City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you. Thank you. Bye.

All right. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome. Good afternoon, everyone. I'd like to call to order this meeting of the San Jose City Council for the afternoon of Tuesday, August 11th. I want to remind those joining remotely that the Zoom link is available on the agenda for today's City Council meeting. If you are participating online and wish to speak, please use the Zoom application and select the raised hand feature. Speakers will be called in order. When it is your turn, the City Clerk will enable you to speak and a notification will appear on your screen. letting you know that you may unmute and provide your comments. I hope everyone got a chance to get a little family time, a little bit of a break this summer, but excited to be back in session here. Tony, would you please call the roll?

Kamei?

Here.

Campos? Present. Tordillos? Here. Cohen? Here. Ortiz? Present. Mulcahy? Here. Duan?

Here.

Ken Dulles.

Here.

Casey. Here. Foley. Here. Mahan.

Here.

You have a quorum.

Thank you. Now, if you're able, please stand and join us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

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.

Thank you. Today's invocation will be provided by the United States Marine Corps Color Guard, and Councilmember Dewan will tell us more.

Thank you, Mayor. Today, we are deeply honored to welcome the United States Marine Corps Color Guard to lead us in our invocation. Long before our nation was founded, warriors carried banners into battle not simply as a symbol of their armies, but a symbol of identity, courage, sacrifice, and unity. When the United States was born, our flag came and represented something greater, the ideals of a nation built on liberty, courage, opportunity, and the belief that government derived its strength from the people. For 250 years, the United States Marine Corps had carried that tradition. With extraordinary honor and distinction, from the earliest day of our republic to this very moment, Marines had stood ready to defend our Constitution, protect our freedom, and answer the calls of duty whenever our nation needs them. The Marine Corps' color guards remind us patriotism we carry every day. Their precision, discipline, and commitment reflect the highest traditions of military service and demonstrate the profound respect we owe to our nation, to our flag, and to the generation who have sacrificed to preserve our freedom. When we look upon the American flag, we see More than a flag, we see the face of those who serve. We see the family who waited and sacrificed. We see generations of Americans who build communities, overcome adversity, and believe that tomorrow could be better than today. The flag reminds us of our victory, but it also reminds us of the challenges and mistakes from our past. Most importantly, to build a nation where freedom is protected, opportunity is possible, and a prosperous nation for all Americans. Today, we are especially honored to have with us Sergeant Arenas, Sergeant Skidmore, Sergeant Arroyo, and Sergeant Corum. To each of you, you remind us that freedom has never been free. It has been protected by the courage and sacrifice of those willing to stand in its defense. As we welcome the callers, let us reflect on the blessing of liberty, remember those who gave everything to our country, and renew our commitment to the principles that make America strong. Please rise, if you are able, and join me in rendering the respect, gratitude, and honor our nation's colors.

Thank you.

¶.

Shoulders, march.

Ready, cut. Mark time, march.

Left face. Forward, march.

Thank you to our U.S. Marine Corps Color Guard and Councilor Dewan for arranging today's invocation. We are on to our ceremonial items. Councilor Condellas, if you would join me at the podium, we will recognize and proclaim August 15th as the 79th anniversary of Indian Independence Day.

Thank you, Council Member Casey, for coming down and joining me. Good afternoon, everybody. Today we proudly proclaim August 15th as India's Independence Day here in the city of San Jose. On August 15th in 1947, after nearly two centuries of British rule, India declared its independence. Indian Independence Day is more than a date in history. It is a celebration of unity, democracy and peace. This day teaches us that when people are united, they can shape their own destiny. That is a lesson that we need to be reminded of now more than ever. And here in San Jose, we are blessed with a vibrant Indian American community. And my district, along with Councilmember Casey's in District 10, is home to one of the largest Indo-American populations here in our city. the culture, the traditions, and contributions enrich every corner of our city and inspire us all The Association of Indo-Americans, or AIA, has been a key partner in building stronger neighborhoods by uplifting Indian American voices and activating our public spaces with amazing cultural events. Before I introduce Dr. Conda, I want to do a quick shameless plug and invite everyone who's here to join us this Friday at 5.30 at City Hall for the official Indian flag raising. a moment where we can stand together to celebrate our community, and it's now my pleasure to introduce and welcome Dr. Ramesh Kanda from the Association of Indo-Americans to say a few words before the mayor presents the proclamation. So, Dr. Kanda.

Thank you. Namaste, everyone. Good afternoon. Honorable mayor, council members, distinguished guests, and dear friends. It is a great honor to accept this commendation from the city of San Jose on behalf of the entire Indian community in the Bay Area. The Association of Indo-Americans, we represent the entire Bay Area and we have large members in San Jose specifically. So in San Jose we celebrate different festivals starting from Holi, Independence Day, and Diwali, and in between many other events in the theaters here, arts and culture. So we feel very privileged to be part of this community and celebrating and being in the community as good citizens and contributing to our economy. Indian Independence Day celebrates freedom, democracy, diversity and strong friendship between India and the United States. So we are deeply grateful to the city of San Jose for recognizing the community, our community and culture and contributions, what we make day in and day out, like everyone. So we are very proud to be part of this great city and remain committed to strengthen the bridge between India and America, as well as all other ethnic groups in the community here. So with that, I would like to thank everyone for giving this opportunity, and especially our honorable council member, Domingo Condales, always in the front of our community to showcase, and also Mayor, attends all of our events. Thank you, Mayor. And many of the council members, they attend our events, so I don't want to just name one or other, but, you know, entire council members, we feel very strong, and they're doing an excellent job. Please give them a big round of applause. Thank you. Thank you again, and we represent all the leaders here. Raj Banotji is a local San Jose leader, and Rajivji, and Venkat Madhipati, and Vijay, and Domingo Condales is also our leader. And Rajeshji and KD Patel, he runs the hotel here, so different. We are technology business people, represent every part of the community. Thank you so much again for giving us the opportunity.

now the mayor will present the proclamation and then we can take a picture doctor thank you

All right. Councilmember Kamei, if you would join me at the podium, we will recognize and proclaim August as Emergency Management Month.

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Today we recognize August as Emergency Management Awareness Month and acknowledge the vital work involved in preparing our community for emergencies and disasters. Emergency management goes beyond crisis response. It includes preparedness, prevention, mitigation, response, and recovery. Our goal is to ensure residents, businesses, schools, and organizations have the knowledge, resources, and partnerships needed to withstand challenges and recover effectively and efficiently. We know that emergencies can happen at any time from severe weather and wildfires to earthquakes, floods, public health emergencies and other unforeseen events. Being prepared before an emergency occurs can save lives, protect property and help our community recover more quickly. This month, we recognize the dedicated emergency managers, first responders, public safety personnel, volunteers, nonprofit organization, healthcare professionals, utility workers, and community partners who work together to keep our community safe. And that's a lot of people. Their commitment often behind the scenes is essential to our community's resilience. Preparedness is a shared responsibility. When individuals prepare, families become stronger. When neighborhoods prepare, communities become more resilient. And when our entire community works together, we are better equipped to face whatever challenges may come our way. I am proud to recognize emergency management awareness month and encourage everyone to make preparedness a priority not just this month but throughout the year and I know that I have a little bit of a challenge with my colleague council member Casey in d10 who has a lot a lot of people and he's got this gold of a thousand cert trained individuals we're kind of on our way but I I'D LIKE TO NOW INTRODUCE RARE REARDON FOR A FEW WORDS BEFORE THE MAYOR PRESENTS THE PROCLAMATION.

GOOD AFTERNOON. EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT IS NOT AN OPERATION BY AN INDIVIDUAL BUT BY A TEAM. IT'S A REAL TEAM SPORT. ALL THE DEPARTMENTS IN THE CITY IDENTIFY A REPRESENTATIVE TO WORK ON OUR EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT WORKGROUP. And together, it took almost 3,000 hours over two years to get ready for the major events that we just had. And again, we're starting the wheels up again because we have El Nino and other storms that we can't anticipate significant impacts. So we will be ready for that, and that's the effort of the team. Thank you very much.

The mayor will now present the proclamation.

Thank you all.

We really appreciate the work you all do. All right, Council Member Mulcahy, if you would join me here at the podium, we will recognize Cake for Kids.

Good afternoon. Welcome back to Council Chambers. Don't all my colleagues look so well rested and healthy? It's really good to be back. Today I am very proud to welcome Cake for Kids Executive Director, Alison Bakewell, to recognize her mission-driven organization's incredible milestone, marking 100,000 cakes delivered to children in need. Alison is joined here with her husband, Tom, and several volunteers and presumably some bakers in the house. If you didn't already know about this unique business, Cake for Kids was founded back in 2010 by the late Libby Grunder. Libby had read an article about a young girl in foster care who received her very first birthday cake and the positive impact that surprise had on her childhood. Since that moment of inspiration, Libby started Something Special, a grassroots effort to serve the Bay Area, providing custom birthday cakes to youth facing adversity, including those experiencing homelessness, food insecurity, foster care, and recovering from domestic violence. What makes this milestone truly meaningful is not just the impressive number reached, but what each cake represents. Cake for Kids has grown to serve 21 states and the District of Columbia, powered by a group of over 12,000 volunteers, including our very own Amber White in our office and her daughters as well. They've delivered over 41,000 cakes in the Bay Area alone. The work Cake for Kids commits to each and every day is truly special and has left a lasting impact on the lives of countless youth here in San Jose. And did you all catch Allison's last name, Bakewell? It's a perfect fit. Allison started as a volunteer baker in 2013 and then moved to operations because maybe the name actually didn't quite fit. but not sure if that's an indication of her baking skills, but she joined full-time in 2017 and has been helping the company's growth ever since. Thank you, Allison, and your team for your service and leadership. Please join me in welcoming Allison Bakewell to say a few words, then Mayor Mahan will present the commendation. Allison? Thank you.

