Public Works Committee - Regular Meeting

rock and roll good morning and welcome to the rules and legislation excuse me see i do rules normally so i tend to if i have it my apologies yes good morning and welcome to the public works and transportation committee on this tuesday june 23rd it is now 11 33 and this meeting shall come to order I would like to give instructions on how to submit a speaker card for items on the agenda before I call roll. If you're here in person and would like to submit a speaker card, please fill out a card on the table and hand it to a clerk representative either before the item is read into record or 10 minutes after the meeting began. The meeting began at 11.33, so that will be 11.43. Online speaker cards are no longer accepted 24 hours before the meeting, after the meeting began, so those will no longer be accepted. And again, speaker cards will not be accepted 10 minutes after the meeting began at 11.43 or before the item is read. With that, I will now call roll on roll for this meeting. Council Member Guyal. Council Member Houston.

Here.

Thank you. Council Member Wong. Present. Chair Unger.

Here.

Thank you. We have four members present. With that, I will now go to, and do you have any announcements before we go? I will now go on to item number one, and item number one is the approval of the draft minutes for the committee meeting of June 9th, 2026. I will need a motion.

I'll second that.

Okay, and that was a motion by Councilmember Gallo, seconded by Councilmember Unger to approve the draft minutes for June 19th, 2026. On roll, Councilmember Gallo. Council Member Houston?

Aye.

Council Member Wong? Aye. And Unger?

Aye.

Item number one is approved with four ayes, as is. That now takes us to item number two. Item number two is determination of scheduling outstanding committee items, and I do have two speakers for this item.

Okay, I believe we have one change from the administration.

Yes, thank you. We would like to move item six from today to the July 14th committee meeting.

I accept that change. Any other comments, Council Member Gaya?

Council and members of the public what I'm requesting is that we schedule as an ongoing within this item for the city administrator to report back in terms of the equipment needs that the city has and specifically Public Works transportation right now we have a hundred and fifty plus vehicles that are not in service or not being used to clean our streets to beautiful our streets and we sit here talking a lot about oh yeah you know we're doing such a great job taking care of our streets but if you go to Any of the auto shops, whether it's the Coliseum and Mr. Unger, I mean, you joined me one time. You could see the trucks, not only the fire department, the police department, the city trucks, but we're sitting here doing a lot of talking, but I don't provide the tools and the vehicles necessary for my workers. We're even short-staffed. We're short-staffed, and then when you look at the vehicles, we don't have to clean the streets. You see it, Ken. Right, and so I'd like to get our report back in terms of how many vehicles, what do we need to do in terms of getting those vehicles replaced, serviced, because I've never seen Oakland at this level. We do a lot of talking, a lot of celebrating, but yet we can't take care of our neighborhood streets. And so I'd like to get a report back through the administrator for the public works staff members to report what is the status of our vehicles, trucks, cars, and so forth that are needed, and what is needed to maintain the department, vehicles necessary to keep our streets clean. To give you an example, this week it's an example. I ride city vehicles cleaning the streets every day, especially on the weekend. My employees, they're not sitting in the office making more policies. They're on the streets every day, Monday through Sunday, 6 a.m. to 12 noon, picking up the illegal dumping and so forth. You get up and go out there on the streets of Oakland at 6 a.m., you're going to be surprised what you see every morning. the truckloads that we pick up. But to give you an example, I went out to ride, used the truck on Sunday, but, you know, I ran out of gas at the street level because the The gauge wasn't working. It told me I had a full tank, but it was on empty. Then secondly, we come back to ride on the big vehicles that we rent to show up and somebody had in the yard on Coliseum had stolen the catalytic converter of the big truck. And even though we have a security guard, we have all this and that, but how... It's not the first time they've sold the catalytic converter, but they've sold now the vehicles at that yard as well. But anyways, we need to be able to report back, because we all talk about a clean city being a priority, but we don't have the tools, the vehicles, and the staffing. Available or necessary to keep our streets clean can especially in the area that you and I live in and so I'd like to get our report back through the administration To let the public know what is our vehicle our staffing status when it comes to public works to keep in our streets safe and clean Okay, I look forward to seeing that as a request for an informational item at the Rules Committee councilmember Houston.

