City Council - Special Meeting

Welcome, everyone. Ready, guys? Welcome to the Tuesday, June 30th Special City Council Meeting for the City of Ojai. Roll call, please.

Mayor Gilman. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Meng. Here. Councilmember Rule. Here. Councilmember Lange. Here. Councilmember Wood.

Mayor, would you lead us in the pledge, please? Of course, Mayor.

Welcome, Mayor, honorable council, members of the community. Ready, begin. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

OK. Any changes to the agenda?

No, I'll move to approve it.

Second. Any objections? Wonderful. Okay, we'll go on to our first item, which is the first amendment to agreement with Ventura County Behavioral Health.

Thanks, Mayor. We're going to wait a moment while we load the presentation. Give me a second, please. Okay, very good. There it is. So tonight we're coming before you asking you to consider the renewal of the agreement with Ventura County Behavioral Health for a dedicated case manager for the city of Ojai serving OTT and the city of Ojai. Next slide, please. So this allocation is born half from the general fund and from the OTT account, and half from the ERF grant. And as I mentioned, I did include it as part of the budget that you adopted earlier this month. Next slide, please. So the Ventura County Behavioral Health Case Manager provides assistance to our most vulnerable population, those who are experiencing mental health issues. Taking advantage of mental health service is a voluntary act. And so the case manager often has to make multiple, multiple contacts with individuals to persuade them to accept the service. It's not something that we can requires somebody to enter into so it's a matter of establishing a relationship or an understanding of what could be possible and these are County services but this is a dedicated person working in the city trying to connect our folks to County services both within and without of OTT In this past year, there were 919 services to 81 individuals. I do not have a breakdown as to the address of these individuals, as to whether they were in OTT or within the city itself. And I don't have a breakdown of all the specific services. I am working with the county health department because I am understanding that as part of our contract, If we designate somebody, and it could be me, to go through the appropriate HIPAA training, then I could be aware of the various types of services that these people were provided and so on and so forth. But at this time, we don't have somebody in that role. Next slide. So just a little slide on the funding. And again, it's 5050 from the general fund and the ERF grant for a total of about 178,000. And it's included within the budget, as I mentioned earlier. Next slide. These are the types of services that are available, but it's certainly not limited to this. If you've been around OTT or around town, you may have seen April Munoz, who is our case manager. Very dedicated. It's a very difficult job. It's one where she's not only working here out of OTT. She does have an office here in Kent Hall that we provide for her so that she can meet with clients. But she also is embedded with the sheriff's department and the chief and his team often bring her along to calls because that was one of the reasons why we contracted for a dedicated resource. The chief would probably be one of the first people to tell you. Our law enforcement folks are excellent. They're highly trained. Behavioral health intervention isn't always their number one skill set that they have, not to mention they're also in uniform, as they should be, but sometimes that's the wrong person when you're vulnerable and you're looking to get assistance. When I'm finished with this, I'd like to have the chief talk a little bit about his involvement with this program and what he sees about it. Next slide, please. So, as I was indicating, it's a coordinated approach. This case manager is embedded with the Sheriff's Department. They also work directly with us here at OTT. They also work with our help of Ojai case managers. Our help of Ojai case managers are not behavioral health specialists. They are primarily trying to get folks signed up for social services and make sure that You know, all their daily living type things are being addressed, food, shelter, banking, personal sanitation, those types of things. Again, they, so this person is kind of a key component providing that individual that, you know, is trained to work in this area. Next slide. So what I like to tell people is this is basically an additional tool in the toolkit. Because using county services is voluntary, we can't compel people to do it. But in time, with enough exposure and with the right person, and I do really feel that we do have the right case manager here, she often can be successful. It might be the 15th or the 50th time that she's talked to somebody about accepting services. But sometimes that moment is right and the person is willing. And when that moment is right, she will often drive that person down to get the services herself. And again, this is really our most vulnerable population. It's harder. I see a difference just because I get the calls for people sleeping on sidewalks or harassing folks in Libby Park or whatever it is. And it's nice for me knowing that it's not just a call to the chief. It often can be a call to April. Hey, there's a person that I've been seeing around town. They're not, you know, this is often when I tell her, I don't think this person is causing a problem, but I can tell this person could probably use some help. And usually when I call, she asks for a description. Oh, that's blah, blah, blah. Yes, I know. I've been, you know, trying to work with this person for a while, and I haven't given up. So anyway. Next slide, please. Before we take it to council questions, I did want to just take a brief moment. Chief, can you talk about your experience with the case manager from Ventura County Behavioral Health?

I'll just take a few minutes, give you my perspective on the public safety side of things. Since coming to Ohio, I've had the opportunity to see firsthand the positive impact April's had on this community. Throughout my time in law enforcement, as the city manager spoke to, we respond to crisis. We're very good at solving problems, mitigating risk in the moment. But it's kind of that long term follow through that we don't really have the capability or the training. In law enforcement rights, success is not always measured in arrests or citations or even taking a police report. Sometimes it's the silent calls that we never go to. And that's really where April shines and these positions shine, right? It's about kind of creating that relationship, getting people connected to services. So if and when they go in crisis again, we don't have to show back up. And I'll give you a great example. Yesterday there was a family disturbance. A schizophrenic son attacked his dad with a kitchen knife. Luckily, the outcome was good. We solved it in the moment, made the arrest. The court process will play out, depending on whatever happens in court. But APRIL is a tool that I can refer, so that person will for sure get referred, and APRIL for sure will follow up with that person if and when they get out of custody. And that's how we measure these successes. A lot of times, we're going to be very silent. We're never going to know about it, and I won't know about it as a chief, and I shouldn't know about it because of privacy laws. But I stay in constant contact with April, oftentimes weekly. And I'll tell you this month, for example, she's had six successful cases. I'm reaching out to people, getting them connected with services through insurance, even their private insurance, or state insurance, whatever it may be. But they're actually going to behavioral health and going to get treatment. So I count those as wins, because that's probably the call my folks will not have to go to in a violent confrontation, and potentially in someone's life, or my deputies get hurt, God forbid. You know, and I call that a win. That's really like, it's a facet of public safety. It's as the city manager spoke to, it really is another tool in our toolbox. It gives us more options, right? Because we're not experts in the mental health field. And I always look at law enforcement, it really is a team sport. It's all of us, the community, it's lots of partners. And more so ever as, you know, later stages of my career now, things have evolved and we see, you know, society, it's rough times right now, right? Mental health is a big deal, trying to get people the help they need. And we don't have all the answers in law enforcement in this position the intensive health behavioral health coordinator It's phenomenal. It just truly gives us the other another option to reach to And I feel confident especially with April. She's I mean she's Johnny on the spot She'll take my phone call any hour any time of day And we have a phenomenal working relationship, but it's a trusted partner for me Mm-hmm Like I said, as I mentioned, I don't see every success, but some of the greatest successes happen quietly, and they may never become public stories, but that doesn't make them any less meaningful. Some of the most important work in public safety is preventing the next crisis and not simply responding to it. And for my professional opinion, this position is invaluable. I recommend that it gets approved, if I had to say, so to speak. It's a phenomenal position, and I can't speak enough about it. And it gives me confidence, gives my deputies confidence. And I completely endorse it, and I think it should be maintained, in my opinion.

