City Council - meeting_joint_regular

All right, it's 2 o'clock, so let's call today's meeting of the Rules and Open Government Committee to order and start with roll call, please.

Candales?

Here.

Duan?

Here.

Foley? Here. Comey? Here. Cohen?

Here.

Thank you.

Thank you. We have one agenda to review, and that's the agenda for next week's council meeting on June 23rd. That one has a 9.30 closed session and a 1.30 regular session. And consent starts on page five. And continues on pages six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12 and ends on page 13. In section three, we have a proposed ballot measure to allow rank choice voting for filling vacancies. In section five, we have actions related to a large format advertising sign request for SJC and Willow Keys Corridor Improvement Project. Section six, long-term power purchase agreement with Shell Energy and the 2026 Integrated Resource Plan for SJCE. And section seven, an amendment between our Animal Care Services and the City of Milpitas. Section eight, grant agreements for multiple programs for homelessness, a Homekey program, action for Branham Lane, and multifamily housing incentive for the Seeley project. And we have three items on land use consent, which will be heard immediately after regular consent. Do we have public comment?

We do not.

All right, back to the committee.

Any approval with that sheet? Second.

All right, motion and a second. Then we will vote. Motion carries 5-0, thank you so much. And we have two items on our rules consent agenda. Do we have public comment on consent?

We do not.

Okay, back to the committee. Do we have a motion for consent?

Second.

Okay, let's vote on consent. And the motion carries 5-0. And now we're on to our action item. This is a policy analysis for vacant commercial storefront activation. Remind me on this, this one's coming back to us or?

This one is coming back to the rules committee chair. There is a workload analysis a little bit different than the traditional method. This is a green and a yellow, recommendation two. and the memorandum will actually go to the city auditor and he will be including that as a part of his 2627 work plan and then the recommendations one and three are yellow lit but as opposed to waiting you know six months until we start priority setting we do have the opportunity to bring those forward when PBC comes forward in the fall with the citywide planning work plan and reprioritization by the council so we'll bring these items into that meeting to have with the council

Okay do we have public comments on this item.

Yes Jordan please make your way to the podium.

Hi I wanted to speak again in support of this item filling our vacant storefronts is important. You know it's unfortunate that this work wasn't able to be rolled into the upcoming fiscal year from the start. Same with the work that Councilmember Tordillos was pushing for a few weeks ago with the ministerial approval. We really need to figure out how to do this little bit of extra work in order to get rid of a lot of work moving forwards. And so I don't know how we do that, but I think it's very important to figure out how to do it. Investing in tools on the back end is one important aspect, but also improving our just overall processes and policies is also very important, and we shouldn't lose sight of that. So I hope we'll figure out how to do that. And I know the businesses really want us to be more efficient. They don't want to go through these long processes. Would they be OK with a one-year, slightly higher tax in order to get this work done and solve their problems forever? Let's be creative. Thank you.

Thank you. Back to the committee. All right.

Well, is that the end for public comment, right? Yes. OK. It looks like Council Member Mulcahy, you're chomping at the bit to make some comments. So we'll turn it over to you for a couple of minutes.

Thank you so much. Thank you, colleagues. Good to see you. First, I want to thank Joseph Morrow from my team who initiated and developed this work. He coordinated our Council Brown Act and hounded countless city staff to create this memo. and our Chief of Staff, Lynn Lee, was his key staff collaborator. I also want to appreciate the Rules Committee for entertaining the two deferrals on this item that have come before you. That pushed for more collaboration with staff in refining the scope of work resulting from this memo. We began exploring this topic in October of 2025 through research conducted and conversations with city staff about their on-the-ground experiences We developed these three policy recommendations for the Rules Committee's consideration and ultimately the Council to address gaps in our policies that contribute to blighted vacant commercial storefronts. And from that, we could see a cleaner San Jose and increased low barrier opportunities for our small business operators. These issues touch nearly every department, including and especially PBCE and OEDCA, as well as Public Works, San Jose Fire, SJPD, Beautify SJ, PRNS, and countless others. Our ultimate aim is to identify and make targeted policy changes. We believe that investing a modest amount of time and resource to improve safety and cleanliness, while also giving unique opportunities to small business, we're supporting our department's efforts to reduce costs over the long term, while providing more neighborhood stability throughout our city. I want to acknowledge our co-signers, Council Members Tordillos, Cohen, Ortiz, and Duan for supporting the memo and for their partnership throughout the process. I want to extend a gratitude to Joe Royce and the City Auditor's team for their willingness to work closely with our office and for their interest in incorporating Recommendation 2 into their work plan. We appreciate them going above and beyond our original recommendation and I hope that a future audit of the city's restaurant and small business programs leads to an even more even more conversation collaboration and action to support efforts to open and sustain more small business throughout the city. Rosalind Huey has been great communicating and coordinating with us along the way, especially when it appeared we were going to see lights other than green. And a shout out to BBC and OEDCA for their work on these items. I appreciate their commitment to bringing this item forward alongside other important priorities in planning's work plan through the upcoming planning work reprioritization process. And so together, I hope the committee and council recognize the value of continuing to innovate and invest in making San Jose a place where people want to invest and where residents can feel safe walking through their local business corridors. I respectfully ask the committee to adopt the workload analysis, and thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Council Member, and it looks like Council Member Dewan wants to weigh in.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Councilmember Mulcahy for leading this. and allow us to join your round act. And it's a great move toward helping our downtown and many other areas to reduce the blights of some of these owners who need a little bit of push to make sure that storefronts look beautiful. And I move to accept the staff recommendation.

That's a move to accept the workload analysis. Is there a second?

Second.

All right, we have motion and a second. I don't see any other hands. Before we vote, I'll take a moment of personal privilege before I go upstairs and my chief corrects me. It's not chomping at the bit, it's champing at the bit, and I'm supposed to say it correctly because he always corrects me when I say it wrong. All right, let's vote. All right, that motion carries 5-0, and we are on to open forum.

We do not have any cards for open forum.

Oh, boy, I was waiting for Jordan. Sorry, Jordan. Thank you for not making public comment. All right, we are adjourned at 2.10 p.m.