I

I just wanted to piggyback on Councilmember Gallo's comment about this. I would advise everyone to review the grand jury report when it comes to illegal dumping on how our city has not been doing the job that they should do. We're not a cleanup service. We're not a cleanup service. We have all the tools that a cleanup service or a waste management has. We gotta deter this problem, prosecute these individuals. I've been working on this for 10, 12, 13, 14 years before it became so high profile that everybody wanna jump on the bandwagon about. but I've been fighting for this for a long time with Supervisor Nate Miley and Governor Gavin Newsom about this crime against our community. So I'd just like to piggyback on that, and at the same time, Councilmember Gallo mentioned about the yard on Coliseum Way. That yard is owned by someone, and we pay rent, millions of dollars, and we should be owning our own piece of property, storing our vehicles so we can have that money for the kids, for dumping, or for whatever we need it for. So the city, in my opinion, is not running it like a business. That's a problem I have. I ran a business many times since I was five years old. I've been cutting grass, paper routes. I know how businesses ran, and this ain't ran like a business. So I just wanted to make that comment and piggyback on what my Council Member Guyot had mentioned. Thank you.

Okay, let's hear from our speakers, please.

Thank you. As I call your name, please approach the podium in any order. State your name for the record. If you're participating on Zoom, please raise your hand so I can easily identify you. I have Ms. Asada Olabala and Blair Beekman in any order.

I saw something in the news, I think yesterday, that caught my attention related to illegal dumping. There are some people who picked up trash in what was Wood Street, West Oakland, and they say for four months nothing has happened in terms of illegal dumping returning. Four months. So we need to get a report on how they speculated that happened that no trash returned for four months because something's going on. We need a report please on what are the prevention strategies to keep up with our equipment? So when my car has a system that when it needs maintenance, it indicates it. So does the public works vehicle equipment have indicators in them that says maintenance necessary, oil change, engine, whatever? Does that exist? I don't know, but it should be the kind of vehicles we have in place so we know when we need to take care of replacing or having maintenance. There you go. Soon as I see that light go off, I'm over to the dealership to get it fixed. Okay, and maybe that's an issue we need to bring up. I wanna report on the School of the Arts city property that has been turned into a park. That property was supposed to be used for outside activities, but they have reconfigured it. Is my time up? I can't see anything.

No, you still have 29 to take a dog.

That property was supposed to be returned to the city in 2027. Now who's got pull up that on official turf all of those benches and so forth so we can put housing on that property. I'm very concerned about the police administration building. How does the public works department determined high priority neighborhoods. How does it determine a high priority process for projects?

I apologize, Ms. Assata, your time is up. That's okay, thank you. Thank you so much. I will now call our next speaker who's participating via Zoom. Actually, let me see, one second. Blair Beekman, I don't see him in the queue. So those are all our speakers for item number two. And with that, do we get a motion and a second for item two? I'll second it so there was a motion by councilmember Giles seconded by councilmember Unger to approve item 2 as amended with which is withdrawing item number 6 on this agenda and rescheduling that item to the July 14th Public Works and Transportation Committee on roll councilmember Gile councilmember Houston Wong? Aye. And Chair Unger? Aye. Item number two is approved as amended. Again, moving item number six to the withdrawing and rescheduling to July 14th. We do have speakers, so you guys will be able to speak at that time when we get to that item. Now moving on to item number three. Item number three is adopt the following pieces of legislation, a resolution authorizing the city administrator to award a contract to United Rotary Brush Corporations in the amount not to exceed $750,000 for the purchase of replacement brooms and brushes for street sweepers for a three-year term, July 1st, 26, to July 1st, 2029, and two one-year options to renew in response to the specification number, RFQ, making sequel findings and to a resolution authorizing the city administrator to award a contract to own equipment sales and the amount not to exceed $750,000 for the purchase of a placement brush brooms and brushes for street sweepers for a three one-year term July 1st 2026 to July 1st 29 and one and two one-year options to renew in response to the specifications RFQ and making sequel findings I do have two speakers for this item

Okay, Mr. Battersby, let's talk about sweeper brushes.

