Finance & Management Committee - Regular Meeting

Good morning and welcome to the finance and management committee meeting of Tuesday 02/24/2026, and this meeting may come to oh, sorry. The time is now 09:30AM, and this meeting may come to order. Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit speaker cards for items on this agenda. If you're here with us in chamber, would like to submit a speaker card, please fill one out and turn one into myself or a clerk representative no later than ten minutes after the start of this meeting or before the item is read into record. Registering to speak via Zoom is now due twenty four hours prior to the start of this meeting.

Sorry. Meeting time. This meeting came to order at 09:30AM, and speaker cards will no longer be accepted ten minutes after, making that time 09:40AM. We'll now proceed with taking roll. Council members Brown? Present. Council member Wong? Oh, sorry. Council member Unger? Here. Council member Wong?

Present.

Thank you. And council member Wong, you're participating virtually. Will you be using your assembly bill two four four nine?

Yes.

Okay. That's right. Do you have anyone over the age of 18 in the room with I do not. Okay. And can you go ahead and state your reason for using your assembly bill two four four nine?

Yes. I'm just recovering from a cold.

Okay. Thank you. And then chair Ramachandran.

Present. Present.

Thank you. We have three members present and then one member present using a B2449. Before we begin, chair, do you have any announcements at this time?

I do not, but council member Brown does. Please go ahead.

Excellent. Thank you so much chair Ramachandran. I just wanted to extend a very warm welcome to Nevea who is spending the entire week with my office. She goes to Envision Academy and so she will be putting together and she's right over here. She will be putting together an amazing presentation just a week in the life of here at Oakland City Hall and so if you all want to stop by and share some insights with her about your role and all of the things, she'll be with us this entire week. So welcome, Nevea.

Thank you. Welcome. Any announcements from the administration? Oh, sorry. No. That's the next item. Thank you.

Thank you. Moving on to item one, approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on 02/10/2026. We do have one speaker that signed up. Miss Asada Olubala? Oh, sorry. It was two. Sorry. That was the speaker for the next item. So we have no speakers on this item.

Okay. I will entertain a motion.

So moved. Second.

Thank you. That was a motion made by council member Brown, seconded by council member Unger to approve the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on 02/10/2026. On roll. Council members Brown? Aye. Council member Wong? Aye. Council member Unger? Aye. And chair Ramachandran? Aye. Thank you. Item one passes with four ayes to approve the draft minutes from 02/10/2026. Reading in item two, determination of scheduled outstanding committee items and we do have one speaker on this

item. Yes. To the administration.

To the chairman of the body, we'd like to withdraw item number four to the pending list no date specific.

Thank you. We can move to public speakers.

Okay. Miss Asada Olubala.

We have to make we are ready. Okay. You got your clock up, mama? Okay. The city administrator is mandated to produce an annual report of his spending up to 250,000.

The last report was 2023. Also, I'm seeing in the agenda you have something called the ability of the city administrator to do piggyback contracts with unlimited spending. You're supposedly changing that today and we need to have a report on how that's been working as far as accountability and trans and transparency. We need to have a report on the business license, the annual business license, which is $412, and I'm asking that report concentrate on the sidewalk vendors that we have all through Oakland with no permitting or licensing. We need to report on businesses that have not necessarily closed down, but have left Oakland and relocated in other cities, or downsized.

Many business Oakland are downsizing for whatever reason. We need to report on the improvements of collecting the business tax. We need to report on the macroeconomic conditions that are beyond the control of the city. That's what I heard about. Okay. That's it.

Thank you for your comments, Cher. That concludes all speakers on this item.

Okay. I will make the motion. Thank

you. We have a motion made by chair Ramachandran, seconded by council member Brown to accept the determination of schedule outstanding committee items on rule. Council members Brown? Aye. Council member Unger? Aye. Council member Wong? Aye. And chair Ramachandran?

Aye.

