Public Safety Committee - Regular Meeting

Yeah.

Good evening, and welcome to the Public Safety Committee meeting of Tuesday, 02/10/2026. The time is now 06:08PM, and this meeting may come to order. Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit speaker cards on 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 time.

This meeting came to order at 06:08PM, and speaker cards will no longer be accepted ten minutes after, making that time 06:18PM. We'll now proceed with taking roll. Council members Fife? Present. Council member sorry. Brown? Present. Council member Houston? Present. And chair Wong? Present. Thank you. We have four members present. Before we begin, chair, do you have any announcements at this time?

I don't. I will ask for some Yes. Just gonna ask people to keep it down in the chamber. I know everyone's excited about the disparity study, but just if we can go ahead and proceed with this. So no announcements except the mask for order in the chamber.

Okay. Thank you. Reading in item number one, approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on January 3

Come on, you got

2,000.

Okay. I'm sorry. I need some order in the chamber. I need voices to to lower down. And if you have a conversation, please have it outside of the chamber so everyone can look can hear and listen to everyone. Sorry. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. I get approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on 01/13/2026 and 01/27/2026. And there are no speakers on this item.

I'll move approval.

Okay. I'll second that. Thank you.

That was a motion made by council member Brown, seconded by chair Wong to approve the draft minutes from the committee meetings held on January 13 and 01/27/2026. On roll, council members Brown? Aye. Council member Fye? Aye. Council member Houston? Aye. And chair Wong? Aye. Thank you. Item number one passes with four ayes. Reading in item two, determination of schedule of outstanding committee items also known as your pending list. There are no speakers that signed up.

I do wanna comment on the pending list. I know that there's been a report that has come out around some troubling overtime published in the Oakland side recently. We do have that report being scheduled to the March 10 finance and management committee meeting. I invite anybody on this committee who wants to listen to that to come to that meeting. So that's going to be March 10 09:30AM colleagues.

And anything from the administration? No. Thank you so much chair. I'll entertain a motion. Second.

Thank you. That was a motion made by council member Houston, seconded by council member Brown to accept the determination of schedule outstanding committee items as is on roll. Council members Brown. Aye. Aye. Aye. Houston. Aye. And chair Wong. Aye.

Thank you. Item number two passes with four ayes to accept the pending list as is. Reading in item three, adopt a resolution authorizing the city administrator to enter into a professional services agreement with Evergreen Con Counseling, a marriage and family therapy corporation to provide behavioral science consultation, training, and confidential mental health services for the Oakland Fire Department from 02/01/2026 through 12/31/2028 in an amount not to exceed $450,000 with two one year year options to extend the agreement for up to an additional two years in an amount not to exceed $150,000 per year without returning to counsel for a total contract amount not to exceed $700,000, and there are no speakers on this item.

Okay. Well we're ready for the staff presentation. Somebody from OFD here? Ah.

Beg your forgiveness for, my inexperience here. Good evening, everybody. My name is Chris Foley. I'm an assistant chief with the Oakland Fire Department. Tonight, I'm here to speak to the importance of the issues of mental and behavioral health support for Oakland firefighters.

I've worked with the Oakland Fire Department since 2002, and I've worked on the issue of peer support for our members for ten years. And I can speak firsthand to the fact that this issue has never been more critical, and we're trying to minimize health and wellness impacts on our first responders. Enacting this contract with Evergreen Counseling will go a long way in supporting and strengthening OFD's health and wellness program. Firefighters routinely face traumatic incidents, cumulative operational stress, and exposures to life threatening situations that significantly affect their psychological The proposed agreement provides OFD with a licensed behavioral science partner to deliver confidential mental health counseling, post critical incident response, training and wellness counseling, and to the staff department wide. Evergreen counseling was selected through a competitive RFP, RFQ process in 2025 and demonstrated the specialized qualifications needed to support firefighters effectively.