Thank you, Chair Unger. Richard Battersby, Assistant Director for Oakland Public Works, Bureau of Maintenance and Internal Services. And just real briefly, we just celebrated the Juneteenth holiday, and I wanted to remind folks that that message was delivered to the free people by the United States Army, so airborne. We are here to discuss two contracts for repair items for our critical street sweepers. We currently have an inventory of 18 street sweepers. At any given time, we're fielding 10 to 12 currently, which is a pretty good number. And to keep those vehicles operational and sweeping, not just running the street, but getting a good thorough sweeping, we have to replace the brushes and other wear components such as the gutter brooms. We have two contracts with two different vendors in keeping with our new practice of going out to RFP and offering opportunity to local businesses. We did receive two responsive bids. None of the Oakland based companies submitted a bid for these repair parts. Each contract is in the amount of $750,000 for five years. Just a reminder to folks that establishing a contract capacity is not a budgetary action. It is just giving us the capability to spend money that the council has already authorized us to spend. We do have on the sweepers and other vehicles We call them a automatic vehicle locators. It's GPS that communicates when a failure is is pending when we get a parameter or we get a reading outside the specified parameters so that vehicle needs service and that also communicates to us the broom up and down time so we have very good tracking data on the vehicles and we get that we do a good job getting them into the shop but as council member gaio so eloquently noted we just don't have the bodies in the shop to fix the vehicles and we're starting to have problems with our external vendor contracts these two contracts will give us the ability to procure the normal wear parts and also repair parts for street sweepers and i'm available to answer any questions you might have colleagues questions councilmember houston

Can you, one of the public members asked the question, how do you choose where the street, how do you choose where you direct a street sweeper to go in? and clean up the street throughout the city.

On the route sweeping programming, that is actually performed by Keep Oakland Clean and Beautiful in the Bureau of the Environment. I don't have direct knowledge, but I have general knowledge on how that takes place. We have map overlays that show the streets that need to be sweeped. And then we try to program the most efficient route. We have another GPS-type system that we're deploying called Route Smart that will help make the routes the street sweepers run the most efficient. The problem that we typically run into is we don't have enough sweepers. To have about a 50% sweeper availability rate really hinders our ability to meet the street sweeping schedules that we are programming.

Then the second question is regarding siting the individuals I mean, I have street sweepers in my neighborhood going daily. But then there's some of us that don't understand the rules or the signage that we have and are parked in the red zone, parked on that day for the street sweeper. What is the process? Does the Department of Transportation still go before or after the street sweeper to cite the people?

Yeah, through the chair, my understanding is prior to the street sweeper running, DOT parking enforcement will send a vehicle and issue citations for vehicles that are parked on the street in violation of the posted street sweeping signage.

Thank you. Thank you for that, and I'll make a motion to approve the item.

Council Member Houston, please.

Through the chair, good morning, Mr. Battersby. I'm gonna piggyback on Councilmember Gallo's question again before I ask my two, is that before in the past, there was a parking car, whatever you wanna call them, citation car following behind the street sweepers. I haven't seen that any longer. Did that change?

Through the chair again this I fixed the street sweepers So I kind of have some general knowledge on how things work But I would have to get the answer that question and report back to you because I just don't know for certain So so through the chair, I'll ask the city administrator.

Is that has that changed? This is late.

Thank you for the question my understanding is that the DOT and street-sweeping teams coordinate and the street sweepers precede they do not follow the street sweeper and

Okay, because they used to follow these to be right there that was it back in the day and really work with people parking on the wrong side of the street in the wrong direction.

Anecdotally I would say the number of tickets that my kids get for street sweeping days proves that they're out there doing it.

All right, you know, I believe what you say so to the chair again. So Mister batters be what's the lifespan of the brooms and brushes on the street sweepers.

uh through the chair it depends um it depends on the surface that's being swept obviously the rougher street surfacing asphalt concrete can have a difference and it also depends on how often we're running the sweepers i would say and again i'm i probably should get the information and get back to you but i i will say that a brush is probably going to last in the matter of months so we're constantly replacing those wear items

Okay, last question to the chair. You mentioned that the Oakland-based, you know I'm Oakland, Oakland first on everything, workers, companies, and you mentioned that they didn't respond. What were those Oakland-based companies' names?

Sure. Through the chair, we have R.S. Hughes Company Incorporated, And the next closest was Granger on Doolittle Drive, but that's in San Leandro. Those are the two most local businesses.

So RSU, I know where Granger is. Where's RSU?

Actually, it's on Edgewater Drive right down the street from the Corporation Yard through the chairman.

And what was the difference in the pricing?

RSUs did not submit a proposal, so.

And Granger didn't either. and grainger did not either can through the chair can we reach out to them and ask them why they did not because that's important did they get it did they miss it did they feel that oakland is not um supporting local businesses and we want to ensure them that they are because i see your work through the chair again i see you what you're trying to do and i appreciate it too because you're looking out because you mentioned it right so can we reach out to them and find out Just find out, just say, hey, you know, this bid came up for these brushes, why didn't you, just to get some input, get some engagement, right? To see and they'd say, oh, wait a minute, Oakland reached out to us, they really wanna work with us. Can we find that out and you get back to my office and let us know why they did not respond?

