City Council - Regular Meeting

Mr. Mayor, it's 5:00. Are we ready to begin? I believe we're ready. Yes.

Recording in progress. Well, good evening and welcome on this uh early start time 5 o'clock. Appreciate the room being full uh for this special meeting of the Pedaluma City Council and the Pedaluma Community Development Successor Agency for Monday, March 23rd, 2026. Uh, as always, if you have a comment you wish to make on tonight's agenda, and tonight's agenda is one item, um, please fill out a speaker card, which are located in the back of the room, and bring it to our clerk, who is right here at the front of the room, so we can include you in the, uh, dialogue this evening. And, um, please note that we have uh, concurrent translation services available during the meeting and uh, that's in Spanish and a variety of other languages. And to access online, if you're at home, please use the link that's in the agenda. And uh to access the translation, if you're in the room, we have a QR code on the back wall there. We'll allow you to sign into the translation services. With that, let's move to our roll call for the evening.

Barnacle present. Peter Thompson here. D Carly here. Now here, Quint here, Shribs here, McDonald here, and we do have a quorum. Wonderful. Let's stand for the pledge of allegiance. I aliance 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.

And a moment of silence, please. Thank you. Well, tonight we have um a workshop. It's the presentation of the fiscal year 20267 work plan. It's an update on our recent accomplishments and uh it's providing direction to staff. And so, uh tonight we'll have our city manager lead off. There is I do want to note to the public that as staff completes the their presentation, we'll invite the public in to comment at that point and then bring it back to council for all of our workshopppy dialogue at that point. So with that is the floor is yours.

Thank you, mayor, council, community, and our staff. As you know, each year the city council undertakes a goal setting process to guide priorities, inform staff work plans, align with the upcoming budget to set priorities that reflect what our community needs most, and ensure we're delivering real results. Since 2019, this process has been shaped by our residents, and it continues to guide how we invest our time, energy, and resources. Our mission continues to be clear to deliver exceptional services, improve quality of life, and support a strong, resilient economy responsibly and efficiently. Next slide, please. In addition to providing 247 service to our community, our city staff are daily delivering on hundreds of initiatives, programs, and projects, and policies that are in support of council priorities and that don't usually get their moment in our goal setting. A lot of work is regulatory required by law in response to trends and circumstances that require us to be agile, strategic while being remaining focused and vigilant on delivering council priorities and being strong fiscal stewards. Tonight, we'll review what was accomplished in the last fiscal year and take a look at ahead at potential priorities shaped by our community's input and available resources. Next slide, please. It wasn't that long ago in 2019 when our city was at a crossroads. We had a structural deficit of $6.5 million in 2021. Staffing levels were 16% lower than they were in 2008. Our services were minimal and not proactive or responsive. Our fleet was nonfunctional and unable to support our staff's work. Our parks, playgrounds, city facilities were undermained and in some cases unusable. Next slide, please. Our pavement condition index was 41 out of 100. Technology was non-existent. You

couldn't find a laptop in the city. And our server and backup were one and the same. In one of our fiscal and organizational sustainability sessions, we presented in excess of $200 million of deferred maintenance in city infrastructure, which took decades prior of disinvestment to create. We did not let what we inherited affect our vision and dreams for our city, our residents, and our staff. Next slide, please. And despite our fragile state, we stepped up and supported five declared emergencies in two and a half years. We were the evacuation zone for the county, and we strengthened our preparedness muscle and became the resiliency beacon throughout these events. Next slide. In 2019, we held our first communitywide vision setting. 250 of our community members provide us with more than 250 priorities. So that's one per one per community member. Many of which have we have completed and which continue to reflect our highest priorities today. And Heather, you please.

Good evening, Mayor Council. Uh Heather Hines, special project manager. I happened to be at the 2019 first meeting uh first community meeting where we did the goal setting created these lovely um visuals. Um it was an amazing community moment. Uh I think we were there six or seven hours. Um and as Peggy mentioned, we walked away with 250 plus things to do. Um so one of the things that I wanted to bring up is when you look at that that board that um graphic so many of those visions are still the things that we find ourselves aligned with today whether it's sustainability or climate initiatives housing inclusivity healthy and active living. I see the zoning code is in bold in one of the bottom corners. Those all continue to be things that come up um as we have community discussion. These were all things that came up as part of the general plan um process when we went out and talked to people in the community about where they wanted to see the community in 25 years. Um so this was a moment um and it continues to shape what we do as staff, the vision we're working towards as a community. Next slide please. when we did get the 250 go do these um we looked for a way to organize them and we came up with these five goals. A city that works for everyone, our environmental legacy, a safe community that thrives, an economy that prospers, and spaces and places that inspire. So each year when we come back to have this discussion, we look back at these goals and do do we need to think about things differently? Um do we need to um

amend these? But they continue to be these overarching foundations um that fit with the conversation we have. So, we wanted to start with touching on that, touching on kind of where we've come since 2019 um before we get into reflecting on what we've accomplished in the past year and what we're looking forward to in the coming year. Thank you. Thank you. Next slide, please.

And now, a brief walk down climate action memory lane. Um I was looking just on the wall right back there um waiting for this meeting to begin and saw the climate declaration now as one of the actions on there. And so the climate resolution that the council passed in 2019 was a direct result of that community input. um definitely a high priority for the community which then led into the creation of the climate action commission and then the climate emergency framework that that commission worked on um spent a lot of time working on and the carbon neutrality goal um for 2030. Those came out as a result of that process. So furthering on and those became like the a guiding light that focused much of our work going forward into the 20 24 blueprint for climate action. And you'll see that theme through much of this document. Um there's a sub bullet on on the slide here that talks about blue text that you'll see throughout there. That's not a typo. that's done intentionally and that's to show that that is an undercurrent that's going through so much of our work and we bring that highlight we notate that um throughout this document because our commitment to uh carbon neutrality and taking decisive climate action is something that we take seriously as staff from the direction given by council. So thank you. Next slide.

Thank you Patrick. Next slide. Thank you. And these community priorities were reflected in the ultimate passage and subsequent implementation of MeasureU. It's important to recognize the role of MeasureU funding. It's enabled critical investments in infrastructure, staffing, and services. Without it, many services would have continued to decline or disappear. Instead, we are stabilizing operations and making forward-looking investments. Since then, we've been tackling our road work. We've seen our PCI improve to 52. We've improved our parks, retained and attracted talent to our city team. We're building a high performing organization by resourcing our staff with training and the tools they need to do their work. We've seen our homeless point in time count drop precipitously. We've supported the building of muchneeded housing in our community. We are renovating our city facilities, especially our fire stations, and are building a new public safety facility in the center of our city to improve response times on our fairgrounds. Uh we are we are programming and uh creating a vision for the community and we are reinvesting in our public spaces, community programming and business support. But we also know the work is not done. The decisions we make now on housing, infrastructure, climate and economic development will define our future. Next slide, please. Council identified several major priorities for the next two-year cycle in which we've made substantial progress and accomplished meaningful results. And these include building our active transportation network, a focused and committed commitment on citywide economic development and downtown revitalization, continued activation of our fairgrounds, and launch of a master plan for that property, completing the general plan and zoning code by the end of this year, teeing up a parks master plan, writing the ship on our landscape assessment districts, and adopting the city's tree ordinance and urban forestry management plan, and implementing our housing

element by encouraging ing and incentivizing housing development in our city. And I would like to ask Paul Khell, our public works director, to take the next slide. Good evening. Uh active transportation and safe streets have been a council priority and community priority for the past past several years. uh in recognition that improving mobility options will help create a happier, healthier community, reduce congestion, improve safety, and help meet our climate goals. In September 2025, council, you approved the active transportation plan, which outlines steps needed to make Pedaluma a worldclass active living city where walking, biking, and rolling are a celebrated part of everyday life. We believe Pedaluma has all the key ingredients to achieve this vision, including our size, topography, weather, um, and our existing network of off- streetet trails. Uh, our team is working hard to deliver near, mid, and long-term projects, uh, that will help create a safe and seamless experience for all people. On the near-term side, we've completed quick build projects throughout the city with an emphasis in school areas. We've reduced speed limits to 15 miles an hour um around uh within 500 ft of all schools and we've implemented traffic calming and pedestrian safety enhance enhancements. We've also been capitalizing on the unique opportunity that our paving projects bring uh to close sidewalk gaps and add and upgrade crosswalks and bike lanes. We've also been keeping an eye on advancing mid to long-term projects, including several that were identified through the recently completed US 101 crossing study, which will help improve cross town connectivity. Next slide.

Thanks, Paul. Brian O, director of community development. Um so one of the other top priorities uh for mayor and council has been um so not just safely moving people through town but also having a thriving local economy. Um and so one of the top goals has been around ensuring that we have a vibrant economy that um ensures that our community, our residents, our property owners, our business owners um have a place to thrive. And so what that means is staff has been working really diligently over the past year on not just retening existing spaces um but also thinking about um as we start to wrestle with updating our zoning code. How do we um ensure a thriving uh regulatory framework uh for all these great new uses that are being not just piloted um here in town but um really throughout the globe. The concept of food trucks um this was not a thing that the um zoning code had to grapple with. Fast forward um a few uh zoning code cycles. Um it's something that is very much part of our um city fabric um throughout the region. Um and so how do we start to think about um using the existing zoning code, making it work in the short term as we start to look at a comprehensive zoning code update um permitting new uses. Council was uh at the forefront of retail cannabis. And so, um, we have our three, um, retail cannabis, uh, fully permitted. We have a final inspection for the final, um, third tomorrow. And so, we're really excited to be able to implement that policy from council. Um, I'm joined here

today by our, uh, new economic development manager, Katherine Depasqua. um and she'll um be supporting and taking the reigns uh for not just our economic development strategies but also um continuing the business navigator program. And so this is something uh that um we've been working handinhand with um economic development department which has now consolidated into community development and we've seen some early returns in working with our local businesses and property owners. Um and then also two things there that I um wanted to highlight. Water street revitalization. Often times we have a lot of time and energy put into planning processes and sometimes it takes some time uh to actually start to see uh the fruits of the labor. And so Water Street is a perfect example. Um, you know, as we started to get some new housing downtown, just on the fringes of downtown, uh, we're starting to see the property owners wanting to come to the table, invest in their bis buildings, uh, to bring on new businesses. Um, so that's something that's been really exciting to be a part of. Um, and then ultimately, um, a few weeks back with the entitlement approval for the EKN Hotel. Um, again, once in a generation opportunity for us to to think about bringing visitors serving downtown, bring some more activation and vibrancy as well as the um approval of the overlay and all the different community benefits that um that may also bring to bear. Next slide. And I will sit here. Um, and we are in the midst, we are one week away from releasing our draft general plan and draft environmental impact report. And so we've spent a lot of time um five

years culminating into this. Uh we expect to be able to start our round of public hearings for council final consideration late summer of an updated general plan which will take us into uh mid-century 2050. Um and so there's been a lot of uh thoughtfulness and a lot of milestones that we've accomplished as a community and as staff to get to this point. um a few of those mentioned there and as Patrick mentioned uh the blueprint being one of those um you know how do we ensure that future near mid long-term future for pedaluma uh that is climate responsible climate resilient um and so we have a blueprint a literal blueprint um on how to accomplish that next slide and I will be here for this one as well housing for all as our city manager mentioned um a lot to be proud of That photo is an example of the Burbank project, River Place. Um that was a um as our housing manager likes to mention, it's um it's the alphabet soup. Um there's a lot of work that happens in the in the you know background um to support our developers, to support um our projects to actually get built, get the money. um whether it's state subsidies, whether it's uh through council's leadership of the reduction of development impact fees for 100% affordable housing projects here in town. Um we have um the proof is is there, right? So housing that is either under or starting soon to start construction. There's a number of projects there both um deed restricted affordable housing as well as market rate. And the pipeline um is is somewhat strong as well. We have some um also

sort of in the wings the Gallagher project that was recently approved. Sid commons um al as well um you had seen the environmental impact report last year and the work's still not complete. We still need there's some of the sort of hard to finish projects, Oyster Cove being one of them. Um, but it is an entitled project. We still think it's a good project. So, um, how do we work with the property owner and any interested developer to actually see that to fruition? Um, which is another one that's, um, on our list. And then every 3 years, um, the update to our building and fire code. Um, and so that was done late last year. And that really sets the tone, ensures the safety of our buildings from both a life safety perspective and a fire safety perspective. Um, and so that has been fully implemented um and we're reviewing all new permits um under the updated um code. And then finally, housing for all homeless services. Um, and supporting our unsheltered population in coordination with our county partners, our community partners that are on the ground. Um, we're very fortunate uh through staff dedication and the ability uh to secure additional funds both at the county level and at the state and the federal level um to have a robust um homeless services program. Um, one example, uh, through the, um, securing of state funds, we're in the final stages, um, to accomplish, um, here in the next couple weeks is the expansion of our family shelter. So, this is something that we hear time and time again, um, a quote unquote special population, you know, how do we, um,

meet the need? Um and staff has continued to demonstrate our community partners have continu continue to demonstrate their passion, their ability um to deliver for the community on that front. Um and so more to come, but just a little preview of what staff has been working on the last year. Next slide. Good evening, council, and happy Monday. I'm here to talk about the Pedaluma Fairgrounds. Cat Risinger, deputy director of parks and recreation. Let's just start off with we planned and implemented successfully hosted a 2025 pedaluma fair and we're very excited about this year's 2026 pedaluma fair where we are in fully integrated in our planning process between agriculture your traditional carnival fair programs and have a few new fun things coming up. So we hope to see you there. We offered the community ice skating rink for 28 days this year. And we piloted the use in the expo hall, so indoors, versus last year, we tried piloting the use on the parking lot against East Washington. And we were able to learn many, many things about the property and how rain likes to funnel towards the street. Very exciting. We also secured the an event manager for our yearround a programming. And this one I personally enjoy as I've learned so many things. A few examples of our community groups and events include cattle camp for youth learning to show at a shows, a judges training program for adults where they literally went over how to do a foot with a ribbon and you hold the foot

which I had never learned before. We also were really excited to host a bilingual professional training focused on preventative care techniques for raising healthy animals and will continue to launch and try new agricultural based programs. We have issued the RFP and interviewed proposers for the fairgrounds master plan. As staff are really looking forward to engaging in this process and to better learn not only the future potential of the Pedaluma Fairgrounds property, but also for our greater Pedaluma community as a whole. Lastly, but not leastly on this list that is not an exclusive list is piloting new uses for the fairgrounds property. And we have still been able to honor legacy uses as outlined in our guiding principles which we follow very closely anytime a program or event is brought onto the fairgrounds. Uh we've been able to host things such as the great egg hunt which is coming up and the pedaluma music festival for a few examples. A few other explored pilot uses would include this new last year was a USA sanctioned boxing event which is actually going to expand from Herszog into expo for next year. We hosted the Paluma Pride. We have a rodeo and music festival coming up in April which will be our first city permitted rodeo which is a very heavy lift for us and we're very excited to try it out. And on a totally separate lens, we have hosted floor ball in the expo hall as well as our multi-use sport court tiles in the Bianke barn. So a very robust and varied pedal in the fairgrounds for your community. shuffle around here. Good evening, council, uh, community and staff. Drew Halter, director of parks and recreation. Uh, next slide, please. So, we are going to take like an

overview now, um, and look about the investment in our parks and open spaces. Kind of a snapshot backwards and forwards. Uh, I want to take a moment to share with the council and and community again um kind of dovetailing on the city manager's comments, you know, where we've been um since the original adoption of our city council goals and priorities. It's especially relevant in in our parks. So, bear with me a little bit. um in 2019, prior to that first adoption, prior to the regional um support of of the parks measure M as well as the local support through Measure U, um you know, we were a parks and facilities maintenance division under public works and we were a recreation services department under uh the city manager. Uh city manager had the the privilege of serving as our parks director at that time uh which I think she found out on her second day maybe. um you know and with with measure U particularly that really catapulted a lot of the investment we've seen in the last two goals and priorities cycle. So I'm going to um talk about again in in 2019 uh we had zero electric vehicles. Our our fleet included um an average of about 200,000 miles per vehicle. We coordinated our vacations and sick time a lot around shared use of vehicles even we had no bucket trucks. We had no compact utility directors. Uh we were very much, you know, bootstrapping it with um with what we had. Uh and and a big credit and creativity goes to the crew, many of which are still here driving that ship today. So fast forward um we've seen those subsequent investments in our people in our places and this has really helped us translate to better services being more responsive uh to the environments as we need to pivot and being more efficient with those investments that we have. Uh

we've grown from seven parks maintenance workers uh in 2019 to 10 we have this year. Uh we've got onethird of our fleet is now electric. We have electric mowers. We've got piloting hand tools. Uh and we've made a lot of significant upgrades in our irrigation to allow us to be more efficient when there are big booms and bus cycles with um water efforts etc. There is more collaboration between departments than ever before. Um even as a reconstitute department um this has been a culture that's been a direct result of uh the council uh and city manage its collaborative efforts uh to really tackle big big uh complex issues. Um some of our accomplishments in this last goals and priority cycle include, you know, really kind of um complex issues like the integrated pest management plan, like the urban forestry management plan, uh land use elements of the general plan, all the plans. Um but but also uh really building that uh institutional kind of muscle to to build new programs and take on the confidence of some things like the new pedaluma aquatics program something the city had not had since 2012. Um, you know, all of this uh on the slide on your on your screen kind of helps and eventually will tee up, which I know is a interest of the council, the strategic parks and recreation master plan. This is something that's been talked about in several goals and priorities and we're not uh waiting right for for funding become available or for this to reach it to all the way as the number one priority. Uh we've established an ad hoc committee at the parks and recreation commission. Uh now we have a lot of plans that are going to help inform that scope including things like the active transportation plan, things like the fairgrounds master plan, and we've learned so much and we're

really ready to have such a a robust conversation that we're going to get started on that. And uh we're excited to provide updates later on where we are. Next slide, please. And we're going to invite the folks from water come up here.