Thank you, Chief. Thank you, Chief, that's all I have. Turn it over to council questions.

Questions, and I assume you'll take questions as well. Yeah, absolutely, yes, any questions for staff?

Yeah, I have a few. And I'm gonna kinda go through some, I've spent a lot of time with this, and I'm gonna go through some things, and I want to be corrected if I'm wrong. But my understanding is that the service that we're talking about is a county obligation. It is not the city's obligation to provide this, but the county is absolutely obligated to provide this service. The issue comes up because the way the law is written, like you know the county doesn't necessarily have the person dedicated to be you know Johnny on the spot to provide that service exactly when it's needed But the county still is obligated. So I'm having some problem, one, with the size of the contract, because we're talking about April. I'm sure she's wonderful. And I could see the argument that we could pay her salary, and then I would want her time to be dedicated to, you know, city of Ojai issues and city of Ojai residents. But what we're paying is quite a bit more than salary of an ISC person. And I know that there'd be an argument, well, you always have these administrative costs attached with the position. But we're We're not obligated to pay the administrative costs. This is a thing that we're doing in order to assure that we have somebody who's available when the crisis happens. So I I I heard the comment about we have you know, a space available for April is that like her regular spot where she works on a.

Yes, she she has two offices, she has one down I think it's in ventura, but this is where by bring up some room here and can call and it's not fancy we just gave her a desk he brought in county. computers. She's able to meet with clients here in a private space. She also comes with a county vehicle that does also add to the cost. And I just, I think the one thing you said, I'm just want to, I'm not correcting you because you're right. The county does provide these types of services. The city does not. However, as you pointed out, without this contract, there's no one dedicated to OHI. So what I experienced when I first started having to manage OTT and really get involved with the mental health challenges in town, we would call You know, unless somebody was actively stabbing somebody, and then it would be a deputy who would show up. We couldn't get somebody here. And you really, what I found over time was having the boots on the ground, somebody that could make the regular contacts with all these folks. That's how the relationship starts. Sorry. Yeah.

Yeah. So my concern is that we can find, so with respect to say a vehicle, the county would still be obligated to have somebody come and respond with a vehicle. What we're paying for is an immediate response. And so I don't see that additional expense being ours. I see it being the county's. And I'd love to be able to say to the county, this is your obligation and you're not serving our valley the way you should be. I'm not gonna argue that. What I wanna argue is that we need to work out a better contract with the county in terms of it recognizing So the way government services work in the state, county, city role, the state mandates programs, and it's mandated this mental health program, and then it's delegated and funded the counties to provide the service. And there's no provision that says each city has to do this. understand the advantage that we could have but what what I'm you know I get I guess my questions are related primarily to the contract and that would be the exhibit because it goes kind of there to me there's a disconnect with the purpose and the contract because the contract talks about it not being crisis, not being, it kind of puts limitations on what's being provided that I'm understanding that's exactly why we're hiring somebody is that they're providing those services. I think the contract, the general contract in the recitals is good and it's strong, but you get down to the description And I've got some problems with how we're spelling out what it is that we're acquiring. from the county that's over and above their normal services.

If I might support that, just in this sense, this is the conversation we had a year ago, if I'm remembering it correctly. I'm asking you, Mr. Harvey, that if I recall correctly, we were approached by the county with a problem and an opportunity, and we decided to spend the money to try to alleviate the problem, which they did not feel, while obliged, that they could fulfill the obligation.

Does that sound, am I remembering right?

I would agree with that. Yeah. So we're having the same, it's the same problem. So I guess if I heard you right, Mr. Whitman, you were suggesting if we were to decide not to support this,

likelihood of them stepping up is not high we would have to live with the problem they would my expectation would be that the county would step up but they would not be as timely and responsive as if we hire and reserve our

individual person so i was i was complaining stepping up with responding but uh in other words the time the time yeah it's a timing issue and i'm not saying i'm objecting to paying that i hear that i mean i'm

I'm interested in the idea that we're going to pay April's salary, but I want her to give us all of her time. I want her to be in Ohio all the time that she's doing that. Yeah, she is dedicated to Ohio. Yeah.

So that's true. But, I mean, your other points, I hear you. I mean, wanting the county to contribute more.

Let me just, a couple other questions, yeah.

Yeah, so would it be an option for us to hire her outright and have her working for the city instead of having someone like her? Would it be possible for us to?

No. Okay. And I say I jumped in quickly with no because I don't have anybody on staff who's qualified to be her supervisor. She's within the behavioral health family, and it's just exactly who you think. People with PhDs, specialists who, yeah, it's Dr. So-and-so and Dr. So-and-so and Dr. So-and-so. We don't have anybody like that.

And I thought about that same issue, but my conclusion is that supervision would have to come from the county, but that's part of their service that they're mandated by the state to provide. Mm-hmm. All we're paying for is that speed of response factor. The rest of it should be assumed by the county because it is part of their mandate.

And they were clear last time. They're not trying to shirk that mandate, but they are trying to be honest about the capability. How does April work with Help of Ojai, if you could describe that a little? Sure.

So Help of Ojai, along with our OTT manager, it's a constant thing. We're just constantly coming together to figure out what type of services our residents need and how we're going to provide them. And it's a division of duties. If it's something like, well, so-and-so needs, so-and-so doesn't have their SSI benefits set up correctly, and they need somebody to troubleshoot this with them, and that's a help of a lot. So-and-so is having issues with getting their Medi-Cal meal deliveries. That's a help of a lot. If it's something related to substance abuse, something related to PTSD, something related to some type of trauma, that's an April issue. If it's something related to the actual encampment itself, our good neighbor agreement, adhering to local laws, that's a OTT manager issue. But often when we meet basically every other week, and we have to go through the folks and talk about the challenges, and it's not always very clear. April, you need to help with this, okay. Whitney, can you do this? It's kind of a fluid thing, but that's kind of the division of labor. And he's, I'm saying he, the chief is very involved in this too, so he and I are both involved.