Yeah, through the chair, absolutely. It may be a, not proprietary, but a specialized nature of street sweeper brushes that perhaps this is something that they don't generally stock. I just don't know. That would be my first guess, but we'll find out directly from the vendors themselves.

Yeah, just reach out to the manager or whoever orders and just ask them so they know that we're concerned why they did not. And just get that back to Trinity for me, please.

Absolutely, thank you.

councilmember wong thank you through the chair first of all thank you for your service to this country um i was wondering so i get some concerns and feedback from some of the community orgs that i work with closely who have street level observations that basically the street sweeping is not always happening on schedule And I know that doesn't sound like something that you can answer for today But would love to just get some insight into that so I do fully support this item because street sweeping is the first line of defense for illegal dumping and The other thing I just was wondering about, I understand we have a street sweeper for bike lanes specifically. I've noticed actually allele dumping happening in our bike lanes. Does this include brushes for the bike lane street sweeper?

Yeah, through the chair, thank you for the questions. Yes, this will include the wear components for the bike lane sweeper, which we coordinated with DOT years ago when we saw the prevalence of bike lanes in the much narrower sweeping area. It's defined by curb, so you have to have that smaller sweeper. We actually had the sweeper on hand in time for the first bike lane opening, so we did a great job on that. And just generally as far as street sweeping not going as scheduled, when you have something between 45 and 50% of your sweeper fleet available, I would imagine that regularly routes are not being swept simply because we don't have the equipment to do so. And the last thing I'll add is through an EPA grant that we received, we'll be buying three battery electric street sweepers in the near future. We hope to have those in service by 2027. They're not exactly a one-to-one replacement for the diesels because of their range due to the battery. And then there's a lengthier charging time. But once we get them deployed, we'll figure that out.

That's great, thank you for your work on that. And I'll second the motion made by Council Member Gallo. Through the Chair, I apologize, I believe I heard Council Member Houston second.

Oh, okay. All good. I'll call the speakers for this item. I have Ms. Asada Olaballa and Blair Beekman for item number three. In any order, please approach the podium or raise your hand in the queue. And please state your name for the record.

How an item comes to the committee. So for this item, you have rule 28 resolution, you had to change the title. So it looks like it went to committee, but at some point after the committee meeting, you had to change the title. So what's the title change? Then related to the second part of this item, this item never went to committee, the second part. Rule 28 is adding it to the agenda. I don't understand why when this item went to rules, why both parts of the agenda as items couldn't be presented. You see, this process of how staff does things all crooked and confusing, it's gotta stop. You have to have some legitimacy. I question the confusion here. And you don't have to explain it. You don't have to explain it because remember, I'm not owed an explanation because I'm only a citizen in this city. which means nothing. So I'm also concerned with the statement we're getting it into the shop. So let's make sure we understand. When we're getting the need for this to be dealt with in terms of the replacement, we do the replacement. It doesn't go out for a payment of some outside vendor to replace the brushes and whatever else it is. That's important because that's a cost. You see, we get it into our shop or we get it into somebody else's shop. And if it's somebody else's shop, how much money do we spend? Lastly, the challenges that people have brought up about once we have this equipment, oh, no, no, I don't wanna go there. I wanna finish up with this process of two one-year options to renew. Why did you do that? Why do you have to put that in there? You have a contract that's for a certain number of years, three years. Why do you put that in? Is that an easy way for you not to have to deal with?

Thank you so much for your comments, Ms. Assata. Our next speaker is Blair Beekman. If you would like to speak, please raise your hand. All names have been called. Unger and so we have a motion for item number three, moved by Council Member Guyot, seconded by Council Member Houston to approve staff recommendations to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council agenda. On roll, Council Member Guyot.

Aye.

Houston.

Aye.

Wong. Aye. Chair Unger.

Aye.

Item number three is approved with four ayes to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council agenda on consent. Yes, and that now takes us to item number 4.

I believe Council Member Houston has a comment.

Yes, yes, on consent, but I need that information back from Mr. Battersby before that date, please, because that might have me to change about extending that, because I just want to hear what those vendors said. That's very important, but I do want it on consent.

Thank you.