This agreement fulfills the city's obligation to support the wellness of OFD members, aligns with the IAFF local 55 MOU provisions regarding mental health resources, and strengthens OFD's capacity to respond to behavioral health needs with clinical expertise, confidentiality, and timely intervention. The Oakland Fire Department has long recognized the necessity of supporting the mental health of its workforce due to the unique stressors associated with emergency response. NOFD's health and wellness program currently includes peer support, a critical incident stress management team, and access to employee assistance program. However, the EAP alone is insufficient to meet the specialized and often immediate mental health needs of firefighters. Evergreen counseling was selected based on its clinical expertise, fire service experience, and capacity to provide confidential services at scale.

The cost of this program over two years is $450,000 with an option to extend the agreement for an additional two years. It's a minimal cost in relation to the impact it will have on our members in their fight against cumulative mental health challenges, And I'd be happy to answer any questions. I

don't see any blinking mics, so I will ask a question. First of all, I completely agree that behavioral health, mental health services are, is a completely critical service that we need to ensure that our first responders have access to. I just have one question around the funding source. Is this being funded through ten ten

general Yes. Public

I'm now asking this of essentially every department for many of the things that come before me which is that, is there another fund that could fund something like this? Was that sought out or at least looked at before using the general purpose funds for this?

I'd have to defer that to the fire chief. I'm sorry, I don't have a good answer for you on that one. Imagining that yes, if he was directed to search for other alternative sources, he certainly would have.

Okay. Okay. And just to walk us through a little bit of the RFP process, how many people responded? Was this the only respondent?

We had a total of four respondents. And of the four, Evergreen was the only local participant in the process. So the three other respondents were from Southern California.

Okay. Yes. Got it. Colleagues, any questions? Councilmember Brown. Excellent. So good to see you.

Nice to see you too. So through the chair to Mr. Foley. So a couple questions. I think the first one, is this our first time doing a contract with Evergreen? It is. Yes. That's correct. Okay. And I guess I'm blending it all together because I know in 2025 we

I'm sorry. Let me back that up a little bit. We do have an existing contract with Evergreen. So this is sort of an an additional contract with them.

Okay. I'm sorry about that. Okay. I was gonna say I I thought so because I remember reading and reviewing this before. And so one question I have, do you know by chance how often the services are utilized by our firefighters?

Our last meeting, the number that was given to us by Evergreen staff was we've had seven forty four visits up to this point. So I don't know how many as this is confidential, I don't know how many members that encompasses.

I see.

But so we've had over 700 clinical visits thus far with Evergreen.

Okay. Excellent. And I would just share, you know Evergreen counseling has a very robust website that you can view. And it just shows some of the stats of and just some of the details of what our firefighters go through and why, how vital this supportive service is right?

Yes absolutely. And

I think maybe my only flag that when looking at the practitioners and thinking about the makeup of our Oakland firefighters I'm just ensuring that you know there are you know people of color practitioners that are also on staff with this counseling agency and also you know maybe like gender as well. It looks like 90, let me make sure I do my math right, yeah 98% of the staff are women and not a person of color. And so I think that would just be my only flag and just making sure cause we know that when you're seeking support it is important to have you know folks that you can talk to that maybe look like you Absolutely. As a priority.

And if I may speak to that point. That question has come up before. People that have sought their assistance on the front end, that very concern came up and that was never asked again. You know, the people that had that concern, their needs were met by this group of practitioners. Yes, very well taken point.

Excellent, thank you.

Yeah I just want to echo my colleague's comments that look I know many therapists, we can speak frankly are white. But I do think that we have a role as a city to push those that we contract with to offer a diversity of clinicians since I think therapy is one of those areas where that sort of cultural just empathy and not just empathy but just the shared cultural background is incredibly important.

Yes and I believe if you look at their website, this is mentioned as kind of part of their explanation of their company and their beliefs. Annie Wright, who's their founder, you know, I think she takes this extremely seriously and discusses it on her web page. And I think that it's perhaps it's not for lack of trying. Maybe perhaps the, you know, I can't speak to a hiring pool that she's up against. But certainly know that it's a priority for her.