Can I ask you, Chief, you may not have this experience or it's not a parallel experience. Working in other places where you had the county position from the county, not somebody dedicated, have you had that experience where you didn't have the level of service and what did you have to do in response?

yeah absolutely i think you know so the county offers a couple services right the the crisis team is one of them we talk about we respond to the crisis sometimes the crisis team will come out they're 24 7. they will come out you know typically non-violent calls we can refer to them in the moment but the value with someone working here is truly that connection because these folks who are service resistant or generating lots of calls for service it's going to take multiple times And they're already distrusting of government, naturally, a lot of them, right? They come out through the system. So they're very apprehensive to get help. So it really is that connection. It's that special person that can reach out to them time and time again. And it's that one breakthrough. And, again, I know we go back. It's hard to put a metric on that. But those breakthroughs are huge because I look at it as a law enforcement officer but a private citizen. And maybe that's that call we don't have to go to or that parent who doesn't get stabbed. And my deputies don't have to possibly shoot them and protect themselves. I look at it, it's kind of the investment. It's the whole philosophy of community policing. You're wrapping, it's holistic approach is what it gets down to. It really is. And for us, quite frankly, we just don't have the resource. And the county, to answer your question, kind of bring it full circle, And it's slow, yeah, because they're very overworked. So we're very blessed to have a dedicated person up here. And I think, you know, the forward thinking a year ago in approving this, I mean, it just speaks volumes to the character of the community, in my opinion.

Thanks.

I'm just curious. So, you know, on the weekends and after six o'clock, like if somebody was in a crisis, what is the general time for the crisis team? Because I know they serve all Ventura County and us being up here, I'm sure it's quite a lot of time that passes when they're in desperate need.

It is. And it's challenging. And I'll be very honest, they don't come out to every call. Our policy, we call them now and notify them every single time. And part of that is it's helping, I don't want to say justify, but they need more staffing as well. Obviously, mental health, we all know, it's a very serious thing. It's very, very prevalent right now. Um, and it has been for probably a decade. Um, and I've seen that cultural, that change, um, and just calls for service and everything else. Most calls we go to anecdotally, I would say 90% have some mental health component for sure. And most of our uses of forces, there's a mental health component with that. Um, So typically, we'd go out, kind of answer your question. If they're available, sometimes they're very quick. Sometimes it's an hour. And sometimes they'll just tell us straight up, hey, we don't have enough people right now. We're busy. Or sometimes they're solo on the weekends, and they're only able to take desk calls. So we'll give them all the information they have. They'll follow up. And that's something they would probably reach out to April and, hey, follow up on Monday to this call. And oftentimes, we just handle it. We handle it, take them to the hospital, take them to mental health ourselves.

Because that's another thing I was wondering, with the hospital being we only have one now with mental health facilities, like how many times then, I know like the one that you just said yesterday, so there was an issue, so of course they were arrested, but then how many, has there been times when they were in need of help and should go to the hospital, but there's no beds for them? So then what do you do in that instance?

So let's say they get arrested. We would take them to jail and book them. And then we'd fill out a psychiatric needs form at the jail. They would do a mental health evaluation, depending on how they answer those questions or they were assessed. The jail staff may take them to mental health or take them to the hospital upon release. Um for us we take them down to vcmc for a contract. It's the closest hospital we take them there Um, if they're not violent, we release them to the hospital staff And then they the doctors medical staff will do the assessment there Um, if they feel like they need a bed, then they'll make the phone calls and a lot of times it's out of county oftentimes. Yeah, um

So do you know in that case, like if they're taken out of county, because I know that happens, and I know because I had a brother that had mental health issues, so when they're taken out of the county, then when they do their 5150 or whatever they're going to be there, then does somebody come and bring them back to Ventura County, or they just let them wander the streets wherever they

That's a great question, and I don't have that answer. I've heard different things over the years.

With my brother, they would just leave him wherever they had a room, and then he wouldn't have a phone, he wouldn't have money, he wouldn't have anything, and thank goodness somebody would call and say, hey, can you just babysit him until we can get down to pick him up?

I hate to say this in case, but yeah, and I heard that more often than not. Yeah. And that kind of goes back to my, I believe, trying to fix the problem before it becomes a crisis. And that's, I think, the real value in April.

So if I could jump in on that really quick. What we do see is the arrest takes place. There's some time spent in jail, but very small amount of jail time. Jails are completely at capacity. And most of them are released. And they always come back here because that's where they live.

and so that's the other part is we just absolutely pick up where we left off oh so-and-so has been released we know we get the report okay let's go back to work did you have a question leslie yeah i did so what i'm understanding basically is is that the county provides crisis support interventions when they are able to depending on availability and that's what they are assuming their mandate is and that's what they provide whether or not that's what the state expects the county to provide That is what they provide. What they don't provide, and don't, I mean, we can talk to them about this, but they don't provide the ongoing, you know, everyday kind of ongoing support that is really what will keep people from going back into crisis. And that is what this contract is for, is to provide that.

I would agree with that statement. That's not correct. That day-to-day stuff of...

doing case management for somebody that's absolutely the county's up well that might be that was that was my question that was the answer during discussion i think that we can have that discussion about what we believe the county's obligation is we can have that discussion about what the county's obligation is what their written obligation is We can also have the discussion as to what the county actually provides and we can look at this realistically and decide that we want to take a principled approach that the county's not providing that which they want, which we believe they should. Therefore, we're not going to supplement or we can look at it and say that our city has a certain need and we are going to provide that. It is not unusual in any circumstance for there to be unfunded mandates. That is a standard. Try to stay with a question, though, if we can. Sorry. So we can discuss that is my answer.

I think you laid it out. Yeah. So questions, yeah. Yeah, I just thought of something else. So with them building the new facility over there by McDonald's, that's going to help incarcerated people, I'm assuming people with mental health issues as well and all of that. So would this position service those people as well when that facility is built?

No. This is for the way we structured this. She works in OTT and OTC. Now, sometimes, you know, okay, there's somebody that was in Ojai, and then we find them over in Miners Oak, but we know that they were in, are we going to take care of it? Yes, because they're probably going to come back into Ojai, because that's where they're staying. But that is what the contract provides.

Also, that's a year out anyway, I suppose, right before that opened. But does April respond to Miners Oaks and Miramani contracts? only when it's an OTT person, or?

Well, no, she's not only serving OTT, it's also, it's OTT and city of Ojai, so.

But this is county, I'm talking about county unincorporated, is she making mental health calls, crisis calls there?

Sometimes if the person, you know, because we end up knowing a lot of these folks, and we, you know, a lot of times this is somebody who's been in Libby Park, a person who's been over in this area, now we're aware because it's a county service that the same person's now over here causing a problem and so there are times when she's brought over there to help with that but it's kind of it's no different than the sheriff department you know we pay for a contract within city limits but does it bleed outside the borders at times absolutely there's a call for service that starts here it ends over um you know there yeah they're not going to stop they're going to go fill it

then I just thought of something else so with her services when somebody you know needs is in need of a service and they bill say like insurance or we I've been told you know that there's so many people living in tent town that are elderly so I'm assuming that they're on Social Security benefits so when they go to receive a service I'm sure they bill insurance so are they when they go down for service this county is getting something back or do you want to

Yeah, we're not getting any type of trickleback rebate from insurance. I mean, we can certainly ask that question. I do think that there are times when they do get reimbursed for something. I don't know exactly how long that takes or what the percentages are, but you're right.