Thanks, Drew. Good evening, mayor and council. I'm Chelsea Thompson, director of water resources and utilities. Um over the past year, we've made progress on um many water supply ri reliability, sustainability, and regulatory um compliance programs for Pedalum's water. For planning, we're advancing the integrated water master plan and have completed the grant funded recycled water facilities planning study study, which you heard about at last week's meeting. These efforts are helping guide near-term priorities including expansion of the local groundwater supply uh and potential expansion of urban recycled water system when grant funding becomes available. The final IWMP is anticipated by the end of the year at which time staff will return to council. At the fairgrounds, we expanded metered water service to several sites including happy hearts preschool, the parks maintenance building, and play dog play. The on-site irrigation well has recently be been decommissioned and we're prioritizing connections for the remaining vendors on site to ensure safe and fully metered service. At Ellis Creek, the team submitted the required 5-year uh national pollutant discharge elimination system or NPDS permit renewal ahead of the June 26 deadline. The permit is currently under review by the regional water board. We anticipate some delay in permit reissuance due to recent regulatory changes for uh discharge requirements at the federal level, but no major operational changes are anticipated at the plant and um current per permit conditions remain in effect until a new permit is issued. We've also completed several grant-f funed projects this last year. Our aquafer storage and rep recovery pilot is complete. The results showed limited long-term feasibility at the Delora well site due to water quality and aquafer capacity. Our advanced metering infrastructure

project is now fully implemented citywide across uh 2,000 or 20,000 plus meters. This project improves leak detection and water customer awareness through the ion water portal and it's expected to save about 600 acre feet annually which is roughly 8% of the city's average annual use of um 7,500 acre feet. Um and then lastly of the grant funded projects, the urban recycled water expansion at R Reineer and Maria has been complete and it's expected to offset about 78 acre feet a year as connections along that extension come come online. For creek maintenance, we removed um sediment and vegetation in Corona Creek under newly issued creek maintenance permits and are advancing a citywide programmatic permit to streamline future work which is anticipated by 20 um summer of 2027. Next slide, please. back again. Patrick Carter, assistant to the city manager. Um, and Deb Fox, our climate action manager. Um, this next slide is about conservation and sustainability. It's just a very short list of some of the major things that we've accomplished recently. Um, as already mentioned by Drew, I appreciate the preview on this. Um, the fleet is a very important part of our uh, climate action. It's one of the areas that we know that creates the most greenhouse gases, transportation throughout the city. Um, and so we've tried to be a model for others in our electrification efforts. Um, we went from a single electric vehicle in 2019. um it was a a Chevy Bolt um in the transit department to now currently we have 46 electric vehicles in the fleet including four of our transit buses and two of our uh

pursuit rated police vehicles which the chief will talk about uh in the next slide. But um going down the list as well um the charging infrastructure we've built out a lot of the easy places where there's capacity to build out and so now we're in the tricky part of finding that new capacity and finding especially the money to build that new capacity for additional fleet um charging. So, that's always something that's cognizant to us and always something that we're looking for more grant funding to help us figure out. Um, taking stock of our building uh energy use, which is another area where um sustainability and our climate action can make an impact in city efforts. Uh we've taken the first step to do energy efficiency audits to see what our building stock is like. And you know, I don't think it's going to be a spoiler to anyone that there's a lot of room for improvement and trying to find again the funding, which is a common refrain, and how we'll be able to finance and afford those um those changes is the kind of next step and the more challenging piece once you figured out the issue. Um but on that theme of trying to find additional funding to do the things that we've identified is the heat pump water heater u replacements. Um we found a partner in um PG&E to use their GK12. So it's government and K through2 government and U school facilities program to replace over 20 heat pumps or 20 water heaters with electric heat pump water heaters at a cost savings to the city of over $300,000 um throughout all of our facilities including the fairgrounds. So, that was a great win that we had recently. Um, and then just kind of skipping to the last part and I'll let Deb speak on the other two. Um, we're partnering with others um to kind of try out new things. So, the the purple cup program, that reusable cup program kind of looks

purple on there. It looks more blue than purple, but it's just imagine that it's purple because that's what they were. Um, trying it out with people. they they identified Paluma as a great place that had like the mindset of trying new things for use. Um and they reached out to us and we helped facilitate and make that program um a possibility for about 3 months. Uh we wish it could have been longer. Um but those cups uh are still in use. Um they've granted us um use and so um we're using those at the fair. We use them at Luma Ice and we're looking forward to using those again at the next the 2026 fair u to try and reduce that just unnecessary waste. You know, people can refill their cups there. Um and we're trying, you know, we recognize that some in in warmer weathers the the water wasn't uh wasn't great. So, um we're looking at ways to to cool that water down and make it a more refreshing people so that they're getting refreshed and reducing waste at the same time. So just trying new things and trying to be innovative like that. I'll turn it over to Deb to talk about the remaining items.

So I'm Deb Fox, the climate action manager. Uh and uh so the we've launched uh climate action working groups. The climate action plan has a lot of actions in it and it's not meant to be done by just the city alone. It really does take a village. And so the working groups are organizing our community partners around the various strategies outlined in the blueprint so that we end up having an electrification working group, a habitat working group that encompasses a lot of the natural systems uh elements that um like a climate action or excuse me a habitat garden campaign, but it's also where our uh comprehensive land management comes into it. It really covers all of the habitat within the city. uh we will have a a waste working group. Uh transportation and transit are just getting formed around bike month that is coming up in the month of May. And then there's the the part of actually organizing all of the community partners to have a coordinated communication around all of this so that we aren't duplicating resources that we're actually leveraging our existing resources and then being able to find out where we have gaps, how to apply for the funds that are coming like Prop$4 dollars that are specific to climate action. Um, and then this also then uh builds our community resiliency is by because it's owned by the community. these climate actions and this blueprint are a community uh action that we all do together with the city in partnership. So that's the uh uh working groups that are underway. Uh the other piece that we have, we have a consultant that is uh will be working with all of our city staff to have that actual the the integrated pest management plan actually implemented uh and up on our website by the end of this year. So that is underway as we speak. Thank you. And I'm not sure who to invite up next.

Good evening. Brian Miller, your police chief. And uh so we're calling this policing the pedaluma way. And I just want to say that for us at the police department, that's really the only way we know. For over 165 years, uh pedaluma policing is really fundamentally what we do inherently. and many communities are adopting community policing strategies and it's just the way we've served and it's the way we've always served. And so for the last few years we've really been focusing on increasing not only our staffing but investing in our staff and the level of service and the level of professionalism. And so for one of the first times in my career um other than the 2008 recession where we reduced our our staffing allocations and we're full staffed out of sheer necessity because of a reduction in size. Uh I'm pleased to report that we are fully staffed in our sworn police officers and I have no vacancies of my allocated police officers positions. So this year we're really focusing on now that we have all of those individuals seated and in in seat. Many of them are training and learning the job, we're really investing in their training and their onboarding, getting our functional staffing um out in the field so that you're going to start seeing the effectiveness and the efficacy of our resources out in the field um deployed in a much more proactive model. and then we can feel the the full comprehensive resources and bandwidth of our services. We're using technology to our benefit. We've implemented a datadriven platform so that not only when we have our our staffing at at full staffing, we can also be the most strategic and and effective in the utilization of that services and uh be very thoughtful in where we're we're deploying our resources and our staff within the community and for what purposes that we're deploying them in the community. Over the last three years, we've been really really heavily engaged in our civilian hybrid oversight model. Um implementing our independent police

auditor um developing and creating and implementing public safety advisory committee and coming back to the council on an annual basis um as legislatively required and doing our annual reporting for military equipment. this year with our partners in in our city attorney's office. We codified all those components into the municipal code which is quite an accomplishment which means that it's part of our city's regulations in the municipal code to stand and so those things are here to stay and part of uh the municipal code. Um, again, as part of our our Pedaluma policing and pedalum way of serving the community, we've really invested heavily in our partnerships, getting into our schools, working with our youth, um, working with our nonprofits. We've relaunched our community police academy, um, enhanced and expanded our district policing model, which only further serves our service delivery to the community. um and really trying to emphasize the community engagement efforts and having a relationship between our staff and the community in which we serve. And then as Patrick Carter reported, um we're trying to do our part um on the climate perspective as well and be part of um part of the solution. And so um you'll see depicted on the bottom two pictures are police vehicles. One is a traditional black and white patrol vehicle and the one on the right is an all white. And then you can kind of make it out in the background as a solar um array. Those are our two all electric um u factory produced police package pursuit rated um patrol vehicles that are currently out in the field as well as the um independent battery operated off-grid solar charging um um panel that's at our our police department. What's great about that is the solar panel, you may remember, was grant approved um here as well as the um black

and white all electric patrol vehicle was fully funded through uh grant funding. So, thank you and I'll turn it off to our next partner.

Good evening, mayor and council and community. Caitlyn Corley, your city clerk. Uh so over the past two years, the city clerk's office has really focused on projects that help expand access and improve transparency for the public. Uh one of those ways uh is our public records system. We've seen a a huge increase in interest in public records requests thanks to our simple online request portal, Next Request. Uh the city responded to over 800 requests in 2025, which was a big jump from 450 in 2024, and we've already hit 200 requests this year. uh and released over 28,000 documents since the portal's inception. Uh if you've walked past our office, you've probably seen the boxes, which has been a part of our uh overhaul of our paper records, which has included a full audit and inventory, and citywide destruction. So, we've cleared out over 800 boxes of outdated and obsolete records, which makes it easier to find the records we need to find. Uh and a huge shout out to Karen Gonzalez, who's our special project consultant. She's done an amazing job on that. She's our record superstar. Um, we have also expanded language access uh and reduce barriers to participation through our AI tool, Wordley, that provides real-time translation and captioning at our council meetings. Um, and we're also extremely proud uh to have helped onboard and support the city's first ever monolingual Spanish speaking commissioners on our rec uh recreation, parks, and music commission. staff was able to coordinate with local interpreters and blue zones to provide interpretation, translation, and general support to these commissioners is really their willingness to volunteer and help us pioneer a multilingual public meeting. It's just an incredible service to the city and helps us connect with our Spanish speaking community broadly. Um, and now I'll pass it over to Linda to talk about our amazing administrative services department.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor and the honorable council members. A city that works for everyone. That's our theme this morning this this evening is also reflects our Pedaluma initiative and a commitment to building a high performing organization through a people centered valuesdriven approach. This initiative is not simply a strategy. It is a long-term investment in our workforce and our organizational culture. It represent a shift toward a sustainable human- centered transformation where people remain the central to every decision we make. Since August of 2025, the administrative services department ASD has served as the foundation of this effort bringing together finance, human resources, information technology and risk management into a unified structure. This alignment allow us to streamline operations, reduce duplication, and ensure that our daily work support the city's strategic priorities. As a result, we are seeing measurable progress, improved efficiency through standardization, increased productivity through automation, stronger alignment across the departments, and a culture based on continuous improvement. Our approach is guided by the four A's. Alertness, agility, adaptability, and alignment. These principles enable us to remain responsive, resilient, and effective in a constantly changing environment to support our city. Across the four divisions of ASD, this work delivers results as follow. In finance, we manage city's financial operations, ensuring a

responsible stewardship of long-term fiscal health. We oversee more than 120 funds and maintain reserves to support essential city services. Pedaluma holds a strong doublea credit rating from standard pores reflecting its sound financial management. We also receive GFOA distinguished budget award and a certificate in excellence financial reporting. Our finance team supports all city's departments with accounting and financial services. And we also manage over 25,000 utility accounts which also play a key role in supporting the city's economy. In workforce management, equally important is the HR. We play a central role in workforce planning, guiding organizational culture and ensuring employees to understand the why behind the change. In the current fiscal year, we have vetted over 3,200 job applications, hired and promoted a total of 90 employees, and in recent months, we also implemented a learning management system, streamlines training, pro improve accessibilities, supports scalable onboarding and upskilling, and provides datadriven insights to enhance our workforce. Pedal innovate pedaluma is our technology initiative. It focuses on modernizing systems and empowering our workforce through technology. We've maintained over 400 GIS data set to enable cross department collaborations and inform decision making. We've expanded over 75 plus web mapping to support key initiatives such as grazing weed abatements. In recent months, we also installed over 18,000 feet, nearly 3.5 miles of

networking hardware at the aquatic centers, the fairgrounds, the temporary fire station, fire station 3.5, and the Kavanaaugh pool. All to strengthen connectivity across the organizations. This connections help semifeps to do the job. Equally important is also our IT help desk. We resolved over 2,500 service requests just this year with an average resolutions of 30 minutes per request. It represent almost 1,250 hours or 7 months of fulltime work dedicated to maintaining productivity across the city. At the same time, we reimagine enterprise risk management to strengthen decision making by embedding the risk awareness across the organizations and fostering a see something, say something, do something mindset. This enables our proactive responses to emerging challenges. Ultimately, one pedaluma is about alignment. is about aligning our people, our processes and our purposes. And through this alignment, I'm very proud to say that ASB partners with all city departments in building a resilient, innovative, and a high performing organization, position ourselves to serve the community effectively now and into the future. And I would be remiss if I did not thank Corey Garberolio, Brandon Golton, Sally Richie, and Joe Nelson for their support and dedication in advancing ASD's missions to serve their organization. Thank you.

Thank you, Linda.

Good evening, city council members, colleagues, community members. I am Eric Danley. I'm the city attorney and I'm going to touch base briefly on um legal accomplishments in in our in our reporting period. Um this slide that's up on the screen now is really mostly focused on our litigation um with just one bullet on on a uh what for us is is a lot of our regulatory work. So I'll expand on that a little bit when we get to that item, the ordinance and policy enactments. And I'm going to talk a little bit about um what are the drivers for some of these actions because um what I think you can see is that they're really driven by policies that the council has set in response to the priorities they've set for the for the community. Um so starting with the first bullet um through the council's direction to join litigation to um against the federal government um to preserve uh congressionally approved grant funding um um in pedaluma which could um which for g for for the current year is approximately $29 million in total federal grant funding. Um, so far, um, joining that litigation has preserved the city's ability to accept, um, $6 million in that funding without having to, um, accept at the same time, um, provisions that the courts have have so far ruled, um, are unconstitutional and violate the 10th amendment, the US Constitution, um, and and would, if we, um, complied with them, potentially um, state law, the values act. Um so and and that work is ongoing. Those cases are ongoing. They're going on up on appeal before the Ninth Circuit. Um and so far with promising results. We've also got currently 10 active mobile home park um

related lawsuits. Um, one of which we've actually prosecuted affirmatively at the council's direction um, concerning violations of the council's senior overlay that enacted in response to um, requests from community members in our senior parks to preserve the senior um, communities into which they opted when they bought their homes. Um, and those what's important about about that litigation activity is it it is consistent with the council's direction to staff to maintain and even strengthen the protections um that exist in the city's municipal code um to uh support the stable housing of nearly 900 households in the city of Paluma um that reside in mobile homes who own their own homes but do not own the underlying land. Um and um five of those parks um are are senior parks um that are protected under the senior overlay. Um we're defending actively two lawsuits that have been brought to um as part of the ongoing efforts to prevent uh Pedaluma and its citizens from using and accessing its beautiful Laferty Ranch property that literally overlooks the whole Pedaluma Valley. Um um we expect to prevail in those lawsuits too. Those are that's important action directed by the council to ensure the public's access to its property and also its the city's ability to continue to be good stewards of that property. Um at Laferdy as many people know there are dosent lead tours being conducted. There's also been legislative activity that the council has taken to um continue to support those tours and the access of the public. Um, and now I'll just I'm going to cover the last slide to note

that our office is also actively representing the city administrative hearings um such as uh there's still a pending appeal um regarding the um cannabis on-site retail sales permitting that um that our community development director mentioned and and um I'm appreciate the efforts of my colleague Jordan Green in our office um representing us in those hearings um and protecting the scheme that um is consistent with the council's direction about providing for that economic development in the form of um retail cannabis re retail cannabis sales in the community. And now just quickly on some of the legislative activity, a number of these efforts um you've already heard mentioned by our colleagues in the other departments because not surprisingly much of what we do in the legal department is in support of the programs that our colleagues in the other departments are leading on. Um so the cannabis um zoning regulations, administrative regulations and permitting process um are are one of the major projects we've worked on. the importance of that of course being economic development. Um I mentioned um the mobile home um litigation but also we've been active um um preparing legislative updates for the city's regulation and two rounds of updates for the mobile home space rent stabilization regulations to preserve that housing. Um the Chief Miller mentioned um the work to codify the whole structure of the city of Pedaluma's commitment to CI civilian police oversight which we've really always had but now has been updated and codified in response to the community conversations um that the city held um in response to the uh George Floyd murders um and all the the helpful

community input and council direction in response to that. Um we uh I I can report tonight that um the action that the council just took to uh convert its uh building electrification regulations to a policy that um that um encourages but but does not require electrification. Um was important to um moot the lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice which they which they've in fact dismissed. We just got confirmation today from the court as a result of the council's action. Um, but it's also clear um the council's commitment to um uh climate change response through building electricification and encouraging that. Um just see I guess the last one I'll mention um there's others but just for for sake of time I'll mention that um there there has part of the um the efforts to maximize uses at the fairgrounds. There was more um zoning activity for that to broaden the ranges of uses that can occur there and are occurring there. and also for the entitlements for the um exciting new public safety facility that that is um that is going to be um um built on the site. So um thank you. That concludes the high point of um what the legal department has been proud to be working on in conjunction with our colleagues.

Thank you, Eric. We've got Deb Fox coming.

Uh hi again. Um, so one of the other hats that I like to say that I wear is strategic partnerships, building our community network. Um, none of this is possible without all of the people that make up our community. And we have amazing organizations in our community that help us do the work that we do. Um, Rebuilding Together with their graffiti removal and they help us at the fair. They have their workforce development program. daily acts with the uh front uh entrance that you all have seen mulched where they help us do uh planting out front with 500 new trees on or excuse me plants on Earth Day. They do so much more as it relates to our water conservation programs relief putting the trees in the ground that we need so desperately as our heat in uh rises uh like we had this last week. We're going to need more trees for shade. Cafe Plente. Um, we have a an they helped us create an advisory committee that allows a two-way street for us to hear from our Spanish speaking community what they uh need or what they uh give feedback on of our programs. Uh they gave feedback on our uh general plan. Uh we also do a lot more with Cafe Poente as it relates to helping to get our uh uh commissioners, new commissioners onto our uh committees, commissioners and boards. Of course, Co Pedaluma who does our uh climate action on the residential uh level and the team building that they do on the blocks are essential for that blueprint for climate action. Pedal people services, all of the programs that they do that are essential for uh caring for our community. There's a whole bunch on others that aren't on there. Schools, uh, we have a partnership with Pedaluma City Schools, uh, to do. We're part of their climate

action task force. Uh, we also, uh, Capstone program over at CASA is how the young woman who came and spoke at last week's meeting, she participated in, uh, a program that allowed her to hear from city staff uh, about some issues that we deal with in terms of civic engagement. She learned there was a whole group of them that have learned about our grazing program, our biouels uh to biomass. Uh I think I said that backwards. Uh we have our pedaluma health center. Uh there's low CN that we work with of course CS uh Sonoma family meals is another one of our food security programs. It's also a workforce development that is essential for our community. the arts center, which is of course another element that is important to bring in to our community because it helps us really connect in and and uh experience the arts. And as I mentioned, there's many that were the staff has already talked about as relates to blue zones and the support that they do in our community. There's the ods program that uh allows us to have our uh bus stops uh cleaned. There's so much more that I haven't even touched on, but just want to really emphasize that is what makes us a peoplepowered pedaluma. Uh I'm proud to uh work with a lot of those community partners and we're always looking for more especially as we're looking for grant funding to support our work. So uh really it's we can't thank them enough for all the work that they do in our community. So in past years the uh capital improvement program or CIP update was uh taken separately not part of the goals and priorities discussions and instead um updated uh update was provided with the budget workshop typically held in May. But with the really increased level of investment especially in the last

couple of years being put towards the CIP, uh it we thought it made sense to at least provide a a brief update here um tonight as part of this discussion. Uh we've been putting uh we're putting a lot of resources both budget and staff time towards the CIP and we wanted the the time, the energy, the level of focus that we're placing into the CIP to be part of this conversation tonight. Uh as mentioned earlier, our aging infrastructure has taken many years to get to its current state. Um and it's going to take us years to catch up. Uh we don't to to catch up with all the deferred maintenance. Uh we can't get to everything at once, but uh you know, we're make we're chipping away at it. We're making good progress as we deliver each CIP project. Our CIP team is working uh with departments across the city to advance projects in all the different program areas from streets and utilities to parks and public buildings. We still we still plan to provide a comprehensive update uh comprehensive CIP update as part of the the workshop in May. Uh but we wanted to share a few highlights tonight. um and a reminder of some of the CIP projects that we've delivered to the community over the past year. So, I'll turn it over to Drew to help us uh celebrate Oh, there he is. to celebrate a few of our parks projects with the next slide. Thank you, Paul. Uh good evening again, council. Drew Halter, director of parks and recreation. So, we're calling the 2025 2026 capital improvement parks projects edition the year of surf and turf. You ready? Okay. Uh so, this year again marked a few milestones in reinvesting in some of the most uh heavily used park facilities and places including the Lucacei all-weather

synthetic turf field as well as the swim center and 50 meter pool as well as the waiting pool. So after an extensive community engagement process, one that we're we're really proud of, how our community uh has has um engaged uh the Lucas Turfield, which was last replaced in 2009, first installed in the year 1999 2000, uh is set to be completed in the next uh two weeks. So next slide here. The project included removing all of the existing crumb rubber, adding new drainage system, a new compaction pad, a new biodegradable infill consisted of olive pits and sand, which is the first system of the city. And as part of the project, the public works team was also able to pull together an in-house design for a new parking lot configuration uh and improvements there, including the concrete retaining walls, the ADA uh parking stalls, drinking fountains, and the five elm trees that you see pictured here in the right. Uh so again really creative team with public works came in not just uh on budget but uh with some improvements there that we were really excited to get happen. Next slide please. Shifting to the surf edition. Um this year we completed the pedaluma swim center pool replastering project as well as the waiting pool. Similarly to Lucasey this was a significant undertaking. Um, you know, that picture on the right was really important because it just shows you expanse of what a a 50 meter pool uh really looks like. This was last repl it does make me cringe a little. Um, you know, the surface was reaching a point

where pool patrons were writing messages for us at the bottom of the pool uh in between practices asking for help. So, thank you for supporting this one and helping to answer those messages. Uh, next slide, please. And I just want to sit here and in awe. Um, you know, in addition to the newly replastered pool, again, the public's work team um was able to build into this project a new steps for the waiting pool, which is significant. This adds not such safety of families entering the water but also increases our ability for instructors to teach classes in the in the pool. Also, as part of this project, we were able to uh retrofit the lighting both inside the pool as well as the deck lighting uh with LED efficient uh and energy efficient um bulbs. Next slide, please. So lastly, rounding out the park's capital projects this year was the completion of the outdoor educational classroom. Don't call me an amphitheater at Schulenberger Park. That was uh this started as a a vision from the former president of the Pedaluma Wetlands Alliance in 2017. uh the late Al Hesa who helped the city secure grant funding for building a community space to foster wetland education, environmental stewardship. Next slide, please. Sometimes, you know, as Paul can think mentioned, some projects uh require time to marinate. this was certainly one of them, but in the end with a new project team that that picked this one up um and the programming needs really changed through the pandemic. So uh although this was a project that uh a lot of folks were really eager and anticipating its in installation, taking that time

re-engaging the Pedal Lima Wetlands Alliance, seeing how programming changed, how it would be utilized really allowed us to deliver a much better, more authentic project in the end with a smaller footprint, uh more thoughtful sight lines. Uh, and we're just really proud that um, this spring, again, that tradition of of taking every third grader out uh, from Paluma to the wetlands to learn about habitat restoration and stewardship uh, is is something that's going to be really um, powerful for the next generations to come. Next slide, please. And to expand on that view, we'll bring up folks from Ellis Creek.

