Ethics Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. Good morning, everyone. My name is Rick Jennings, and you are in the personnel and public employee committee meeting, and we are glad that you are here. So with that said, we will start our meeting, and, we will start with a roll call. Clerk, will you please do a roll call, please?

Thank you, chair. Vice mayor Telemontes is currently absent. Vice chair Kaplan?

Here.

Councilmember Vang?

Here.

And chair Jennings?

Here.

Thank you. We have quorum.

Perfect. We will now move to our land acknowledgment and pledge of allegiance. Council member Lisa Kaplan will lead us.

Please stand and rise if you are able for the acknowledgments in honor of Sacramento's indigenous peoples and tribal lands. To the original people of this land, the Nisenan people, the Southern Maidu, the Valley and Plains Miwok, the Putwin Wintun people, and the people of Wilton Rancheria, Sacramento's only federally recognized tribe. May we acknowledge and honor the native people who came before us and still walk beside us today on these ancestral lands by choosing to gather today in the active practice of acknowledgment and appreciation of Sacramento's indigenous peoples' histories, contributions, and lives. Please remain standing. Pledge.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,

with liberty and justice for all.

We will now move to our consent calendar. All items under the consent calendar are considered and acted by one motion. Do we have any public comment on our consent calendar?

Thank you chair I have no speaker slips for this item.

I move the item. I will second.

It' been moved and second any further discussion? Seeing none hearing none all in favor say aye. We are unanimous in our decision, so that's a three-zero vote. We will now move to item number two, our discussion calendar.

Thank you, chair. Item number two is review of applicants for the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Commission. The seat meeting recommendation today is seat B. Requirements for seat B are as follows: Must be a resident of the city, must not be an elected officer, and must not be an employee of the city or county. We have three applicants for review today. Each will have two minutes to respond to the questions that will be brought up on the screen momentarily. Applicants were notified of the questions prior to today's meeting. Our first applicant is David Alvarado.

Welcome, David.

Hi. My name is David Alvarado. I'm currently a Sacramento State student. The reason I'm interested in serving on this board and commission is while I am a Poli Sci major, I want to get more involved in local politics. And I think the the best place to start is by serving on a local commission. While I don't have previous experience serving in a position like this, I'm currently the president of the Sacramento State College Democrats. I'm also on four different committees in the student government at Sac State, and I've been pretty involved in local government and local politics.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Our next applicant is David Deleuz.

Good morning, welcome committee. I'm David Deleuz. I live at 190 Bewick Circle in North Natomas. I'd like to serve on the SHRA board because housing stability is the foundation of our region's economy. It's important for public safety and for community health.

And our challenges here in Sacramento are no longer just limited to affordability, but also the need to address displacement, homelessness, workforce access, and equitable neighborhood investment. Now my professional experience in civil rights, public infrastructure policy, and economic participation has shown me that effective housing policy must connect people to opportunity not simply to provide units, but pathways to stability and upward mobility. SHRA operates at the intersection of housing redevelopment and public investment, which makes it a really unique opportunity to influence outcomes for residents at all income levels. My desire is to bring practical solution oriented leadership to this body. I want to expand access to housing and ensure that public resources are used strategically to support both vulnerable residents, but also sustain community growth.

My skills and abilities, I currently serve as the deputy director for civil rights at the California Department of Transportation, where I oversee programs designed to ensure equitable participation in publicly funded infrastructure and development projects. It includes policy development, compliance oversight and engagement with local agencies, developers, contractors and community stakeholders, all which directly intersect with housing access, neighborhood investment, and economic mobility.

Thank you for being here today. Your two minutes is completed.

Wow, that was quick. Okay. Well, thank you very much. Appreciate your time. Thank you.

Thank you. Our final applicant is Michael Flamate. They do not appear to be in the audience today. I did RSVP with them, spoke with him over the phone, but it looks like they were not able to make it this morning. So that concludes our applicants for today. I'm here for any questions.

Thank you. I forgot. Sorry. Chair.

That's okay. No problem.

Again.