Because how many people, if I don't know what the numbers are at Tent Town. So how many of those, I don't need names or anything, but I'm just curious, how many are on Social Security, how many are on Complete Disability, and how many are on, I don't know what it's called when you don't have the services where the state pays. Right. Medi-Cal.

Yeah, so I don't have a breakdown, but every single person, this is part of what, now we're blurring into a little bit of what Help of Ojai does. Help of Ojai tries to make sure that everybody's covered by it. So either you're on SSI, you're on disability, you're on Medi-Cal, you're covered. All of our folks in there have one of them.

But there's no reimbursement for that.

Right.

for what April does. There could be reimbursement when they arrive at a service facility. It could be paid for through insurance or Medi-Cal.

I know about this. Any more questions? I have one public comment. Bill Miley, please. Thank you, sir.

Hello. My main concern is the city's source of money. I fully support providing social service support to temporarily housed homeless folks, plus those city folks who are homeless or at risk. And buying it from the county behavioral health is good. They're connected. They're part of the system. Regarding city residency, there may be folks seemingly living within the city, but with residency history in the greater Ojai Valley. Those folks are really the responsibility, in my opinion, of county government. We should have a contract for building a county for their service. Because they're really not city residents. Also, I question the appropriateness of taking monies from the cabin state grant to pay for daily support services when we reduced capital monies for the cabin village construction by eliminating important features from the construction specifications. That was not good. I said that then. We should now plan for continued fiscal support for behavioral health services, excluding state money grants. Use unallocated reserves. Their services likely will be needed for at least a few years, coming years, next year, the year after, and so on. And here's what I think is a key thing that ought to go on the wall. Behavioral health intervention in our city, I believe their services can keep our atmosphere in our city calmer. Nobody's yelling down the street. The tourists don't have to experience that. We have a calmer and caring city. Also, they help prevent the crisis from occurring, and they catch it early and refer it for help. Put a Band-Aid on it rather than cutting them and lopping off the limb. Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Anybody online, Mr. Montgomery?

Mayor, no raised hands on Zoom. OK.

I guess moving to discussion then, one question, Mr. Harvey, would be something like, to express what I'm hearing from my colleagues is the interest in actually the service, we're all happy with that, but we are concerned about this extra cost, would be pressing them a little to say, We get it, and if we have to step up some, we possibly are up for that, but this is a big, it's a lot to pay. And so, do you think, I guess it's a question, how would you feel about, let me word it differently, do you think there's some movement there on their side that we can press for?

I always think it's worth a conversation and discussion.

I think that would be good. I agree. That's my main issue, is that I think we can explore fairer way of us compensating for and paying so that we're paying primarily for that person to be here immediately not necessarily paying for like the day-to-day routine stuff and That, I just think the contract should reflect on that.

Is it possible, like for instance, for us just to decide to start billing the county? I mean, how does that kind of work? You know, it's like, here's your bill, and you know, we find in Prop 1, which was passed in 2024, that this says such and such. I mean, that is...

You know what I think, if I could just jump in.

It could be a discussion, but also.

The opportunity is probably between the supervisor's office and the CAO's office. And the CAO, I think you guys are all aware, she came from the behavioral health side of the house. So Dr. Johnson and the supervisor would probably be the best people. And maybe even Mike Pettit, who's also an Ojai resident, and the assistant CAO, having a conversation with three of them saying, all right, here's what I heard from my counsel. They like having this dedicated service. They don't like having to pay so much.

right and I think you know we can decide to be forceful on that yeah by saying you know by passing a resolution from the council that you know we would I mean I don't know that billing them for it is the way to go but I think it does convey a message I think what we could say is like look we're one of the few cities in the county that have seen a need here and have signed up for this service because it makes things better for our community but we don't necessarily think that's

Right. We just are trying to address a need. And we'd like for you to help us with this. And we're a little small city.

I thought what Mr. Miley offered, too, was actually really interesting because we are wanting to be focused on how does this go on in perpetuity and so on. and to use the money in the immediate time, yeah, it takes away from that. How could it not? So if that, go ahead, please.

No, I was just gonna say, and I thought his point was also, Mr. Miley, I thought your point was well taken, that we are diverting money from OTT and long-term benefits around construction, around resources that would serve, you know, long-term health mental health issue or at OTT for instance it could be you know having aromatherapy garden whatever it happens to be you know what I mean and and or refrigerator and I think we could ask legal staff to look at what what proposition one actually says and do we have any legal sort of you know, oomph to say, well, you know what? Proposition 1 does actually say this. I just don't want to get into a long discussion with the county, and the county comes back and says, well, so sorry, but no. And I'm not saying that they would.

If I may, because the current city contract expires, I believe, today. And so I do think that assuming we don't want there to be some lapse in services and the fact that the city is currently paying for the full-time equivalent position that Ms. Munoz provides, I guess my question to council would be, would you be comfortable authorizing a shorter term, instead of authorizing an amendment at this amount for the full year, authorizing a shorter duration amendment to extend the term at some prorated amount for three months or something like that that would give us time to have these discussions with the county. We were already, as noted in the staff report, already having some initial discussions with the county about the form of the particular amendment. because the version they provided, I had some legal concerns about it. It only did two things. It established the NTE for 26, 27, and extended the term by one year, but some of the other stuff in it didn't quite mesh with the original contract. So I think we can have that discussion about scope. My only question is, knowing that we have a contract that's going to expire today, and there would be no further authorization to extend it if Council doesn't provide that, is there direction to provide a shorter duration?

Thanks for that information. Is three months the amount of time that would be needed, or could it be less?

we can cancel the contract on 30 days notice, and so can the county, the way I read the contract. So, you know, we can pick a timeframe that we think is reasonable to negotiate a new contract, and if it doesn't work out, we can cancel and or extend.

That's sort of what I was asking, I guess. What I need to be asking is, I was thinking 30 days, but that might be ambitious. We extended 30 days.

It sends a message.

But if you can't get it done in time, then that's me.

I don't think 30 days is sufficient.

I was going to say six months. I mean, I do want to be reasonable. I do want people to be sure.

I wasn't insisting on 30 days.

That was a question, how long will it take to do this. I think three months is probably reasonable. We might need a little longer

Somewhere between three and six months. I might say, can we please have four months just to make sure.

Or I mean, I thought what was said, though, three months, at least you could always come back to us if it's not done. But it does send a message saying, we do care about the service, but we're pressing here. We're not satisfied. And it does have an expiration date.