Thank you. Item number two passes with four ayes to accept the determination of scheduled outstanding committee items.

And to the clerk, that includes the removal of item four today?

Yes. So as amended. Thank you. Thank you. Now reading in item three, adopt a resolution approving ongoing cooperative purchase agreements exceeding $250,000 for citywide commodity goods and services contract as outlined in table one in addition in an additional amount not to exceed $8,040,000, and we do have two speakers that signed up.

K. Thank you.

Good morning, to the council chair, Rosh Hashanah and, the council members. I'm Fred Halliburton, the purchasing supervisor, with the purchasing section. The item before you today is a staff recommended resolution seeking approval of ongoing citywide cooperative agreements exceeding $250,000. Cooperative agreements are a purchasing a procurement option authorized under, municipal code two point zero four point zero eight zero. This provision allows the city to, take advantage of procurements conducted other government entity entities in order to achieve savings and shorten purchasing timelines.

However, the specific code section authorizes cooperative agreements sets no limits on contracts amounts. The proposed action would confirm council approval of existing cooperative agreements and provide increases to contract amounts. This would also align with the city's practices of cooperative agreements with the with existing $250,000 limits on contracts approved under the city administrators authority. There are four cooperative agreements purchasing agreements in the attached table one that would effectively serve to support all city departments with hardware, industrial supplies, tools, janitorial supplies, and paper products. The requested actions include both approval of these contracts and additional contract funding.

SAFA recommends approving approval of the proposed resolution to allow for uninterrupted business operations citywide. I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.

Thank you. Colleagues, questions? Councilman Brown.

Excellent. Thank you so much for the report. And so I guess through the chair to the city administration and or the presenter just kind of reading through the report I guess one question that comes to my mind I imagine that all of these vendors that are in on table one these are all folks that we've contracted with in the past is that correct?

That is correct yes.

And is there ever an opportunity to report back on these spending on the spending that occurs under these buckets? Does that ever come to finance?

Yes. That is currently we're currently undertaking that.

Can you expound on that? I'm sorry. What do you mean? It's so I I guess like in the past to finance, do we receive a report on these various vendors and the things that were purchased?

Yes. That's correct. Okay. You will receive a report. We're working on that. Yes.

Through the chair to council member Brown, there's a report in progress regarding the city administrator's, contract authority, both under his own authority and general contract spending that is being developed by our contracts and purchasing bureau, and that will be, we're expecting it to come, this spring to this body.

Okay. Thank you so much, Director Johnson. Can you shed light on when was the last time that report was generated?

There's, two different, topics of it. The there's a report that was generated in 2023 that related to contract authority. It was not as comprehensive as it needed to be in terms of the total scope of the city managed authority and all contracts approved. So we are working to expand the scope to include the full set of contracts. And, again, we're trying to deliver that to you guys this spring. So there is a antecedent report that was developed in 2023. The scope of that was not broad enough in our estimation to really cover the full set of contracts that have been issued and so we are working to ensure that we have all of that information included in a report and we're again we're going to bring it this spring.

Excellent. Thank you so much. And then will the can you share what the duration of the report like will it be from you know what June 2023 till June 2024 or how like what's the scope?

Our contracting and purchasing administrator is here to correct me if I'm incorrect. I believe we're going from the time span of the last report to the present is what we're looking at but in our contracting purchasing administrators here, oh I'm getting a thumbs up, that is an accurate statement.

Excellent. And then my final question in table one the first vendor it lists citywide contract office and school supplies. Is my assumption correct that that just includes like for our rec centers purchasing?

Through the chair council member Brown, yes that would include rec centers but also like head start programs things of that nature so yes.

Okay excellent thank you so much.

Yes, ma'am. I

don't know if council member Wong has their has their hand raised on Zoom. Okay. So just to clarify, the some of the increases are pretty steep, like the last one for janitorial supplies from $2.50 to 1,200,000.0. Is there a reason that the original amount was not anticipated to be as high, but then we're we're needing that higher amount?