Think back to your childhood birthdays. Now imagine that birthday without a cake, without singing. Imagine feeling invisible. This is what it's like for thousands of children that we serve. Every day, Cake for Kids is trying to change that reality. We want to provide positive, critical childhood experiences that help raise their self-esteem and guide them towards a bright future by creating a custom cake made especially for them, we're hoping to provide a special moment for them that can make all the difference. So just to give you an idea of what an impact of a cake can have, we recently delivered cupcakes to a 22-year-old foster youth, Samantha. She requested cupcakes but didn't really think that they were going to arrive for her. She said that people make promises all the time, but they rarely keep their promises. So when the social worker delivered the cupcakes to her home, she had a huge smile on her face, and she was overwhelmed that someone who didn't even know her took the time to make something special for her and to make cupcakes just the way she wanted them. Cake for Kids is powered by an amazing group of volunteers, And they pour their heart and soul into every bake, even though they know that they're never going to be able to meet the youth that they're baking for. But they do this because they want to make sure that that youth feels special and that they know someone cares, even though that person has never met them. So Cake for Kids has been in the Bay Area since 2010, so over 16 years. And like they said, over 41,000 cakes delivered in the Bay Area. But across the country, we have 28 chapters from coast to coast. And we recently delivered our 100,000th celebration of a youth. So that's 100,000 moments of joy, that's 100,000 graduations, adoptions, birthdays, but more importantly, that's 100,000 youth celebrated. So I want to thank Council Member Mulcahy, Mayor Mahon, the City of San Jose for recognizing Cake for Kids in this important milestone, and we look forward to the next 100,000.

I'd love to get a photo together. Thank you all so much. Is that working? There we go. Last but not least, I would like to invite our city manager, Jennifer McGuire, our sports and special events director, Tommy O'Hare, I believe John Poach is not here, but representatives from the San Jose Sports Authority and all of the partners and staffs, I think we have a pretty big group coming down, all of the partners and staff who were involved in the success of our 2026 major sports events as we recognize our collective achievement. And in a moment, I'll invite all of my council colleagues to come down for one big group photo. If we could have everybody come down, don't be shy, come on. It's gonna be a great photo. As folks are coming down, I will just sort of introduce the item and then hand it off to our city manager. Welcome. Come on down, everybody. So we are fresh off of hosting the world's largest sporting events, and the city manager and I want to take a moment to recognize the incredible work that has gone into making 2026 an unforgettable year in San Jose. It really does take a village. Welcome, everybody. Chief, thanks for being here. Awesome. Hi, welcome. So going back a couple of years ago, I believe actually about two years ago during our budget deliberation, this council began discussing how we wanted to show up for what was going to be an unprecedented year in San Jose sports history. Super Bowl, March Madness, and World Cup all coming to the South Bay in the same year. And it can be a little bit nerve-wracking and risky to choose to invest the way that we did, but I'm grateful to the council and our city manager and her team for deciding that this was an opportunity that was worth seizing, that we didn't have to just step back and let these events just happen to us, but that we could proactively plan a year of programming from watch parties and drone shows and concerts in places like downtown and out in our neighborhood districts to engagement in our school districts and boys and girls clubs and other places serving our youth and really use this as a platform for something much more than hosting some big sporting events. This was an opportunity for us to ensure that everyone in our community, even if they couldn't afford a ticket to the big game, or wouldn't be able to attend the event could be part of something unforgettable, a unique memory of being part of something bigger than themselves, of a special moment where San Jose was part of being on the world stage. Thanks to early investments from the council, and I know Mookie at the airport was a big early believer, we were able to bring on Tommy O'Hare, who came into the role of sports and special events director. Tommy immediately got to work partnering with John Poach and our sports authority, who, as you all know, for decades, has done an incredible job of bringing incredible sporting events to San Jose and ensuring that the entire community is engaged. And from there, over the last two years, every department in this city a number of external partners, including Shark Sports Entertainment, the San Jose Earthquakes, Team San Jose, San Jose State University, San Jose Downtown Association, our Chamber of Commerce, VTA, of course, the Bay Area Host Committee, and many others came together to help us play host on the largest stage in the world. And for those of you who are around for World Cup, you know San Jose showed up. we hosted over 1 million people just downtown at our primary san pedro watch party but also had thousands of people attend neighborhood-based watch parties thanks to the work of the directors alliance and many other community leaders and our council members i think what's most special about this event series of events is that we're really able to Elevate San Jose's brand as a place that's a destination that is uniquely culturally rich and diverse and vibrant and really change people's perception of what our downtown is capable of and what it means to be a major U.S. city. I'm so excited to build on the success in the years ahead. We have our 250th next year opportunity to keep building and then Olympics. And so much more. So I just I really want to thank everyone who worked incredibly hard long days and nights from our police officers to public works to all emergency management, all the departments who had to work incredibly hard. I'll let Jennifer say more about our departments, but we're going to give this commendation to Tommy O'Hare. Sadly, John Poach is on a well-deserved vacation with his family, but Tom will have Tommy accepted on behalf of both of them. because the two of them came together and really kept us all on track and coordinated and held everybody accountable for playing their role, including making me do a bunch of fundraising phone calls to help make sure it was all possible. So Tommy, thank you for leading us through an incredible 2026. It went better than I could have ever possibly imagined. I'm so proud of how our city came together to play host on the global stage for some of the biggest sporting events around. Jennifer, would you like to add a few words?

Thank you, Mayor, and good afternoon, everybody. Again, I am also incredibly, incredibly proud of this team. As the mayor mentioned, major watch parties and community events were held at San Pedro Square and across all 10 city council districts during the FIFA World Cup. A huge thanks also goes very much to our mayor and entire city council. all of our community partners and neighborhood business districts who ensured there was something for residents and visitors throughout our diverse city to enjoy. And what a way to drive positive economic impact to our city. In addition to our many businesses and community partners, none of this would have been possible without the hard work, collaboration, and dedication of our city employees. And with that, I am honored to acknowledge the City of San Jose employees who prepared for and hosted an unforgettable FIFA World Cup experience. I also want to express a sincere thank you to Deputy City Manager Rosalyn Huey. Would you raise your hand there, Rosalyn? And also, 2026 Sports and Special Events Director Tommy O'Hare, one of my better hires. I'm happy with him. for their absolutely exceptional leadership and coordination throughout this effort. This collaboration brought together teams across the city, including, ready for this, again, it takes a village, airport, economic development and cultural affairs, emergency management, environmental services, fire, housing, parks, recreation, and neighborhood services, planning, building, and code enforcement, police, public works, transportation, and our city attorney's office.

Now I'm gonna ask you, all that are city employees, I think we'll just have all city employees back here.

This is that team, and this is not all of them by any stretch of the imagination. So thank you all, to all of you, and to everyone who helped make this historic summer possible. Thank you for representing San Jose with excellence and showing what we can accomplish when we work together as one team. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Jennifer. Thank you, Jennifer. I'd like to invite all of my colleagues on the city council to come down. We'll present the commendation to Tommy. Tommy, you have to share this with John Poach, though, okay?

Are you guys just going to stand? Okay, that works, yeah.

Good idea. You look taller that way.

Okay. Tommy, we've got to put you in the middle here. You kept us all on track. Thank you. Jennifer. He was our early investor.

You guys were.

Thanks for the partnership. Thank you guys. Thank you.

All right, we're on to orders of the day. I'm not aware of any requested changes and we do not have an adjournment. So I'm going to move on to the closed session report.

Mayor, Council met in closed session today regarding the items listed on the agenda. There's nothing to report at this time.

Thank you, Susanna. Appreciate it. All right. Next is the consent calendar. Are there any items Council would like to pull from consent? Okay. I believe we have one recusal on item 2.2. Council Member Mulcahy, is that correct? Okay. So why don't we pull item 2.2, let you...

Yeah, Mayor, I have a conflict with item 2.2. I have a financial interest in the property next door, but I'll stay at the dais and not leave the room.

Okay, great, so thank you. Colleagues, let's take item 2.2 for a separate vote first if we could. Tony, do we have any comment on item 2.2 specifically?

No.

Okay, thank you. Going back to the council.

Move approval. Second. Of 2.2.

Okay. I don't see any other hands. Tony, let's vote on 2.2. Okay.

Motion passes unanimously.

Great. Okay, so we're on to the remainder of the consent calendar. Thank you, council member. We have a second. Tony, do we have public comment on the remainder?

Yes, I have three items for consent calendar. And I have one person so far online. As a reminder, speakers must comply with the city's code of conduct for public meetings. Please direct comments to the body. Limit remarks to the item on the agendas. the agenda and observe the time limit. Conduct that materially disrupts the meeting or interferes with others' ability to participate may result in muting or removal as authorized by law. If you are participating by telephone, to raise your hand, please press star 9. I'm going to start with the in-person. I have Voldemar Calderon, Benarita Nastassi Vera, and an anonymous that says the settlement. If you could come down. and you don't have to speak in that particular order. And then online after I get, sorry, I have two mice and I keep grabbing the wrong one. Roland will be called after the other three speak. Go to the microphone.

Good evening, council members. My name is Valdemar Calderon. I'm with Unite Here Local 19, and I am proud to represent over 550 retail and food and beverage workers at the airport. As the city council seeks to approve a general authorization for uh airport grants we want to discuss the need for support for workers at the airport at the san jose airport these workers are the front line ambassadors of the city and they are often the first and last people who interact with visitors and residents at the heart of san jose however for far too long they have been treated as second-class workers by the city's labor policy and currently the Airport living wage is $7.56 less than the city's living wage. Workers deserve a wage that matches the reality of living and working in San Jose, and that aligns with San Jose standards for its city workers. The current disparity between...