Again, that now takes us to item number four. Item number four is a resolution awarding a purchase contract for asphalt and concrete disposal services to Agrit Materials Inc. in accordance with the request for the RFQ. Specifications and contract bid in the amount not to exceed $560,000 per year for three years with one additional two-year option in the amount not to exceed $560,000 per year for a total not to exceed $2,800,000 over five years. Waiving any further advertising and bidding and awarding a purchase contract for asphalt and concrete disposal services to be green recycling and simply supply LLC. accordance with the request of the RFQ specifications and contracts big contractors bid any amount not to exceed five hundred sixty thousand dollars per year for three years with one additional two-year option any amount not to exceed two million two million eight hundred thousand dollars over five years and adopting sequel findings I have two speakers for this item okay let's hear the report please

okay good morning council committee members my name is tony jones i'm the interim operations manager for the department of transportation streets and sidewalk division currently right now we're repaving our streets and we have the opportunity to update newly surface roads but at this time our disposal as far as what we're trying to get rid of the material, we have to base it out at our Oakport Transportation Station, where it's basically like our third option. Right now, we don't have a contract with Argent Material, who we were using at the time. So we had to store it at our own location for right now. And currently, it's about three stories high. Yes, we're running out of room. So we're trying to keep our work in progress and keep things moving. But at this time, we're going to have to slow down because we have no place to store our debris as far as concrete and our asphalt spoils. So we're looking to get a contract renewed with Argent Material and trying to get a second contract with Bee Green Supply. that would help us out tremendously because our third option would also be, we'd have to use waste management. And right now, waste management, we're spending about almost over, I would say close to $2 million just for disposal. And that's way too high. So I'm here today to present this to you. Hopefully it'll pass and then that would help us out tremendously. ANY QUESTIONS?

THANK YOU FOR THAT REPORT. LET'S HEAR FROM COUNCILMEMBER HOUSTON, PLEASE.

THROUGH THE CHAIR. MR. TONY JONES, NICE MEETING YOU. PLEASURE. LET ME SHARE THIS WITH YOU. BEFORE THIS WORLD THAT I LIVE IN AS COUNCILMEMBER, I KNOW BOTH OF THOSE COMPANIES, ONE IS IN 7 AND ONE IS IN 6, RESPONSIBLE TO A WHOLE OTHER LEVEL. when it comes to embracing the homeless, Arjun Material hired the justice impacted and the homeless to actually clean up the streets, actually paved Baldwin themselves at their cost, and actually keeps and cares about the air quality in that area. Now, for us to actually, this is the news that I like to hear, you know, we're using a local company that's hiring local people that's being responsible to our community, that hires people within our community. in our community and is saving us some money. We don't have to go to waste management. This is beautiful. This is music to my ears when I hear companies that are in the city of Oakland, that's been here, that's dedicated, that actually is responsible on different levels, right? And then to mention Bee Green, that's in district seven, I mean six is Kevin Jenkins, President Kevin Jenkins. Me and him are two peas in a pod, so anything that he goes with, I go with it also. But I'm saying they're responsible, right? So you made two great choices that are in Oakland, responsible of the streets and the surroundings and beautifying our neighborhood so and saving us money so uh mr tony jones pleasure meeting you for the first time with this great news and i want to move this item let's do it council member wong uh i just want to say well done and i'll second the item just based off everything my colleague just said thank you

Council member guy.

Yes Thank you. Mr. Jones for For being with us here in the city of Oakland and certainly, you know the history of our streets and so forth So the only request that I have is just to do it publicly it used to be years several years ago That you know once a month that that I would had a chance to identify the potholes in my district and But my employees and I would actually come to join your crew to fill those potholes. And I like to get back to doing that because we would get those done directly, immediately, and the public would see us getting it done. But anyway, so if you could just check in with your leadership and... and I'd be more than happy to join. I'll identify the potholes in my district, but I'll join your crew to fill the potholes with three, four of my other employees as well.

Thank you. Just make sure you have a service request number with those potholes.

All right, thank you. Let's hear from our public speakers, please.

As I call your name, please approach the podium and state your name for the record. If you are participating via Zoom, this is a time to raise your hand if you would like to speak on item four, if you signed up for it. I have Blair Beekman and Asada Olaballa.

Interim, huh? Okay. Yes, sir. I hope you keep the job. Let me tell you why. Because you gave an honest presentation and in that presentation you said, we had a contract, we didn't renew the contract, and because we didn't renew the contract, we had to take responsibility that we're not supposed to take responsibility for holding that asphalt. Why we didn't renew the contract? Why do we have to do this process of holding this stuff And why didn't we have a timely renewal of the contract? Again, that's staffing. I'm concerned about once you go through pulling up that asphalt, there's a possibility that the soil that you're dealing with has contaminated that asphalt. Particularly in areas of West Oakland, I know that's the case. You have lead in the soil, PCB can be in the soil if you're in West Oakland. Do you go through a process of determining if that asphalt is contaminated? You have to do that. And if it's contaminated, how do you eliminate contaminated soil asphalt compared to non-contaminated? Who does the contractor deal with that you're dealing with contaminated Asphalt or are they only taking non-contaminated? This contaminated soil throughout Oakland is a big deal and I know for a fact it's not being handled correctly. Lastly, hiring local people. I'm getting tired of hearing this thing about hiring local people and hiring local companies when you got the people that live in Oakland not having jobs because you allow illegal immigrants to come in here and take them jobs. So please cut down on that.