There you are. So this last year we completed the Ellis Creek floating solar project, now one of the largest in California at six megawws. You can advance to the next slide, Caitlyn. Thank you. The system has been fully operational since September of last year and is offsetting most of the facilities on-site electricity use, reducing the reliance on grid power, and supporting our goal of carbon neutrality by 2030. Staff are tracking firstear performance to understand how seasonal production aligns with annual energy use. This project required no upfront cost to the city. Through a power purchase agreement, the developer financed, built, and maintains the system, and the city purchases the power at below market rates. Estimated savings are about 450,000 annually with over 11 million across 20 years. and we're in the first year now. Um to confirm those savings, operations are managed by a third-party provider with twice yearly service and staff continue working with White Pine on additional energy efficiency opportunities. Overall, this project highlights Pedaluma's commitment to ST sustainability and long-term cost savings. So, we're nearing completion of the tertiary upgrades project at Ellis Creek. This project increases recycled water capacity to meet peak summer demand and supports future system expansion. Ellis Creek was originally designed to produce up to 4.8 million gallons per day of tertiary recycled water and this project expands treatment capacity to 6.8 MGD with the addition of two new cloth media filters and a third UV disinfection system with the existing channel. Construction on this project began in early 2023, supported by a $3.6 million state grant. Major components are now complete. The UV system was approved for use last summer, and the

filter expansion is operational with final optimization underway. The contract closeout for this project is expected to go to council later this year. Thank you, Chelse. Now, we'll walk through ongoing and proposed priority areas where we're seeking your input and prioritization. And Paul, you're going to kick this off. Uh, next slide, please.

Yeah. So, starting off with the CIP, uh, repairing our streets uh continues to be a top priority and we're excited uh to uh to have several paving projects planned for the next two years. When we do paving, uh, it's not just paving, right? So, we look at the utilities, underground utilities that are existing, the water and sewer uh sewer pipes to see what the condition is of those to see if those need to be repaired or replaced prior to paving. We also take the opportunity, as I mentioned briefly earlier, to incorporate active transportation elements to improve safety and connectivity. So, I'll go down the list here briefly. Uh Reineer Avenue just started construction. That's from uh North Mcdow to Cinema Mountain Parkway. uh that paving will be complete by this fall. You may recall also that utility improvements were completed in 2025 along Reineer Caulfield Lane uh that goes from Peran to Garfield Drive. We plan to complete complete the design for Caulfield by the end of uh 2026 with construction planned for 2027. Similarly, Howard Street which goes from A Street to West Street. Um that one will include sewer and water manes in Howard. Uh we we're working on the design now for Howard. Uh and that design will be complete in 2026 with construction for both utility and paving work planned for 2027. Moving to D Street uh which goes from the boulevard uh out to south city limits. The D Street project will also include the replacement of sewer and water infrastructure prior to paving. Uh the design will be completed in 2027 with construction for both the utility and paving work planned for 2028. In addition to those uh paving reconstruction projects, we also have our annual pavement maintenance uh project or slurry seal. Um not all candidates, not all streets are good

candidates for slurry seal. Uh but it's an uh extremely cost-effective treatment type for uh trying to keep our our roads that are in good con good good condition in good condition. Uh we budget approximately 800,000 each year uh so that we can deliver a slurry project uh each summer or fall. Uh and I'll hand it over to Chelsea. So, if you heard a couple times already, a key priority this year for the city is the PIP's parallel force main project. PIP stands for plant influent pump station. This project will install a new 2 and a half mile long 42-in HDP force man from the pips's pump station on Hopper Street to the Ellis Creek facility. The existing line, which was installed in 1973, is over 50 years old and nearing end of its service life. This pipeline is critical for con conveying the city's wastewater to Ellis Creek for treatment. Due to its age, location near Calrans and smart infrastructure and lack of redundancy, it prevents reliability risks. The project will build a parallel force main alongside the existing force main adding redundancy and improving system reliability. This is a major generational infrastructure investment. Currently, the team is finalizing per permits with regulatory agencies, securing necessary easements. Easements are expected to go to council this spring with bidding this summer and contract awards start targeted for September. Estimated construction on the parallel force main is about 44 million with additional costs for contingency and construction management. Overall, this project is critical to ensure long-term wastewater system reliability and remains a top priority. Along with the force main um is the pips pump station. So originally the PIP CIP planned for pump upgrades at the pump station which conveys wastewater to Ellis Creek. A recent 2025 condition assessment

identified several key challenges. The facility has cited bank vulnerabilities and it predates current standards along with space constraints that make maintenance and pump replacement difficult because the pump station operates 247. Major construction would require exp um extensive bypass pumping, adding complexity and cost. Based on condition assessment findings, the city's moving forward with full replacement of the pump station to improve long-term reliability and efficiency. While aligning this work with the parallel force main will be ideal. We also recognize this might be challenging. Together, these projects will significantly improve system resiliency and reduce the risk of sanitary sewer overflows. So, for the pump station, design is expected to begin in March 2026 um this month and run through early 2027. Bidding is planned for March 2027 with contract reward around May in construction from July of 2027 through March of 2028. Uh the current estimate for the pump station is about 1 million for design and 24 million for construction. And to support both of these PIPS projects, the city's planning a wastewater bond issuance, which will be discussed later in tonight's presentation.

Next slide, please. Thank you. This this next year, uh, you'll be seeing the committee will be seeing two significant public safety facility improvement projects that are part of our capital improvement plan. um they're that are consistent with the public safety facility master plan as well and will be funded by um mostly by measure U and by measure H. The first being uh Pedaluma's D Street fire station number one that is going to be receiving a significant seismic upgrade and other safety upgrades and construction on that began last week and we anticipate that project to be completed by this time of next year. In the meantime, our fire engine and paramedic ambulance are housed in a temporary fire station on Pedalum Boulevard south to continue emergency operations on the on the west side of town. The second project is uh the public safety facility. They'll be located at the fairgrounds. I'll let Brian speak to that a little bit.

Yeah, I think we've uh had quite a bit of discussion about that new facility. We've cleared all the significant hurdles in public discussion here for the planning commission and the presentation to the city council. Uh we've recently received the requests for qualifications back and we're currently working with our public work partners to review and start evaluating those qualifications. we're on track with that that process which the chief and myself are learning a lot about the public works um processes and procedures and the bidding processes and um things that we didn't know much about. Um and I believe in my understanding from the timeline that's been published in that packet that we're hoping to have continued conversations about bond bonding and u construction awarding contracts and later in this spring and uh early summer. um with hopes to be under uh hopefully under contract um by the time around July um and then hopefully uh as things progress to be um substantially completed with construction in uh uh what's it

March of 2028. Summer 2028.

And so everything's been proceeding uh accordingly and and we couldn't be more ecstatic uh with the progression of the project. Thank you. Okay, I will take the next one. So, wanted to emphasize fiscal and organizational sustainability for a few moments. And this has been an emphasis for us over the years and it will continue to be uh and you may see some ramped up emphasis on uh fiscal sustainability in the coming year. So about 10 months ago, we brought to the council a workshop just to kind of give a refresher on what we looked at back in 2020 and 2021 uh more on the expense and the investment side of of the ledger. and we uh we had many different points of emphasis in that presentation and so wanted to uh go into a few of these in a bit more detail. So first of all, we're just going to be focusing on the overall budget uh in the upcoming year and ensuring that we can continue to provide core services. Revenue growth has slowed while costs continue to escalate and there is little to no flexibility in the budget at this time and you will hear from staff at the budget workshop in May uh some of the strategies on how we're balancing the needs of the community with finite resources and finite resources includes measure U which has enabled us to transform the organization and respond to those top measure U priorities that you heard about earlier. But even measure U is limited. So like the original presentation that again focused on expenses and investment, staff are also working on a revenues workshop that we will bring to council to learn about and consider a variety of potential new revenue options. A key component of the measured

implementation plan was workforce stabilization, which included bringing both staff compensation up to market and an emphasis and a continuation of providing regular annual colas or cost of living adjustments to stay competitive in the market and recruit and retain talented staff. And in 2026, as we look to this next fiscal year, all labor agreements are up for negotiation. So, we continue to be focused on maintaining overall competitive compensation while acknowledging our resource limitations and bringing creative proposals to the bargaining table. You heard a bit about economic development this evening from Brian O. So, that will also be an emphasis this year. And economic development, it creates benefits for the community in terms of robust job creation, business growth opportunities, and thriving shopping and entertainment locations. uh but they also have the benefit of boosting city revenues that can be reinvested into community services. Another strategy that we've begun analyzing is the utilization of city facilities and properties to determine what we should keep uh what we should sell as surplus for other uses and which buildings make sense to continue investing in and which do not. And you've seen this already play out a bit. Uh Jeff mentioned a minute ago our public safety facilities master plan and we plan to expand on that type of analysis to all city properties. Our focus will be on organizing or excuse me optimizing um the usage of city real estate for community benefit and whether that means continued city ownership in those properties or perhaps not and recommending better utilization options and achieving potential revenue uh revenues from property sales. And then finally, uh you've heard about a few projects tonight that will require

significant investment in terms of capital infrastructure, and we will be recommending several bond issuances to council in the next few months to get those projects funded and built. Uh leveraging our new measure H fire sales tax revenues as well as measure U to construct the safety facility. uh adding a fourth fire station, replacing our outof-date police station and new emergency operations center, and then as Chelsea mentioned a few moments ago, a wastewater revenue bond to finance construction of the Pips's parallel force main and a portion of the pump station project which at least occurring uh according to our current financial forecasting can be accommodated within the existing rate structure uh for wastewater. So, these are this just a snapshot and a preview of some of the activities that you're going to be hearing about uh over the next year from staff. And they will require thoughtful, creative, and open-minded approaches to managing city finances while also keeping the council's goals in mind and the community benefit at the forefront of our thinking.

Next slide.

Thank you, Brian. As we look to this next year, the following are service areas that we expect to stabilize andor transform um our mobile crisis and safety team. They're funded by measure O. Um funding that is um the city generates all the cities in the county and the county generate for a countywide measure on mental health initiatives. Um it's currently being threatened um for reduction which um it funds our mobile crisis safe team. So, our South County partners along with our nonprofit partner that helps us uh put safe um together and operate safe and manage safe. Um we are having to come up with um other options um and how to provide that service to the community. Reimagining transit um currently we're facing a deficit in transit. So, reimagining transit to be effective, efficient, sustainable. and our TRA uh transit advisory committee has been working really hard on some options to bring to council the funding strategy to sustain our significant efforts in homelessness um prevention and support. As you heard earlier, we are heavily reliant on state and federal funding for that um program and that is starting to come to an end. So we are coming up with other ideas on how to um continue the excellent work that we have been um undertaking over the last three years. Complete the request for proposal process and continue to move key planning functions in the house. We um we will be coming to council in May to talk about what our planning um department will continue to evolve into. Um write our landscaping assessment districts. um we have like 50 of them and um some of them are underwater. So we've um that was a follow-up from our meeting with council uh to kind of write that ship and deliver on service while being sustainable.

After bringing in our aquatics program in house after a decade and a half to create programming that meets the diverse needs of our community and that is also cost effective and stabilize our animal services and plan for long-term both locally and countywide. So really working u with our um other city partners and the county and our nonprofits to really um stabilize that service and bring some continuity improvements to that service. And next I'd like to ask Brian O to deliver our last slide. So, as we start to think as a city on how to stabilize and evolve our service delivery, we don't want to lose sight of the long-term vision and the long-term planning efforts uh that we have embarked on over the last several years. Um and so what's really exciting as we start to see the culmination the um expected adoption of a new general plan is how do we as a community as a staff go about to implement said plan. And so there's a lot of very forwardinking um goals, policies, programs that our community is expecting of us. And so, uh, putting together a robust implementation plan, um, to chart out for the city, um, dovetailing into the two specific plans. Um, so those are, you can consider them many general plans. And so we have, um, one for our uh, what we call the central pedalum specific plan, but it's really focused on our downtown smart station. Um, that's 20 plus years. um old now. And so we want to make sure that that plan,

said plan, um is in full alignment with all the different goals and objectives that the council and the community have set out for the general plan. And so we're very fortunate to get grant funding for that effort. And so we're looking to kick that off here shortly um with the support of our regional uh planning organization, the Metropolitan Transportation uh Committee and Commission and Abag. Um and then we are have already launched um a uh revisioning reimagining of our north end of town on the east side. Um we have a specific plan um underway um to build around a um a catalyst. We have our second station um that is open. It's thriving. How do we start to build an identity and build a community um around that asset? Um, our parks team touched on the fairgrounds master plan and so we're in the final stages of selecting a consultant to support the city to support the community through that exciting process to help reimagine and fully utilize as a community our fairgrounds property. Um, and then as part of the implementation of the general plan is the zoning code. And so we need to make sure that there's alignment with our zoning code. How do we make sure it's nimble? It's supportive of all the wonderful uses and creativity that the community um wants to deliver um for us um and also something that meets the climate blueprint. And so how do we make sure um that we keep the north star to to be climate resilient? Um, and one of the ways we're going to do that is updating um, and putting forward good policy um, good local policy,

downtown placemaking. And so this touches um, on parkletits um, as being one component, but also our one of our key gems as a city is our downtown. How do we make sure that uh downtown's thriving? Not just with new uses, not just retening old uses, underutilized uses, but making it a place um for everyone um to share and to thrive. Um and I'll just touch briefly on part of that is the parking management. So downtown, how do we make sure that um not only there's accessibility for all downtown um but it's very much connected to the placemaking um and the attractiveness um that we all are very proud of. Um and so with that, next slide. It's why we do the things we do. Um, as you heard tonight, the city's balancing our uh day-to-day service delivery with our focus on long-term transformation. And we've made strong progress. And we recognize there's still more work to do. A lot more work to do. Tonight's our opportunity to refine priorities, stay focused, and continue delivering for the community. And our city team is grateful to serve this incredible community. And we look forward to hearing council's priorities. and we'll return with a plan to align those priorities with resources and timelines that deliver for a Paluma community. And we're available for questions and clarifications. Thank you.

Well, thank you. Uh great presentation. I really want to thank all the staff who put in the effort and uh hit on all that detail. You know, I cringe to think where we were in in 2018 and uh and and then um love all the progress we've been seeing since 2019 to get us to where we are today. And a lot of your listing, I mean, I think it gets overshadowed by the issue dour, you know, whatever's hot today. But all that work's been going on from all those people and that's much appreciated. Um it's quite a recital of achievement. Uh but like you say there's still a ways to go and um even though that was a strong strong effort since 2019 I think this meeting like you say is the focus on what we're going forward with. So thank you for that uh presentation and at this point rather than bring it up to council which I know will be an engaging environment um I'd like to open it to public comment first and I'd like our clerk to take it away from this point here. Yes, we did receive uh 12 public comments ahead of the meeting and those are posted online. And at this time I will start a 30 second clock and so during these 30 seconds members of the public wishing to speak should bring their speaker cards to my desk if they have not already done so. And speaker cards received after this time may not be accommodated.

Okay. Um, thank you all for um being here to public comment and and to help with that, we have Natasha Giuliani to be first and Don Foreman to follow.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council, my name is Natasha Juliana. I am the director of Cool Paluma, a nonprofit focused on building community resilience by empowering local climate solutions. But most importantly, I'm a mom and a wannabe grandmother. My number one priority is protecting the future for our next generations to come. So, I'm not here to speak on my behalf, but on theirs. At the STE's goals and priorities workshop, as was mentioned by Patrick in 2019, I was there. The community asked that equitable climate action be the number one objective. We proudly walked away from there with sustainability and regeneration marked at the top of the paper as the metag goal overarching everything. And I think we heard a lot about that tonight. And I I love seeing how it's been so integrated into the city's staff's work. And I really really appreciate that. Just after that, uh, Pedaluma City Council went on to unanimous unanimously pass the climate emergency resolution, which has been, you know, the catalyst for so much of this great work. And, um, we've accomplished a lot as we saw tonight. I ask that tonight, 7 years later, in the year 2026, we recommmit ourselves to prioritizing equitable climate action and community resilience. Last week, Paluma was consistently 25 degrees above the average temperature. This historic heat wave is now traveling across the country, smashing temperature records from California to Pennsylvania. It might find feel good to go outside in your shorts and grill on your barbecue, but this is not normal. It's not good for all of the other plants and animals that live on this planet that have adapted to the way the climate has been for the last millennia. And um and so we need to to remember that the climate crisis is here. It's now.

It's affect the effects of warming planet are being felt even more quickly than scientists predicted. Last fall, a new scientific review called the planetary health check in 2025 showed that seven of nine planetary boundaries have now been exceeded. I cannot stress enough how serious this is. If we destroy the basic life support system on Earth, everything else is a moot point. No one is coming to save us. We're not actually going to Mars. We need to get organized and focused on taking care of each other while we take care of the planet. So, please prioritize equitable climate action and community resilience, not for my sake, but for all of the children who are not here tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Don Foreman to be followed by Rosemary Hart.

Hi. Um, Pedalum made a commitment to become age friendly when it joined AARP network um in early 2020. Age friendly worldwide movement focus on uh creative livable communities for people of all ages. Pedaluma age friendly action plan from 2023 on page four the streets transportation community spaces uh one line mentions additional public bathrooms that's where we're going is bathrooms tonight um one is currently being prepared in planning stages in 2425 there was a city top 10 goals and priorities and bathrooms were on the list but they didn't make it um in the CIP80 of 2223 there was 510k on the budget and in 2526 there's 180. Not sure why it went down so much. Um but anyways we need bathrooms in town so hopefully that could get on the goals you know. Thank you.