Thank you, that's your time? That's your time? Yeah. Next speaker. If you want to submit anything in writing, you can give it to me and I can distribute it to you.

Buenas tardes. Mi nombre es Venerita. Soy residente en San Jose. He trabajado como cocinera con HMO en el aeropuerto de San Jose por cuatro años. Cada día llego temprano a mi turno en la cocina preparando comida para miles de viajeros que pasan por nuestra ciudad.

Every day I arrive early for my shift in the kitchen, preparing food for thousands of travelers who pass through our city. Since I don't drive, I take an Uber to get to and from work. Each turn, in the only way to arrive. That means an additional expense. Besides the rent, there's the food before lunch on my day. I do this job with pride because I represent San Jose to the world. But like many working families here, I feel the pressure of the cost of living each month.

Thank you, that's your time. Your time is up. Your time is up. I'm going to move on to... I don't see the third person in line, so I'm going to go to Roland online.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council, and welcome back. I'd like to very briefly touch on item 2.21, and I would like to start by expressing my gratitude for you actually agendizing a hearing on this. But I personally experience an issue with transparency, which is the same thing that happened in planning. That's why this thing totally flew below the radar. because he's talking about giving a franchise Tokai Energy for the purpose of transmitting electric service in cities public right away. What we're doing here is that we're going to be connecting a 100 megawatt battery electric plant right behind Lucky and surrounded by two churches and connect that to the Center Teresa substation. So moving forward, if you can have a little bit more transparency into the agenda item when we publish it. Thank you.

Sorry, back to council.

Thank you, Tony. Thank you to our public speakers. Coming back to the council, we have a motion on the rest of consent. I don't see any other hands. Tony, let's vote.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. Okay, we're on to land use consent, which is item 10.1a. It's the rezoning for 5891 Rue Ferrari Church. Do we have a motion or questions, comments?

Move to accept the item.

Great. Thank you. Tony, do we have public comment on item 10.1a?

I'm not sure. I think I have a card for Lakshman. And I can't read the handwriting, but the word permit looks like it's in there. So I'm calling, if Lakshman, if this is the item you wanted to speak on.

If you're in the chamber and wanted to speak on item 10.1A, which is the rezoning of 5891 Rue Ferrari Church, please begin walking down the stairs.

Otherwise, I'll move this card to open forum and call that person later.

Let's pause for one moment. I think we may have one public speaker, sir, maybe two. Okay. Okay, this is on item 10.1a? On item 10.1a, is that right? Okay, you have one minute. Go ahead.

We simply ask that the council approve this project. It's been plowing ahead for quite some time. We've been three years since we purchased the property, and we would like to expedite it. And with your approval, we can get on site and get engaged with our community. So we appreciate your support and your help.

Tony, do we have another public comment? Okay, not online either.

Back to council.

Okay, thank you. Okay, colleagues, we have a motion. I don't see any other hands, so I believe we're ready to vote. Tony, let's vote.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. Item 3.1, report of the city manager.

Thank you, Mayor. I do not have a report today.

Great. Thank you. All right. We're on to item 3.3, Proposition 1, Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act of 2026. I believe we have a brief staff presentation, comments. Emily, I'll turn it over to you when you're ready.

Good afternoon, Mayor. Council members, city managers, city attorney, city colleagues, and members of the public. I'm Emily Lamb, the Director of Administration, Policy, and Intergovernmental Relations for the City Manager's Office. And I'm here today to recommend support for Proposition 1, the Veteran and Affordable Housing Bond Act of 2026. Support means that the state could borrow $11.25 billion to construct or renovate housing for veterans, students, and Californians with lower incomes, mental health, or substance abuse challenges. This aligns with the city-focused area of building more housing, and it could facilitate the city's access to funding through grant or low-interest loan programs established by the bond. This includes repurposing interim housing to permanent supportive housing, affordable housing, and multifamily housing. Previously, with the $4 billion bond for veterans and affordable housing that voters approved in 2018, the city secured about $14 million. This time around, we believe that we could secure approximately $40 million if Proposition 1 were approved and assuming a similar proportional allocation. This bond is supported by a broad coalition, including the Bay Area Council, Cal Cities, Silicon Valley at Home, as well as advocates of housing, businesses, communities, environmental protection, labor, senior citizens, veterans, and youth groups. Also supporting Proposition 1 is San Jose State University, as they would add or upgrade housing for nearly 900 students. And with that, I'm happy to take questions.

Great. Thank you, Emily. Appreciate that. verbal report and recommendation. Tony, do we have public comment?

I have no cards in person. I have one speaker online. Brian, you have one minute. Wait. Before you go, as a reminder, you must apply with the city's code of conduct for public meetings. Please direct comments to the body and limit remarks to the agenda item and observe the time limit.

Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Thank you, ma'am. I appreciate the work you do. It The one minute thing is a bit much, but I understand it. And I know people don't trust these plan acts, but I've been doing research and the bonds are really overseen publicly wise, at least from what I can observe what's online. It takes a little time. So the only thing I've suggested, if the bond act passes, having a more transparent way for people to see where their money's going. But I support the act. Thank you.

Back to council.

Thanks, Tony. So just before I turn to a couple of colleagues for comments, I'll just say one thing that Emily referenced that I do think is noteworthy with this bond is something that my team and I worked with others to negotiate in, which is more flexibility. And I do think specifically the ability to use proceeds from the state's bond, should it pass, to both fund new permanent affordable housing, but also facilitate the conversion of interim into permanent is particularly exciting. So as we've talked about sites like some of the motels we've converted, it could be the Arena Motel, or it could be Branham in Monterey, which is not a motel, but I know Council Member Campos has advocated for converting into permanent affordable. This would be a financial tool for us to convert want to help us convert one or more of those sites which also reduces the operating burden on the general fund and helps add to the supply of affordable housing so I just I think that element of flexibility is useful into something my team and I spent a bit of time over the last six months negotiating with the proponents of the bill and that's why most big city mayors in the state are are supporting prop one okay let me turn to colleagues and we had a couple of hands up and we'll start with Councilmember Dwan

THANK YOU, MAYOR, AND THANK YOU TO THE IGR TEAM. I ENCOURAGE MY COLLEAGUES TO SUPPORT THIS PROPOSITION ONE. NOT ONLY BUILD HOUSING FOR OUR VET TO HELP AFFORDABLE HOUSING TO FIRST TIME PURCHASE ASSISTANT and including our students and our farm workers and multifamily housing. We're in a crisis in the city of San Jose and same as throughout the state of California and other states as well. We are shortage on affordable housing. And if we don't do anything about it, it's continued to grow. and a lot of our families out there will become homeless. And I think it's important that we find solution and funding to build more housing, not only here, but many other areas as well. And I will be supporting this measure. Thank you. Thanks, Council Member.

Let's go to Council Member Tordillos.

Thank you, Mayor. I just want to start by thanking Emily and the team from IGR for initiating this process. You know, Affordability remains the dominant challenge facing our region and at a time where the city is expected to face ongoing budget shortfalls in the years ahead. Every dollar that we're able to leverage from the state is money that we can put towards building more affordable housing in our communities and supporting affordability for everyone here in San Jose. I'm appreciative of the additional flexibility that this bill language will offer I know here in district 3 we have multiple hotel Canada hotel and motel candidates that are also could be good opportunities for conversion into permanent housing so I hope that this bond measure passes and if it does I hope that our partners here at the city across IGR and the housing department can work with our development community to make sure that we're securing funding that is commensurate with both our Our status as the largest city in Northern California, but also just the depth of the affordability crisis that we face here in the South Bay So with that I will move approval of the staff recommendation Thanks councilmember.

Okay. I don't think we have any other hands Tony.

Let's vote Motion passes unanimously

Thank you. We're on to item 3.4 resolution of intention to approve an amendment to the contract between the California public employees retirement system and the city of San Jose And Sorry Tony to a public comment I Have no cards for this item. Okay, come back to the council move approval.

I

All right. I don't see any other requests to speak. Tony, let's please vote on item 3.4.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. All right. On to item 3.5. This is the fiscal year 2026-2027 property tax levy for general obligation bonds. Do we have public comment on item 3.5?

I have no comments for this item.

OK. Thank you. Come back to the council, colleagues.

Move approval.

OK. Great. Seeing no other hands, Tony, let's please vote.

Motion passes unanimously with Cohen absent.

OK. Thank you. Let's move on to item 3.6 public hearing for the fiscal year 2026 2027 annual residential solid waste collection service charges to be placed on the 2026 2027 Santa Clara County secured property tax role Thank you move approval Okay Not seeing any other hands, Tony. I believe we're ready to vote on item 3.6.

Motion passes unanimously with Cohen absent.

Okay, we're on to item 3.7, public hearing for the fiscal year. There's Councillor Cohen. I think he would like to register an aye vote if the clerk will allow it. Public hearing for the fiscal year 2026-2027, sanitary sewer service and use charge and storm sewer service charge assessments to be placed on the 2026-2027 Santa Clara County secured property tax roll. Do we have any public comment on item 3.7? Brian?

online um thank you uh just not only the support for it i know i now that i understand the cost um again it goes back to and it might be just me and i'll totally admit that um explaining why and that if i'm remembering right you are obligated to pay this it's something that you you don't just willy-nilly do and it comes across that way not from you but just in general the way people look at it, because everything keeps going up. I would just ask maybe for a better explanation and educate us, because a lot of us, it's very complicated. And I'd like to thank what the treatment plant and what all the waste disposal people do. It keeps our society from going through some very painful times. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. I'm unable to see the raised hand feature. I think we have the vote screen up. Colleagues, were there any Other questions or comments? Okay, then we are ready to vote. Thank you.