Vice Chair, Lisa Kaplan.

Need more coffee. I'm in the process. Thank you, Chair. Thank you to both Davids for for applying. As the city, we're kind of in the middle of reviewing SHRA, city county partnership, the separate SHRA board that young man, David.

I appreciate you applying, but I think we need somebody right now just because we're in the middle of changing everything, having somebody who's who served in and aware of housing right now where their voice is very important. I see that you're from District 6. So, I will make sure that council member Garra is aware that you are interested in boards and commissions and also see if he has any openings, for you as well. But I would like to make a motion to move David Duluth for the open seats.

Council member Vang.

Thank you. I just wanted to echo my colleague, Elisa Kaplan. First, David, I wanna say thank you for having the courage to step up and to apply for this appointment and putting yourself out there. I think one of the best way is to serve on boards and commission. And so I just really appreciate you being here today and saying I'm a young person at Sac State. I wanna serve this community. And I may not have the experience, but how I build experience is putting myself out there to begin that process. So I just wanna commend you. I'm also noting that you're in District 6 as well, and I will talk to council member Garra. There are also numerous of boards in commission, and I wanna make sure that we don't miss that opportunity for your leadership, especially young people in this moment, because we need your voice at the table now more than ever.

And so I really just wanna say thank you for putting yourself out there. Ian, David, thank you for also submitting your application, and I know that you have a lot of experience around working with our our underserved communities. And what really spoke to me about your application is really the needing the the need to address displacement and connecting people to real opportunity in housing. And so, I'm going to support the motion on the table, but I am just so grateful that there are numerous folks applying. We want to make sure that we get all of you at the table on our boards and commission. And so with that, I will second the motion on the table.

Thank you very much. It's been moved and seconded. And just a few comments. We are looking for people to step up to leadership, and I appreciate both of you for stepping up to leadership. Even though we had three and the other person didn't show up, I'd like to have a conversation with them as well to let them know that we need those who wanna step up and take a leadership position and move our city forward.

We need everyone at this point in time to be able to do that. And so while there'll be a decision made today on who will take this position, I can guarantee you we have so many more positions that we can point you to if you just contact our office and talk to us about what is the opportunity for me, whether it's in District 6 where you live or whether it's in District 7 where I get the opportunity to make decisions. We look forward to helping everyone move into this position. So I do think we need David at this point in time, and I'm saying David, David Duluth. I think we need the leadership that you bring to the table.

I've looked at your resume. I've looked at your experience. I think it fits very well with this position. And at this point in time, I can't third it. I don't need to, but that my vote will do that. So therefore, I'm going to call for the call. All in favor of David Duluth for this position? Aye. Please say aye.

Yes. Aye.

Aye. So that is unanimous in the decision. And again, we look forward, David, to getting an opportunity to talk with you and seeing where you may be able to serve as well while you're in school, finishing school, which is a priority. And I want you to take that priority, but also continue want you to continue to serve as well. So with that said, decision has been made. It's been voted on. Congratulations, David Duluth. Alright. Next item, please.

Thank you, chair. Our next item, item three, is city of Sacramento Community Police Review Commission 2025 annual report and 2026 work plan. We do have a presentation from vice chair John Johnson of the commission.

Mister Johnson, welcome. We are glad you're here. Thank you very much. Looking forward to your report.

Well, it's good to see you all today. I could stand behind here and talk to you rather than sit behind there and govern every month. But it's just good to be here today with you today. I'm here today in regards to representing our commissioners, which you do have a list of here, and representing our chair today who's not able to be with us. And we thank our police representative, captain Buchanan, being with us also on today.

Moving to our 2025 accomplishments. A key accomplishments in 2025 as we meet on the second Monday at 05:30 here in the council chambers is Had approved and transmitted the 2024 annual report and recommendations to the p p committee and city council and advanced the 2025 work plan priorities. And then we also went about improving the organizational effectiveness and ad hoc committees and discussions among our commission members. And then also we held meetings in regards to the MEU, the military equipment use for public meetings to support transparency and community engagement, which went very well in our district's committee community that we held them in at those dates. And then we look at our twenty six twenty twenty six work plan priorities that we have adopted.

