting at 10.30 a.m. Thank you very much. Our next meeting is August 11th.