Thank you Rosemary Hart to be followed by Darren Rakazen. Honorable mayor and city council members. Hello. I uh it's my fourth or fifth goals and priorities workshop. I started with the uh representing the Pedaluma Women's Club and now I have over a thousand people asking me to represent them. And as members of your community, we're grateful for the attention you have given to our riverfront by prioritizing the trestle every single year. and we come once again to ask you to prioritize it for the 2627 fiscal year. While we have seen some project progress in those past four years, our community has yet to see visible on the ground commitment that we've been hoping for. Whether or not the city owns the trestle, your constituency as part of your city and its continued deterioration affects all of us. It's become an eyesore, a safety issue, an environmental concern, and an embarrassment in the place we value deeply. So we ask you three things. Really commit to this project. Prioritize it for 2627. We cannot ignore it forever. 24-hour fitness is falling into the river as I'm speaking. Um, number two, hold conu uh community visioning meetings. FA is expected to have shovel ready plans soon. So, now is that ideal time to bring residents together through these meetings. conversations will ensure that the work and the dollars that you have allocated

to this will reflect the shared vision and needs of the people who live, work, and gather here. And number three, determine maybe the economic impact. Perhaps that's the magic key that will get us to move on this project. We need to learn about the long-term benefits of this riverfront and an economic impact study could demonstrate to you all something that we already feel and that a beautiful accessible prominade would strengthen our local economy, support our small businesses and enhance the quality of life for everyone. You know this is our riverfront. It's the picture we show to people when we are trying to get them to come here as tourists. We all have a stake in its future. Let's work together to make it a reality. Thank you.

Thank you, Darren Rakazen to be followed by Chantel Rogers.

Thank you, Caitlyn. Uh, council mayor, I appreciate that this exercise has kind of evolved over the years from the top 10 priority fight into a recap of here's the context of all city operations. Here are things that are ongoing. Here are things that are one-time moves steps forward. I think in reading the staff report in preparation for this meeting, I didn't quite interpret it that way. So, I want to say I think there was some in my mind, I like this exercise being a precursor for the budget. I think there is more we can do to contextualize this information and make it more effective both for decision makers and for public participation because the presentation's attached there now but we didn't have this great slide deck. We don't have some of the verbal context. Is there a rubric we can develop for some of these on cost? Is there an identification we can make on churn or core daily services versus one-time projects that is delineated? Because if you look at the discussion section of the staff report, it's a list of everything. It's at toward the end it's separated with like SIP and fiscal sustainability in a better format. But I think there's a lot we can do there again to improve this for our decision makers and for the public. And I think my next point is something that could potentially help with that. And I think it has to be one of the top priorities if it's not already internally which is developing comprehensive AI policy. I think we're entering an era where permit desks are going to be transformed by AI. permit processes are going to be transformed by AI where you don't need desk hours to support someone in going through that process. I think there are opportunities to improve organization of documents like this. I would love to see the end of the era of like $4 million three-year long master planning projects where it's document generationheavy where an AI can really do a lot of the brute force and free up staff for hightouch community engagement type roles. But then on the flip side, there's a data security and best practices uh side of that. You know, I'm not going to put anyone on the spot, but a city staff member at the last planning commission meeting had

chat GPT up and answering questions which we all to some extent use because it is a common tool, but do we have policies internally to make sure everyone's on the same page with how to most effectively use those tools? So, I think that AI has to be a centerpiece moving forward. I think we're a couple years, you know, this is already out there, but I think there's a great opportunity now to really seize onto it and find where we can leverage it to not replace core services, replace core personnel, but really be a supportive tool. And then finally, something from the comprehensive annual financial report for fiscal year 25 um that I didn't see on here is the marina. The auditor recognized that as a going concern issue. It was really the only issue in the city's financials that it flagged as a going concern problem. And it would be great to see at least a mention of that strategy-wise, like what is the future of the marina? Is it solvent? Is it not? What do we do with it? Um, so I I just want to flag that because again, I like that idea of this conversation leading into a bigger budget discussion with how do we allocate resources. So, let's push more in that direction. Thank you. Thank you, Chantel Rogers to be followed by Rick Berg.

Good evening. Um, so the staff report that was posted before this meeting um was all over the place and almost impossible to follow um for such an important topic. It's disappointing that the city didn't put in more effort to present a cohesive plan. The presentation actually given tonight is significantly different and wasn't posted early. I I looked this afternoon. It wasn't there. It's there now. Um but we didn't have an opportunity to look at it. Um and I I I really think that posting that ahead of time gives the public a better opportunity to follow along and give feedback that is pertinent to to what you're trying to present. So much feedback was uh received for tonight's meeting concerning the sorry state of our trestle. Um in years past, refurbishing the trestle was identified as a city priority, but it seems to have fallen off of the list, at least from the priorities I have here. Um the trestle has gone from an eyesore to a travesty and a city embarrassment. It's literally rotting into the water at an accelerated rate. smells worse every day and the rats are the size of cats. The council makes much of supposed blight caused by chain link fences, but this is true blight. It's only a matter of time before articles written about Paluma will veer from vibest downtown to most dilapidated. I know it's complicated and expensive, but please put it back at the top of your priority list. We really can't wait any longer. Also absent from the priorities list as in place through fiscal year 27 is any mention of road paving. While the presentation thanks the citizens of Paluma for their support by passing measure U, most of us assumed that the 1% increase in sales tax that we pay

every day would go significantly towards road repair. That's how Measure U was sold to us. but instead virtually all the tax revenue is going to pay for city employees, their benefits and pensions and other city functions and projects unrelated to the road repair. The bond is almost all spent or committed and now we've added close to a million dollars a year in bond repayment. Road repair deserves to be at the top of our priorities list now and until said time that our roads are all in decent shape. As a reality check, our country is at war. Gas and everyday items are rising exponentially in cost, and assumptions we have made in the past about tourist traffic, local spending, and continued revenues can no longer be counted on. We need to tighten up our priorities to address necessities and not nicities. Thank you.

Thank you, Rick Berg, to be followed by Moren Gotshaw. Well, good evening, council members and Mr. Mayor. Uh, my name is Rick Berg. I'm a Pedaluma resident and property owner as well as real estate broker with Century 21 Epic in our downtown office. And, uh, I am a member of the Pedaluma downtown Association uh, board of directors. Uh I too am here this evening to talk about the trestle and urge the council to engage in robust community visioning and design process regarding reimagining the trestle. Uh this is nothing less than a safety hazard and an eyesore and an embarrassment uh and instead could be an asset uh and a driver uh helping to fuel the economy, the economic vibrancy and growth of our downtown and all of Pedaluma. Uh I know work has been done around this project and I know the trestle I know uh the ownership of the trestle is complicated and unclear. Uh and at the same time this highly visible feature in our downtown core needs to be addressed. Uh please make engaging our community in a visioning process uh reimagining the trestle uh priority this coming fiscal year. Thank you.

Thank you Moren Gotchell. Um, and at a workshop, I'm hoping three minutes is going to hold you. We're not Wayne can't um Wayne is seating his time. We're We're not going to allow seating during a workshop time. A workshop is maximum three minutes. Okay. Thank you. I'm sorry. To be followed by Katherine Greger.

Okay, sounds good. All right. Well, then I'll get to the point. Um I'm here to discuss um as a priority uh the financial health. Um I have appeared before the council previously to raise concerns about the city's general fund reserves. Each time the city response has been the same. We are in compliance and we carry two months of reserves. That is the GFO minimum standard. But 2 months equals 16.7%. It's 2 / 12. The city's own finance director wrote in the fiscal year 2025 ACFR transmittal letter dated December 30th, the city continues to maintain emergency reserves according to council policy at 15% of operating expenditures. And I asked this council at the very minimum to meet the GFOA standard. The difference between 15% and 16.7 may sound small, but in the context of Pedaluma's multi-million dollar operational budget, the 1.7 gap represents hundreds of thousands of dollars in emergency liquidity that does not exist when a crisis arrives. The city fund balance referenced in their annual comprehensive financial report, right? balance wrench and the violence sorry I was looking at the clock December 30th submitted to the state authorizes raises a fundamental question it is unclear how the city arrives at 15% of unassigned funds the total government fund balance of 156.5 million is compromised by is comp is put together of five separate categories 2.3 million is non-spendable and cannot be sent spent 130 million is restricted legally constrained. 7.9 million is

committed. Formally set aside by council action. 16.7 million assigned designed for specific intended use and unassigned is a negative.6 million. The city's 15% reserve claim appears to be counting the assigned fund balance of 16.7 million. Money already earmarked for specific intended purposes. The GFOA owns guidance warns against this. The general fund itself confirms the problem. 18.8 million total made up of 2.1 million nonspendable and 16.7 million assigned unassigned zero residents deserve a direct explanation from the city of how it arrives at a GFOA compliant unassigned reserve. I also want to address the AA bonding rating from S&P Global rating applies specifically to the city's 2026 lease revenue bonds measure H sales tax bonds backed by dedicated revenue streams and is not a certificate that the city's general fund reserves are adequate. I'm urging the council to be fiscally responsible and to increase the reserves. Thank you. Thank you. Katherine Greger to be followed by Anina Zito.

Hi everyone. I too am here to talk about the trestle on that lovely piece of paper there. It says need to deal with a trestle. You know, the trestle has just kind of become this thing that makes everyone groan and it's a problem and it's ugly and it's got rats and it's like a bummer. So, I understand why perhaps it kind of slips up the priorities and um it's not there as a top goal this year. So, there's a lot of people that really care about it. And listening to these wonderful presentations and the hard work of city staff, as some of you know, I'm former city staff from Austin, Texas. It seems to me that perhaps it fits within the community development department. Sorry, um, Brian, but um, you know, this can really be an economic development initiative. And as Brian Cochran so succinctly pointed out, the path out of the city's financial woes is economic development. And the public works department is fabulous. Rosemary and I have sat through so many meetings with public works staff. They're great engineers and they did the engineering work and they got an engineering consultant and they basically said you can't fix it and it's rotting and you know you can't lipstick this pig. We're so sorry. Um, I mean, they did prov they did present some ideas and oh, maybe it's wood and maybe the plans go this way or that way, but it was kind of like options within a teeny tiny little cup. And really, the options should be at the level of what is the vision of our community? What do we want? What is the opportunity here? I

mean, it's our waterfront. It's our riverfront. I personally am not invested in preserving the dilapidated trestle. I'm okay if it just needs to go. What I'd love is to have a beautiful waterfront. And as someone else pointed out, these are the pictures that we show to everyone. They're in the Chamber of Commerce brochures and the visit Paluma brochures. And there's that trestle. So, I'm just asking you all to get some excitement and some vision around it. And instead of seeing it as like need to deal with the trestle, you know, let's get a really crack urban design firm in here. Let's fund them. Let's do visioning, right? I hear the parks department knows a lot about that. Maybe they could help. Um, and really treat it as a vision opportunity, something excitement, something that can bring economic growth into our city and just make it look really great. Thank you so much. Thank you, Nina Zito.

Thank you. Uh we have Veronica Olsen to be followed by Andy Schrader.

Hi, good evening everyone. Hope you're having a great day. It's a lot of stuff to do on this to-do list. Um, I'm gonna I just want to talk a little bit about um, you know, when we walk in our city, every street in Paluma, every building we pass is a decision that has been made and we've adopted our blueprint and the active transportation plan and we're about to adopt our general plan. So, our directions are very clear. The question is, do we have all the implementation tools in place to deliver this consistently? There are three straightforward ways to close that gap. Staff has has put a lot of work into these plans and there's a lot already in motion, but what I'm pointing to is something more foundational and probably more boring. And that is um we are asked to look at what we can see every day in the in the standards that we we have. Um the first area is by right housing. This is where a share of the city is being built and it bypasses discretionary review. So whatever is not written to into the objective design standards does not get built. And today our gaps in the objective design standards are our minimum floor height, our transparent glazing at the street and street street trees and frontage landscape. In pure cities, these are already standard. Palo Alto requires 14oot ground floors. Berkeley, St. Louis, Abyispo require minimum ground floor heights. Berkeley require transparent glazing. And all three cities require street trees along their frontage. Pedaluma requires none, no street trees on objective design standards. So in

many cities, um, frontage standards also include soil volume, green infrastructure, and climate adapted planting. These are not aesthetic choices. They shape shade. They shape activity and how the street works over time. And they're set at construction. Once built, they're difficult to change. So my ask is to include to update the objective design standards to include the pedestrian experience, ground floor height, transparency, street trees and requirements. Thank you. Thank you, Andy Schrader.

Hello, Mayor uh city council. Thank you to the staff for a terrific presentation and uh and for all the terrific work that that led up to it. I want to echo Natasha Juliana's comments about climate. The world meteor meteor meteorological organization's press released just today says this. The earth's climate is more out of balance than at any time in observed history. The state of the climate report confirms that the years 2015 to 2025 are the hottest 11 years globally on record and that extreme weather impacts millions and costs billions. End quote. We saw over 1,200 12,500 homes burned to the ground in Los Angeles last year from climate exacerbated wildfires for which the 2017 Tubs fire which only burned about 6,000 homes. It was just a warm-up act. It's getting worse fast. And the problem that we have with kicking the can down the road on climate is that we are actually inside that can that's being kicked. And what that means when a federal administration is aggressively bad on climate is that we need to step up our efforts locally. You have dozens of volunteers on climate committees working for free to figure out how to implement the blueprint for climate action regardless of the budget situation which I'm aware is dire. This work needs your ongoing attention and resources for our children. Second, when the council voted to replace the plastic carpet at Leesi, you said you would seriously consider a citywide ban on plastic grass installation. After last week's heatwave, that time is now. My 9-year-old daughter was signed up for soccer training practice on plastic grass at 400 p.m. last Monday and Wednesday. Given the high temperatures, the soccer community was

likely playing on surfaces reaching between 140 and 160°. I didn't let my daughter practice last week and I ate the hundred bucks that was nonrefundable. Since the soccer association does not actually have a real actionable extreme heat plan in place, the cities should have one and halt practice on extreme heat days. People who don't know any better put their children at serious risk because they don't know any better. The role of government is to protect us from bad men's practices. Thank you. Thank you. That was the last card I have for public comment tonight and I'll bring it back up to the council where uh certainly we have a lot to think about um um for where we've been and a little bit of a question for where we're going. Um I I do want to echo out one of our speakers comments that all the assumptions of the past are not secure for the future. And uh you know you can mean that as a climate comment or you can mean that as a federal or state government funding comment but uh yeah we are in a period where uh perhaps uh caution is an uh is a key a key word here. Um and um with that um I guess one comment that I want to lead with is uh the presentation showed us our capital program um and and the big projects we have coming as a um doubling or tripling the capital program in the next year or two. I mean, we have 50 $60 million of capital being built every year and and now we're going to add a 70 million public safety building and then we're going to add a uh uh the sewer improvements at another 50 million in a time of caution. That's great ambition. If you know where you have that funding coming from, you know, the need is so

severe. I'm I'm just pleased with the ambition of the capital projects team. Um but let me uh um you know having tiptoed for a minute to give our council think their their chance to get their thoughts together. I'd like to invite our council to uh weigh in and uh council member Kar Thompson. I would like to start off understanding the trestle where we're going as and take that just on sing as a single issue just to start off with because it seems to be I have I have opinions but I rather hear from staff on ownership uh responsibility and where we're going to be going and then I'll give my opinion and comments. Great.

Let's do that. Sorry, Eric and then Gina, would you mind coming up?

So, thank you, council. I'll start by responding to uh that from the legal perspective and then I think Gina and maybe other public works team members will follow up. So, uh um there's a lot of old history there and we have not um gathered all of it. I still have some qu some questions, but we do have some preliminary conclusions um from from the document review that's been done so far, including with the help of uh Steve Lefranki um who's very good at researching historic uh title documents. Um and based on that review um what we conclude is that um presently is that there is no indication that um the rail easements on the trestle which were conveyed by um the McNair company to the Northwest Pacific Railroad. um ever involved any title transfer, but that was just an easement. And it also appears from review of that easement, which which we have, which we've looked at carefully, um that the easement expired of its own terms 90 days after the rail use was abandoned and um and returned to the McNair company. Um, and it also appears based on our current review with with a public works team's help using our JS system um that nearly all of the trestle slash um what's referred to as the warf which um which improvements

were done in combination by by the McNairs and the railroad. Um nearly all of those improvements overlay state lands. It looks like there may be a little bit of um of an extent to which the um current o owners and successors to the McNair company which according to the title information we have um are known as MKD Great Pedalumma Mill LLC owned by Darla and Pat um Flanigan. Um otherwise it seems it appears that those improvements are not on a designated parcel but over state lands. Um we find no city ownership interest at all either to the land the uh wararf the trestle um or the underlying state lands. We do find that there is a still active and still in effect city sewer easement um that was authorized to attach to the retaining wall and still is and is separate from and doesn't rely for support on the trestle. Um so the city does have that interest and it's and as staff inform it's an important facility that we still maintain and use. Um and it as as best as we can surmise. Um when the easement grant to the railroad for the trestle improvements and related warf

improvements expired um on abandonment of that use. and 90 days later it reverted back to the mcnears. It appears and along with the pertinances which I would take to include the trestle but it doesn't state explicitly. I would take um it would appear that um the ownership of those improvements would have succeeded along with that parcel which is the old mill parcel. um and that therefore the current owners of the old mill parcel may in fact be owners of the trestle improvements but the city is not and as best as we can tell smart as successor to the railroad is not. Um so with Mr. Lef Frankie's help that's what we see from the records and I've reviewed all of them that we currently have. Um and you know as a result of that those conclusions you know that provides um you know there there's some significant takeaways we can draw which I'll be happy to help the council discuss if you wish about you know um the city's lack of control concerning that property um the state lands um authority visav the the state lands, tidyland trust land that it's being occupied by the trussle um etc. So that's that's what we can share tonight.

Was that that was part one of two questions, right? Is there a second part?

That's part one. So part two. So are we in contact with the state lands to have a conversation with them? Who are we talking with? Who will we be talking with? It depends on what the the council direction is given those facts. And I think there's some there's some my recommendation would be that we have some discussion about what what is what are the implication implications of some of those facts given and and staff can talk about and I think they've reported previously about what their analysis has been what it shows of the condition of the trestle etc. And has the owners of the mill been informed that they may be owners of this?

We have not been in touch with them. I've only recently gone through all this information closely to prepare for tonight's discussion. Um we've we've been doing the things that we talked to you about earlier tonight and and not this. Um uh I think this is at least in my a good start. We staff is prepared to talk about the work that we have done and the work that we can do while we're figuring out ownership. Okay. Challenges. Yeah.