And our goal one is to strengthen community awareness of a commission. That means that we're trying to do is bring more people in to our commission meetings when we meet during the week and let them know exactly what we're doing to be aware. Sometime we hear from the calendar, not to say calendar for where they come in and they have presentation, but we can't do anything about those things. But we can let them be aware about what we're trying to do to strengthen their communities. Then our goal too is conduct structured community outreach.

And that means again going into our districts that allow us to to meet as a group and to hear the voice of our community which we have done over the period of years now. And then our goal three is to strengthen partnership within you, the city council, is my idea that I brought to the commission and we overwhelmingly said okay that we would do is to spend more time with our city council members talking to you, getting your feedback, giving your input, letting you know one on one what we're trying to do as a commissioner and to help us as much as we can to understand how to operate our commission within the city government. And then our last goal is to establish ad hoc committees to support this work and overwhelmingly have our commission members that have taken upon themselves to lead ad hoc committees in different areas so that we can go ahead and move ahead the work plan for 2026. Commission our commission held eight public meetings during, the year 2025, and it was estimated annual cost of $24,168. Our commission operates without a dedicated staff support.

We're limited and which we thank you very much, especially for the departments that serve and help us. The city clerk's office, the city's district city's district attorney's office, and also the Sacramento Police Commission, which overwhelmingly meet us with us every month here in the council chambers. And our commissioners conduct research. We prepare staff reports, and lead community engagement efforts. And we try to do our best with the ability that we have and some bring a lot of experience to the table and we're able to help each other and lean on each other and to get a lot of things done.

But we still need that help and support again from our city. Twenty twenty twenty five recommendation to the city council, again, was to evaluate and provide direction regarding staffing support necessary for the commission to effectively fulfill its purpose and duties, and also to explore reassignment or reallocation reallocation of existing city staff resources rather than creating new budget positions. Again, working again within a time the frame here of knowing that our city is under a budget crunch, knowing there's some things that have already been decided upon. But all we ask to do is just to work within the confines of the structure of the city, city council. And also to enhance administrative coordination, research support, public commission, and again, help us on the agenda of preparation, which we are doing our best each and every month to do.

Thank you.

Okay. I'd like to are you finished? I'm sorry.

Thank you,

Oh, thank you. Thank you. That was an excellent report. I appreciate that very much. And I'd like to now open it up to my colleagues to give additional direction. But before we do that, I'll go to the community, if there's any community comment.

No, chair. I have no public speakers for this item.

Alrighty. So now we'll come to my colleagues, and I'll start with, vice chair Lisa Kaplan.

Thank you. It word from our chair. So thank you for for stepping in and and helping out. I think what this is a good time that you've come and looking at, okay, what is the actual purpose of our police review commission? It's been a little bit in limbo and I think as we now have a new city manager and we're looking at OPSA as well.

And I think as we look at OPSA, it's wise to look at the police review commission at the same time where can it be closer aligned and and how what is staffing look like. This is a good time to kinda do that relook at everything. I'm not sure it'll totally get ferreted out and cleaned within within a year, but I appreciate what the commission is looking at and the questions you guys are asking that I think we as a council have been looking at and wrestling at, but haven't come to a unified decision. But I think with the restructuring of OPSA and how all of that works, really see the police review commission and OPSA should be more aligned and closer than they are now, truly honestly. And that's so that's my hope where I'm only one individual council member, but I want you to know that's how I see where I think it can it can it can work as we know we have a budget deficit and we have to look at doing things a little differently and how does it come in alignment.

But just continue to follow through and the accountability and the asking questions. So, I am good moving your report to to counsel and your work plan as is knowing that more is coming as as we look at what's the next direction.

Beautiful. Thank you.

Council member Vang.

Thank you. Hi mister Johnson. First I just want to say thank you so much for your service being on the commission and to all of our commissioners, just really wanna take a moment to say thank you for their service. And I know that this is your annual report that you bring to us about the goals that you're setting for next year. And I just wanna uplift one goal in particular that I think is incredibly important and just wanna say on record is establishing the various ad hoc committees to support the work.