When the contract was put into place, that was only a sort of like a placeholder knowing that they would have to come back later and increase the contract. That was to accommodate mostly our fire departments.

Okay. And are all four of these companies used by our neighboring cities? Is that the basis of the cooperative agreement?

Yes.

Okay. Can you give examples of which cities or counties are involved in this cooperative agreement?

I know that Blazdell's they also have a heavy presence in Sacramento, Cogent in Vallejo, I believe, Fastenal, Berkeley, also Hayward, and JC Nelson, I believe they're in Fair Fairfield. They have a heavy presence there. I wouldn't know any offhand, any other city there.

Okay. Thank you. And could you just explain what the benefit of going through this cooperative agreement is with these other cities that are not necessarily your neighbors or ones we work with rather than a separate contract with them for these services?

Well, as we I pointed out, it does shorten contracting time to put a contract in place. The competitive bid, situation takes, a a bit of time to put together. With these contracts, with the co op contract, it allows us to go into a contract that's already been competitively bid.

Okay. And are any of these local businesses?

Blazedales is a local business. They've been local business working with us for quite a while.

Okay. Colleagues, any additional questions? Council member council member Wong then council member Brown.

Thank you. Through the chair, I just wanna echo some of my colleagues' remarks on the concern of the the steepness of the amount. And and this is, I will say, not just directed at you. It's sort of a global comment on when we as counsel are being asked to approve high dollar, contract amounts. I don't see a lot of, you know, past performance data. I mean, I sounds like the cooperative agreement is going to lower down the cost, but we're also at a time when we need

to Right.

Tighten our our belts. And we're told that on one hand, and then I think on the other hand, you know, in some ways, feel very forced to just rubber stamp essentially what is status quo stuff. Because, as noted in the report, it says if we don't approve this contract, that we're going to, you know, interrupt the business operations of a lot of the city departments. But I just so in some ways, I feel like I have to vote for this. And at the same time, I don't feel like I have the the data that gives me the responsible decision making that has assurances that, you know, there isn't going to be waste associated with this particular resolution.

Again comments. Yep.

Again, this is for citywide use, and the the contract amounts are not amounts that we are paying out. It would depend on each department's capacity that they have to purchase any of these goods.

And I I do you have any reason to because I've worked in a government office. It's kind of like, I don't know if this is necessarily what's happening here, but sometimes it's like, oh, we gotta use up our use up our budget, so let's just buy all these things just to to justify using up the budget. Do we have any data on, you know, how our various departments are using these cooperative agreements? I noticed that we can get office furniture. I, for example, would wanna make sure that nobody's out here buying, like, plush couches. I'm just this is an egregious example that I doubt I doubt fools happening, and nonetheless, I feel like it deserves some scrutiny.

Councilmember Brown. I'm sorry, city, do you had a comment first?

Okay. Okay. I guess to add to councilmember Wong's statement and also comparing what I read in the report potentially as I'm reading the report I think what would be helpful for me would be because I think someone mentioned that J. C. Nelson supply company that is used by the fire department right?

And so in reading the report perhaps it could be helpful that when items like this come before us maybe it's outlining like who are some of the key departments that are taking advantage of these services so that we're able to really like piece together the amount that's being requested and then you know just like how I asked the question, oh school supplies. And so I was brainstorming in my mind like okay well who would need that, right? So I think that would just be my comment and if this item is forwarded to the full city council for approval I guess I would be interested in seeing maybe an addition to report where it outlines who will you know who are some of the city departments that are actually taking advantage of these particular services.

Thank you. I will echo that it is a little sparse on details this report and if a supplemental could be added on a little details about what Councilmember Brown mentioned, what departments utilize these services, as well as my question of what other cities utilize these these companies as part of the cooperative that would be ideal or examples of cities or counties that do. Councilman Brown.