Hi, council mayor. Uh Gina Benedetti Patnick, assistant director of public works. Excuse me. Uh so in the past year uh we we left um our budget discussions with council with um clear direction that um that council was not interested in making any any big decisions or providing much guidance on u on any design elements until we had some some um pivotal and crucial community input. and asked us to come back subsequent to that to share what we've learned and also to pursue the environmental permitting constraints and get a better understanding of which of the environmental permit agencies uh were would have mitigation uh elements and conditions um for any permit applications. So subsequent to that meeting, we started in um August and September meeting had several meetings with all of the permit agencies. So that included state lands who doesn't seem to be too concerned about or acknowledged that um that the trestle is sitting on top of their land without a lease um or any acknowledgement of it. We have a lot of state lands leases uh up and down the river on each side of the river throughout Pedaluma and that particular element has no no lease under it. Um at the time when we were meeting with them we didn't understand we understood much less about the ownership uh landscape than we do now. And um I'm I'm uh I'm a

little reticent to take that conversation further with state lands just yet until we have some strategic conversations with with you about that. Um but in addition to state lands, we talked to the Army Corps of Engineers and we talked to the US Coast Guard and we talked to Fish and Wildlife and I'm forgetting a couple others, but gives you the idea. We had several of those meetings and um and we receive feedback. We have a pretty good idea of uh which a what agencies are concerned with what. So fish and wildlife is concerned with uh any changes we make and how that might affect shading for uh for the fish species. And uh we did did not were not able to although we tried to have a conversation with Shipo, that's the state historic preservation office. And we uh were advised that they will um only engage in discussions for uh those applications through the Army Corps of Engineers as a federal agency. So they will talk to us once we submit a formal application to army corps and not before and then they will only do it through army corps although they did say that at that point they would you know they would entertain uh a direct conversation with the city as well. So we basically talked to everyone and and I did have correspondence with shipo um to learn as to learn that much and to confirm that much. So uh so that environmental um exploration there they were considered pre-application meetings. It was a way to get preliminary determination and some idea of where their red flags would be so that we could um we could plan accordingly and and share that with council. And I and I will be prepared to

do that. I I have u now a final memo that summarizes all of their input. Um and then a as we had gathered that uh it was late October, we were um we were considering um starting to move into more public engagement and prior to coming back to council in February, which was our plan as I think someone mentioned earlier. and we realized that we didn't have good data and good research yet on the ownership situation. We knew that it was going to be critical and pivotal to the conversation and to the development of the project, but at that point we uh we engaged uh uh SJLA, Stephen J. Frankie Associates to uh to do that title research for us and they worked on that through the winter and um and brought to us um their findings uh which Eric has just recently had a chance to review. Um that's the work that we have proceeded with. And while while we um uh while we arrived at that point where we needed more information on ownership, we realized we really needed to pause on the other parallel activities in the project, namely public engagement and any further um um visioning or design considerations until we understood who the stakeholders were in the property. Um, and that takes us up from from our last conversation in June to present.

Yeah. No, I appreciate that because I'm on the Smart board of directors and so we keep getting these letters about, you know, putting money into the trestle and so smart started fin looked at the ownership and so I've read their documents and um it was pretty clear that they were not the owners and that was recently. So, I'm really glad that we're kind of where we're at um at this point. So, thank you.

Of course. And that confirmation of ownership is going to be required for any grant money that we go seek. So, that is kind of crucial. Um Um Yeah, this is this is all comment. Who's Do you want to stay on trestle for a I mean, I think the public wants us to stay on trestle. So, uh, who wants to weigh in on, um, that um, yeah, you have the floor. So, there you go. Continue, please.

I'll actually, um, have spoken with Katherine Guyger and I've talked brought a lot of people down to this area. I think I just don't see that it's going to be rehabilitated the structure itself and I think we need just to kind of start fresh and you know I was down there the other day with a friend and we're looking over and you can't see the river because the trestle is obstructing it and so how many years are we going to have that sit there and I feel as a council we need to make a decision of where we want to go um because I personally don't see real rehabilitation as a viable option unless I hear different from an engineer and costs and you know I just don't think it's viable. So I'm going to leave it at that. Council member now

um before we do anything and thank you council member Kater Thompson for bringing this up and thank you Gina for um all your work on this and um before I get into my question. Can we get a council written update on everything that you just gave us? Absolutely.

Thank you. I was trying to take notes and pay attention at the same time. And to the city attorney, can we as a city council or a city force the um the what did you call it? Shipo state. Can we force them to um take some responsibility? And also there was a public comment about the great PMA mill possibly falling into the river. So, we might want to have code enforcement, I don't know, building inspection on that. Um, because that would be really a terrible thing. And then another thing is I always say the public wants to know why is there a chain link fence? Why is this trestle daba? What is the background? If if we had signage and before it was a a fundraising signage, how much money we put into this? but a QR code that took you to the city's website that told the public what is going on with this project. Why is it an eyesore? Why is it still sitting here? We were just going down memory lane with some photos and artwork from the old Exchange Bank and Golden Eagle Shopping Center that showed the last time it was walked on and that was during the Pedalum River Festival in the '9s. And we were really lucky. We just put plywood down, but it's gone real downhill since then. So, say the attorney, what can we force the state lands to do? I don't think we can force them to do anything. We can we can um the council can provide direction in light of new facts which I think are relatively new for SMART too because I think we would have heard a similar conclusion from them a lot earlier if they if they had the information to support it because I you know I think they look upon

you know I think I think anyway I think we would have heard that from them sooner. Um, I I think I think we're going to need council direction and discussion with the council to help help them frame it in view of of what seem to be the current facts that seem to be pretty stable. There probably need to be further discussions with the folks that may be the current owners. There probably need to be discussions with state lands because because we're not seeing anything in the record about state lands authorization or tideland trust authorization regarding those improvements. Um you know that easement grant I referred to it's like it's amazing what they used to do in the 1940s with two pages. Um yeah. So um and you know this was started um some of the first easement documents were in 1938 and then the one I referred to as 1942. So this is leading up to and during the war. So there's a lot going on back then. A lot of history going on. So, um I don't have unfortunately I don't have a roadmap to give you, but when we know more about what the council um wants to direct in view of the current information and if if there's further information the council needs to help give that direction, then then we'll have a better sense and we can we can give specifics and and I'm happy to summarize what we have and fill in blanks as best as I can as the council may wish. Well, okay.

Can I offer a quick clarification? I'm sorry, mayor.

Um, council member now mentioned and and or I think um someone in public comment also mentioned concern about about the mills structural stability. And we do have inspectors that are watching this closely. There is concern, but it isn't because the mill structure is is showing any signs of settlement. It's the wararf next to the pedal mill that seems to be settling and at a significant enough rate that we're concerned about uh and it's right next to the to the walkway. Um and so we're looking very hard at that right now. Um but it's not the mill. The mill's

So do we own that warf? who who's the owner and responsible party very likely the successors to the McNair company the the mill owners there's maybe a little piece of it that we have but um that's a huge liability so should we send them a letter indicating as the the actual owners that this is a a huge liability for safety for our community

I think what we need to do is start having some conversations because it's not for us to advise them or or conclude what their property rights are or aren't. And they may have information that we lack. Um, and likely they have their own, you know, positions on what they what they bought, you know. So, I think there's some some further information to be had.

Okay. You know, I'm going to jump in if I can. And um, you know, since the beginning, we've known this was not city property. Has never been confused. We always said smart or something, but we knew it was never city lands. We also knew it wasn't uh able to fit in our priority of funding. We knew we could do the seed money, but we knew. So, I think what I'm not hearing is the partnership. I hear the city trying to lead a train that doesn't want to go down the trestle. And really what needs to happen is it has to have more partnership. So we don't demand of state lands. We go and collaborate with state lands. We invite them in to us could help them with the problem they're having the liability. US could do the this whole bunch of things. We have the the women's club and other organizations. But the reason we'd be partners on it is because we felt it was an essential asset to our community. The thing we are in charge of is our community. So having access to the river that u place uh that we talk about in that 2019 2020 um boards is that this was what we viewed as essential to pedaluma having river access having riverview connecting. So in one sense the vision said that in a second sense economic development says that. I love that the speaker said hey if we studied it we'd show that that was a lot of money coming into town from people who aren't afraid of blight or you know who who were turned away by blight but would actually do more for the downtown businesses if we had here. So I think we need to start not from a position of what's the engineering on it. It's always on who are the partners who can help us get over the finish line. So many things we've gotten huge grants for. I mean, you know, we're still counting on next grants on things

even in a tough environment. Um, so first we need to figure out is this the community's vision? And that's the step we thought we did by getting it on the top 10, you know, seven, eight years ago. And now, you know, it's been on the top 10, but we haven't moved it forward. Let's try it from a partnership perspective. Let's try it from it's the community's vision for us and then the rest of the decisions follow that not not the first one of you know the piles and peers and things like that. Good research will tell us who good partners will be. That's essential research finding out that shipa might stonewall us and things like that but but then we go to allies who get us this thing. But if we keep trying to get over hurdles on our own and individually, you know, we're not succeeding. We need to have allies. We need to have partners we're working with. And that's where I'd hope this next year um would be that we'd drive the public engagement such that they got their say about how important this is. And that will help us convince legislators, convince uh whoever we have at regulatory sides that yeah, this is an essential community value. That's why I'd like to see it in our top 10. Any more on the trestle? Council member D Carly.

Um I just when this does come back to us, I would like to see and I've asked for it before that we considered you know older reports about restoration of the existing trestle. Um I I think there's been a lot been a lot of assumptions made that you know the whole thing needs to go. Um and I think we should look at that. I mean, especially from a financial standpoint, you know, money's tight right now. And um, you know, we have what is a very historic structure. If you know, like for example, the Oddfellow's building just got restored and that had some uh stuff hiding under the surface that made it very difficult to do so. And maybe it have been easier to tear the building down and start over, but it was a historic building that's part of Paluma and people wanted to see that saved. and now it's finished and it's beautiful and it was because of that extra work that went into preserving it. So, you know, that trestle is a big part of our history. Um, if we rip it out and start with something new, we have something like the building that's on the corner of the Boulevard and Western, you know, that's that Stuckco building. So, I think I think when this does come back to us, we need to look at that old report. We need to we need to look at what it's going to take to actually restore what's existing there, you know, and and simply replacing stuff like the deck ties and and um you know, the deck itself. And you know, that could be a much quicker solution in in getting things fixed up. So, what I'm hearing you say is you agree it's a community value that you want to support replacing the trestle, fixing it up, ending the blight problem there. You're behind continuing focus on the trestle.

Yeah. And I was last summer, too, when when we discussed it at council. I do want to see it restored and and, you know, be a part of our community and contribute in all the ways everybody else wants to see it. And you know, when I was a kid, I used to sit on it and watch the boats come in during parades. You know, I want more kids to be able to do that. And so, yeah, I think it should be a priority going forward. Um, but I also think that that is a historic structure. We need to look at saving it. Council member Shribs.

Okay. Just for the trestle, um, I think we really need to break it up into two phases and communicate as the two phases. Um, I don't think we're going to reach agreement on anything for what the end product is going to look like. That would be phase two. Um, and that's going to be several years down the road until we get phase one, which is removal of the hazardous and safety issue that it is. So phase one and if we want to get the community behind this, we've got to get them convinced yes, we need to raise the money because I don't think the um if the building owners own that part um which they going to resist and then whatever it takes, it's going to be years and years before that get to resolve. We're gonna have to step up and probably work with them as partners as well as the state and um and look at make it a a brownfield site because as toxic as it is, it may be an official or should be a brownfield site actually. And uh we need to find ways of removing the hazard that it is environmentally and safety wise and say we we need to get the community to help us raise the money as well as so as one partnership with the building with us and and maybe some other state federal get what we can there and then get that done first and say that's that's the goal. That's going to be a that might be a fivey year, six year goal just right there. And then we can start thinking about what can we do with it to build it back up to where we want it to be. And we may decide to do a restoration. We may do a a huge plaza instead. Uh but we'll decide at that time and it might be it's going to be a different council making that decision down the road six years from now. So, um I suggest we really push hard on uh gathering the community behind a um removal of the debris, the isore, the toxicity, the safety hazard. Um get that done as a as a priority and then um worry about the vision later.

I'll just make a comment. Oh, go ahead, Frank.

Council member Quint. Yeah, I mean I think with um there's there's so much new information tonight that uh it's kind of hard to excuse me hard to digest in the moment. But I think you know the trestle what it is now it can't it's it can't stay the way it is. like if if we have the same trestle in 15 years, you know, I kind of feel like as community leaders, we're doing our community a dis a disservice and and we're missing an opportunity. And so I think for me personally, I think the work that needs to be done over the next year is figuring out what sort of what the implications are of this ownership. uh having conversations with the right people and starting to formulate um the long-term plan so that we can either replace it in some form or another.

Council member Konson, do you have an add? I agree and I probably knew more information than most council members, so I appreciate that this is kind of new to everybody, but I feel like kicking the can down the road is not what we need to do. I mean, I walk down there with people that have been raised in this area, contractors, and everybody's saying the same thing. I mean this thing to rehabilitate the what's existing there is nearly impossible unless you have you know money just to throw away and when we talk about meeting with the core of engineers I don't think we're going to go very far with the core of engineers at this point and so I'm not sure if we want to kick this down the road just so another council can be presented with the same information and And I just think that I I think I'm willing to find out more information from from um agencies, but I do not see that we're going to be a rehabilitate this. I'm just going to be a realist. And when you stand there, and I urge people to go down there and just stand away from the trestle and then look and see what can be just even to be able to see the river would be really nice. And right now we can't. And I think and I urge people to walk down on the dock and really look at it and look very closely. It's a toxic dump down there at this point,

especially at low time. Council member Barnacle, time. Yeah. Um, I do want to move on from this because I think there's a lot of other great stuff to talk. First, thanks for the presentation, everybody who's in the room. Um, there's tremendous amount of work that goes on every day. Um what what like is a huge new wrinkle to me is the private ownership because in a typical thing we would say let's do a public workshop it's owned by smart it's own you know they can transfer to the city um if it's a private ownership we can't compel that right so this is where I'm this is

only the only the onboard side the the trestle itself is state lands right one of the questions is the underlying land as best as we can determine. Absolutely. But one of the questions is what about the structure? Who owns that?

So, I mean, feels to me we've got to figure that out. Um, I completely agree that it's um for those of us who are sitting up here, it feels like we're like neglecting our duties every time we walk by it. So, um I do want to see us continue to make progress on it. Um I am less concerned about seeing a totally historic trestle. I'm obviously much more concerned about having a beautiful waterfront that um brings people downtown and that we feel um is a good representation of the city. Um I think we've got to start talking with the owners and figuring out what's possible. Um you know whether it's tax relief for the private property there or whether you know whatever it is like there's got to be creative things we can do. I mean how we can you know put a property tax bond on if we if we're that you know compelled to do it. we can, you know, put something on that's very specific for that. Um, but it is, uh, it's a blight quite frankly and it's a nuisance and something needs to be done and I don't want to keep coming back 9 months later, nine months later and like more stuff that we figured out, but we haven't actually like we don't have a path forward. So, some sort of a path forward is is what I'm looking for on this. I was just looking at what we had last June and it was community meeting in fall and we're just um I can see why we didn't have the community meeting but I I definitely feel like we need to get to the bottom of some of these things that are going to just continue to sty us. Um and with that I think the priority is to like get the stuff that's actually moving done because the longer things drag out the higher the costs go and we don't get the return on the investment. So, um, like we need to keep kicking this can, um, and keep moving it forward because it it is an embarrassment. Um, but I don't want to see the general plan slip. I don't want to see the, you know,

specific plan slip. I don't want to see the zoning code slip. Um, all the, you know, all the stuff that we're going to take out bonds for, we need to spend that money and and see the the benefits. So, um, to me, like this is something we need to keep trudging forward on, but like, um, it's not something I'm ready to put millions of dollars into right now, right? We don't we have no idea what we're getting into. We need to figure out a path forward. Um, I do like the idea of having community development more involved in it. It is tr totally an economic development issue. um much more so than like at at least at this point it feels more like a it feels more like an economic development issue than it does a public works issue um because of just sort of the complexities of the planning and things like that um and what like what the actual value is to the community. It's not like it's public infrastructure that we rely on to get toilet water to the water treatment facility or drive on or something like that. It's it's truly an amenity that is there. Um

that might be a good point to plates to um wrap on yeah I just don't want to spend all night here otherwise we should motion to go beyond 11 everybody weigh in on Jessel and so council member now can I ask one question just for our um information uh overload here. How much have we spent, Gina, on on the trestle so far? Because it doesn't look like we're making it a priority and it's been in our priorities, but we have spent money and I've circled the public speaker that says increase revenues and we're not increasing revenues by spending money on the trestle. So, how much money have we spent?

I I can't off the top of my head give you a hard number. I can tell you in this last year when I became most closely involved with the project, we spent very little actually because we've haven't engaged our uh our consultants other than meetings with agencies. So, um, we might have spent in the order of magnitude of, um, maybe 300,000. And then there's staff time, but there but there was money spent prior to that year. And and your staff's time on this that could have been on streets. That's true. Um, and I don't have hours for you.

Okay. It's it's much less significant than than our um than our third party consultants and the budget will reveal the expenditure on the project versus the budget for you in in the budget and I can send it to you as well if we can have a a council update on the trestle how much we spent so far that way we're transparent we've we can share it with the community as well. Thank you. Absolutely. And council car, you did you have one other

um I just had one quick comment that's already it's been touched on, but you know, I think I think that the city well ownership really needs to be determined on the trestle first and and a viable path forward with the city before we continue to develop some sort of a plan, you know, which we do need. The trestle does need to be done. Um but we need to sort some things out before we continue to plan. Right. And council member Barnacle. All right. All right, I'm going to switch gears.

Well, I'm I'm sorry. I'm going to close I'm going to put both. Yes, please. So, um yeah, it it is my thought that um um that we need partners as I mentioned and and I think that most partners will be glad to see us and if we have an understanding that it's grants that pay the construction then if the trestle structure is owned by someone else who is probably seeing a liability, they're probably going to be happy that we have a grant. We don't have a grant. We don't get involved in the business. We don't assume their liability. all those kinds of things. But I think us going in a benevolent way and saying this liability of yours is something that the city has an economic benefit from, you know, let us help you. I think we'll be in a better place on that. But I think staff were cut out from the diverse opinions expressed here tonight. And um so with that, Council Member Barnacle, you wanted to tee us off a different way here. Oh, pardon me. I'm going to do one more. There were a few public comments that were pretty darn engaging that maybe could get direct um commentary on and city manager, do you have some?

Yeah, I wanted to respond on the marina really quickly here just uh because we're I guess talking about waterways. Um, so staff has been engaging with the state on our marina um to try to resolve the loan that still exists on that particular facility. It's roughly a $4 million loan. Um, and as I I think we've shared previously and has been in all of our financial reports for many years, the city, to our knowledge, has never paid a a payment against that loan, and it continues to acrue interest every year. So, that total balance is now up over $7 million a year. We've engaged the state. They have been willing to come to the table and talk to us about some significant um redo of that particular agreement to get it paid down in a way that would be financially doable for the city uh while also potentially waving a large quantity of that interest. So, that would be a significant win for the city if we can get that negotiated. It's still working on it, so nothing formal to report. Uh but we're I think optimistic that we can get to an agreement that will that will make that more sustainable. Now that doesn't uh that doesn't address the operations of the marina, you know, which still uh over the past number of years have operated in the negative. So that's another issue that we need to address at budget time. Um but at least on the loan portion, we've hopefully made some significant progress.

Wonderful. Thank you, Councilman Barnacle. Yeah. Um, it's a good segue actually. Um, shedding things that are operating at a deficit feel like a good thing right now. Um, to as a priority for us. Um, so I'm just going to start there. Do you want me to like tea up an issue because I got literally a list of things here that I want to run through. Uh, two take two or three and draw a breath and see where it um

um Okay. So 800 PAS is a lot, Caitlyn. Um, thank you for that. I know that's a team effort, too, with the whole city management staff. Every P that comes in, we have to look over and all of that and, um, taking considerable amount of our staff time. Um, so I'm interested in, you know, obviously, as I said, making sure that things don't slip that are already in motion, get them done. Um I'm wondering what is it what's the outlook looking like for safe right now currently as it stands with the county

that we probably have 18 months of full funding and then we don't have anything unless measure O gets extended. So we will be covering half of SAFE in the next fiscal year and then full cost in subsequent years which would be over a million dollars. So we have funding. Measure O was approved in 2020. We're in 2026. So we'll be basically we will be about a year and a half without funding for for the SAFE program. Correct.

Okay. Um Okay. Do you know if they're planning to renew that tax? I'm hearing mutterings, but I'm I'm hoping that they're going to start to really focus on messaging and and working on our most public facing program, which is which is our mobile crisis.