Right? It's not just these conversation that you have on the dice as commissioner, but some of the work around the outreach and events that needs to happen to coordinate that, the various outreach and community events. I think, so that community knows exactly what the commission's role is. And in particular, the other committee, the policy and procedure committee, I know that over the years, there's been frustration from previous commissioners around implementations, around different recommendations from the policy from the commission. And oftentimes, I do feel what I hear from the community is that the commission is often just a checkbox.

And how do we ensure that when commissioners make recommendation that the council and the mayor takes them seriously and advocate for them to be implemented. And so, I appreciate that we're gonna be having an ad hoc committee around the policy and procedure identifying some of the policy recommendation to have discussion and what that track what that tracking looks like and to follow-up on the log status, which I think is probably one of the most important piece of the commission's work, right, that you all discuss, deliberate, you provide recommendation, but they may there may not be follow-up on those recommendations. And so really really great to see that that part is is in the is part of the the the framework and the proposal that we have in front of us. And I actually look forward to seeing that work moving forward into next year and supporting the commission and tracking those recommendation and making sure that mayor and council takes those recommendations seriously. And again, mister Johnson, just thank you so much for your hard work.

And with that, I will second the motion on the table.

Alright. It's been moved and seconded. I just wanna have a few comments. Looking forward to working with you and the commission in 2026. When I take a look at what you've done with limited resources in 2025, I'd like to say congratulations.

I mean, to have eight public meetings in the in the community and without necessarily having the dedicated staff, It just means that there's strong leadership in your commission, and I just want to applaud you and the commissioners for what you've done and continue to keep doing. We want to help with strengthening community outreach. That's one of the goals that I see. And I've got some incredible ideas, and I know if I've got some ideas, it means my colleagues have some ideas as well. And so be having the opportunity to meet with each council member and their staff and talk about how would you go about reaching the community and so you can strengthen that community outreach goal.

That would be one of the things. And I see the other one, which is what I've already said, is partnering with the city council and working with us together. And so I just want to kind of really focus on that one because I believe strongly when the people speak, we should all be listening. That's why we have two ears and one mouth. We ought to listen twice as much as we talk. With that said, great job in 2025 looking forward to what' going to happen in 2026 and beyond and looking forward to working with you to achieve all the goals that you presented to us today.

Okay? Thanks again, and I appreciate you all, and we look forward to it to 2026.

Okay. I'm a call the question before you leave.

Chair, before you Call the question. Before you call the question, yes. I heard, and I could have missed this, I heard council member Vang second the motion, but I don't believe I actually heard a a motion on the I move it. You will move it. Okay. Yes.

Thank you.

As as presented.

So it's been moved to moving forward to council as presented, and it's been seconded. All in favor, aye. Aye. Opposed? There are none. So therefore it is unanimous and we look forward to seeing you and Chair Sample at our next opportunity.

Thank you very much again.

Thank you. Okay. Next item.

Thank you, chair. That include concludes our discussion calendar for today. The next item is committee comments, ideas, questions.

I'm good, chair.

I think there are three I'm goods up here. And so that's a good thing.

Jacob, you good? Do want to add to the fourth?

And I'm I'm gonna move quickly before one of my council members, including me, change our minds. So next item, please.

Our next item is public comments, matters not on the agenda, and I have no speaker slips for this item.

Okay. So for all of you who are here, I will close this out. I thank you for coming. I thank you for being a part of this meeting. I invite you to our next meeting, which will happen

One moment. June 16, I believe.

June 16. We invite you to come back to our next meeting. We we can't do this without the public, so we invite you to invite friends and and those who want to understand a little bit more about this this commission.

And, chair, I was incorrect. It is June 23.

June 23. So seven days from June 16. June 23 is our next meeting. Okay. Same time?

Yes. 11AM.

Okay. 11AM. So without any further business to do, we thank all of you for being here. This meeting is hereby adjourned.