Okay, sorry.

Oh, I'm sorry. I was thinking of the last item. I'm clearly out of practice. We'll go. I was tricked by the voting screen being up. Okay. So we have a motion. Let's back up. Sorry. We jumped the gun. My fault. Tony, can we go back? We have a motion from Council Member Condales to approve. Second from Council Member Cohen. I think we are now ready to vote.

Yes. Does any, like, I was just going to leave it.

There you go. It's still there. Will everyone please confirm their vote?

Motion passes unanimously. I also have two cards. I failed to call for item 3.3 to public speakers, and I know you already voted on it, but I wanted to give them the opportunity to come down, and that's Tamara and Corey, if they still want to talk about item 3.3.

All right, we're clearly getting back in the hang of things here. If you wanted to weigh in on item 3.3, we will provide a brief opportunity for folks.

I apologize for missing the card. I am rusty.

That's okay. We're all getting back into it. Tony, you had three names, I believe. You want to reread those?

It was just Tamara and Corey.

I see Tamara. Come on down, Tamara. Okay. Tamara, go. Yeah, go ahead.

It'll be short and sweet. Thank you for unanimously passing it, and we look forward to working with you. My name is Tamara Chavez, and I work with PATH and the regional director, so I appreciate all of your work. Thank you.

Thanks, Tamara. Okay, was there anyone else who was missed on item 3.3 who wishes to speak? I don't see anyone else approaching the podium, so Tony, it's okay with you. I'm going to move on to item 3.8.

Yeah, I just want to make sure they got that chance.

Great. Item 3.8, Amendments to Council Policy 0-4 and San Jose Municipal Code Title 2.08 related to boards and commissions. Tony, I believe you were going to give a few remarks on this item.

Yeah, I just have a few remarks. This item before you recommends updates to Council Policy 04 and related provisions of the Municipal Code. Governing the city's boards and commissions the primary goal of this item is to streamline the boards and commissions program reduce administrative workload and provide greater flexibility as Our systems and best practices evolve the key changes include streamlining the application and appointment process by removing those from the council policy to allow the city clerk to establish and update administrative procedures Limiting conflict of interest checks to only decision-making and quasi-judicial bodies rather than all advisory commissions. Provide commissioners greater flexibility to excused absences for good cause. Formally implementing the council's previous direction to sunset the neighborhoods commission. Dissolving the Council Appointment Advisory Commission, which has been unable to meet since 2020 due to lack of applicants, and moving those special eligibility appointments to mayoral nomination and council approval. This is a process that is already in the Municipal Code as the backup process and has been followed for the last six years. Generally moving commissions to quarterly meetings unless a different frequency is necessary to fulfill their statutory responsibilities and requiring commissions to follow council policy 037 for virtual and hybrid meetings and I'm available for any questions Thank You Tony appreciate that

Do we have public comment on item 3.8?

Yes. I have Jordan in person followed by Brian and call in user 1. And if you are on the phone, press star 9 to raise your hand.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks in advance for returning to hybrid meetings. I ask that you approve most of this item. I do request that council strike the sentence about not meeting more than quarterly It's concerning that the burden would fall on commissions to prove that they need to meet more than quarterly in order to do their jobs. And even if they statutorily can achieve their objectives with just quarterly meetings, there's, you know, community engagement happens at these advisory commission meetings. And it's just a really important avenue for members of the public to learn what's going on in the city and to provide their input. The staff memo doesn't have any fiscal or equity impact analysis for the move to quarterly, so we don't even know whether this is actually gonna make a big difference. I also ask that you use SB 707 in order to allow advisory commissions to themselves meet in a hybrid format. See my email, thank you.

Okay, Brian, followed by call-in user one.

Thank you. I understand that the district at the council level, the minute, if there's a lot of people that used to be, if it was over so many people, it was two minutes, even two minutes isn't enough. So we rely on email and I'm sorry, I get no response to emails and I get that to some degree, but at these community meetings, like the other gentleman said, this is where we have our discussion and it takes longer than a minute or if an email's written to at least that it's acknowledged that it was got and it was at least glossed over. Because a lot of us spend a lot of time doing emails to try to get the facts right, to get our sources right. I would really encourage that. I don't think it's gonna change, but I just would encourage that. Thank you.

Call in user one, followed by Martha.

Martha O'Connell, GSMOL, representing thousands of mobile home residents who wish to comment at the Housing Commission by Zoom. Also eight years on the Housing Commission and four of those as chair. During the time that the Housing Commission had Zoom, we only had one single incident of hate speech. That commissioner was subjected to vicious language based on a protected category under the Civil Rights Act in California. The person was muted and then removed from the meeting. That commissioner later stated that she would rather be subjected to vicious comments at every single meeting rather than take away the Zoom capacity for the residents. And just so you know, that commissioner with me.

Okay, thank you. And that's back to council.

Thanks, Tony. Let me come back to colleagues here. We'll start with Vice Mayor Foley.

Great, thank you. Tony, thank you for bringing this forward, particularly the simplification of applying for commissions and removing some of the blanket requirements that we had for everyone applying for every commission, no matter what the commission was. So I think this should make it a lot easier and more applicable to the appointment, the position the individual is actually seeking. I do have a question though regarding the quarterly meetings. I'm a little concerned that in the proposal it indicates that staff decides whether it should meet greater than quarterly. What's the thinking behind the quarterly meetings?

When I first started here, commissions were on quarterly meetings. And they, over time, went from quarterly to monthly. So I chose quarterly because it has been a standard in the past. It was put to quarterly back then due to the recession. And sorry, my watch just talked to me. It was put back to quarterly that back then during the recession to save staff time. So I kind of went back to that standard We already have six Commission's that meet quarterly and we I did put language in there though that if the work plan is they can bring it back to the committee that they are is responsible for approving the work plan to say in our work plan we need to meet six times a year not four times a year but but quarterly is sort of the kind of minimum unless you like we have a couple commissions that only meet two times a year we have 13 that meet monthly I have a commission that meets monthly but we cancel about every We cancel two to three meetings in a quarter already. So that's why I chose quarterly. It was a previous standard. I kind of just went back to it. But there is flexibility in the language that they can bring a work plan back to the council committee to approve more if they need to.

I think the concern that I have is the frequency of the meetings and I don't object to less meetings if they're getting their work done in less time that makes sense for most commissions but I'm looking at Jordan Moldau who's chair of BPAC and they get a lot done in their monthly meetings so to force them into a quarterly meeting Is Not the best use of their time in their advocacy So I'm wondering why this is staff driven and not Commission driven. It seems to me that that if summer meeting Semi-annually summer meeting quarterly. That's great. Some have to me and more than monthly Planning Commission Etc HCD me they meet often as well but leaving other Commission's up to the The discussion at the committee level or the commission level makes sense to me and puts the control there. I hear you about the work plan, but the work plan and the committee go hand in hand and they should be coordinating. So I would like to move approval of 3.8 with a modification that the frequency of the meetings be determined at the first committee meeting of the fiscal year by the committee. Thank you, Council Member. And that's it for me, thanks.

Thanks, Vice Mayor. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Let me turn to Council Member Cohen.

Yeah, I was going to raise the same question. So thank you, Vice Mayor, for bringing that up. I was concerned about a default to quarterly. I think it might make sense for some commissions to scale back. But as we heard, 13 commissions are currently meeting monthly. And I know that some of them have fairly robust agendas, things like library and early childhood education. And so I think defaulting to quarterly would kind of create a conflict where the commission might want to meet more frequently, but staff doesn't want to support it. I like the idea of offering some flexibility and maybe even language that says that commissions should meet no you know no less than quarterly so that there's some requirement that the Commission's meet although I heard you say there's one or two that meet even less than quarterly but allowing the Commission to make that determination makes sense I'm a little hesitant on the once a year always kind of you know having this conversation every year about how often should we meet but because I mean there could be times when you know but but I'm I'm okay with this compromise at this point to see how it goes but I I just wanted to make sure that we didn't have some kind of default expectation that the work that when you're joining Commission you're only meeting quarterly because for some Commission's there's a reason why they meet more frequently

Councilman member if I could respond to that the reason I said the first meeting of the fiscal year is because that's actually when they're setting the calendar for the year so if they decide okay we we don't want to have a meeting in December we want to have a meeting in November you know they're moving their schedule around so that's the time that also that the commissioners then are aware of of what their responsibility is for the fiscal year. That's how I chose that time frame.

I think they set their work plans in the spring for the following year, so maybe that's the time. But anyway, I appreciate the alternative language, and I think it'll be better than the defaulted quarterly, so thank you.

Great. Thanks, Council Member. Any other comments or questions? Council Member Mulcahy?

yeah just one question about um you know attendance at meetings that i'd understood one of the challenges that in some committees we've been having is getting a quorum to qualify do we have any data on that any any input on that

I don't have that data right now, but I do know if somebody misses three meetings in a row, they're generally removed from the commission. So if we have absences in other commissions, it's not necessarily the same person all the time. It might rotate.

Whose responsibility is that to both check attendance as well as excuse someone? Is that coming from your department?

No, the staff liaison for each one. is responsible for tracking then they'll tell us they'll tell my office hey this guy's missed three meetings and then we send the official letter saying you are now deemed resigned but my office isn't tracking it it's tracked individually because that's been noted as a concern are you feeling like the liaisons and your office are working well together to make sure that's actually being done Yes.

Okay.