And then I guess my last point is because I do recognize the need that we want to be supportive of the different needs that the departments have. Like I have heard firsthand where you know some of our city departments are trying to get some of these services completed but then the contract is expired or like it takes a long time for these you know vendors to get paid. And so I see both sides of what we're trying to tackle in this moment.

To the chair and maybe to the members of the body in general, is the request for supplemental maybe to make it clear a breakdown of the departments that have used these listed contracts over the past year or two time span so that you can see the spending departments and which other cities are participating in these particular coops? Specifically, just want to make sure we're clear on what you need in terms of supplemental information.

Yes. Thank you so much. At this time, I'm only focused on like what we're doing as a city for Oakland. So I'm fine with you know we don't need I don't need a comparison of what other cities are doing but just more of an analysis if we just focus on the table and some of the vendors that are listed and then what are the city departments that are utilizing these services and if you happen to have you know for maybe the last year what were some of the things that were purchased? That could be helpful.

Okay, thank you. Council member Wong.

Thanks. Through the chair. And director Johnson, just to add to that, I would like to see just maybe a sampling and some some of the products that are most used, just the cost that we're procuring these particular supplies for. Are they within you know? Are are they are we getting kind of the the economies of scale that we're getting through the report as the report states.

To Councilman Wong's question and to my staff and finance, can we provide an attachment of the itemized amount in these contractual? I know these are basically catalog contracts. Can we attach and append the catalogs that are been negotiated?

The catalogs?

Yeah. So just the sample of what can be ordered off of, for instance, for Bladestales.

Oh, absolutely. It would be extensive. But

yes. We have that available. So councilman Wong, I'm happy to include that as an attachment to your report.

Perfect. Thank you so much.

Yes. Calling in the names that signed up for item number two. If you're here with us in chamber you can come up to the podium. Miss Asada Olubala and Kevin Dally.

Okay. You got your timer. This is unbelievable. If you read the report, what you are primarily trying to do is to change the practice the city administrator had that unlimited spending related to piggyback contracts, no limit spending. You want to now introduce the the practice that the city administrator has the authority to enter into contracts up to $250,000.

So with the piggyback contracts or cooperative agreement, the city administrator can only spend up to $250,000 on piggyback contracts. Any contracts hired in $250,000 has to come to counsel for approval. That's the issue, not what departments are getting whatever. You should be very much concerned that in the past you had a city administrator with the capacity for unlimited spending. Under the issue of coming under the umbrella of sustainability, you have to have no unlimited capacities for any department.

You can't have it. So why is this general conversation about who's getting what department, and you're not looking at the proposal that the city administrator will be limited in his spending because in the past, the city administrator has had unlimited, no limited spending on piggyback contracts, and nobody's bringing it up. That's called irresponsibility, dereliction of your duty to deal with the deficit that we have had to had, and to create sustainability in the budget practice. You. That's my time. This is ridiculous.

Kevin Dally from lower district 4. Just speaking for myself today. I I do appreciate the desire to move contracts along more quickly. I know sometimes the city can get stuck with endless approval of contracts. I would like to examine the the report that's coming to council soon, the 2024 City of Oakland disparity study final report.

I know that also discusses issues related to contract reform. It'd be good to have that discussed along with the attempt at improving improving the speed of contracts. If we could put those together, I think that would make contract reform an easier process. Looking forward to the full report to city council coming up soon. Thanks.

Thank you for your comments, chair. That concludes all speakers on this item.

Thank you. Okay. I will entertain a motion with that includes our request for supplemental information before going council.

So moved.

I'll second that.

Thank you. We have a motion made by council members Brown, seconded by Unger to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the March 3 city council agenda with the request for supplemental report, providing the following information, who are some of the city departments that are actually taking taking advantage of the particular services, what other cities utilize these companies as part of the cooperative, some of the vendors that are listed, and what are the city departments that are utilizing those services. And sorry. A sampling of some of the products that are most used on roll. Sorry.