Yeah. I'm just wondering if maybe there's something whether we should just stop participating in county taxes if we're not getting um those uh getting the the value back. Um I just that's it's unacceptable in my opinion. Um, I'm I I have a suspicion that our inclusionary zoning ordinance is having um negative impacts on our ability to build housing. Um, I think we need to look at that uh at the planning department. Um, and with our zoning code update and things like that, um, it's not lost on me that projects like Oyster Cove are stalled right now. Um, I've heard some rumblings about some other projects that may be stalling. Um, and I just uh I think that's um there's a lot of new research coming out that's saying that's not actually having the the intended impact and it's functioning actually as a tax on on new projects versus um actually getting getting projects built. Um I think we've always talked about our parking ordinance. I think a surgical update to the parking ordinance. I don't think we need to have a big workshop on it, but it feels like it's something that we should we've said we we're going to get done. Um we've done the tree ordinance, we've done other things. Getting the parking ordinance done doesn't feel like a heavy lift. Um updating the the 72-hour um threshold feels like a very um light lift indeed. Um I wholly agree that AI for permitting stuff, it's going to revolutionize it. Um, we just adopted a a tree ordinance and someone should be able to ask, "Do I need a tree permit?" and get that answer without having to interact with a person. Um, same thing with our municipal code, our zoning code, all of that. I think um, an AI policy is probably one of the best things that we can be on the frontier of um, when we think about making our like the efficiency of the workflows of staff,

but also the accessibility of government. So, I'm uh definitely supportive of that. Maybe we take a break now and kind of see who's who's got some interest on this. You had 800 PAS as your uh first thing. I mean, other than thanking Caitlyn for the effort. Uh was there was there a a policy consideration in that? Uh I don't have a policy consideration there. Um, I mean it's mindboggling how much time we're spending just responding to PAS and I know some of them are pretty sweeping and it's um it's, you know, it's uh it's not cool.

It takes transparent government to an excess level. It's just it's burden burden for for the good of the public. But notice it. Anybody want to weigh in on Pas? Okay. Next one I have listed there is the the safe team and um you know as as the measure O representative um um I on the oversight committee I I know they are teeing up for another cycle but you make a good point is that they say they have a year and a half of funding for three years till they're they get reassigned funding. So yeah, we're going to have a real problem there. We have to decide is safe what we do with the community and like you know we're faced with the animal services million dollar increase we're faced with this other area and you know again it comes back to economic development we have to have the costs of going for up for what the public is demanding as a service in this community. Anyone want to weigh in on safe before we um Yes, there we go. Council member now.

Well, to go along with Mr. Mayor over here when his partnership idea, I think our partners would be healthy pedaluma and I know the city manager and I have had conversations on this. Looking ahead, we might have to look at those other city community partners and gravel a little bit because we know our federal grant money is not available. So, we're going to have to reach out to the community and city manager if you need one of us to or the mayor and I to go ask for a partnership. So for the first I would say three years on safe two and a half years we we helped raise funds healthy pedaluma providence federal grant I can't remember what else but we had the alphabet soup of grants so we would continue and that's our that's our focus for the entire south county um go ahead

yeah that's correct we we uh initially received money from the city and then through grant funding through the implementation and expansion of the program through county heat program funding um healthy petal aluma providence funding we were self-sufficient and then when measure O funding became available we had partial funding for the program and went into full funding in a subsequent year and then have relied on subsequent funding as we heard that uh other municipalities were receiving not only funding for full funding they were receiving substantial inkind support from the county uh in the way of clinician supports that were embedded in the team that we were not receiving that same um type of support. So, um we're looking for those type of commitments. We're having those discussion like the city manager um indicated. We just uh communicated back some of the requests from our our collaborative partners that represent the entire South County regional um safe program teams. We're hoping to hear back on on that work. Um and looking forward to to continuing a sustainable program. We're still seeing about 5% of at least the the police department calls for service being diverted into the program. We've seen regionally what the impacts and and the need for mental health diversionary programs are from some of our allied agencies and and uh recognize that when it's not there and available, some of the impacts that can tragically come from those interactions. And uh just today we had a call for service here in the parking lot just outside of uh the council chambers for one of our individual community members that needed some assistance. So the safe team was there and they're operating and have been continuing to operate since July of 2021 247 in this community and we're the first program in this county. So we hope they're here to stay in perpetuity. We are um we're um super pleased that Pedaluma stood up safe team first. when when it stood up, I don't think measure O had actually gone into service yet. I mean, we we

stood up this because of need right away. And so we funded it right away and we found what. But then as each region also did the same thing, you realize it's a regional solution. It's not just a pedaluma thing anymore. We we showed them how. But um but then um it should be a regional tax, you know, especially when they have a mental health ballot. a measure like that. So, as a regional solution, it's got to be um regional funding and partnership and partnership.

Word of the day, partnership. Um and then um um we were talking about the Council Barn brought up the inclusionary ordinance. Um I I love that as a discussion uh in in uh in our fees maybe is where we hit it first. Um, you know, I think we should also have um, uh, discussions on impact fees. I mean, we will have discussions on impact fees and, um, and which of those is is motivational to getting I mean, if we're committed to housing, we have to have all these things on the table. Um, and so I'm I'm I'm okay with a conversation at the when we do fees. What is the moment of fee discussion? So, we are as part of the general plan update, we would have to consider an adoption of new fees. There's some additional state um requirements, etc. And so, we do have uh team members that are um actively going through the procurement process to dovetail that conversation. I will just mention so I love the um the thought experiment um and I do think it's grounded in some of the challenges that um developers are um reacting to um and there's you know at its basic form it's a subsidy um and so I think there's a good conversation to be had that touches on fees so we have our um uh fee reduction as our first foray into this. Um, but as council member Barnacle can attest to, we have kicked off with the planning commission an update to the zoning code. And so I think there's an opportunity there for us to look at. Um, I think the big question is how do we increase productivity of housing? Um, because there's so many different levers. I just jotted down a few things um, by having this conversation about

15%. So what inclusionary zoning is referring to is we have a requirement 15% of new um construction to have an inclusionary. So that's a deed restricted and so that's where um we are able to see some production of both rental and for sale um deed restricted quote unquote affordable housing. Um, but that's also where we get our ENL. And so we have an ENL funding um, pot that developers can opt to essentially pay a fee rather than do the 15%. And so that's a fe that's a funding allocation, which is um, diminishing, but it's something that also goes to supporting our housing program. And so there's some impacts that we'd want to weigh. Um, and then the other one, state funding. um we see the subsidies starting to go down on the 100% affordable housing and so all of this has connective tissue. Um it's a good conversation to have. um state density bonus law um definitely encourage us encourages us to start thinking about this because um by giving let's say the 15% inclusionary we're already um basically activating parts of the state density bonus law um just by having that 15%. So again, a really comprehensive conversation to be had ultimately about housing production. Um so that's something.

Thank you. I think the discussions were I I will probably be be coming at that from um more of an equity side that it's important to preserve that our nonprofit housing it provides uh housing for people with 50% less or less AMI. the very poor and very low income and um there's nothing been done in the 60 to 80 range and and what we do with our inclusion orders helps that missing middle and have it have it and so there's it's going to be a great discussion.

Can I just uh add to that? Um, it it will be important to look at it both from a zoning code and from a fee because our inclusionary fee right now is very very low because the regulations and the zoning code require it to be on site. So, we don't often use the fee. So, the fee um is very very low. So, I think it's kind of to Brian's point, it's it's going to be a conversation of a lot of those different levers and we're going to have to pick it up and talk about it as part of different things. Um, and along with the fee discussion, state requirements to start doing housing, um, fees, uh, development impact fees for residential based on square footage as opposed to units. So, there's a lot of those levers that we will start talking about and looking at both as part of our zoning code update, but also our fee updates.

Uh, the parking ordinance uh was next on that list we're checking off. Yes. Uh, since we were talking about housing, I'd love to continue that conversation for a moment if we could,

please. So, um, you know, when I think about housing, certainly, um, I am a huge proponent that it, you know, maintains that that it's still on on, you know, one of our top priorities. Um, but I think about, you know, sort of the um physical constraints of our urban growth boundary. there's really um not a lot of opportunity for large development projects and there I see opportunity uh throughout um all over town for uh small projects and I don't think um I don't think we're going to be successful in developing small projects infill projects, finding lots that we can put, you know, two, three, four units on. Um, unless the city develops a strategy to try to promote that. And so, you know, I'd like to take the opportunity to just say I think that we should be looking at that. I'd also add to that um you know a few of us were at the JC round table and I've been to the JC a few times now uh recently and it's clear that our um you know our tra the trade program that the JC has developed is really become a crown jewel of the JC like that's the thing that gets promoted right and you go through that facility and it's quite amazing Well, um, what if our JC built a home in Paluma? Like what opportunity is there? like how can the

city be a catalyst to work with the JC to, you know, find a small lot and be a partner, you know, to building something because I think if you build one, we might build two and so on and so forth. And so I'd love to see um some work in that area. And council member Shribs.

Okay, topic of housing. Again, just follow up um an agreement um after bending at the round table, but also two other uh sources of um information that I received basically to increase housing. Um we have the general plan with with the land uses in there, but what the missing is the missing middle uh the middle housing. That was what we needed for the new PE the young folks coming up need a place to start. And um it turns out in all three sources um they all said it's the financing structure behind it all and the city could help as a partner with the banks and there's a whole financing is for the for the market rate. There's financing for subsidized um housing. Uh there's there's financial institutions that take care of that. But their missing middle is caught in the middle of both of these financing structures that's available in the market in the in the money market. So um they said you can deal with this locally if we that the city works with the local uh financial institutions here and also with the local developers who are the middle developers not the ones that at either end. um and maybe a whole new set of younger uh entrepreneurial developers for that missing middle, the two, the four, the 10 up to a 10. But the two to 10 area uh of units per parcel um that that is actually the the best they said as a percentage of increasing our housing, especially for um the young families coming up, that that is the should be the number one priority of of increasing housing for for any city right now. So that's that's what I'm hearing. So I think that's that's a different concept than I've heard before.

It is. I think it's public banking and some other things. Just you're on this. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just say at the planning commission we have we broke up the zoning code update into like a few tranches. The first trunch was like cleanup basic cleanup of the zoning code and whatnot. The second trunch was small lot strategies. So like literally just looking at like what is our zoning code doing to try and promote small lot um development. So that will um I would imagine probably be coming forward in the next few months for a workshop with the planning commission and then um ultimately come into the council in the fall. So we definitely agree with that.

So I think and obviously what we're doing is we're brainstorming tonight and and uh um you know coming up with ideas. we're we're going to pass this all back to staff who's going to filter around and and um take our big picture things and put them into something that's transactional or non-transactional as the case may be. So um do we have enough to kind of have that conversation going on um both on um small systems needing incentives and and also financing parts things. And please

um on um council member um Quint, the junior college does have a wonderful program. Um and I think that they could partner maybe a partner again with the rebuilding together who has the same vision for their um apprentice who want to build like tiny homes or ADUs. And also we have a lot of empty single family homes that need to be repaired so they can go back on the rental market or back on the housing market. So rebuilding together is a great if we could maybe partnership with them um with their vision for the future. And uh they also they are mentioning something called an empty home tax. And I'm not sure how that works, but I mentioned it to the city manager because we have these empty homes and these empty businesses. And you can tax them to encourage them to turn them over into the market and encourage new businesses to come in or get those homes back on the market either in the rental market or the housing market. And some of our tiny or our little single family home lots, there's one right on McDow right between Caulfield and Baywood. And you can see they're building a new house. are retrofitting the older home that was there and it's an old farmhouse.

So on the uh empty housing thing, are you hearing um outside legislation? Are you suggesting a city legislation on that? right now it's just in the conversation stage with rebuilding together and I'm not sure um it was just an information that I received and I'm looking into it and so I I kind of threw the ball at the city manager to see if she knew anything about it and if there was a tax incentive for some of these empty businesses not to get filled because there's quite a few empty businesses that aren't renting out and they're empty and they're oblike to are shopping centers. So if there you know what can we do about it and if it needs to go to the state legislators then that's the direction but maybe Brian know has more information.

I can I can take a shot at it. Yes. Um we've always talked about this. It's the three-legged stool. It's the city. It's a business. Um and it's a property owner. And so part of what we're endeavoring for this year with a more robust economic development team integrated within community development um is to start having those conversations with the property owners. Um and so we always like to take the um carrot approach, right? How do we encourage people to um uh reinvest in our community? Um, you know, I don't I I would want to look at the numbers a little bit closer to see if there really is a vacancy problem. Um, you see things like uh Vancouver. Um, I think that's one of the sort of examples of um employing a vacancy uh tax or something to that level. But I think I'd want to look a little bit closer at um is this really a problem? Are we, you know, how to solve it? um and then come back with some with some strategies. Um I think there's been a lot of really great ideas and conversation and dialogue. I think what it points to is um again a clear council mandate demand um to create community um and by do one way to do that is to um increase our housing production, make it more diverse. So, all the things that Heather mentioned, all the things that we're bringing to planning commission, um I do think it's all going to come um to a head. I mean, as many of you know, I live in town. Um I uh it's something I I can't turn off when I'm sitting at a light. I look at a parcel and I think about, okay, how do we turn this thing into a small lot? Um how do we open up these home ownership opportunities? Um and that commitment um resonates throughout the department, throughout this city. Um, so I know that we'll come up with a a really robust plan um to do so.

Thank you. Thank you. Um, Councilman Barnacle also brought up a cleanup of the parking ordinance and I'm I've seen that on our agenda for a while. I'd love to have some action there. Anyone want to comment on a hand on that? I'll be happy to. I support our police chief evaluating our existing parking ordinance and updating it. It's old. It's outdated and it needs to be done. And I know council member now we've we know what we're talking about. Yeah. And um and I think it's just time to move forward on that.

Okay. Um and then um AI policy. Um does staff want to weigh in on uh how our technology approach is going on and are we uh um embracing the imminent future is that we call it and we let's hit a little staff first. Council member Shrebs, did you want to

I'll just go first. Um yeah, so um I'm trying to pay attention to the AI um discussions going on now, but the good and the bad. Um, and lots happening on both ends, but it turns out the good if if if it's there, it's not going away. Um, it can be used for good if moving forward. Just talked to several folks from the insurance industry um and uh they're all using it to um to make help them make decisions. Other cities, I just came out of a meeting with uh several other mayors from all over the US and they were all saying got to step up and use it as a tool. Um and uh so especially like rewriting ordinances and and designing and do it's it's extremely more powerful than you think it is. Um and it uh and to step up and use it. I've even recommended it for um the the general plan that's coming to us online. I suggested at the GPAC the other night, oh, how about having a AI search engine so people can find out what's what's really there because it's going to be over a thousand pages. So we need to be able to be able to find stuff. So that's where there's all sorts of tools that can be used.

Council member Kater Thompson,

I've been in uh meetings with the League of California Cities on this and other cities are going in the same direction and so I feel as though our city manager and city attorney who are part of the league um can work with other cities to find out exactly what's going on because a few cities are going in that direction, but all cities want to go there. And I would just say um a year ago the city was one of the first cities to adopt um an AI platform that we are currently using. It's called Prophecy AI. um it's out of a a former Stanford grad and he created this this program that is that we're starting to use for our staff writing, for our research, for a lot of other things, but it really needs to be um integrated into our intergov and our permitting system. So, we've we've talked about that as that next step. So, we are putting our toe in the water.

Okay, good. And that got us current with things that have been commented so far on. Is there a next comment there? Do you have one? You want a couple? I've got just a couple more.

All right. Uh design build. We I just when I see that we're still paying for energy audits and we're not doing design build on our energy projects, that it feels like a huge miss to me. Um when I look, we managed to do design build for our public safety facility. Um our skate park is could be could have been done probably two years sooner if we were eligible to do design build. Like what do we have? What's the pathway to allowing us to do that? because I can't help but think that part of the reason why some of our capital projects slip is because we don't have like the industry standard procurement tool that every other city has.

So, couple things. Um, thanks for the question. Um we are to to do traditional straight up design build awarding a contract by negotiation without bidding. We would need to modify the charter because it has a lowest bidding requirement. Um and it it raises the bidding threshold to like 30,000. general law cities still it's 5,000 but and that's helpful but um but we we it pre prevents us from doing traditional design build by negotiation. The re reason that's important in design build contracts is um when an agency um retains a single contractor for everything the design permitting the construction you really are putting all your eggs in that basket. you have to have a lot of faith. It has to be really reliable contractor and a great relationship with them. Um but there's also um the issue of um institutional capacity to do design build because um it takes some special um public works staff expertise to to manage it um and it takes um different document sets to implement it. what we're doing for the public safety facility. I'm I'm going to call I've been calling quasi design build and it's pretty nice. We do a pre-qualification that we have as a charter city we have even more control over than general law cities. And so that way we set up a bas we solicit submission of qualifications. We set up a a qualified bid pool that are the only biders having established their qualifications who can then bid on the design build you know design and construction project. So we satisfy our bidding requirement but we get the

benefits of design build and so our public works team um um um led by um Paul Gagan who comes to us who came to us from private industry with design build experience um played a really important role along with our um consultant Mac 5 to um and we did a lot of work in our office to really update our document set. So now we have that set so that so we can do that. We could have done that same thing if we had that expertise already in place in the form of Paul for the skate park. We didn't but we now now we do. So so one way is to do charter update but the other way is to is to use the tools we've developed and the expertise we have in house now to do more of that for projects that lend themselves to it. Not all do, but some some will. So we can continue to utilize that. Yeah, I think we I think my hunch is that we should My experience with design build is that

it gets things done much faster and a lot of times people don't want to like especially on energy projects they're like we can do the energy audit but that's not they're not going to go back and they're going to do their own energy audit and then we pay for it twice. So um I love to hear that whatever you worked out for that for that facility is scalable to other projects. Um, I look forward to seeing it used to the extent that it makes sense. Um,

it's going to be exciting, I think, to get with the with the really strong staff that's been being developed in public works and and expertise like Paul and others bring. It's going to be neat, I think, uh, to see uh, what are those projects where they want to use those same tools because they think they'll be helpful. And we'll be talking more to the council about that.

Thank you. still um let's let's have a moment to weigh in and can I ask maybe public works staff um in the uh PIPS pump station that seems to be a natural for that if it's not already it's too far down the road but um since since you're up and I know you're working the capital budget um any other project you want to name that maybe we should be thinking sure so actually not involved anymore research facilities, but I'll speak to this. We're not planning to design build that project right now.

Thank you. The components of that um pump station being designed and being decided on, it would be uh to Eric's point, probably a bad project for design build because we don't know exactly what we need specified to the level that would minimize the city's risk to go into design build route. So that one right now we're planning design bid build um starting design phase and going through traditional bidding procurement. Thank you. Council have any other thoughts on that one? Did you wish to wait? You made the trip up. Speak up. Good evening. just wanted to weigh in on. So, we're really happy that we've been working.

Sorry. We're really happy we've been working with the city attorney team to develop uh new bid documents so that we can do that because skate park was one of the projects we would have preferred to do design build on. So, it's not a one-sizefits-all type of um procurement method. It we lose a lot of control. So certain types of projects, especially like our, you know, street utility projects, we want to do design, bid, build because we want to have that control and be able to manipulate those projects so we can fit in with the different goals we have. But there are certain types of projects that may not be our expertise where we would look towards that design build model. One of the other challenging and pieces of that is for a design build, we really want to develop a really robust um basis of design. And so that takes a lot of time. We actually almost created, you know, you know, I don't want to say it like that, but the documents that we put in place for the Pedaluma public safety facility are very robust. So it takes a lot of time to get those documents and in some cases those projects are just better off to be finished you know in the design bid build piece. So just want to

thank you that

okay um let's see where are we now next I think we're moving to council member Kater Thompson. Well, that kind of segus into the need for a charter update which is probably needed to be done a long time ago and just want to bring that up and the met benefits of it and the time that it would take. I know it takes a lot of time but you know we have a 300 and some odd page charter and San Jose has one that's about 40 pages when they redid theirs. So this has been um this has been on the list you know since we all got started here and um um the the question is is this the right year to do that?