And I would imagine knowing a bit about her background, she's done everything she can to alleviate this concern whether or not, I mean clearly if you look at her homepage it's mostly women. And so something that we can certainly bring back to them as a point.

Yes. Yes. That's what I would request that you do especially because there actually are more and more people of color actually serving in these types of therapist roles.

I will have a conversation with her about that.

Thank you.

Great.

Any other questions or I will entertain a motion. Council

member Fife. So moved.

Thank you. We have a motion made by council member Fife, seconded by council member Brown to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the February 17 city council agenda. On roll, members Brown. Aye. Aye. Aye. Houston. Aye. And Chair Wong. Aye. Thank you. Item number three passes with four ayes to forward this item to the February 17 city council agenda on consent. Reading in item four. A motion to designate council member Houston as vice chair of the public safety committee, and there's one speaker that signed up.

Council member Houston, do you want to you have five minutes to make your pitch to to us.

Oh, it's a pitch. Okay. Alright. I just wanna say that public safety has been my my passion for years. It's been for legal graffiti or graffiti vandalism, illegal dumping, homelessness.

And it it's just been a passion of mine to to to move our city in in the right way just like I'm doing with that EAP, that encampment abatement policy that we're gonna be working on real soon that I spoke to some about. Public safety is the key to the city. If we don't have public safety, our city won't be able to get businesses. We won't be able to to move forward in a healthy way. So in case you're not around, and and I'll I'll I'll be that person that'll chair it for the public safety committee and that's it. That's what I like to say.

Sounds good. Councilmember Brown. Yes. So to the chair and councilmember Houston, I guess I was I know this is a new item that the council has moved forward with having the vice chairs. I was curious how you propose operationally for this position to be working and functioning.

How I imagine this would work and I think this is the first committee that has a vice chairperson appointment coming before it is that in times when I would be absent, I don't plan on being absent much but you know whoever gets appointed as the vice chair would then serve in the chair role for that session.

I see. Any anything else or that's just the chairing of the meeting?

I think that would be it and then I I imagine that whoever is the vice chair because I I know that sometimes, say, when I wanna reach out to the district attorney or the Alameda sheriff or DV, you know, just various entities that are not just within the city but outside of the city that I have used that title in order to, know, get access to somebody to have a conversation around public safety and I would imagine a vice chairperson could also use that title to you know be taken say seriously by entities outside beyond directly out of the city that we have pur view over.

I see. Thank you. I was just curious.

Councilmember Brown or Fife, excuse me. I'll be fully transparent that I was the sole vote on the city council against the change in the rules of procedure because in all of our committees, the chair can identify who should chair in their absence. So this change in the rules of procedure just was not logical and it was one of the reasons that I voted no. That said, if the body the Public Safety Committee does want to move council council member Houston forward, then I want to offer my support and services council member because sharing is more than a passion. It's about understanding the rules of procedure.

It's understanding the Brown Act. It's being able to manage the public. It's being able to manage time and manage yourself. Because a lot of times in these spaces, people will come specifically to antagonize. So it takes a lot of self management, but also community management.

So I wanted to articulate that because and and just state again for the record why I thought this particular change in the rules of procedure didn't make sense because it's something again that the chair can already do without this formal procedure. And what I felt at the time what it was a it that is that it was a political move to choose an individual to be the vice chair of the rules committee. That is what was happening. But that said, I just wanted to state my my opinion for the record and I'm happy to be a part of calling the vote.

Sounds good. I think we have a public comment. Let's move move to that.

Calling in the name that signed up for item number four, miss Paula Hawthorne.

Is there a timer somewhere that I need to pay attention to? Because I'm from Texas and I'll talk forever. So I had the honor of working with Bridget Cook, a friend of mine, and of mister Houston's. And in one project that went sideways, she said she would call Ken Houston. I said, who's that?