And if you do a longer term, I mean, again, as Councilman Whitman pointed out, either party may terminate the agreement for any reason on provision of 30 days notice. We don't have to have cause. So, I mean, from that perspective, you could approve moving forward with the amendment and then direct staff to report back in three or four months and then terminate if we haven't made progress. I mean, you have multiple options.

connotatively i i well this is a question there's more pressure if you only approve that's what i was going to say i like that too yes and i i guess the other part potentially goes into the negotiations with the county is that we actually have the right to say you're underserving us and and so we could you know tactfully presented to the county that you don't want us to be saying you're underserving us and are demanding and suing you to provide the service. We're willing to pay, but we wanna pay what's right under the circumstances given that this is your obligation. we're just making sure we have that extra level of service.

Right, and I would say, I understand the point, and ultimately your threat is litigation, but there is a clause, I think, that says to the ability that you're able to provide those services in Proposition 1, I'm not exactly sure, I want to play hardball, but I don't want to get into them putting up a stance where, okay, you're going to sue us. While I would like to hand them a bill and be forceful in that way, I don't want to get into a situation where we're even implying the threat of litigation. For me, that would be an uncomfortable position to start with. I don't want that. I agree.

Yeah, and I think one simple thing that we could do is, borrowing from Mr. Miley's suggestion, we could say, it turns out we actually do need this $88,000 of the ERF grant for Cabin Village. It's coming in under over budget. I mean, we have a legitimate reason to ask for a reduction. This money isn't, I mean, it's something that we actually do need.

That's an interesting thing to ask it. So that's half the money, hypothetically speaking, not to say that's what we are agreeing to. But you could say, hey, listen, we really need the service here, but we don't want to let go of this fund. And then we do press. So am I hearing that a 90 day extension of the contract makes sense with the understanding that there's a negotiation expectation between the city manager and the county? I'd make that motion. I just have one more question.

Looking at the first paragraph where it says for a new total not to exceed limit of 371,955. And then when you look on page nine or page two of 18, It says the not to exceed 194,308.

So that is the original agreement, and that is the original not to exceed amount for the first year and a couple of months. So we would be increasing the 194 for fiscal year 24, 25, and 25, 26 by the additional 177,647 if you approve the full year. What I think I hear in the motion is that there's approval of a prorated amount for up to three months.

It'd be 44,411. No, I hear that.

Does that make sense council?

Yeah, and we're clear that we value this No, absolutely Believe this service for our people.

I started I started out looking at this saying Why the hell are we paying for this? The county's got the obligation. I ended up because I read further and further understanding that we don't have a We have a need for immediate service, but we can't just assert that you have to give us immediate service. So we're securing immediate service. But I don't want us to pay a surplus because we've entered into that agreement.

That's a totally reasonable position, in my opinion.

And I also agree with the constant point that the county does have some obligation in this situation. And as we know, we have to knock on that door and ask for that. The county is not going to give it. And we may need to knock more forcefully, as Councilmember Whitman always points out. Let's knock hard. Anyway, great.

Would you be willing to make the motion, Mr. Whitman?

Yeah.

Okay.

And can we repeat that? Yes, we can. Just to make sure that wasn't happening.

Yes, as I heard it. Motion from Council Member Whitman, no second yet, but to authorize the shorter term of three months, 90 days, beginning today at a prorated amount, allowing time to discuss with the county the council's provided direction tonight in return with an updated contract from the city attorney's office. I'll second that. Roll call. Mayor Pro Tem Meng. Yes. Council Member Rule.

Yes.

Council Member Lange.

Yes.

Council Member Whitman. Yes. Mayor Gilman. Yes. Motion passed.

OK. Thank you for that. That's good thinking. Moving on to item number two, the concept review for the City of Ojai speed hump policy. Ms. Palmer, thank you for doing this.

Thank you, good evening everybody. So the item for you tonight, and I want to place some emphasis on this, that this is just a concept review, and it is just a starting point. So there was never any intention for this to be the final speedhunt policy, and I would be looking to you all tonight to see if we wanted to discuss the policy development here and now, or move this on to the newly formed and I am working right now and trying to get that first meeting for that safety commission established, and I'm thinking it's going to be sometime around early August, so just for your reference, if that's the direction you choose to go. So usually when we move forward with a new policy that the city hasn't had, what we do is look at other agencies nearby. So we did that on this. And attached, we have a red line of County of Ventura's policy. We thought that might be, again, a good starting point. And then at the back of the packet, there's also some other local agencies and what their criteria is for establishing or allowing speed humps. So one question that I have had asked of me numerous times is it doesn't seem fair that the County of Ventura's policy requires the property owners to pay for speed humps. I would not recommend that. And a couple of reasons because when we, our hope anyways is once we establish a policy, we can universally apply that to all streets and all requests throughout the city and not just an individual neighborhood. and we don't want, let's just say, a disadvantaged neighborhood not being allowed to get a speed home because they can't afford it. That's not what we wanna do. So that's just one thing that I just wanted to put out there because I've heard that quite a few times. So I can go through County of Ventura's policy, I can compare it to the other cities, Or you guys can give me direction to take this to our safety committee or whatever you want to do. I'm looking for direction.

That's fair.

I know that you wanted to see this before we met for the safety commission, but we're super close now. So anyway, so I'm looking for feedback from all of you tonight.

Any questions before we go to public comments?

yeah if we adopted the 67% rule would we still have the ability to say even though this neighborhood isn't crazy about it we think there's a safety need and we're kind of Maybe there's 55% who want it or 60% or 64%. Would we have the legal ability to say, despite the 67%, we're deciding that we need to install this?

So this body, based on my understanding, can override any policy that you adopt. And there's a whole set of criteria, which I'm sure you have kind of taken a look at, and a lot of speed studies, volume, speed, curvature of the road, that 60, 67, 75 percent, whatever that number is we end up with in our policy in terms of how many neighbors are in support of it. you would have the ability, we could bring it back and say here's what we found out. And so I would expect moving forward, whether it's on this particular, on the development of the policy or the implementation later, that these would all be vetted through the safety committee, or the commission rather, before you see them. And so it would come back to you for the final determination. That would be my sort of expectation.

Follow on question. Since we are a small city, the expectation I was having was every time after the Public Safety Commission were was vetting a request that it gets looked in all the, you know, all the investigation happens. this body would approve every one of those before we go forward, is that correct?

That would be my expectation.

Yeah, so, I mean, there's not gonna be that many.

Yeah, well, so I should take a step back. We are collecting a list of streets, and we have many. So another, something else that we need to consider as a city is how selective or how permissive we want this policy to be. Because there are many, many streets and neighborhoods who want speed humps. So I would expect as soon as we get a policy that the number goes up significantly. So it's just something that we need to consider. Do we want speed humps on all residential streets or do we want to be a little bit more selective on that?

And if I may, in response to Council Member Whitman's question, I do think it wouldn't hurt to just include, we can include a statement in the policy that makes it very clear that the City Council retains discretion over the final decision on whether a speed hump

And sort of similar to some of the stop signs we've installed. You pass a resolution and you can override that. So I would think, and to agree with Bethany, it's like if we put the language in the policy, well then certainly it's possible.