With that information. On roll, council members Brown. Aye. Council member Unger. Aye. Council member Wong.

No. I'm I just think it's important to establish that when the administration asks for high dollar contract amendments that I I need more data in order to vote yes. Thank you.

And chair Ramachandran? Aye. Thank you. Item number three passes with three ayes, one no Wong, to forward this item to the city council agenda on nonconsent. Consent. Since it's not unanimous, it would be nonconsent.

Okay. It's as recommendation of the chair to rules, will say consent.

Good morning. This is Malay McPherson with the city attorney's office. I can read the rule with regard to non consent or consent designation. It says with respect to items that a standing committee forwards to the council, the committee chair may designate such items as consent items only if the standing committee's recommendation was unanimous provided that the rules and legislation committee has authority to make the final determination of consent or non consent items.

Okay. The non consent is the recommendation.

Okay. Thank you. Item three passes with three ayes, one no Wong to be forwarded to the March 3 city council agenda on non consent. Now reading in item number four, receive an informational report from the Budget Advisory Commission on the proposed June parcel tax measure to support essential city services and fiscal stability, and there are three speakers that signed up to speak.

Okay.

To the chair this is the item that we asked to be moved to the pending list, no date specific. I understand that you need to hear public speakers but we're not, delivering a report at this time.

Understood. We can move to public speakers.

Calling in the names that sign up for item four, missus Sato Olubala, Kevin Daly, and Derek Barnes. If you're here with us in chamber, you can come up to the podium. Or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified.

So I I think you need to be reminded of the fiscal obligations of property owners in this city. Beside besides paying city of Oakland property taxes or partial taxes, they pay taxes related to OUSD. They pay AC transit and BART taxes. They pay county taxes. But related to your city taxes there's the property owners annual tax, the real estate transfer tax, the annual rent adjustment fee that's a $137 per unit, the business license tax $95, the mandatory soft story retrofix program that's a fee, The vacant property tax which was anywhere from 3,000 to $6,000 per year.

The cost for tenant move out agreement, that's payment, security deposit documentation, that's a payment, maintenance and utility costs, that includes mortgage insurance, homeowners insurance, fire insurance, earthly insurance, flood insurance, water sewage payment, electric waste manage payments. Do you realize how much money people have to put out in this city? The minimum annual Oakland tax bill is anywhere from over $7,453 to over $5,000, higher than any other national minimum property tax bill of average in this country is $2,400. And now you want to talk about another tax. Make it make sense.

Thank you. Thank

you for your comments, miss Olabala. Thank you. Chair, all names have been called.

Okay. Thank you.

And then noting that this item was withdrawn and placed on the pending list, no date specific. Now reading in item number five, receive an informational report sorry. An informational cash management report for fiscal year two thousand twenty five two thousand twenty six second quarter ended 12/31/2025 and we have three speakers that signed up for this item.

Good morning, chair Ramachandran and fellow committee members. I'm David Jones with the Treasury Bureau. Before I do this, this morning is an informational cash management report, for the second quarter fiscal year twenty five twenty six ending 12/31/2025. It's our traditional quarterly report. I'll just go through a couple of items.

Highlights on page one show that the portfolio had a balance of approximately $2,170,000,000 as compared to September, which was about $2,090,000,000 so a slight increase. The days of maturity on the portfolio are about two hundred and forty four days. The portfolio had a yield of 3.68% versus a yield in September of about 3.98%. And the portfolio had daily liquidity of 20% and a hundred day liquidity of a little over 66%. The portfolio is in full compliance with the city's investment policy and the city still invests with priorities of safety, liquidity, and yield.

And that concludes my report this morning.

Thank you, colleagues. Questions? Comments? Councilman Vunger.

Yeah. Thank you. Could you talk a little bit about the seasonality of our cash flow? There there's been some reporting that I don't find incredibly accurate which compares one quarter to the previous quarter. Would we be better off comparing at the exact same time every year to year?