Yeah. My staff person in my office who's sort of over boards and commissions is in frequent contact with all the liaisons with different things. And I know we've got one person who we just sent a warning out to because he's missed a few meetings.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks, Council Member. Council Member Kamea?

Thank you. I was thinking about what Councilmember Cohen mentioned in terms of when they put together their work plan. I don't want to peg it always to the first meeting of whenever a commission would meet. I think that they would know whatever their work plan is and I'd like to allow a little bit of flexibility should it be appropriate when they're doing their work plan to say, hey, this is the work plan. It gets approved by the committee or the commission, And so it would make sense to, you know, like, as appropriate, whether it's in the committee or the first time they meet or what have you. I know that some members turn over. Sometimes you'll get new members. But, you know, allowing a little bit of flexibility I think would be helpful. And that's kind of a request for a little bit of a friendly amendment. I was going to say, is that a friendly amendment request?

So can you be more specific?

When they're doing their work plan for the following year, at the end, they're approving what are they going to do in the next fiscal year. But sometimes it happens before their first meeting of the next fiscal year. So at a time when they're getting their calendars in order.

So I feel like we're micromanaging this a little bit. I just want them to set the calendar and determine how many times they're going to meet amongst themselves.

Can it be as general as that?

sure if you want me to remove the at the first meeting of the fiscal year that's fine I will do that and that still accomplishes what because really I want them to have the flexibility to decide under their own time what works best for them but I appreciate the comment does that work okay great thanks for the clarification and the flexibility I'm not seeing any other hands

Okay. Tony, let's vote on the Vice Mayor's motion.

Okay, and before that, I just wanted to announce for the record that under Orders of the Day, you did approve an item being added to this to apply virtual meetings to council committees. When you approved Orders of the Day, that was one of the adds. I just wanted to say that for the record, that that item was added under Orders of the Day, so Policy 037 will apply to council committees moving forward, which is just a return to virtual comments. And now I'll start voting. Thank you Tony Motion passes unanimously All right.

Thank you all we're on to item 5.2 response to Santa Clara County's civil grand jury report entitled a canopy and decline the San Jose serious about expanding its tree coverage and We have a staff presentation. I'll turn things over to John wrist down the team. I

While they're settling down, I did receive a card for 5.1. That item was deferred. The person who submitted that card will be called during open forum.

Okay. Thank you, Tony. John?

Thank you, Mayor and Council. John Russo, Director of Transportation. We are here for a response to the Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury Report. With me today is Matthew Tolney, Senior Deputy City Attorney with our City Attorney's Office. Sarah Davis, our city forester in Department of Transportation, and Assistant Director Rick Scott. What we're going to do is I'm going to turn it over to Matthew. He's going to do a very brief summary of the response to the grand jury report, and then I'll do a couple of slides just to do some background and history of the community management for the forest management plan. Go ahead.

Thank you, John. Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of the council. Matthew Tolmay, Senior Deputy City Attorney. As part of my duties, I advise the Department of Transportation. As you may be aware, the Santa Clara Civil Grand Jury submitted a report on the city's tree canopy coverage, and they published that report on May 19th. That report contained six findings. A summary of those six findings are on the slide before you. As part of, or as required by the California Penal Code, We have 90 days to respond to that report. The deadline for this particular report is next Monday, August 17th. As part of that report and our responses, California Penal Code also requires us to respond to each finding in a particular way. We must either agree entirely with each finding or we can disagree with the finding either partially or entirely with those findings. As you can see before you, for all six of the findings, we have disagreed either entirely or partially. The civil grand jury also typically, and they did so with this report, includes recommendations that go along with each one of these findings. We are required by the penal code to respond to those recommendations in a particular way. We have four options. We can state that that recommendation has already been implemented, Or second option, that the recommendation has not yet been implemented but will be at a future date. The third option is that it has not been implemented because it requires further analysis. Or the fourth option is that you could respond that the recommendations will not be implemented. In our responses to each of these findings, city staff has evaluated them and determined that each recommendation has already been implemented by the city. My office assists city staff who has the knowledge about the community forest management plan in responding to these, but ensuring that they conform to state law. The entirety of those responses are contained in the memorandum. And with that, I can pass it back over to city staff to go over the details of the program.

Thank you, Matthew. I just want to give a little bit of context and brief history and summarize kind of where we are with the plan since it's been adopted in 23. We have approved a new street tree list, which really helps homeowners with guidance on what trees can be and should be planted within the city. Since we adopted this, we have been averaging more than 2,000 plantings per year, which was outlined in the plan, so we're proud of that. We're also pruning quite a bit more trees with the grants that we received, so that's an important element of the plan as well, to maintain and manage those trees. And one of the things that I think we did a really good job with, we were hit with a shot hole borer, which was an invasive bug that brought a virus into the trees a couple years ago, and we had to pivot away from planting and actually take take a real big move towards saving many trees that could have been damaged by this virus that was going to go through. So we did a great job of actually pivoting away from that and then taking care of that pretty serious event that we're still dealing with as of today. We also are trying to get, there we go. more trees into our parks, streets, and in private property, so we're allowing started a new program for a free tree for all program part of this was funded by that federal grant that we received as well but this is just getting underway and we're really pleased that we can actually allow and provide for free trees for planting and in some cases in some parts of the city actually we will help to maintain and get those trees established we we have been pretty busy with the the work with planting the new trees and maintaining new trees and trying to establish the cost for all these new trees that we're working on we're happy that we have some really great partners involved with us too one of them was the um today at at the consent county you did approve a contract with our one of our partners conservation corps and that conservation corps we rely on to do a lot of tree planting so that's a really big thing we just got approved today And then our biggest partner, Our City Forest, is really, really a great help and a partner with us with both getting events, planting events scheduled and done as well as planting and maintaining trees around the city. Terrific partnership to help us get back to our canopy and we're looking forward to actually doing more with Our City Forest over the next couple of years. And then moving forward, these are some of the goals and actions that are within the plan. We've got a number of really important goals within that. We're going to revisit every five years what that goal and where we are with the canopy. We work with the county and the state in terms of how to determine what that canopy looks like. So every five years we're gonna update that. We definitely want to plant more and maintain more. It's really a budget issue, but we're actually aggressively still wanting to go after grants to be able to do more planting. and of course uh community partnership and actually getting the word out about free trees how to maintain trees and to plant more trees in in the city's right-of-way and then monitor that progress within the city structure of the t e committee and council and we're happy to turn it back over to council for questions on the response

Thanks, John.

All right, let's go to public comment first, Tony.

Okay, I have three cards in person, and I so far have two hands on line. As a reminder, speakers must comply with the city's code of conduct. Please direct comments to the body, limit remarks to the agenda item, and observe the time limit. Conduct that materially disrupts the meeting or interferes with the other's ability to participate may result in muting or removal as authorized by law. If you're participating by telephone, press star nine to raise your hand. Lynn, it looks like Lynn Paulson, Tara, and Jordan, come on down. And then after them, I'll have Brian and caller 1367.

Hello, my name is Lynn Paulson. I'm speaking about the tree canopy issue as a resident of San Jose and a volunteer active in neighborhood organizations and events. I appreciate the fact that the Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury investigated the important issue of the need for a tree canopy in San Jose. The tree canopy is important to all residents in the city with its impacts on cleaning our air, cooling our air and land, improving wildlife habitat, and increasing our enjoyment of the scenic values of the community. The city's response does not yet provide enough detail to give the public confidence in how the city will reverse the long-term decline in canopy. I sent a letter which outlined what is missing. I respectfully ask the city council to direct staff to incorporate the recommendations outlined by our city forest, including a funded implementation plan as the city moves forward from this grand jury response. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Thank you. Speaking on behalf of our city forest, I think the mayor and council got our public comment letter with five recommendations in response to strengthen San Jose's declining tree canopy. As the Arbor Day Foundation found, every dollar a city invests in a tree provides two to five dollars in benefit. And as Lynn pointed out, we're looking at, we grew our AmeriCorps program and so the city's always provided a match to our AmeriCorps program and we hope the match can reflect our recent growth in terms of our workforce. We're also looking at better use of development mitigation fees to get replacement trees in the ground. And just as importantly, we cannot plant our way out of canopy decline while continuing to lose mature trees. So we hope that can be increased preventative and structural pruning particularly in low-income neighborhoods and want to especially mention our constructive discussion.

Thank you. That's your time. Next speaker. Greg, come on down.

Jordan Moldau, District 3. I'd just like to speak in support of all the written public comments and verbal public comments. I especially liked Our City Forest's suggestion about the zero net canopy loss policy. I think that would be really good to have. I also think some of the staff responses seem a bit unnecessarily pedantic and missing the forest for the trees, as it were. The response about how the forester and DOT are in charge seemed to miss the larger point that was trying to be made, that there seems to be some sort of breakdown in consistency between how DOT handles trees and how other departments handle trees. the response about how we revisit our planting counts every five years and adjusts myths that maybe five years is not frequently enough. And it probably is true that if we keep at our current rate, we will miss our goal. So I hope we will think a little bit more deeply about the responses. Thanks.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Oh, sorry about that. Good afternoon, City Council. My name is Greg. I'm a resident of District 8. I live within neighborhoods close to Evergreen Eastside and Eastridge. Very beautiful trees over there. It's a very nice neighborhood. The greenery, the way that they upkeep everything over there is really nice. However, I do like to speak towards the fact that this is not common throughout the rest of the city. I know Transport T&E met yesterday as a committee and was able to discuss some of these issues. I did not watch the whole video, unfortunately. However, I do want to make it aware that there are a lot of organizations out there that do plant trees. My brother was part of Rotary and Interact in high school. I went around and planting trees, but the upkeep AND MAINTAINING THESE TREES SO THAT IT'S NOT GETTING IN THE WAY OF RESIDENTS HOUSES IS A VERY BIG DANGER. SO I PLEASE ASK TO HAVE CITY COUNCIL REVIEW THESE PROPOSALS. THANK YOU.