It's here though, isn't it? It's page 28, page 30 rather of the large packet. It's the number one. Maybe I'm misreading it. Speed humps cushions will be installed only, and then you see these bullet points, and the city council approves the request, and in conformance with the standard design. So I thought your question was, well, the design's gonna matter, but the council would have weighed in the way that I'm reading that.

Okay. But if we, I wanted to clarify that if it was only 60%, could we decide that... this seems like the best solution for a problem on the street.

I agree with that. It'd be nice to have that flexibility.

And so just one other question. What's the methodology for figuring out the percentage of people on the street?

I cannot tell you definitively because it's a very broad percentage. I've seen it from 50% up to 75%. And I think it's a determination that an agency makes.

But my question was more about how is it gathered? Do we have staff go out or do we send out mailers or do we have the street, the residents of the street that are in favor?

again so that criteria is broad too and so some of the agencies say it's just along the street that is that the speed humps would be installed other policies say that it's surrounding streets and we would want to define that for what works best for us but I think to answer his question what I've done elsewhere let's say you have let's say it's a simple

where it's really just this one impacted street. Let's say it's pretty clear there's 30 homes that you can see on the street. What I've done elsewhere is we've gone door to door, placing door hangers, and then we've also, through community development, tried to look up who owns each property, send a letter, and then we have a meeting, and we invite everybody to come down. Not everybody shows up. But then you say, this is what's being proposed for your street, this is what the policy says. we're gonna actually send to you a ballot. That's what we did elsewhere. You're gonna need to fill it out and mail it back in. That's what we did. It doesn't have to be that way, but that's what I did elsewhere.

And some policies have, we notice within a 400, 500 foot radius. Some other policies put the onus on the neighbors and say you guys gotta go out and give us a petition of everybody who's in support or who's not in support.

Yeah, I don't recommend. What's been more successful for me is just kind of the soft touch. And hopefully we don't have 20 of these that we're doing all at once. And you try it out in a few. But multiple interactions, having that meeting with the neighborhood or the street, and then going from there. It'd be nice to try some, too. Go ahead, Zach.

They sign both if they want it or they don't, just so you have a super trail.

Yeah, so what we did was at the meeting, we announced here that we're planning on doing. I showed them this is what's going to come to you. Don't. Please submit this and then we're going to tally it. And then we sent out another follow-up. Okay, we got the results in. 51% said they wanted it. 49% didn't. Therefore, we're going to...

And if I may add one more thing. Sure. In preparation for putting the agenda materials together, I did provide some feedback to Ms. Palmer, but I was very clear with her that this is only a concept review at this stage, so we don't have to have all the questions answered for purposes of this discussion. But I did let her know that, you know, we need to make sure that it's very clear in terms of how we're counting the 67%. You know, 67% of what is it? Individual properties. And then 67% of people within a certain geographic area where the proposed speed hump is. So I think all of those are things that will be fleshed out as we're finalizing the policy.

I get it. I would recommend, this is what I've done elsewhere, is just doing household, right? It counts as one. I don't care if you've got 30 people living there, if you've got one.

But these would all be issues. The proposal, I thought, one of your options is that's what the Public Safety Commission would work on these for two hours. Yeah. All these questions, and then come back to us with, we thought this through, here's the piece. You were going to say something.

Yeah, I actually had a question about the 67%, because we have the digital speed monitors that can keep track of speed, correct, of motorists' How many motorists exceed the speed limit and things like that is that would that be a part of this?

We we could do that That's not as accurate as somebody going out like when we put in this in the when we did our speed study just recently We actually had a person sitting out there counting cars, which is volume and tracking speed, which is the speed element so there's two components of us of a survey that we would like to do and But we could do that. It just gets you more of a general idea. Okay. Thank you. And one other thing that I would also like to add too is that we did, when you adopted the budget last week, we did, you approved $100,000 in our CIP for speed humps for next year. So also a lot of these agencies say, hey, once we've run out of our budget for the year we're not installing anymore. And that's kind of a way to keep the number to a reasonable number. And I don't know how many we're actually going to install, but based on some of the calls I get, we may get a request for many. And one speed hump is about $7,000 to $8,000 if we do it along with a paving project because the asphalt machine's already out there. Yes, right. If we don't, and they're all like one-offs, then it goes up to $10,000 to $12,000 per speed hump. So if we have four along a road, that could get quite expensive. Understood. So just another consideration. So there's a lot that goes into this and a lot of things to consider.

So this... speed humps potentially become part of the CIP where annually we're prioritizing where speed hump money is going?

Ideally. The problem is, for example, on Cuyama. We just did that street two years ago. We just paved that road two years ago. So we would hope to do that and sort of prioritize and install the speed humps along with a paving project because it's more cost effective. We had economies of scale, of course.

But if I could just jump in, we could just simply have a line item. We could. You could say, I want to spend $50,000, $100,000, whatever your amount is. And that way, we would just spend it as we're able to, either as part of the project or if the project's concluded. Or you prioritize based on need and not cost efficiency.

You could do that too. This street's really in that shape. A number of ways you could do that.

And so we have $100,000 in our budget this year. And if we move forward with any, I would like to prioritize them on streets that we're going to be coming up soon for paving.

I get that.

Yeah. I mean, it's cost effective that way.

However, sorry, I'm just going to keep this going.

But we can go another way.

It won't always be so clean and neat as that. And you might want to have this as part of the Public Safety Commission discussion. They can make a recommendation how they want it to be implemented.

Well, I was also going to say, too, after we do a project or two, I presume there will be learnings from that that will modify. So it would be nice to pause things out a little and see how it's going.

And whatever policy we adopt can always be revised if we find something better works.

Yeah. Well, if it's okay, I'll go to the public comments and I bet we'll get more information. Jim McEachin, please. Armando Stockenfield, if I'm pronouncing that correctly. And then Bill Miley. Hello.

Hello. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Council. I had some prepared remarks because I was in jury duty today and I wasn't sure I'd make it. But I think Council has brought up most of the issues that I had issues with. The 67% is interesting. It's not just 67% of the homes in the adjacent area, but it's also 67% of the speeders. So I don't know where the six, seven thing comes from. if it's one of those things. But anyway, I think it does need to be thought out. I mean, I'm more concerned about the 20% of drivers that are driving 15 or 20 miles an hour over the speed limit than I am about 67% that are going two or three miles over the speed limit. So there's some definitions that have to be made. And I am, as you probably know, a new member of the Safety Commission, and I would just request that you forward this to us, because I think we can put some time into it, because you need to have a lot of discretion with this. And it's more complicated than just the number of people approving it, and the speeding is also complicated. AS MS. PALMER IS SAYING, THERE'S ISSUES ABOUT VOLUME AND A WHOLE LOT OF OTHER THINGS, SHORTCUTTING THAT'S BEING USED TO SHORTCUT THE HIGHWAY. SO THAT WAS JUST MY REQUEST THAT YOU REFER IT TO US FOR RECOMMENDATIONS.