Thank you for your comments. Your time has ended. We are now moving to the Zoom speakers. If you signed up to speak for item four, Blair Beekman, please raise your hand if you would like to speak. Blair Beekman. And all names have been called for item four. With that, I will call roll. One moment. I have a motion by Council Member Houston, seconded by Council Member Wong to approve item four to be forwarded, approve staff's recommendations to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council Agenda on roll. Council Member Guyal.

Aye.

Houston.

Aye.

Wong? Aye. Chair Unger?

Aye.

Item number four is approved with four ayes to be approved to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council agenda on consent. With that, we will now go to item number five. item number five, adopt a resolution awarding a construction contract to Griddle Inc., DBA, Raise Electric Inc. for the Highway Safety Improvement Program, Cycle 10, 14th Street Safety Project between Mandela Parkway and Brush Street. the lowest responsible and responsive bidder in accordance with the project plan specification and contractors bid in the amount of $2,494,685.86 in adopting CEQA findings. I have three speakers for this item. Okay, let's hear from our staff, please.

My name is Amit Salwan, Principal Civil Engineer with Department of Transportation. So this item is to award a construction contract for 14th Street safety project between Mandela Parkway and Brush Street in West Oakland. The scope of the project is to reduce travel lanes from two lanes in each direction to one lane in each direction and installation of new rectangular rapid flashing beacons, signal master arms, additional pedestrian crossings across the median, crosswalk enhancements including advanced stop lines and street lights. The project intersections have the highest quantity and severity of reported crashes involving pedestrians and bicycles. This project is located in one of the highest equity priority area in the city and will connect to the downtown 14th Street project that is in active construction right now. This project is approved by the State Highway Safety Improvement Program and the City's Capital Improvement Program and is funded by State Highway Safety Improvement Program funds, State Gas Tax and Measure BB. Therefore, staff recommends that the City Council adopt a resolution awarding a construction contract to Grendel INC DBA Reyes Electric INC as they are the lowest responsible and responsible bidder and meets the city's small local business program requirements with 83.35% participation rate. That includes 32.44% to a small local business and 4.62% to a very small local business. I will do it for questions, thank you.

Excellent, thank you. Colleagues, questions? All right, let's hear from our speakers, please.

As I call your name, please approach the podium in any order, or if you're participating via Zoom, please raise your hand in the queue. I have Ms. Asada Olaballa, Kevin Daly, and Blair Beekman, in any order.

Now, Kevin Daly, thanks. I'm really looking forward to the 14th Street project being built. As you mentioned, it is on a high injury network, and it's somewhat of a continuation of the 14th Street project that goes past City Hall all the way to the lake, which is how I get to the council meetings. So good or bad news is you might have more cyclists attending council meetings if you have a safe way for them to get there. So thanks. Thanks for pushing this forward.

Thank you for your comments. Next speaker for item five.

OK, so this is an item that is. Item is rule 28. So it didn't go to rules. So if this was an ongoing project, why couldn't you get it to rules on time to be vetted? Why do we have to use Rule 28 to put it on the agenda? Does it have a timeline that has to be met, that you have to use Rule 28? The item identifies that this is a part of what they call Highway Safety, I'm sorry, which one is it? Broadway Streetscape. But when you go into the report, you're talking about 2nd Street to 11th Street, and that's Chinatown and Jack London Square, and 20th Street to Grand. Now, this is not any high population of residents. Yeah, they are Asians, like you say in the report, because it's Chinatown. But you go into all this race and equity, you go into pensions, disability, households that are very low income compared to Oakland population. That's a lie. This is another Chinatown focus. You got some of the projects you got on in Chinatown. Chinatown bought transit developments. You got the Oakland Alameda Access Project, the Chinatown Complete Streets Plan, the Lincoln Recreational Center Resiliency Hub, the Safe Route to School 10 Street Improvement, all of that in Chinatown. What you got going on in District 6? What projects, Mr. Houston, in District 7 they got going on? They got eight projects going on in Chinatown related to this area of street improvement, eight. and you're trying to make it look like this project is for people who are in high-risk communities.