THANK YOU. BRIAN.

I'M WELL I CAN'T REALLY DESCRIBE IT IN A MINUTE. I WAS PART OF A PROJECT CAN'T MENTION IT DUE TO REASONS BUT I WATCHED you know, there's trees have an emotional impact. You know, my mom planted a tree at the place where we were at and watched it grow up and understand emotion and that kind of stuff. Me lacking money and funding means I don't really, I'm not entitled to that. At least that's what was made clear to me. And people thought it was sort of funny when they ripped the trees out in front of the people who used to live there. Um, and these were things that people raised for 40, 50 years, uh, families did. And, um, It was emotional. I'm sure that's a personal and moral failing on my part, or at least that's what I'm often told. But I just think we should think about that too. I'm sure I'm probably mistaken though. Thank you.

Caller 1367.

Yes, my name's Lillian. I live in District 3. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay, thank you. The Community Forest Advisory Committee needs to meet more often. They need to discuss what the new street tree list consists of. Does it consist of just street trees or is it developers who uproot trees? And my main concern is you have a $5.6 million grant from the US Forestry Service. Why not include keeping our tree canopy what we have already and not have that decline, because it's sad to say that we sometimes turn a blind eye to that. And I'll just make a comment quickly, if I may. St. James Park, which will have a pavilion, has a placard in front of it. It's very small, and it states that 98 trees are going to be uprooted for the pavilion. What is more important to Tree City USA San Jose, your tree canopy, Thank you, back to council.

Thank you, Tony. Thank you to those who spoke during public comment. Let me start with colleagues. Council Member Ortiz.

Thank you, Mayor. Also, thank you, staff, for your presentation. First, I just want to thank staff for their thoughtful response to the Civil Grand Jury Report and for the work that has gone into implementing the Community Forest Management Plan. It's encouraging to see the progress that we've made from expanding forestry staff and increasing tree plantings to improving pruning cycles and securing significant federal funding. I also appreciate the thorough response to each of the grand jury's findings. And while there are areas where the city and the grand jury may disagree, I think this report gives us an important opportunity to identify where we can continue improving and growing on the progress that have already been made. I also want to thank our city forest for their letter and continued partnership with the city. I've had the opportunity to join OCF at several tree plantings throughout my district, and I've seen firsthand their community involvement and long-term care that they bring to this work. I especially appreciate the next steps they outlined in their letter. particularly around strengthening the city's partnership with OCF, expanding investment in tree planting and care, and placing greater emphasis on preserving our existing mature tree canopy. I hope we can continue building on the strong working relationship staff and OCF have developed because I think that partnership will be critical to achieving our long-term goals. With that being said, I do have a few questions. One of the themes raised in both the grand jury report and our city force letter is that planting new trees alone won't reverse the canopy decline. if we're continuing to lose mature trees. I wanted to ask if you could talk a little bit about how the city is accounting for the loss of mature trees today, and whether there are additional opportunities to strengthen preservation efforts and prevent pruning, and preventative pruning, particularly in low-income communities where canopy protection won't be a family's number one priority.

Thank you. John Risto again. What I'll do is maybe I'll do an overview of that and then I'm going to probably turn it over to Sarah for some of those more detailed things. So the loss of trees, it can happen just because trees are getting older and they do need to be replaced. But quite a few of them do happen, the loss of trees with new development. One of the speakers did mention that. When new development comes around there is quite often in the case that Trees will need to be removed for new new buildings We do have a mitigation program run by a planning department that does collect For each one of those trees that may be removed Those funds are then moved over to either parks department or us to actually try to replace do replacement planting So that is one way of doing it. I think There's probably much more to that and I'm gonna turn it over to professional Sarah to actually talk about what goes into some of the loss of the trees and then what we possibly can do about that. Sarah, do you wanna take that?

Thank you, John. Council members, Sarah Davis, city forester for the city of San Jose. So accounting for canopy loss can be a very technical thing, as we can count trees by trees. And one tree doesn't necessarily always equal another. A new tree isn't the same as a large tree. So over time, as a large tree goes missing, is lost from the canopy, its replacements might be four more trees. that over time will grow to replace that larger tree at a rate of four times. And canopy is difficult to measure because we're playing a very long game here. So we plant one tree, we might not see in the data that that tree is providing benefit for 25 years. So it's a long game. So right now, CAL FIRE is working on a project where they'll be looking at all of the urban canopies across the state of California about every other year. So they're about to deliver that product here in the fall, and that's based on the imagery from 2024. So those time intervals have tightened up considerably. It used to be sometimes your canopy cover was based every 10 years, sometimes every five years. It was a mixed bag. So we're moving forward with being able to set those baselines and being able to consistently measure ourselves against those baselines. So moving on to preventative pruning. We are actively pruning all of those trees that are in public spaces, so the medians and the backups, the land between the sound walls and the curb essentially. That pruning rotation before the adaptation of the plan was about 30 years per tree. So we touch each tree about once every 30 years. Since then, we've been able to reduce that down to about 11 years. So we're able to touch each one of those public trees about once every year, 11 years. That is down one from last year. So we're making considerable progress. Additionally, we do understand, that tree preservation does have to do with pruning. So part of our federal grant project is to go through qualifying neighborhoods and do some proactive maintenance of street trees in those areas. And that'll be able to help us understand what the real world cost is of taking on pruning at that large of a scale. And if you could please repeat for me question number two of the three questions.

I Just pretty much said like how are you? Are you focusing these preventative pruning strategies in areas that are lower income or under resourced?

Yeah, of course we try to be as equitable as possible and that federal grant is focused on Certain parts of town that have lowered canopy and have more struggles with tree care Do you keep track as we've been making progress over the years?

do we keep track of how these districts that have low canopy and are improving the progress that we've made?

Yeah, at this point, since we're only in year three of a 40-year plan, we are collecting that information based on each individual tree, so tree by tree stem. Again, we'll have to wait a little bit more time to see what that canopy contribution is going to be as the trees grow.

Just so that we know how much time would we need to wait in order to start understanding our effectiveness with our strategy.

Yeah, think about your kids, right? When they're little, they stay little for a minute, and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, they're six feet tall. That's kind of what a tree does as well. So there's a rapid increase. So around year 10 to 15 is where we see that tree really starting to take off.

So when we're no longer council members. So I guess that's the next round of council members' responsibility. Okay. As we continue to implement the community forest management plan, do we currently have enough workforce and programming capacity to carry out these recommendations? Are there opportunities to strengthen existing programs and partnerships so that we have the crews, outreach, and long-term maintenance necessary to achieve our canopy goals?

thank you again I'll give an overview and then turn it over to both Sarah and Rick for that one so I think the quick answer is yes with our partnership with our City Forest and the action that Council took today to award a contract to Conservation Corps and we also have contractors that we've awarded contracts to so we have enough capacity to plant the trees it'd be nice to have some more budget to plant more trees but the capacity is is there i think i'll let sarah and and rick answer the rest of that because it would be something we would like to actually have or our city forest be able to take on more when their capacity increases because they do a great job with that but uh it is a budgetary thing as well so sarah or rick you want to do the details of that yeah sure thank you jean

Initially, about four or five years ago, the forestry staff within the Department of Transportation was two people. Since then, we've been able to expand staff sixfold. So we're up to 12 FTE at the moment, two of which are being funded by that federal grant and will be with us just for a term of two years. So our workforce in terms of the city itself is amping up and we're getting to that right size. In terms of the nonprofit capacity to do planting and outreach work, I believe we're there and we are growing with our partners. In terms of the actual labor force for our contractors who are doing the work, that has been a struggle for the last 20 years. However, the Department of Labor at the federal level has recognized tree work as a skilled trade, so those workers are becoming more and more available as well.

Okay. Thank you so much. Final question. As the city moves from planning to implementation, how does staff envision continuing to partner with organizations, whether it's our city forest or others, to expand the tree planting, improve long-term survival of the trees, and help us achieve these goals in the management plan? Do you want to?

Sure, I will dive right into that. Trees in the City involve the community at all different levels, from individuals up to the city government. And sometimes that, well, always, that nonprofit partner in the middle acts as a bridge between the two. Without a successful urban forestry nonprofit, it's very difficult for the municipality to be successful as well. So moving forward, I'm really excited about a renewed relationship with Our City Forest. I think we've... work some bumps out and are working much, much better together, which is a very excited about. And we see this model across the nation is very similar. If you have that hole in your nonprofit space, in your partner world, it's really challenging. And with that, as the relationship becomes more and more mature, even though it's been around for over 30 years, that establishment and stewardship work can just grow and blossom from there. So I'm excited with the continued relationship with OCF, as well as to venturing into a new territory with the San Jose Conservation Corps as playing a role in the addition of urban work to their already existing programs in the wildland interface as well as the forest.

Okay. Thank you so much. Looking forward to this conversation, I guess, in 10 years. I don't know. We'll see. Thank you.

I think we'll have an item this fall, another one, right? But yeah, good point. What do they say about trees? The best time to plant one is 20 years ago or something like that? All right, Council Member Cohen.