THANK YOU, SIR. THAT'S WHAT WE NEEDED TO HEAR. Amando Stockenfield, am I pronouncing your last name correctly? No. Okay, please help me.

No, it's Amado Stackenfeld.

Amado Stackenfeld, got it.

Good to see you, Mr. Andy Gilman, everyone here. I think you guys probably recognize me. We've had meetings. You guys have been nice enough to address this, Lindy, how many times so far. um as far as how you guys make the deliberations on deciding how and when these are applied um my experience this evening has been that you guys clearly care about the safety and well-being of our community as a whole uh i have two young children and their safety is my priority along with our neighbors and dogs who are walking On the intersection of Kuyama and Sierra, which I'm sure you guys are all aware of that people speed on. I appreciate you guys lowering the speed limit, but that hasn't exactly changed the flow of traffic or the amount of traffic volume, which I think is the largest issue. I'm sure everyone in town on their street in residential streets would like fewer cars to be driving down them that are using them as shortcuts. So this obviously isn't I don't think it's a speed bump only situation or problem or issue. It's like, how do we move traffic to where The majority of traffic should be moving right on the highway, which I understand is a sequencing of lights, which I've heard from the motorcycle cop. He's mentioned to me that he thinks that that would be a way to potentially help with shortcut and speed throughout town. But as far as. Getting 67% of people to agree with speed bumps. I hope that you guys, and it seems like your focus here is that everyone's safe. If it comes back at 55, I hope you guys would agree that that is enough to choose to keep people safe. There's some sort of traffic calming process that seems like the number one thing. Thank you guys. bringing on a team to hopefully expedite and make this process faster. We've also been obviously dealing with our street for a number of years, and I don't think anyone should have to wait for a safe place for their kids to travel. Thank you. I appreciate it.

I would like to just say a couple of comments to that. So I will be bringing forward to you all in the next session Short while, hopefully, in the next couple of months, the triangles up in the Arbolada neighborhood, we're working on a re-striping plan, too. And I've met with Jim on that. And so we're trying to come up with a striping plan, like one way and then one way. It's really haphazard. So I will be bringing something forward. We're looking at more than just speed humps.

I understand.

Point being.

Thanks for that. Bill Miley, please. And then Randy Coggin after that.

So on the proposed street home policies, there's one condition that should be eliminated. All of this is certainly, it's time that this is occurring. Drown is the most recent example. It's been years. As I remember, residents have even paid for some humps. Maybe I'm wrong. The chart compares county versus proposed city's policies One policy I strongly dislike is the allowance of adjoining street residents to vote yes or no. Why? If the primary street under consideration is an access street to others, it's very likely those speeding are living on the adjacent streets. It would be their disadvantage to say yes unless they have really empathy. So don't hold focused street residents hostage to other streets' residents. OK. It seems to me the key issue beyond resident opinion and vote, 50 to 75%, is whether the vehicle behavior on a given street is excessive. And that's determined by city engineering studies more than one time. And if the results show consistent excess speed at a 25 mile an hour area, 30 plus, and 85% of the vehicles, I guess that's the law, exceed the posted speed limit, then it's more important that it be done by engineering results, not resident opinion. Because some people just don't give a shit.

Mr. Miley.

I live on North Signal Street, and when some people come down, they're going 45 miles an hour. If we put a hub, they'd be going through people's houses and in the culvert. Anyway, also, the ultimate speed control is radar speed assessment and ticketing. Click, you get the ticket. And I understand the state legislature has funded five cities for about five years to study this. And ultimately, we can do that. But it seems to me that all of our streets, if they're being operated in excess of the speed limit, 30 or more, We ought to certainly be reducing that and make it safe for people. Forget the opinion. Do the study.

Thank you, sir. Randy Coggin, please.

Well, I know the last time I was here, I said enjoy it because it was going to be my shortest comment, but I'm going to make a liar out of myself. Ditto what Bill, what Amato, and what Jim said. Okay. That was good.

Thank you, sir.

Well, I'm happy to have more discussion, but if we're inclined to move this to the Public Safety Commission, I suggest we do that.

I would be in favor of moving this to the Public Safety Commission. I would as well.

And I just want to make a couple of comments. One is that when I was talking about 67%, I was talking about where that's used as a threshold for saying you build it. I didn't understand that we were also talking about a percentage rate of how many people are speeding. I agree with what Mr. Amato said. So traffic safety includes the potential that you have too high of a volume And the speed might be kind of relatively okay in a vacuum, but because the street isn't designed to take that volume, the speed humps potentially cause fewer people to drive them, and that improves the safety because you're reducing the volume, not because you're necessarily reducing the speed of the car. So I'd want to keep that in mind. within the realm of what were our policy.

I think that would be a criteria that I would be interested in as well.

And a lot of agencies do a pre and a post survey to see if the speed humps are actually doing what we hope they're doing.

You mean an investigation, really? When you mean that?

No, just like a pre-speed volume survey, and then one after the speed humps are installed to see if traffic is moving in a different direction, going alternate routes, to see if they're working as intended.

Oh, that's great.

And I had a question, too, that I was thinking about as they were talking, and maybe this is for those of you who are on the commission, something to ponder, that if it's determined, if a community, if a neighborhood or street people, residents who live on a street determine they don't want the speed humps anymore, can we also include something about...

When it's time to to remove a speed hump we can okay, we definitely can There's there's a there there are some unintended consequences of installing speed humps and a lot of people want them just not in front of their house There's trucks that go by and slow down for a speed hump and all the tools jingle around there's acceleration deceleration So there's some things that happen.

Yeah Thank you for all your work on yeah, that's wonderful come I

Would you want to make that into a motion?

Yeah, I'll make a motion that we pass this on to our newly formed Safety Commission to bring back recommendations for an official speed hump policy.

I second that on the condition that it is the inaugural that's being addressed by the, so it'll have first priority for what our safety commission does at that probably early August meeting.

Right behind training, I'm sorry. We are gonna insist that they go through board.

The first issue that they research. I would second that. I expected that.

Yes, I know, right. We all knew that. Understood? Yes. Council Member Rule?

Yes.

Council Member Whitman? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Meng? Yes. Council Member Lange? Yes. Mayor Gilman? Yes.

Okay, wonderful. Thanks, guys. This is gonna happen. Our last item is the council member town hall and panel policy.

Yes, Mayor, and I'm gonna ask Ms. Cervantes with the help of Ms. Burgess to present this item to you.

And then just one question. So we have what was sent in the agenda packet and then we have this on our desk, okay.