Thank you for your comments, Ms. Assata. Our next speaker, Blair Beekman. All right, it looks like Blair is not available. We will, we need a motion.

I believe Council Member Wong had a comment.

yeah thank you through the chair so um i think this project looks fantastic i i want to see more of this across the city just uh too many people continue to get uh hit and and we just we we have a real issue with reckless driving and people getting harmed by it um so Thank you for applying and getting this H-CIP funding. Would welcome your thoughts on how we can get more of this. And one question I just have is on Measure BB funding this. I thought Measure BB, we were in the negative on that or somebody explained that. Can you explain where we are with our Measure BB funding? Thanks.

I don't know the details of the Mayor Beebe, but I know that for this project the money has been reserved through Mayor Beebe. So we have the funds from Mayor Beebe on this project. I don't know the overall picture of Mayor Beebe.

Excuse me. You know, the flashing lights, things like that. I would just love to see more of that across the city.

We try our best to get after the grants wherever possible. We have a dedicated team with funding strategy and our city planners. So we go for each and every grant possible.

Right. Thank you. Appreciate it. And with that, I will make a motion.

Council Member Houston, did you have a question?

It was really not a question, Councilmember Unger. It was more of a statement that, and I always say this, that just this weekend, and Ms. Bessie Lake can share, it just happened at Sunnyside, our community center was burned up. Our kids got to be moved to somewhere else. District seven has been underserved for so long, so long. I'm not only hurt, I'm angered. I'm angered, and I'm gonna start moving in a different way now, because I got my 15 months under my feet now, and I'm gonna move like I moved in the streets back in the day. I'm gonna move with force. I'm gonna move with my people because they deserve better. They deserve better. And my electoral obligation to my people that put me in office was to stand up for them. And I'm cut from a different cloth and I will. And the people that are watching that know me, they know I will. And I'm gonna pull my people together. We gonna fight for what's right. And it's gonna be good or it's gonna be ugly because I'm the only person on this dais that can speak to the two races that are underserved. My mom is black, my father's Latino. Nobody can speak to it like I can, nobody. And I'm gonna speak to this at public safety later today as the vice chair, that I support my LGBTQ community. My first cousin, when I was a kid, she LGBTQ. Councilmember Wayne knows I support her initiative. Janani knows I support hers. Councilmember Brown knows I support hers. I support my Latino family. They know. When my family die in Mexico, I got to get over there in 24 hours because they handle it a different way. They bury quicker, right? When my people die on the streets in the asphalt, their blood is dripped in that asphalt, I'm there with them too. So I'm going to start moving in a different way. If my people don't get took care of, I'm moving a different way because I'm tired. And I'm going to say this. My electoral obligation is to stand up for my black folks, and they not getting took care of. They're not, they're not. You heard them this day, the other day, when they came down here with Measure NN, talking about underserved, East Oakland, East Oakland. I represent East Oakland, from the hills to the flatlands. below the second rural tracks to Sheffield Village. Very diverse. Very diverse. And I touch them all. So I just had to say that because come to public safety. Because I'm going to speak on this on a different way. So these streets, my streets need to be taken care of too. Thank you.

Thank you, and I have a motion by Councilmember Wong, seconded by Councilmember Gallo to approve staff recommendations to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council agenda. On roll, Councilmember Gallo. Aye. Councilmember Houston.

Aye.

Councilmember Wong. Aye. And Chair Unger.

Aye.

Item number five was approved with four ayes to be forwarded to the July 7th City Council agenda on consent. that now takes us to our last item item number six which was withdrawn and rescheduled for the july 14th public works and transportation committee agenda i will quickly read in the title as stated by city attorney and then we will call the speakers as we will not be hearing this item this item has been withdrawn and will be rescheduled is rescheduled to the july 14 public works and transportation committee And this is a resolution awarding a construction contract to McGuire Hester for Ball Race Rescape Improvement Projects, the lowest responsible and responsible bidder in accordance with the project plan and specifications at state requirements and with contractors bid in the amount of $20,881,650 and adopting appropriate CEQA findings. again i will call the speakers who signed up for this item but this item will be rescheduled to july 14th and i have miss asada olabala blair beekman and kevin dally if you are participating online please raise your hand for those who are here in chambers please line up at the podium and state your name for the record thank you