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for the report and thank you for serious review of the grand jury report. I don't have any real concerns about the response to the grand jury report. I think the answers make sense. We are working on... We're in early phases of this project, so to conclude that we're not making progress or not on track at this stage is a little premature. Having said that, there are some valid questions that are raised by the report and I just want to ask a few I do want to also acknowledge that this is not necessarily the time to ask about data and numbers we get that when we get our tree canopy report which I know comes during the fiscal year we'll see later and have a chance to dive into more details on some of this good stuff but you know one good point that was raised was how there's a difference between planting trees and then maintaining them after they're planted and I just Wanna make sure we feel like we have a good balance and a good support structure to keep the trees alive after they're planted to make sure they're watered adequately because that's been a big concern of mine in many of the plantings that we do. So I don't know if you have any thoughts on that at this point.

Sure, we're structuring our approach in a couple of different ways. Where we're planting in public spaces for medians and our backups, those trees that are being planted come with a warranty. So if our contractor is unable to establish that tree over a three-year period, they have to replace it, and the clock starts ticking fast. over again and where we're planting trees in neighborhoods there's two different mechanisms for establishment care in neighborhoods that are within the grant area that grant will provide support and establishment watering as well as pruning and in those neighborhoods where we're using our development mitigation funding those individual property owners commit to taking care of their tree. So a tree doesn't just pop up without a steward. That steward has to come forward before the tree can pop up.

Great, thank you. I know that you mentioned the warranty and how we replace trees. I know it's frustrating for people, for all of us, when we see a row of trees planted along the side of the road and a third of them are dead six months later and know we always are wondering is someone watching does someone know this is dead and i guess i want to ask that question because i often am reporting or having my staff call it in should we be confident that there's a good process in place to monitor those trees once they're planted so that the follow-up occurs and the replacement occurs in a timely manner yes we we do

Check in on those trees from time to time. We mostly check in on those trees when we receive the invoices for watering. We want to confirm that what we're paying for is actually happening. So we do go back and follow our contractors to make sure that that watering is happening. These are living things. Things go wrong, there's pests, there's diseases, there's environmental problems as well as abiotic factors that come into play. So typically a street tree in an inner core of a city has about a 7% mortality rate. So there is always some loss with planting, but we are following up, yes.

Okay, thank you. I will also add that if you do notice anything that's concerning, never hesitate to let us know. Appreciate it. I will.

I'm sure we will continue to do that. Thank you. The... the when we when we brought this when we had this issue come forward in 2023 and we were kind of coming up with all this one of the things that we had learned was that we were collecting these tree mitigation funds they were sitting in an account they weren't being spent this isn't the right time for me to ask you data about that fund probably but i want to just make sure that when we get our report coming back that we can maybe actually see what was the balance then what is the spending each year how is it being used can we you know see some specifics about that that yeah we could report on that and actually

Sarah can give you some good news in how we spent down that money right now, but we'll give you the year-to-year as well. Okay.

Yeah, of course. We do spend it down. Right now, the balance in that account is the lowest it's ever been. We are spending that money with our partners like OCF for their pay-for services, so we are sharing that. around as well as with our typical contractors. And we are monitoring that when those fees come in, half of those dollars are spent in the district that it was generated from. And the other half of those fees are going into a pool or a kitty to share with the other neighborhoods that don't have as much development going on. So it is a little unpredictable because those fees do come from development. So there needs to be a developer that steps forward plans a project and actually moves through to removing large trees and then at that point we'll see that money come in so those projects don't always happen sometimes there could be a year turnaround and poof there's a five square building sometimes a project could come through that might take five years to get to the stage of breaking ground so We can predict the outgoing stream. We can't always predict the ingoing revenue stream. And honestly, we kind of want the revenue stream to be as low as possible. That means we're protecting as many large trees as possible.

When do the fees come in? When the trees are removed at the beginning of construction or at the same time as all the other fees at the very end of project?

When the building permits are issued.

So trees will be removed and it could take two years to three years? No. can't cut down a tree until your project starts well that's what I mean but what the project starts you're saying the fees still don't come in though over a couple years after when the building permit the occupancy permit is is obtained or no it's come or the fees come in with the building permit yes okay so they come in or they come in at the beginning when the trees are about to be removed yeah because there could be a project where it doesn't actually get built so the trees could be gone and

and the project evaporates and now we're missing trees. That's what I was wondering, okay. So they don't move out until the project actually begins.

And something I want us to think about, and maybe it'll be conversation and a policy discussion, I'm just throwing it out loud now because it just occurred to me, it's been occurring to me this year, but in order to solve this problem we also might need some policy changes when it comes to what we expect of development. So we kind of operate under this expectation that when a development comes into a large property, especially the large scale developments, many of which are in my district, that trees are gonna be lost and that's just the way it is and we have a six to one or whatever ratio of replacement and we get fees and then we use them. But we haven't really looked at those policies to try to figure out how do we maximize the preservation of the existing trees. And I'll just give an example, because we have a development in the Lundy area on Trade Zone in North San Jose, which had 50 trees on the property. It's a manufacturing building. It's going to be a great project. And certainly, I'm not suggesting we hold projects back for this. there were a number of trees along the road. But the result of our policies say that when the development occurs that certain sidewalk improvements and roadside improvements have to occur in a certain configuration. So the trees have to be on the certain side of the sidewalk and there's a whole layout. And if we find out when the development is occurring that that's not the current layout, we expect them to remove the trees even if the developer's willing to preserve them. I've had a conversation with a developer there who said, if you can get me out of cutting down all these trees, We're happy to, we don't need these trees to be removed, but the city policy said the sidewalk has to be here. The trees have to be here. So you have to take down the trees and put in new trees. I drove by the other day. Construction just started last month. All the trees are gone and it was that moment of I'm so upset I couldn't make this happen. But we ought to be revisiting some of our policies that puts tree preservation at equal footing with some of the other things on our priority list. So I want to suggest that I will be bringing that forward when we have this next conversation because we seem to be defaulting to just removing trees and dealing with the outcome later. and a lot of trees are being lost in areas of large development, particularly in District 4, but I'm sure in other places around the city. So just wanted to leave it with that. Thank you.

Thanks, Council Member. I think it's a great point, and we would benefit from having a little more nuance or flexibility. Public works doesn't always get to win. Sometimes our urban forest does. All right. Just kidding, Matt. All right. We're on to Council Member Mulcahy.

Thank you, Mayor. So our D6 team has been working with the Corey Neighborhood Reforestation Committee and DOT's arborist, Sarah Davis, and of course, Tara and our city forest, who we heard from earlier. Corey's a large, predominantly single family neighborhood just above Valley Fair, kind of northwest corner of the district. City of Santa Clara. Trees are a defining element of the neighborhood for sure. And there's been some really important and collaborative effort between the parties I talked about. And one of the things that's really been identified, it's sort of not really what Councilmember Cohn was just talking about. It's sort of adjacent. It's sort of This notion that when we send projects through the process, through the PBCE process, whether a street tree existed there before or not, the expectation is somebody's planting street trees as part of that project. And I sort of put this in the same category as I do and I drive Matt Lush crazy when I complain about the fact that when we let developers build in our streets and then they don't restore the asphalt the same way, right? We're releasing these people from signing off on a project, they get to occupy it and they're off and running, but the street in front of the property looks terrible, right? We're going through it right now in our district where we have San Jose Water digging up all over our neighborhood. after literally a year and a half ago, the streets were repaved. I feel the same way about street trees, and I know the Cory neighborhood feels the same way, where we're releasing people, and I know we're talking about people who just built a house, put in an ADU, a developer who built multiple units. You can go to many projects, certainly in this area that we're talking about, because where it's an issue and they are raising it, and I agree, I can go to other parts of District 6 and see the same thing, And I know that colleagues are probably not in their heads. They have the same condition in their own areas. What are we doing? How can we do this? It seems to me like you guys aren't necessarily the shepherds of that during construction. You're inheriting that. DOT after it happens is there any collaboration that you're thinking about with your partners at PBC e to make sure that whoever's signing off on that project like literally allowing PG&E to get turned back on but yet we got no street tree out in front and nobody is going back to check to make sure it gets planted So what can we do and how can we do better in this regard? And are you thinking about that? Maybe I'll start with John.

Yeah, let me. The utility cuts in the streets are something that we do work with Public Works on to make sure that the standards for returning that street are met. And that is something that we always work with. Sometimes that doesn't happen or we need to do better there. But that was just your example. What you're talking about is the development review process in terms of when new developments come in that disrupt existing trees and possibly sidewalks and all the rest of it. We're part of that process and actually Sarah probably reviews every project that comes through the development process and then we provide our comments back through Public Works Development Services for replacement of trees or the whole removal of trees issues i think you're bringing up so we were part of that process and so our arborist are looking at that all the way as a development goes all the way through and starts to build then it's really up to uh public works and inspectors to ensure that whatever those conditions that were approved for that project are met with regard to replacement of trees and replacement of sidewalks and curb and gutter and all that so we we are all together on that we work together with those departments planning and building code enforcement and development services and public works so they get our influence they get our comments on all the developments with regard to trees and anything with regard to the roadway system so I don't know if that answers fully your question, but we're part of that process.