And before I pass it over to Mr. Bontes, what I will note is that we did make a few minor revisions, as I think noted maybe in the staff report, to clarify the role of council versus authority of the city manager based on some of the feedback we received when this was presented a few months ago. Okay. I noticed after the agenda was being published that the city clerk's office, as they dutifully do, they accepted the red lines. And I thought, ooh, it might be helpful to show you the red lines. Normally, whenever there's a red line, they clean everything up before it gets put into the packet. And I did not clarify that we should give you guys a red line copy. So we brought it tonight just so that you could see it.

You answered it.

Thanks.

And we are happy to take any questions.

Okay. I wasn't quite clear from the resolution whether every potential meeting would end up at least going through a consent calendar, if not an actual discussion, so that there would be the potential for a majority of council to either disagree that it should be a city sponsored event or suggest a massaging of the content.

So the revision that we proposed in section four under Roman numeral four on the second page of the policy. Yeah. If you're following along online, it would be on page 45 of the, sorry. Yeah, 43. 43 of the faculty pages sticking together. Yeah. We it previously read council direction or city manager authorization Well, it would say city sponsored events require council direction or city manager authorization for council action Previously it said council direction or mayor slash city manager authorization for council action. And so what the revision was intended to clarify is that effectively there would be council direction provided or some approval from the city manager based on some previous authorization from council. So council might set a policy at the beginning of the year, or not policy, but may provide direction at the beginning of the year for a certain number of town halls

something like that and then the city manager could act on that direction or at council's discretion we could bring each one to council at it as they come up in that scenario though that you just brought up it's so if i use it on that same that same bullet so if if the majority of the council wanted to do a city sponsored event that's obvious and clear if we just said well we want to have quarterly events and the city manager is taking the council action to have the city sponsored event, but let's say it's a subject that the majority of the council wouldn't be comfortable with, somewhere down the line, that's what I thought your question might have been pointing to. Yeah, there should be some, it seems like if it's a city sponsored event, there might be a way for the city to weigh in a little on that.

Because that section that you pointed to uses the word should, provide direction yeah so guiding principles council should provide direction but it that should is kind of like a suggestion of a best practices as opposed to a So I'd like to see the language say something more along the lines. And I'm fine with it going to the consent calendar with the idea that at least it would be triggered for us to take a look at what's in that. And if somebody wanted to have a discussion, then we could have it.

And I would probably be inclined to always do that. I think that's, you know, there's no reason why.

Well, I thought that the three kinds of events really clarify it. So we it's it's just really clear like you're just renting it by yourself and you are expressing yourself as an individual or Each council person gets to have one Or it's a city sponsored one.

It's I think I like the distinctions and we did add in a sentence to clarify that you know this this does not preclude having informational meetings I mean I there could be times where you know if like with the new business license tax software the city is hosting a meeting to help make sure that businesses know how to use the new software I don't I I see that as being different from things like the tree ordinance workshop where we're asking for public input on a policy direction that the city may take or we're providing information about a policy direction that the city is going to take. I think I don't want to limit the city manager's ability to have a meeting like that if we see the need.

It's an operational need. But even in those instances, sorry.

You probably would bring it to council.

I would definitely, at a minimum, put it in my weekly updates. Like, hey, next week we're going to convene an A-frame sign meeting for the arcade business. And then that's an opportunity. If somebody reads it, oh, I've got some concerns about that. They can call me over the weekend to talk about it. If it's not appropriate, whatever the situation. Yeah.

But we can absolutely change that. Yeah, that makes sense. That should to Chow.

Yeah. I thought it was well done. There wasn't anything that caught my eye. I don't have any public comments. Would you check online, please?

No participants on Zoom, ma'am.

Should we make a motion? Yeah, I think we're ready. I think it's good. I think it's good too.

Okay, I'll make a motion To approve to yes the clarification that we just mentioned.

Yes, exactly Exactly to approve with this to the clarification and I guess I should have asked this question, but Are we gonna have you know some type of proposal about How much money will spend on these in a given year where we're kind of working with a budget in terms of? That's a good question.

We definitely could, but most of it will be staff time. So if it comes more than staff time, we can definitely bring it forward.

And I second. And so let me bring up just one tiny case in point. So one, we heard some public comment in the past where people were hoping for more workshops. And so in a meeting recently, last month, maybe we thought, oh, it'd be nice to do a workshop on the goals, on the progress on the goals in August. And we came up with a potential date, but that would be, that should come to this body to see, well, I'm trying to do the test case now. That would come to this body to see, oh, does this make sense that we'd want to have a workshop on that date for this subject?

That's just a special city council. That's just a special meeting.

Yeah. Yeah, okay.

We did bring forward Ms. Councilmember Rule's public safety town hall, and that was approved and also scheduled for August.

And we did do the August. Okay, great. Oh, so that one we actually brought forward.

I think a lot of the time they're going to be special city council meetings. It's a topic that everybody's interested in. It's just easier. We have everybody here. Everybody can weigh in.

Because I would like everybody to weigh in.

Okay, but then there's... I mean, it gets a little complicated when you're, because the community is wanting to have, like, an exchange. And there's rules that apply to when you have an exchange. So that's...

I think that's what we're talking about, the distinction here.

for me that's the distinction is that it's a back and forth it's a moderated discussion with the community versus a special meeting that is formal and well you can still do that you can just make it simply a workshop format and you could just you could set it up that way you make it clear that you're not taking any action right here's the topic you want to talk about and you can make it clear from the agenda we're going to have a little bit of different format this time we're going to allow for more of a You know, I've done this before. I hope you're okay with something like this. I mean, it's just a little more freeform.

The tree workshop was a great example of that, right? People talked longer. We had more back and forth.

And we did notice the tree workshop as a special meeting. Yeah, yeah.

So we just want to be clear that the public is aware when we do these special meetings. Like, hey, this is a little bit different. It's a workshop. There's no action. Here's the topic. We can add a little bit even more than what we have in the past about how the dialogue will go.

Right. As long as it's consistent for all public speakers. Yes, of course.

Right. Right. Is that satisfying you?

It does. I see a distinction between something that's formal, even though it's called a workshop, versus something that's a community discussion. I do see a distinction. I don't think that it needs to be codified or that it requires more conversation here. I think it's up to each individual council member and or the staff how they would like to broach that and the distinction that they would like to make.

Yeah.

So that second example of the item where it's the council member-hosted community meeting, that would be the one where you can completely just be having a roundtable conversation, if that's what you wanted to do.

Yeah, but there still are rules associated with a special meeting. I mean, there's notice, there's agenda, there's still rules that have to be followed, public comment, things like that. So that's all I'm saying. I get it. however anyone wants to uh approach a meeting they want to have or that the city wants to have yeah what other that decision would be that sounds good

I think we're ready. Yes. Motion and a second. Roll call. Mayor Pro Tem Meng. Yes. Council Member Rule. Yes. Council Member Whitman. Yes. Council Member Lange. Yes. Mayor Gilman.

Yes. All right. We had three unanimous votes in one night. So mark that day. And with that, we will adjourn.