Um well it it it will be a good thing to do and I I view it as part of the pedalum as sort of maturation into the next you know generation of the city's potential and what's ahead. Um, and it's true that modern docu charters are, we've talked about this before, charters are documents of limitation. They're voter imposed limits on the council's authority. Modern charters are shorter rather than longer because they include less limits because they um are designed to provide for more innovation. Transparency still continues to be very important, but so does innovation and flexibility. Um, it's probably at least an 18-month process, if not a two-year process, to do a full charter update. You know, my recommendation has been would be that we do a a new charter. Um, and there's probably some good features to keep in our old ched charter, but lots of lots of innovations to make. Um I would guess this is not the year because this is what's going to occupy most of most of our focus is going to be general plan general plan EIR zoning amendment and development fees based on those things all those things happening in parallel super important things and you know I I'd love it if the charter if a charter update followed close on the heels to them um you know it's basically a campaign process and and there two different ways ways to do it. The council can can um drive it um which may be the best way for that kind of change. So, it would be great to do that and we we're keeping lists of what we'd recommend be a part of it or be eliminated from the charter. Um so, when when it's time, we'll be be glad to partner on that with the council and the community.

Okay, I hear that. So in and just for clarity to the audience which like that was mostly staff um so uh you're saying that's a public process right we go out so like any other of our planning doc we be on communication on that for that that's the reason for the two-year there's prescribed public hearings and intervals between them and um but I'm also weighing in when we have saturation of of public communication you know there's too much of that for the public to really understand it. That that would be one of my worries is like overwhelming that process and getting it past the general plan will be great, right? I think that's probably

sounds good to me. Just as long as we actually commit to doing that and I think it's important. Um, and then the other thing is when Brian know when you were talking about the housing and the um are you talking about with economic development talking to property owners that have vacant buildings and blight in our downtown? Um I around our downtown not just specifically.

I do think there's a focus on downtown just because we have a lot of partnerships there. Um it's the most visible. It's what we hear most often. Um, but we have an economic development strategy that would cut citywide. Um, but I do think there's some opportunity as we start thinking about um downtown beautifification and um you we're just starting to see the demand. We're starting to see some retenning. Um the idea then is you know how do we support sort of the the final handful um to get to the next step.

So is that a council goal and priority or is that the direction you're going? I mean are we going in that direction now?

So we will be So um not only did I touch on it, uh Brian Cochran, our assistant city manager touched on it as well. Um, we do have an economic development um, a a very rough sketch which is really built off of the economic development framework that the council and the community has waited on. Um, and so our plan is to come back later this year for a workshop um, to really dive into that because there's a lot to cover. Economic development means something different for everybody. Um, so I think it'll be a good opportunity um, to write the ship as council. um with a wellp preppared and developed um strategy. And if one of those key goals is uh a focus on um sort of long vacant um retail downtown, um we can look at that as a strategy.

And are we going to at the same time look at not necessarily a vacancy tax or something that a tool that we can use? Will the city be evaluating? We'll be doing a deep dive in that in the economic development strategy and if that's a place to go um and that's where the focus is. Um we can go there.

Okay. And then um I'm just going to talk about the chain link fences. We have the 7-Eleven that has a chain link fence. Fourth and C has a chain link fence. And it's blighted. And do we do an ordinance? What do we do about the chain link fences? I mean they can they can stay up for years or do we have an ordinance that says there's a time frame if you're not moving forward with the project?

Yeah. So the intent of using a chain link fence is really to um is preventative. Right. There's an active construction site. Uh we want to uh create a a barrier for uh the interest of public safety. Um and so you've named a couple. Um we've been in contact with property owners um that own um not only the buildings and um properties that you mentioned um but the other you know there's a handful that I hear every day whether it's through our inspection team whether it's through um community members um I don't so again I don't know if the focus should be just on you know how do we absolve ourselves of chain link fences. Um I would want to really focus on the root of the problem. Um and part of it is um you know is there interest you know how do we get people new prospective businesses that are interested in those sites um seamlessly through um the permit process and I I see our econ dev team is here and so we have been having those conversations when a new business wants to go into forth and see um and just being really clear on what the expectations are and what the requirements are um and so We continue to do that. I've been having direct conversations. Um they sort of get picked up and and sat down. Um I think everyone wants to see a a vibrant, productive downtown. And um and I know we'll get there.

Since there's no development being done on the two I talked about, why are the chain link fences allowed to be up? So it's it's a bit of a it's a judgment call. you take the chain link fences down, it opens up the opportunity for um graffiti and etc. Um at this point, I feel like we're having a good conversation um with uh the property owners. Um the 7-Eleven, I think you're referring to the Walnut Grill um which is No, I'm referring to on Howard Street. Howard Street in Washington. Okay. Yes. Um that's

different 7-Eleven. Yeah. I mean it's I mean yeah all the you know the palm trees are just dropping on the inside. It's filthy. So it's an eyesore.

So we do have a perspective um essentially it's um it goes back and forth. A property owner we have been having reg um regular engagement. Um, but it could be either a retenant of a 7-Eleven under different ownership or just a more local um mom and pop miniart type of um outfit. Um, and so those conversations are ongoing. Um, it's somewhat of a judgment call and if we want to to say, "Hey, you're not having a you know, there's no active site here. There's no need for um chainlink fences." But then you're we're also then opening it up to other things. So it's it's somewhat of a balance. And um I understand the frustration. Um again, this is the stuff that we get at the counter, all the questions, a lot of really great ideas on what um those sites can be. Um and so I think that's what's really critical this year is to really start having open up those dialogues. um you know really build that robust rolodex um and those relationships and the rapport with the property owners um so we get to see um so if I could I think it's valuable information but this is dangerously close to leading the workshop at this moment and so um I I think where the question is does council want to uh set some expectation on that or hear from and and you say you you have an economic development workshop um in the cards and and that's and this could be part and parcel to that.

Okay. Well, I'd like to have updates also because people comment and I don't have an answer. So, it would be nice to have updates and then, you know, work into the workshop go in that direction. Okay? because you know we talk about our economics and I'm looking forward to actually bringing economic vitality into our town and not just continue having vacant buildings that are prominent buildings. the project engineer in me has to ask what's the timeline when do you think that workshop ballparky

um well we just on board I would say somewhere in the summer sort of frame out um you know we just onboarded our our new manager and so next week we we do have a consultant um that has been uh thinking through different strategies has interviewed um people on the ground whether it's brokers property owners ers. Um, and so I do think we're we're ready for a pretty robust conversation. Thanks, Council Member. Now,

um, on to um, Kater Thompson's um, council member Kater Thompson's um, chainling fences across from Walnut Park, D Street and Pedma Boulevard. You sent us an email a while back and I just recently had to refer to it because a community member asked me about it. And the chain link fence, it gets so much signage. Um, it's just always filled with commercial things that don't relate to that parcel, but it was just a change of ownership. Where are they in that development process? Do they have to clean it up? Do they submit an application? Where are they in that process? and and and again as this is getting detaily can you make that

maybe it could be in the update that council member Mara Thompson asked for could because that's another chain length fence area but I don't really need that information right this moment but to put it out there yes okay thank you did I see a hand down here is it council member Quint

yeah since we're on the topic of economic development you know one of the things that I want to um express is that uh in the literature that I've read, our retail vacancy rates in Paluma are pretty much on par with Sonoma County and Santa Rosa. Uh but when you look at industrial and office uh we lag we're we're in office space our vacancy rates are much worse in Santa Rosa um and Sonoma County but industrial we are the worst in the county um and we're a real drag on the county. So, um, you know, I would, you know, as I'm I'm really excited to hear you talk about the work that's going into the economic development, uh, strategy and and I look forward to the workshop on that. And I just encourage, um, that our economic development focus is really um, you know, it's not just about downtown. It's really holistic. And by the way, I just want to say uh I am really I am so excited that the Kmart is getting a facelift and the work that the the development around that um you know the infrastructure, the sidewalks and everything is a great improvement and u and so I just want to say let's do more of that.

Absolutely. Just just quickly, I'm really happy about the Kmart also because I started taking pictures in 2014 on that sidewalk. But what's really great is now there's going to be a four-way crossing going into the community center. So people don't have to walk across a weird driveway to go into the community center. And I just thank you, Gina, for that. We talked about that and thank you for making it happen. Whoever did. Wonderful. Council member Shrebs.

Oh, yeah. Just continuing the topic of of economic development. Council member Quint u support everything but he basically said um I have the other topic of we'll eventually get to the the climate change resiliency u which is more long-term but we have maybe more midterm than long-term now. So I'll get to that later but just paying back to which is tied to economic development because we're going to need the money in order to do all the resiliency for climate change. So economic development needs to be upped in priority I think. Um and if you want to be um just from a high level look at it like a fangi does is there profit. So if there's going to be a profit in it let's do it. If there's not let's not do it. And let's look at everything we're saying hey climate ready everything has a climate resiliency component. No everything we do also has to have an economic. We are a business money coming in money coming out. We have stock with with uh all our stockholders in city. So we really need to um look at us as a business and if if the marina is can't provide us with income then drop it. If uh everything that was done by our forefathers all they did was it's always based on can they make a profit off of it that got built. So there's all sorts of things that um a whole change in maybe um a little bit of philosophy around this. So in in the economic development area, glad we have someone new on board that's going to be working on this. But all these little things, even restrooms downtown are an economic benefit that's going to bring in more because tourism dollars is our future. That's where our money's coming from in the downtown area. So to provide for tourism dollars to come in, we're going to have to have those restrooms. We're going to have to get rid of the storefronts, get rid of the fencing, and we have to do it sooner than later. Not have nice conversations over the next six months. next week, go talk to the enemy's carrot and stick. Hey, we love you to do something, but if you don't do it by this date, the the stick's coming and it's going to be a

$10,000 fee coming at you. So, what let's talk some more. Be a little bit more trumpish in that respect, bit a little more bargaining negotiation. So, stronger there. Then, um with tourism, we also have um this the industrial businesses, the the amount of office space that is empty around town, especially the industrial complexes. And if you look at it, we have lots of science in in the north uh in the South Mcdow extension. You get down there now and most of the businesses, they're science-based in one way or another.

Everything. So, are we missing something here? We need to bring in more science uh companies and and things. Can we go out and bring them in? Um then, um then the other things that the museum retrofit, it's a huge tourism attraction. we that has to stay upgraded. That is a huge money maker for us. That's where people go to. That's one of our main attractions for tourism. So, yeah, we do need to retrofit it. Uh same thing with the marina. If we want folks to bring their boats in, we're going to have to get it dredged and bring the boat. If if that doesn't provide us with with econ economic development, if we can't have people living, can we at least dredge it so we could have people living there and have it rented small housing on a boat? That that's housing. So, can we have lots of housing there? Can we do it at Salelita? You go down there. It's house boats. Why don't we just switch and say, "Hey, bring your house boats up here, park it. We'll have 20 of those all paying us rent since we own it." That's the direction we need to go in. Not this small yacht once in a while here. Single person. We need whole h houses on the water there. So, let's let's dredge it enough for a house boat. You only need three feet. You don't need 10 feet. Just need three feet because they're barges basically. Um things like that. Um then the um uh another one is is for economic like our day worker center right now the day workers working out there it's it's economically a sad situation but if we had a day worker center maybe at the fairgrounds as one of the buildings which would also be a resiliency part component for for a future for climate change. So, can we actually do something so that we have our workers in town here doing better work, more efficient work for everyone that needs a worker for a day? And so, having that day worker center could provide a huge amount of economic benefit to all the homeowners and small business folks that need uh quick labor, right? That so how are we supporting them? That's an economic development.

Um, so all these things that are economic developments, we need to give a little higher to. Okay. So that's a a slight philosophical difference there. So I just want to support um what's been set up here basically and and have that as a a lens of everything that we're doing because economic development needs to happen as our main besides climate change. That's our second priority. Anyway, that's Anybody else want to say more about that? Okay. Um, you want to talk on that one or stuff? Yes. Right there with that. You have a follow up on on John's thoughts.

Let me let me uh let me We could follow up on his thoughts first.

Let me let me run back on that. Um um I have a real hard time um suggesting that the city's business will be based on an economic driver primary consideration. I then and I loved every idea that you said after that, you know, um I I uh um I I hate uh framing things in in a profit basis, but I understand where you were going with, you know, uh economic development is the engine that runs everything else in the town and every benefit we want from the museum, which I was so happy you raised to um the day workers uh here standing in the sunshine and whatnot. Um, but uh I definitely want you on the marketing team for that because uh your ability to put that out there in a time when it might be hard to get the economic consultant to say those same things um I is is great to have that on the market. And I think probably the council feels the same way is that we want things to work in the town to grow. Um it may not be that we can get an economic report in that says the same thing as our desire to economically grow, but um do appreciate the take on it. Yeah. Okay. Council member D Carly.

Thank you. Yeah. So I um you know with with industry, I' I've been saying this for a long time, but we need to continue to promote it. Um, as Councilman uh Quint said, you know, it's we're we're last in the county as far as industry goes and um I think at one point we must have been at the top of the list and you know, Pedaluma was born on the river and it was born on the river because of the opportunity for industry. You know, otherwise people wouldn't have come here, invested in it, started companies and made Paluma what it is today. And so, you know, I think we should continue to, you know, prioritize preserving uh river industrial sites. You know, we should continue to look at stuff along the rails and preserve those sites as well because um you know, the opportunity the the businesses might not be there today, but the opportunity for them to be there someday won't be there if we change that and continue to develop it. And so, you know, that's that's something I really want to see is is industry citywide become a priority um as well as the rest of our businesses throughout the town. We're not just the downtown. The downtown is is the center. Um but there is a lot more to Pedaluma than just that. And I am happy to see that staff did put an emphasis on business econ development this last year um to come up with a concier service and to implement some new tools around that. Um I was a little surprised to hear we don't know the city doesn't know who all the businesses in town are, let alone have contact with them all. And so I don't know why we don't know that. But I would think that that's the foundation of us knowing, you know, what our economic development is going to look like is to know everybody that's involved, who they are, what their needs are. And um you know, we need to we need to also look at we we need to

have more of a baseline of exactly what we've got in town and and um you know to really begin to understand what the businesses need here so that we can help take care of them and continue to you know continue to make a better city out of it. Um, you know, the couple years ago the chamers's government affairs committee, they came up with the idea of of pedaluma being business ready just as we promote being climate ready. And I think taking a friendly approach like that towards business would really help entice bring new businesses in. We'd be proactive and go out and and seek new businesses. We'd be looking to other cities that are pretty vibrant and figuring out how did they do it? You know, how how can Pedaluma do that? because we've definitely got the potential. Pedalum has done it before and we could continue to do that and we should be. So, I'm glad staff's taken the direction and we have a new um economic development person on board and uh yeah, I'm just looking forward to continuing that in this next year. Council member Ker Thompson.

I was just um actually talking with somebody about the riverfront and you know like where Shamrock is you know and how important that is you know to keep and they were talking about Oyster Cove and you know concerned if Oyster Cove went then the Shamrock or whatever it's called now what I know it's not owned by them. Um but I do think it is important that we um you know make sure that businesses like that stay in Paluma. Um but the other thing is I just wanted you know the elephant in the room is kind of what happened with EKN. We had a really great opportunity to have a hotel probably built today and it just blew up and that was really economic engineed for downtown a high-end hotel and I'm just hoping this other one really gets built and you know there's deficiencies in it as far as you know parking compared to the other one and I just don't think the public really understood the value of the original hotel. it would have been built today and it would have been great for our economics and we'd be talking a different story today instead of being really con of course we're concerned because of what's happening in the the high costs of what's happening because of um our federal government but um we really need to understand that that was a big setback I feel for our downtown and so we have to you know we can go ahead and you know talk to businesses but they also need the customers to go there and it's not just local people. So I just want to raise that. Thank you.

Thank you. Council member now

um the um the marina that council member Shrebs brought up it it is our responsibility but we could outsource it. We could find um someone that wants to have house bows if it's a a doable thing. So, we could outsource the marina and have somebody else run it. And um that I just wanted to throw that out there. Um industry, the river and the rails is very important that Council Member D. Carly brought up that is our history of Pedaluma. And also we have um no place in town, I've said this for three years up here to buy an appliance. If your dishwasher goes out, your washer and dryer goes out. Your TV, I don't even know, you could buy a TV, maybe Target, but probably not the high-end ones. Anyway, we need that business. So that's an economic development that we really need to go find and build in Paloma because our retail tax dollars are going to Ron Park, they're going to Nevada, they're going to Santa Rosa, they're going to San because we don't have an appliance store in town. So if we build new housing, all those appliances and all those remodels, they're shopping outside of Paluma to buy those appliances. Um the other um I'm very on board with the design build that council member Barnacle brought up and thank you very much for that. And we need need to promote the city's successes and what the planning commission is doing. We need to promote those things. We hear the wonderful things the police department is doing or the parks markets department are doing, but we don't always hear what the planning department, economic

development department is doing and what those other um departments are doing and committees are doing and they're doing really wonderful things. And we do have um these vacant buildings. There's vacant gyms. There's vacant paint paint stores that we need to fill with something else that is probably needed that I can't think of right off the top of my head right now. But those are just to add on to um the things that are needed in Paluma that people are leaving town to purchase. It's been a good evening. Um, Frank,

are you are you uh getting ready to or wrap up?

I had a couple thoughts. Uh, one thought I was, you know, we've talked about housing and um um you know, anecdotes come in and my friend in the back of the room, Warren, will tell you that um that I use the tagline a lot, the plural of anecdote is not data, but I'm going to tell a story anyway. I mean, I'm hearing more and more businesses saying, "I can't get the labor force." And and and I mentioned that to some and they they say that's because rent and housing isn't available or too high. And that's what we've kind of addressed. And I talked to others who say they're not paying a wage that'll recruit a worker. And I go, well, I don't know how I work from that side of things. Hopefully, the city can influence. And so when we talk about fee structures and things like that is a new production but especially I guess production goal independent of the means to get to production goal is a real value. And I just wanted to highlight that again. I did love the idea of of um we need more in our uh comm's department because we've tried to connect a hundred different ways and yet I talked to somebody today who's been involved in the tree protection ordinance and he said, "Oh, I didn't realize it passed. Did you guys pass that?" And I was like, I'm like, why isn't your network blowing up with achievements? When we have achievements, tell the good story. You know, if you have troubles, you can come on a council on a Monday night and tell a bad story, but when we have the good story, pump that out into the community. Um, and and those were two things I wanted to have on the table. Council member Quint.

Yeah. I just want to say thank you to Don Foreman for for Is he still here? Well, I know.

Yeah. think um well because you know he's advocating for something that we really need and uh I would I would advocate for and I would uh I would love for my fellow council members to support making um a downtown bathroom a priority. I mean, I don't mean to get too punny here, but maybe we add an extra million dollars to the PIPS project. I mean, it is all sewer related and build a build a bathroom or maybe I I don't know, somehow like it just, you know, um seems to me to be something we should work on getting done.

And that's Okay, thank you. Can I jump in? You may. Can the city go back to our partner with the downtown bathroom, the land owner that has the bathrooms that are downtown? Can we reopen that? Can

would you volunteer to help us with her? That would be great. That would be great. Sure, council member. But um and also some wayfinding um as a grandmother of seven small children who have small bladders and an old lady here there a wayfinding just to point out that we do have some downtown bathrooms and it might help but we also couldn't maybe reopen that can of worms. So, we are working with the downtown association to update their map, which we need to get on our website. Um, because there are actually are some places in downtown that you can use restroom. Um, and then speaking with the property owner, um, you need to we need your help because

Yeah, that'd be great. I'll follow through with that one. I mean, that the building is being renovated. I mean, that was kind of the time to really talk to them again. Um because it was a public bathroom at one point and then we offered to renovate it and maintain it. No, I know that. And so, but it's really about unfortunately it's about a piece of property over there that he wants to sell to the city for a certain amount of money and it's quo pro. It doesn't work that way. We don't have that money.