She said, he is a wonderful man who runs a really good group and who we can depend upon. She said he is honest, his people do the work that he says they'll do, They come in on time and on budget and we need his help and he'll be here for us. And that is exactly what happened. I stand here partly in memory of my friend. I know the time we had together but partly to tell you what I think she would tell you which is that Ken Houston has been devoting his life to the betterment of the people of Oakland and he's a wonderful person to have as your vice chair, an amazing man.

And also, I want to say as the public safety committee, this is amazing honor and that this is probably other than rules the second most powerful committee. Desley Brooks ran this committee in such a way that it was the most powerful thing ever and she did it by asking for reports. This current issue with the with the inequitable discipline black black police officers getting harsher discipline than white. She'd have them in here OPD day after day. What's going on?

How are you going to fix it? When are you going to fix it? Now report back to me on how it is fixed. She wouldn't have stood for it. I ask you not to either.

Thank you for your comments. Chair, that concludes all speakers on this item.

Okay. Thank you. And then my request of you actually, Councilmember Houston is if you do become vice chair I think for a number of the recent meetings that you have taken them remotely. It is important for me is if you're appointed in this role that you are here more in person for for these meetings going forward. Okay, great. Thank you. You wanna make a motion? Do you wanna make the motion?

I'll make a motion to move it.

Alright. I'll second that.

Thank you. We have a motion made by council member Houston, seconded by chair Wong to accept the to approve the motion to designate council member Houston as vice chair of the public safety committee. Honorable council members Brown. Aye. Aye. Aye. Houston. Aye. And chair Wong. Aye.

Thank you. Item number four passes with four ayes to appoint council member Houston as vice chair of the public safety committee. Moving on to open forum, we do have 16 speakers that signed up to speak. In no particular order, you can come up to the podium, state your name for the record, or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified. Marcus Romero Garcia, Greg Slaughter, Alberto Para, Christine Miller, Avery Arbaugh, Donna Griggs Murphy, Cameron Preston, Ethan Lipman, Tariq Woods, Barley Anastos, Candida Hayes, Sheila Jackson, Adriana Martinez, Michelle Washington, Marie McKenzie, and Valerie Bachelor.

When you come up to the podium, please state your name for the record.

K. Good, good evening, the council members in the community. My name is Gregory Slaughter. I am a resident of District 7 and a member of ACE. I'm here today to share some concerns around public safety.

Okay. FLAC, data surveillance in December, majority of you voted to enter into the contract with FLAC even after hearing from hundreds of constituents over multiple hours of of city council meetings. Now Santa Cruz, Los Altos, Los Altsa Hills, Mountain View, and Richmond has all canceled their contract with Flock because they allowed ICE and other federal agencies to access their system despite a prohibit prohibited under state law. Our immigrant families deserve sanctuary, and that means canceling flock. Please reckon

Thank you for your comments. Thank you for your comments. Sir, will you be translating for him? Thank you.

For him. Good evening, council members and community. My name is Alberto. I'm a resident of District 5 and a member of ACE. I am here today to share some con my concerns around public safety. I'm a renter in Oakland, and I'm currently dealing with security cameras that do not work and pests. I have reached out multiple times to my landlord and property management with no solution. This is not the only stress this is not only stressful, but it's a public safety matter because I'm not I know I'm not alone. Thousands of tenants all over Oakland are dealing with habitability issues and landlords who put profits over people. That's why I'm organizing with Ace and calling on you all to support a proactive rental inspection program that will help renters like me have a habitable home.

My comment. Good afternoon, committee members. My name is Marcus and I'm an organizer working daily with tenants across Oakland. I'm here today because of our current compliant based code enforcement system is failing. I see the human cost of this failure every day.

I've sat in living rooms where children are developing chronic respiratory issues because of pervasive untreated mold, mold the landlord has ignored for months if not years. I've spoken with seniors living in senior buildings that were once dedicated senior housing who have gone years without heat, huddled around space heaters in the winter because they are too afraid to complain or have complained and it's gone unaddressed. I've seen homes with physical holes in the walls and in the floor with the basic structure of the building is literally fought failing the people inside. For immigrant tenants in Oakland, requests for repairs have been met with threats of ICE. I have seen landlords explicitly use a tenant status as a weapon to avoid fixing a leak or heater.