You know that last item, that's this item, as I was addressing, I had my notes on the wrong page, but this was a Rule 28 item, and now you're saying it was an emergency, you had to put it on the agenda, but now you're taking it off the agenda. So why did you put it on the agenda in the first place? It didn't go to rules. Who put it on the agenda? Staff from Public Works? I'm telling you, Public Works needs a whole lot of scrutiny. I'm not going to repeat what I said, but this is considered a high population, just like item five, high population. Who's this high population? You know, there's a reason why black people all over these countries are boycotting the Asian businesses. Go to Chinatown, see how many black people work in Chinatown. Go to Fruitvale, see how many black people work in Fruitvale's businesses. None. And then when you have your non-profits, like the Lau family, the East Asian Youth Center, gonna take care of correcting issues for black people. Y'all better get the hell out of here. and stop this insanity. And as soon as we bring up, we're not gonna support Asian beauty shops and Asian nails, that's Asian hate. And Chinatown had a meeting last Saturday on how they gonna stop Asian hate. You need to stop using black people to make your money. That's what you need to stop doing. Do your thing. I don't know how under Proposition 209, how you can allocate money from the state for Chinatown. That's a race community. I don't know how y'all do that, but I'll bring it up. But you need to stop this prioritizing giving special treatment.

Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, Kevin. You'll pass. Kevin Daly is passing, and I have Blair Beekman. All right.

Well, I do not have comment on this item. Sorry. Thank you.

Thank you all name been called So again item number six a Broadway streetscape improvement project construction project was withdrawn and rescheduled to do July 14th During our item to pending list with that. We will now go to open forum We have miss Assata Olaballa Blair Beekman and Kevin Daly for open forum. I

Kevin Daly. Now that we have made decisions on where parking enforcement is, I'd love to revisit the question of progressive ticketing. There's a number of drivers who repeatedly have the same violations and have decided it's just a cost of doing business. The city is capable of increasing the costs with repeated violations subject of course to state law and i'd suggest that either finance or public works and transportation look at the issue and decide how we can increase the ticketing i hope for safer streets but until then at least we make a little bit of more money thanks thank you for your comments next speaker for open form

You seem to have no need to discuss the maintenance issues that are going on at the police administration building that building has been scheduled for a number of years to be demolished because of the number of safety issues seismic issues, particularly. and some of the health issues that continue to go on in that building, but you don't deal with it. But you use Measure U money to build a library in Chinatown for which the community decided they wanted, not the library, the recreational center, they wanted to build a new recreational center, and your city management said, we'll pay for it. We'll pay for it. At the same time, that police administration building is continuing to be a high risk issue. When the property is demolished, we supposed to put affordable housing on the property. That was the next part of it. But you are ignoring high priority issues to do favoritism, particular in Chinatown, for which Wong is gonna, Public Safety declared it, we already had a sanctuary city ordinance, Gallo and Wong, but now you wanna ordinance that the city is a city of refugees. When are you gonna refuge the people who live here who are African Americans? I'll go into that detail over and over at every meeting. You gots a hell of a nerve to bring a city of refuge issue when you don't deal with gentrification. You don't deal with 10% unemployment of African Americans. You got a hell of a nerve talking about this needs to be a city of refugees for people who don't live here when you don't do nothing for the people that do live here who are known as African Americans.

Thank you for your comments. We will now move to Zoom speakers. I have Blair Beekman. You may unmute yourself and begin.

Hi, Blair Beekman. Really good luck on how to address that previous item, by the way. Thank you for it. For this item per open forum, my two big issues today will be the strong mayor, how to work on the strong mayor issues, and the flock issues. I think I'm going to address flock because it seems more appropriate to this sort of meeting today. We were promised, you know, in the December meeting, I mean, I was heard they were at death's door if they didn't sign the contract by March 2026. And I heard, has the contract been signed? I heard it took a long time for that contract to be signed, like into May it wasn't signed yet. How is that going? I'm a bit concerned and worried. I mean, I spoke, you know, In just all of my everything that you guys did a great thing with compromise and but you know what that happens is you end up feeling stupid afterwards. And I still mean what I said meant what I said, but maybe we could have done it in a year's time in an 18 month period timeframe. And I never ever knew the concept that flock can be adding on to their their surveillance things in that two year time period, but I guess i'm kind of remembering that now. How is the flock review process going? I think we really should have, you know, six-month updates, some kind of report saying, well, we're at this place, the police are doing this, they're going to bring this to the PAC at this such and such a time very soon. We should have those kind of things happening. And we should be, you know, this is a community process to change the world, basically, and change our dynamic of how we view issues. Good luck that we work on this as a good community process. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. All speakers have been called for open forum.

All right, let's call it a day. Meeting adjourned.