It's correct. And I want to bring up one more thing on the U plastic turf. I think for the future I would like to um not replace other fields with the plastic and I think that can probably be in another year that we can actually or some year we can have a conversation about that. Um because we also have the schools that have a lot of plastic turf and what do they what are their plans and maybe start with a partnership with the schools

stretch. Can I ask Patrick Carter to come up because I believe the county is doing something on no turf. Yeah. Um Zero Soma um is a countywide or uh organization, a JPA, joint powers authority of the cities

of the cities and the county. Um so all all 10 jurisdictions. Uh they are working on a model ordinance. Um, and I believe that was going to be going to the county board of supervisors first for direction. I'd need to follow up to find out what they decided on that. I think it was mixed. Um, there were some equity concerns about that. Um, but u, yeah, I can provide an update on that. Um, and certainly if that is um, if that model ordinance is um, produced by Zeroway Soma, it would be they don't have authority to do things countywide. it would be coming to each jurisdiction for approval. Um so there there may be some action countywide on that happening this year. That's great. And then we can get updates on it. Thank you, Patrick.

Yes. And I think u we've had um park and wreck constraints on fields before. You know, it used to be a concern if you can't play if it's rained and going to damage the field. I don't see a reason why a standard couldn't be set for when a field closure occurs, you know, due to heat. And so that's maybe something to put in thoughts. Council member Shribs.

Yeah. Uh, one of the things we did discuss at the time we did the Lucasey field um was should there be any new um artificial turfs anywhere here in town? And I think a simpler thing than a big ordinance might be just a simple um um calling for a moratorum on any new turf just as at least a temporary maybe a year or two until we get an ordinance in place. But I'm hoping a moratorum uh vote would just uh of any new artificial turf anywhere would would uh with a certain date start. I think that would be hopefully simpler and easier and quicker. Are you asking that to be public? Yeah. Are you talking about residential use landscape use?

Residential, public, uh or industrial, whatever. No, no artificial turf. No new turf on on land here in the city. Interesting idea.

We could certainly look at that. the um the um the moratoria or interim ordinances as they're called in section 65858 in the government code are supposed to be a tool. The their intended purpose is to freeze the status quo while an agency is considering new regulations to buy time. And so that's the purpose it's intended for. and and we haven't looked at that particular thing, but um and there's a there's a problem with doing it in a way that it gets in the way of new housing because because that's you know there there's a moratorum on moratoria on housing um if you will but but probably that's that probably there's not a problem with turf. So we could check on that and if that's if that's a council priority we can certainly act

hopefully if that's a simple thing to do. Yeah. Quick and dirty way of doing it temporarily. Council member Clint.

Yeah. I I mean I don't really me personally I don't want uh staff spending any time on that uh in the near future um because any new projects need to come to us for approval and we can say yes or I mean we can we can uh look at each project um on its own merit and make that decision. And I have a problem with it in that uh for example like we ban roundup um on city facility but we don't the public doesn't buy into that same level and it doesn't seem um like u there's an equity there that more communication would be beneficial to you know we the message those harm messages need to get sold to the individual as well as to a city. So

I think they were I think the public was trying to sell us on doing it, not us trying to sell them. So we had a huge outpouring of folks trying to do that, sell us on that idea. So uh I think you your your logic is reversed here.

I'm I'm concerned that the city the minority user of a product is the only change when the need is to change the majority use. you know Roundup much more gets sold you know at the hardware stores than gets used by the city. So and and the mentality the messaging on climate for me has to be that we are in this together partners like you it isn't just being impressed on the city it's we do it and we hope you do it. So, you know, there's different messages. Home stretch everybody. Council member Shrebs,

can we bring up a few topics? Sure. I just go back to what was said earlier. Microphone. City charter was mentioned.

The city charter was uh mentioned earlier. Um is it possible? Um this is doing a a a creating a new city charter. this would be a perfect AI application in about one hour. Um, if I worked with a staff person, I could probably come up with um an actual city charter that might actually work. So, if if if just as a trial basis, just as a test case, so I think that is quite possible now. Okay. So, u just just to see what would happen. Uh because we there's plenty of cities with city charters, we could do something, but with that list that you just said you had and plus AI, I'd be willing to help you navigate the AI on that. Anyway, just as as a possibility.

Um so, um do you guys have standing meetings? Uh uh Council Member Shribs, do you occasionally meet with legal staff? Um well, I'm just asking if I could work with them for an hour then. Um perhaps that would be a conversation for that discuss that point maybe.

Okay. Okay. All right. Let's move on. Um uh the other area I was hoping to work on uh tonight was also um because our climate readiness and that is um one of our like our number one goal that we've kind of promoted that this is what we are all about. Um and just as a reminder that there is so much tied up in that but it's it may have to be done sooner than later. And all these things are tied to climate resiliency. And just just for examples, um the sea level rise and flooding adaptations, not whereas we're trying to change our water policies, but actually adapting to this future that we're facing. Um, we have a resiliency center at the fairgrounds, which would possibly include um a combination with with the police and fire, but also it would have a maybe using the um the raceway track as well as buildings for a senior center as well as a daycare center would all be combined together into a more of a resiliency center um uh institution as well as a park which would also serve as for bringing people in for it to stay. um uh in case of disasters. Um we need green uh greenway and open spaces because our groundwater we're going to be more dependent on our groundwater. We're using 5 to 10% now. Uh we may need to end up being 20% down the road given um what may be happening. So we have to build out our groundwater network as well as the land needs to be kept in greenways and open spaces for that purpose. Um and then in our transport, we're losing transport monies and doing things. So we have to think differently about transport uh besides the active transportation that we're talking about which is basically uh biking and walking and wheeling everywhere. Um so we have to shift over and we may have to go to share rides, autonomous share ride systems with with microcars whatever. So we need to be thinking about those things which is which is totally new for

us here. It's being used in other places but it's not in even our concepts not even in our general plan not even uh anywhere listed. So um get and then another thing is on the fair grounds of having a because we're our food distribution system is going to get disrupted. That's one of the major things. All the trucking is getting disrupted right now. Um the cost of gas is going up. Trucking may be difficult. Shipping global shipping is being disrupted. That is coming more and more. So having a food distribution local. So we need because we just article said we were one of a a major canning of fruit. We should have fruits. We yeah it's nice to have we have cows and we have um uh chickens and we have vines uh grape vines but we really need um other stuff. We also need um a lot more um vegetables and fruit grown here which used to be grown here. And so we need to bring that back. So we needed to support that through our agricultural program at the fairgrounds. So that is part of a res resiliency part. Uh not just supporting our current a but actually looking at our future a what we really need um things like that. So there's all this all these things that are working together for this resiliency for climate change. I think that needs to be broadened out even further than what we are now because I think it's coming sooner than later as was uh said earlier today as one uh as our first presenter. So, I just want to just bring that back up. And there's all sorts of other things that are contributing to that as as a major emphasis. Thank you.

To follow up on what Councilman Shripps was talking about with with making Pedaluma more self-sufficient. Um, I was going to talk about it earlier with economic development, but I think as we as we look at what the city needs, I think, uh, you know, there was a point in time in Paluma where things were either um, brought and sold here or produced here. And Pedaluma could probably stand alone. Everything you ever needed, you could get here. And I think as the the team develops an economic plan, we should be looking at how do we make Pedaluma um completely standalone and self-sufficient. Thank you, Council Member Barnacle.

Um it's hard to be one hour charters. Um, sorry. Uh, uh, I definitely agree that we like I think the autonomous vehicles is a point well made. We're actually, um, Whimo is actually eligible to come here now. Um, when we think about our housing and we think about the future of housing, we're um, you know, AVs are going to they they hold the potential to to make one car households, no car households like a much more real thing. and we need to like I don't think we're grappling with it in the same way that I don't necessarily think we're grappling with AI in the way that it's going to change things or it could change things. Um, of course climate like I think that's still a top priority for this city. It's still um everywhere it it lers in all the stuff we do. Um the one thing I'll say is we called it active transportation this year. I definitely I would prefer that we keep calling it safe streets. Um, active transportation is wonky jargon and safe streets is about the outcomes. Um, 2025 actually saw more bicycle and pedestrian fatalities in Paluma than any year in recent record. Um, and so we clearly have work to do. There's still a lot more to be done. And I think um, when we characterize it as active transportation, it feels like getting people out of their cars or infrastructure only or anything like that. But it's enforcement. I mean, my daughter bolted out of Artplay Cafe this weekend and almost got trucked by a dad and three kids on ebikes and e scooters and like I almost took the guy out because he almost took my daughter out, you know, she's two and um like I want enforcement. Yeah. On the sidewalk in downtown like trucking at like 15 miles an hour. Like I um I want enforcement. Um, and uh, so I, um, I think all of

that fits into it. I would really prefer to keep it termed safe streets. Um, it's more inclusive, it's more accessible. Um, all of that. Um, I think all the stuff about the fairgrounds that Council Member Shri said is great, but I think the key is get the master plan started, don't let things slip, keep things moving forward. Um, is really the the name of the game on all this stuff. Um the best resistance we have to what we're seeing right now from our federal government is to keep moving forward in the way that we believe in. So um thank you to all the staff who do that every day. Feeling good about things council member. Now

before we end I do want to bring up the fact that I have a street that I have been asked to have fixed for three years. It's getting not any better. It's down to gravel and it is designated to be a safe street someday on our schedule. And that's St. Francis and it's right in front of Miwok school and it goes from McDow all the way to the catwalk and those ebikes are on the sidewalk a lot and they worry me and my grandchildren and I do the yogurt at Target and they're coming off that catwalk so fast into the Target shopping center around the Target shopping center and they're going to they're going to really there's going to be a fatal accident. Um, not to mention on Washington Street in front of the baseball parks and um, when I honk my horn, I'm going to get the middle finger because they're they're not obeying any rules. They're not wearing their helmets correctly or at all. So, we really do need to put something in place that we can um, I think go to the parents and say, "Please enforce this." I I know. I hear it's, "Oh, grandma and grandpa bought that bike and the kid gets to ride it." Well, someone needs to be taking responsibility when that rider hurts somebody, especially if they're under the age of 16 and they're riding these bikes through Lacy Park with all these ball players and their families and siblings coming out and they're someone's going to get hurt. So I just safe streets are really important to me from um in and it's a slurry seal is not going to do it. So I'm just going to leave with that for the evening. Thank you.

We almost got to the end of the conversation without ebikes coming up on the agenda. But I think uh I think all of us are getting calls on ebikes and watching uh behavior on that and I'm hoping that's still in staff's work plan. Council member K. And recently and I sent the article I think to the police department of a woman in Davis, a nurse and she got hit and it might I'm not sure exactly what happened, you know, but she died and this was about four weeks ago and so they really are dangerous and we don't want to see that in our community. And every time I look at our Camry and see the big dent in the back of the trunk from the ebike that hit Jerry, I mean they you have to go pretty fast to make a dent in a car like that. So I see it every day.

Council member Carly.

Um yeah, ebikes is one of the things on my list and I still have my whole list to go through, but um you know I ebikes um and bikes just two wheels in general. you know, we just uh last fall passed the active transportation plan, and that's a huge grid of bike routes um throughout the town. And we don't, you know, I see kids all the time doing stuff that they shouldn't that I might have at one point, but they shouldn't. And um uh some of it's pretty safe. And I've watched pedestrians get hit on sidewalks by bikes and the bikes run off and you know um there's no there's no um insurance requirements. There's no um registration for the bikes. There's no any sort of training classes, anything like that. All the things that you would have as a motorist on the road to have an actual license. Um you don't have any of that yet. We've we've now created a plan where this is throughout the whole town and on one half you have lots of regulations and and licensing and on the other half you have absolutely nothing. And so while we do need to enforce I mean the laws are out there already while we do need to enforce those and continue to expand upon them we need to look at too what's going to happen as bikes and cars you know inevitably interact with each other. We don't want that to happen, but that's that's the reality of it.

You said you had a list. Are there comments?

Yeah, I'm going to the list now. Um, it was mentioned in the presentation earlier. Um, you know, and I'm glad that we'll have something coming to us about bringing planning back in house. Um, had a lot of questions at the last goals and priorities meeting and, you know, was promised um promised some stuff to do with that which I never received. So hopefully I'll get updates on that as as that comes to us. Um but nonetheless I would like staff to follow up on those things. Um I do want to talk about roads which was also addressed tonight but uh you know we had that 5-year paving plan and not much has been done since and roads have been you know resealed you know tar snakes slurry seal all that stuff but I mean there's a lot of major roads around town that are in pretty bad shape and I understand trying to align it with um utility work but uh I mean there's a lot a lot a lot of roads that need it And the city made a promise that those roads were going to get refinished. And so, you know, in this last year to really only be talking about paving a portion of Reineer, you know, which is a pretty medium use road compared to a lot, we we need to be doing a lot more and prioritizing more road pavement um in the coming years to fulfill that promise of the five-year paving plan. And then um we've we've talked about you know funding safe and stuff but I think the future of transit is also something that really needs to be addressed as well and ensuring that you know we need to either get the funding for it or determine what what we're going to do what direction we're going to go in. Um I would also like to you know I would like to go back to agriculture. I brought this up last year. Um, but agriculture does need a

lot of support in Paluma and it's been two years since Measure J and I haven't seen a lot from either the city or the county since then and agriculture continues to face very serious threats and without going into details up here. Um, agriculture does need help and I think the city needs to work much closer with the county and figure out solutions to protect um, not only just our heritage but our a major economic driver in our county because you know those those people are kind of on their own right now and I feel like between the city and the county they should both be coming up with solutions as to how to protect agriculture because even if it's outside in the county, you know, it still affects us in here because there's so much a support uh business-wise within the city, it would affect us greatly here, too. So, we really need to protect outside and inside and work with the county to get something like that done. So, I would appreciate my colleagues taking an interest in that, too, and helping to direct staff and figuring out how we can actually get that done. Then um you know on on finance I I do think you know as we talked as was mentioned hours ago in public comment um you to do some sort of a formal risk assessment in the coming budget and provide you know clear clear unassigned funding that matches like GFOA guidelines and figure out how we can do that to always make sure that we have the reserves and what they are and be more clear about it as again was mentioned. And um yeah, so you know, agriculture, business and econ, um you know, planning, roads, transit, finance, those are the things that are

kind of at the top of my list right now. And I would like to see um I would like to see emphasis on this year.

Thank you, Council Member Shribs. Just as a reminder of of what we have started with, which is a presentation with a huge amount of things holistically done across a broad spectrum of just about everything here in this town. Um uh that celebrate what what we've got done and and we are moving in in a holistic way. Um and that staff is going to work on a little of everything at the same time to improve us holistically. And uh so I just want to leave us with a positive note that I'm really looking forward to um continuing working on many fronts in little ways. Everybody's working toward a vision uniformly I think here and we are in step with each other and I'm really happy to see where we're at and where we're going.

Hi council member

Barnacle finish off on the a thing. Um, I really think we've got to focus on what we can do in in the city, like what are the things that we can do. If you have specific, we said this last year, if you have specific things that the city and the county should work together on, but like just saying go go do is not it's not policy direction like we heard from the folks who are operating the fair that we're doing a programming now on the fair and we're focusing more on that. Um, you know, my thing, the thing that I think very concretely in the city that we need to focus on, we've all met with the owners of Huntton Barons. Um, like to me the big risk is we lose Reichart ducks or something like that. We heard, you know, very clearly that if the if one of the big a producers out in the county goes, it's going to put a lot of hardship on Hutton Barons. Like we've got to focus on the things that we can do in the city to make sure that we the egg supporting businesses that we have feel supported. I love that we've got our economic development folks all in the in the room here, but like um to me that's like if we're going to support a like that's the thing that we need to lean into is um making sure that like those businesses um have the support they need to continue to to support, you know, the a community at large because I just I don't see like and I without a like it's hard for me to to jump on board and say yes, let's do that without a concrete proposal because our staff is already doing a million. They're all working full-time right now. So, um, but if I were to say one thing, like the egg supporting businesses in the city is the thing that is really supported um is really a concern for me given that we've seen, you know, farms out in Point Rays um go out of business recently. Um, bird flu now has hit Reichard ducks multiple times. Like those things need to be um like uh those things put a lot of pressure on the egg supporting businesses as well. I do appreciate uh council member

Shrib's ideas of the fair having greater focus on egg too that I think uh all of us keep that in mind and I appreciate this the fair staff's um constant effort to to uh keep that principle in mind at the fairgrounds. Council Darly.

Yeah. Well, I I think that um it's I mean it's I'm you know I'm not coming here tonight with the solutions. I'm coming here being presented with the problem and saying, "Hey, this is the problem." You know, I'm not I think all of us are generalists on on everything. And so, you know, we see a problem, we we talk to staff, we have the meetings, we give the direction and figure out a solution together. I mean, that's that's the goal that I want to promote. So, I mean, I think if if you're on the fence about it, you know, um I mean, it would be if if it's coming together and finding a solution, would you be on the side of that?

Um, definitely on in support of supporting a like I said, the thing that I can see right now that's within the city, like very tangible what the city can do. I laid that out. Um, I'm what I'm not here to do is say like go try and form a working group with the county. like that's the county's jurisdiction. They're the ones who are the ones adopting policies in the county. They're the ones who have a lot more resources than we have. Um we've got a ton of problems that we've got to solve here. Um and I want to keep us focused on like the jurisdiction that we have. Okay. Um,

and I I think between our economic development focus on egg supporting businesses and our master plan of the fairgrounds, we've got some good nexus to be able to support egg. Um, so we've got we can get some traction there. Council member now,

um, a few years ago, might be five or six years ago, there was a farm exhibit, um, like big tractors and what have you at the fairgrounds. So that's something that we can do again is reach out to the John Deere tractor people and say have a farm exhibit and use the fairgrounds and they used every piece of green property to showcase their equipment the John Deere and that's the only one that can come to my my head right now at 9:15. But also we have done some good things and we've helped um Clover Storenetta expand. We have built um farmhouse uh a farm workers housing. We we there is some successes that we've done. We have helped these um like hunt and barren. We all got together. We all met with them. We talked to the owners about what they want to do in the future. We understand that the dairies are going out of business because it's too hard to stay in business and make a profit. So, we are doing things and I think there's probably even more on the list that I don't know off the top of my head and I'd like to see that list so that the public and the council members know what it is we have done because we have um been a great partner. again the mayor's word of the night partnership with a and a businesses and promoting um more agg um visuals at the fairgrounds. So I'm very proud of this city for um having that vision and doing that um going forward. So I don't think a lot of people know that I happen to be on the fairgrounds every day and what we're doing with rebuilding and it's not all aggrelated but it's an apprentice apprentichip

program that they're um helping construction and building things and the farm um little the dairy exhibit or judging that happened and that is wonderful but I don't think the community and the council all know what's going on and there's probably more that I'm not even thinking about right now.

Okay. Um, thank you. Um, I do want to thank all the staff who put in all the work for pulling this all together. Really do appreciate it. I mean, the list is legend. um and um not only for showing us all those highlevel achievement parts but teasing up all the things that are coming up soon be the um you know the shift we're doing to zoom and how staff is preparing us for that July meeting when you know we'll be back in there that area or the uh changes to planning department efforts and the the things that are going to be teed up there all the things that the public has connected on that staff is doing and uh getting done And um I I think um the goal that I have to close this with is I think we're doing great, but we want to be greater and we want to be financially sustainable. So, you know, um please take away tonight's council directions package that I know you're coming back to with a with a package for us later of the real and unreal. Um and coming back with budget, which is so so much also a goals priority statement. So, thank you all very much for being in here tonight and um that closes our meeting for the evening.