Is it the seasonality of our, you know, cash flows? Traditionally in the April, we receive our property tax, okay, a large chunk. We also receive a large chunk in the December. And then between the period of, I would say, mid mid Feb well, no. Mid January to to the March, we received a significant amount of our business tax because that's our business tax renewal.

With regards to the outflows, we obviously paid the ports debt service in April and in October. So those are pretty big layouts as or, you know, expenditures as well as our debt service payments. And then we have our regular taxes and biweekly payrolls. But as far as the seasonality, it's pretty consistent because we would get a big chunk of cash in the April and another big chunk in December. And that happens every year.

Okay. We can move to public speakers.

Calling in the names that sign up for item number five, miss Isata Olabala, Kevin Dally, and Derek Barnes. If you're in chamber, you can come up to the podium, or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified. Okay. Chair, at this time all names have been called.

Okay. I will entertain a motion.

I'll make the motion to receive and

file. Second.

Thank you. We have a motion made by council member Brown seconded by council member Unger to approve the recommendations of staff and to receive and file this informational report in committee on rule. Council members Brown? Aye. Unger? Aye. Wong? Aye. And chair Ramachandran? Aye. Thank you. Item five passes with four ayes to receive and file this informational report in committee. Moving on to open forum. Calling in the names that signed up to speak, missus Sato Olubala and Kevin Dally.

Kevin Dally speaking for myself. I appreciate two weeks ago, Bradley Johnson gave a presentation saying his goal was to take some of the income from the sugar sweetened beverage tax and use it for the purposes that it was originally planned for. And I I think that's great. My wife worked on getting the tax out there. I would like to look at some other issues that have been approved by council that where income for the money has been suggested for a certain purpose.

In 2021, the council unanimously approved the reimagining public safety task force with some recommendations. And one of those was to use a certain amount of the income from street parking revenue and from citations to fund Oak Dot traffic services. And obviously, when we have budget problems, we can't do that. But I'm hoping that we can put that on the list of being used. I was glad to see council member Brown's former policy director on that particular recommendation.

Possibilities are replace bus benches and shelters. Council member Wong is on the AC Transit Oakland interagency liaison committee, and I think she understands that we're removing shelters in the middle of the rainy season for people who are taking buses. We're not gonna get them put in this season, but maybe for next year, we could use some of the extra income. Of course, this is also the recommendation that says move direct parking enforcement to the Department of Transportation. And I know that not everyone likes that idea, but I think we should do both this recommendation for the money and keep the parking enforcement in transportation.

Thank you.

One of the things you are comfortable with saying is that illegal immigrants contribute to the economic stability of this country. That's not necessarily true. We we need to have an opportunity to look at the fact that not all undocumented immigrants pay taxes. Some work under the table and do not pay income taxes. Some work in off the books jobs.

I don't know what that means. Illegal immigrants can put economic strains on state and local budgets by causing negative fiscal impacts. The city Of New York spent $12,000,000,000 over the next three years on housing, food, health care, and other securities for illegal services illegal immigrants. Chicago in 2023 spent $361,000,000 on illegal immigrants having the needs for the same things I just mentioned, housing education. Illegal immigrants make up expenses with the use of welfare, with the use of public education, significant physical costs, with the use of emergency medical services.

So don't come here and say that that you are a sanctuary city, you have an economic to some people that you don't give to African Americans. And we're gonna continue to have this confrontation conversation until you bring a report of the economic impact of being a sanctuary city. When that happens, then we can move from there. But you are making assumptions about your sanctuary city status doesn't have any impact negatively. It does.

African Americans are 9% of unemployment in in the city of Oakland and 14% unemployment in the city of California. Low level scale jobs, Barbara Jordan told y'all, that's my time, my baby. I'll tell y'all.

Thank you for your comments, chair. That concludes all speakers for open forum.

Thank you everyone. The meeting's adjourned.