Under a compliant based system, a city inspection is a tell that the tenant spoke up making them a target for retaliation. This isn't just a housing issue, it's a civil rights and public safety crisis. We need to take the target off of a tenant's backs. I'm asking the committee to implement a proactive rental inspection program. Safe housing is a foundation of a safe city. Please move forward with a proactive rental inspect

Hello. My name is Avery, I'm an organizer with ACE. I organize mostly in District 2 and I'm here today representing myself but also representing almost a 100 tenants and ACE members in District 2 who many of which couldn't be here today but signed on to a petition calling for safe and healthy homes for all. And that means proactive rental inspections so that as Marcus illustrated, we have a system in which tenants aren't going to be retaliated against for calling for habitable homes but also means taking our illegal dumping crisis seriously. We have some folks here who have pictures of the conditions.

I've seen it every single day walking around the trash on the streets in District 2. It's only getting worse and we need to really take care of it and start to.

Hi, my name is my name is Christine Miller and I'm in District 2 also and yeah, we've collected signatures from I don't know the total count of people but I helped collect signatures and and there's a everybody seems to be in agreement, you know, that this is something we need. We also need proactive trash cleanup too, you know, instead of just reactive, like in our area, wait five or six days before somebody shows up after you call 311. And a lot of the people that that I spoke with in the neighborhood, you know, definitely have issues with the fact that it's, you know, it's filthy. It's a safer environment, you know, when when our neighborhoods are clean. I'd also wanted to say about the flock thing.

I wanted to know what whether you guys are actually actively looking for another company to run this thing because, that's what I heard was the possibility, but

Thank you for your comments.

Hello. My name is Barley. I'm a member of ACE and I'm also resident in District 2. I live on East 19th Street. I was also out knocking doors trying to get petitions for these same things.

Proactive rental inspections, cleaning up some of the potholes in our streets, and also proactive dump or trash removal. I've also been out knocking doors for ACE since September in my neighborhood and the most common things I have my neighbors tell me that they're concerned about, because that's all we're asking them is what they're concerned about, is the trash and the streets. And some of my neighbors have, while we were there talking to them, pointed out trash that had been sitting there for up to a month. Large pieces of trash like sofas and mattresses. And they're also complaining about the potholes in their streets tearing up their cars, which is causing it's already unaffordable in this city and this country, having a vehicle that you have to go get maintenance more often than you should is

Bless you. Hi. I'm Cameron Preston. I'm also in District 2 and just found out about this today, so I'm not exactly prepared. But, Charlene, I saw you at the cleanup at the Clinton Park the other day, and I do a lot of cleanups in the neighborhood and really care about Oakland and keeping it clean. I live right next to Clinton Square Park and there's there is lots of piles of trash all over the place. I walk around Laney College with my dog all the time. That place gets trashed really heavily too. There's a car that's been right in front of my house now for since last March that's been abandoned. I called it into 3116 or about eight months ago and it's still there.

Walk around my street all the time in the box springs and the mattresses and just the general upkeep that needs to happen. I think there can be a lot more like community organized stuff. It doesn't even necessarily like have to be tax dollar supported stuff, but I think there's a lot of people that would get together if we started organizing a lot of things more. So if we can have more

If you can stick around, I'll if I could get the location of that abandoned vehicle, we can escalate that with Oak three one one.

Good evening city council members. My name is Valerie Bachelor and I'm the director of ACE Oakland and the District 6 resident. And we're all here today because we want safe and healthy homes communities. And to us that first starts off with getting rid of the flock contract. As you have heard, hundreds of other cities are also getting rid of their flock contracts and just recently Santa Cruz, Los Altos Hills, Mountain View and Richmond have all canceled their contracts because ICE and federal agencies have accessed their systems even though it's prohibited by state law.

So we're asking you to re agendize that agreement and cancel that contract. As other folks have also mentioned, one of the largest issues that's going on in Oakland right now is the lack of proactive rental inspection. We have seen tenants go years without a heater, years with mold, years with thousands of other issues, and none of those have been deemed in enough for landlords to take care of them. And we have to have a proactive program because

Thank you for your comments.

And I'm Paula Hawthorne. I believe you have a thing for me also. When we were trying to get, ceasefire implemented in Oakland, I gave away books to people. To every single person on the city council, I gave a book. And right now, I'm seeing some not as much support for the police commission as I think it deserves.

And so, I'm giving you books. So, I have brought books for each of you and that is, Darwin Bond Graham's The Writers Come Out at Night. And I have marked where it talks about the police commission, why it was implemented, how it was implemented. And I'm giving each of you one of these. If you've already read it or you don't want it, just give it to someone else, please. But I really ask you to inform yourselves about why the police commission is so important and why it needs your total support. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Moving to Zoom users. Do you have a

I do.

Hi, my name is Candida Haynes and I am particularly interested in what's going on with proactive rental inspection. I have I don't know how to get support in terms of situations that the landlord refuses to intervene in. I live in a coop situation co living situation, so none of us own. And I there is a safety concern that probably goes more towards domestic violence, although there are no familiar familial or sexual ties. So I'm really here because I think there need to be services related to tenant on tenant harassment, which is something that I found that none of the agencies or nonprofits that I reach out to handle.

I know SEEDS used to do

Thank you for your comments. Now switching to Zoom users. Donna Murphy, you can unmute yourself and begin your one minute comment.

Hi. My name is Donna Griggs Murphy. I'm a member. I'm live in District 2 and a proud member of ACE. I stand with my ACE colleagues, on the clock issue. I'm hoping that you heard all the comments about flock and that you will reagendize this item. It's important that we keep ice out of our sanctuary city and that we do all we can to make sure our city is safe. So I'm hoping that you reagendize the item on flock, and I look forward to supporting it. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Marie, you can unmute yourself and begin your comment.

Hello. My name is Marie. I, I live in District 3, and I am a ACE member. I'm here to talk about public safety. I live in a senior building, and right now, I would love to be in person, but it is very dangerous for seniors to, leave our building at night.

There's a bunch of people having their cars broken into. Our gate isn't as safe, so a lot of homeless people like to wander in and cause issues with other residents here. And, you know, it's not their fault that they don't have the resources needed to help them get into actual housing, but it harms the other people who are actually able to be in housing. We don't have proper lighting on our street, and we need that stuff like that to get fixed because, you know, I feel like the seniors are a lot of forgotten people in Oakland, and we need to change that.

Thank you for your comments. If your name was called and you'd still like to speak, please come up to the podium or raise your hand to be identified on Zoom. At this time, all names have been called.

Alright. Thank you everyone who made public comment. I'll I'll after this meeting, I'd love to chat with you all. And with that, this meeting is dismissed. Oh, unless council member Fife, you have something to say?

I just wanna confirm because I've been working on PrEP and LHAP since 2021. And even though things are moving slowly in the city of Oakland, they are moving. And I wanna confirm that this organization is being consulted and is a part of the conversation. I can ask that offline because from my understanding that is happening.

Okay.

So if that is incorrect then I need to go back and talk to staff about what's happening but I'll take my responses offline. Sounds good. Councilmember Brown, doesn't look like you're got or you do? Okay.

Yeah. I was actually gonna provide that update that the at least as far as like internally with the city I believe. I just had a briefing on the kind of the lead abatement program city staff has been working very diligently on for some time and it's nearing completion and so I want to say in March or April it should be coming to CED. Yeah.

That's true. So we will

have an update on that very

inspections but it it is a subset of what needs to be addressed. Okay. Well, with that, I move to dismiss this meeting. Thank you so much.