Well, I'm asking the question, though, John, because we have a lot of areas where we don't have street trees that probably you went and looked at the permit and the approval process. They were required to put them in, and I guess what I'm asking is we have conditions that are left behind after somebody signs off on a permit card for grants occupancy, and yet certain things are left behind unfinished like a street tree that wasn't planted that was required to be.

yeah that would be we would absolutely need to follow up with public works to make sure that the tree gets planted if it was in that design and condition of approval it needs to get done but we're in on the front end of it and then to ensure that it actually gets done according to the plans is another step in that process if you're okay with it i'd love to get sarah's input because we're working on this exact issue with this reforestation committee is there anything you wanted to add about the you know the aggravation that the neighbors are feeling

Yes, and I really appreciate the Cory neighborhood being active in this space. It reinvigorates our ideas of working a little bit more collaboratively. So on large-scale development, we pretty much have that down. We will engage with the project in the planning phase before it moves over to the public works phase. so that we're being proactive in meeting design standards for the private property, as well as right-sizing the infrastructure and the public right-of-way to support street trees. We're also conditioning the approval of those plans based on the species that they choose, so if there are any changes made along the way, my team is involved to make sure that the infrastructure stays the right size for the change of the plant species. So where the gap is right now is in single family, duplex, and ADUs. So right now forestry isn't in that pipeline. And I believe that's part of the issue in the Casey neighborhood. I'm sorry, you're council member Casey. That's council member Casey. I meant to say Corey, the Corey neighborhood. is they're seeing lots of scraping builds, so we're not seeing those plans. So I actually have a meeting next week with the new code enforcement supervisor to see how we can integrate forestry into those processes, as well as enter into the realm of private property tree removal permitting. I will add one thing to development is at the time the Certificate of occupancy is signed off before then our inspector will go out and check the landscape And if the proper things aren't planted in the right place or in the right way, we do have the developer make those corrections That's what I'm looking for Thank you

Thanks, Councilmember. I just have a couple comments and questions. I'll try to be brief. I really appreciate my colleagues' excellent questions, and I know everybody on this council cares a lot about our urban forest. I want to especially just recognize Councilmember Cohn has been a real champion. He's set aggressive tree planting and maintenance goals in his district, and he's been very on top of the policy work in this area, but I know it's a shared passion for many, if not all of us. The thing I'm trying to better understand, and I think my colleagues got at this a little bit, particularly Council Member Ortiz, is understanding our long-term trajectory, and Sarah, you spoke to the challenge, all the factors of not all trees are the same, different levels of maturity, public and private land, there's so many different variables here, and yet, we are in the age of artificial intelligence and satellite imagery and all these new tools. And I think there's a growing awareness of the value of a healthy urban forest. When you all come back, whether it's this fall with the additional data we'll have or in 2027, so next year with the five-year review, can you help us understand the quality of the data analysis we'll have at that point? And maybe I can be more specific. We know we want to be at 20%. We were in 2012 at 15.4. 2020, we had dropped to 13%. We're somewhere between there, probably closer to 13%. I don't know. Maybe you know. with all these different variables no matter how much complexity there is at the end of the day you take a top-down photograph of the city and there's some amount of canopy cover and I just I want to know if we understand which variables or levers we might be able to pull and the magnitude at which we need to pull them or in other words, the investment we need to make to be on a net positive trajectory because we've said we wanna be at 20% by 2051, is that right? Okay, so when will we get the high quality data analysis to really understand our true trend lines and which levers or variables this council might be able to pull?

You've asked the question, Mr. Mayor, of me totally geeking out now. So we've gotten past that pixel size resolution I've talked about before about measuring canopy cover, and it's going to be more consistent now moving forward with the CAL FIRE project. Their data is going to be analyzed by the California Air Quality Board as well as partners at NASA. So we have really great minds honing in on producing a logical process over and over and over. So we're getting that dialed in. So I'm happy about that data. question about how do we get to a larger percentage of cover, I think something to consider is land use. So are we looking at a percentage of canopy cover in industrial areas versus neighborhoods? because those are very different land use types. And in those industrial areas, they're covered by large footprints of buildings. It's more challenging to get canopy cover there. We can shade the parking lot, but we can't necessarily shade the expanse of the roof. However, in a neighborhood, higher canopy cover percentage is obtainable because there is more space. The buildings are smaller and have smaller footprints, and there is the luxury of having the private property on the parcel as well. So I think the lever is considering what is the right size canopy cover for different land use types.

Okay. If I can build on what Sarah is saying, I am myself also a very data-driven person, And of all the programs that we oversee, forestry is the most challenging for that mindset because it is a living thing. There are a lot of variables that impact it. And the biggest single impediment to us having a trend line to this point has been infrequent canopy calculations. It just takes so long for us to get it. As Sarah said, there's many ways to disaggregate that data. I do think that with a one to two year frequency that we are expecting in the future, it gives us a much better position to actually start exercising these levers that we're talking about and seeing possibly quicker modifications to our total goal.

Yeah, I really do think with the proliferation of satellites and better data processing that we should be at a point where we can really better understand our baseline and how it's trending. I think we as a council need to be able to understand a very basic baseline question or the answer to a basic question, which is at our current investment level and our current policies, are we net positive every year and how much? And therefore, what is our trend line? And I just think that's the most basic question of do we know, are we heading in the right direction or not? And at what kind of rate? Because even if it's positive, if it would take us until 2100 to get there, then we're not investing enough to hit our goal at least. But it's hard for us without that analysis to really right-size our investment or talk about other policies. So I'm looking forward, again, whether it's Later this year or 2027 with the five-year review, I really would like to know how close we can get to answering that question of the rate of change with some confidence. Again, at our current investment level, current policies. want to also say I appreciated seeing the free tree giveaway and I think there's an area where we can partner with folks like our city forest and other partners you know we've got 1.5 million trees in the city and change over 90 percent of them are on private property privately maintained city doesn't have access to them except I suppose in an emergency but um need to really think about again is for a future conversation we're going to have to get more creative and ambitious beyond the land that is in the public right-of-way i know we all know that but i just i don't know we've had enough conversation beyond develop new development and the requirements on developers and some of the conversation councilman cohen councilman mulcahy were having earlier I want to think more about, like us collectively, think more about how do we inspire, enable, incentivize private property owners to do more with the land that already accounts for over 90% of our urban forest. Okay, so that's mostly food for thought. I think we all want to tee up the next really substantive conversation, but I appreciate the official response to the Grand Jury Report. Appreciate the Grand Jury highlighting this important issue, even if our official response maybe takes issue with a few of their recs, but... Yeah, it's an important topic. So thanks, everybody. I don't see any other hands. We do have a motion to adopt our response. Tony, let's vote.

Motion passes unanimously.

All right. Thank you all. Appreciate your work on this. We're on to item 7.1. This is the agreement with Bell Properties for Professional Property Management Services. Eric, when you're ready, please jump in.

Thank you, Mayor. So Eric Sullivan, Director of Housing. I'll just give a very brief presentation just on a few slides related to this item, which moves forward on our continuing work regarding optimizing the shelter system. This is part two, as we've already executed on the roll-up of our consolidated security services. Now we're consolidating work around property management across the sites, shifting that work from our social service providers to a centralized execution. So this intended site is to be deployed across a targeted set of sites where we have direct control. So it's primarily focusing on those sites that we have direct ownership. So our existing five motels that we just leased there will be excluded from this work. as we then are coming with a follow-up item to acquire a few of those hotels. This consolidated work is really going to allow us to achieve our ongoing target of over 95% of occupancy rate. You'll see our trend thus far in the past six months is trending a bit below that due to just some transitional work that we have to do in some of the scattered and a very kind of segregated work around unit turns as well as continuing maintenance at each of the sites. So this targeted set will address 15 sites in total, just about 1,700 beds, 1,400 units at this list of properties. We're going to be rolling this out beginning in September through the end of the year as we look to transition to this consolidated execution for property management. This is a very consistent approach that you'll see across housing authorities and other big property managers, given that the city now runs 22 different sites, 15 sites specifically on this list, where we can get to scale of optimization as well as effectively bulk purchasing this service in order to get to service reductions. This is just some basic principles around property management which is a lane of business that the department is deeply involved in at this point. And so as I mentioned, the overall approach here is to transition Bell Properties in, remove that service from our social service providers that they do through contracted work through third parties. We'll be exempting out sort of some of the sites that we're terming off or transitioning We're just leasing but eventually owning and just doing this execution very methodically so we can get to a much more comprehensive operation across the sides. A lot of the core services that Bell is going to be picking up are these areas of execution that our social service providers just simply are not designed to provide. routine maintenance, emergency repairs, pest control, dealing with groundskeeper, refuse collection, a whole host of that sort of centralized work that deals with general property maintenance at these sites. And by executing a work order system, which is part of the added benefit that Bell Properties is going to bring, we're going to have a firmer connection with my good colleague Matt Lesh's team in Public Works to ensure we get more timely unit turns so we can maximize utilization of all the beds within the system. Overall, as we look to execute on this work, we're projecting just about $1 million worth of savings or a 20% reduction from the listed budgeted amount in the current FY26-27 budget. That's our target we're working towards. As we get to execution, we'll be continuing to track those outcomes to ensure that our strategy of approach here for property management is meeting its objectives. So that's the overview of this work, and I'm happy to answer your questions.

Thanks, Nick. Appreciate the overview and your hard work to make sure we are finding efficiencies and bringing down operational costs in the interim housing portfolio. Tony, do we have public comment?

Yes, I have Ted in person, followed by Brian online. Ted, come on down. As a reminder, speakers must comply with the city's code of conduct, direct comments to the body, and limit remarks to the agenda item.

Good afternoon. My name's Ted Scarlett. Mayor, I've been asking for two years to meet with you. And what I have to say, I'd really rather say in private, most of it. But this was a lot of fancy language, and I appreciate this man as a professional that he is. But I'm going to tell you, this whole setup is a dismal failure. And the number one reason are the individuals participating. There's a brand new facility. It hasn't even been open six months. It's being destroyed. And this is a big game to the participants, a large portion of the participants. There are people who really need help. They want to get back. out in society that's a small portion of the participants this is a i've seen this firsthand it's a huge game these people are become violent they have no interest in participating in society you are wasting taxpayer dollars thank you that's your time brian i'm just hoping that the management um

Dave Kuntz, That you're undertaking is consistent in applying the rules to the city and to the individuals that are receiving the services. Dave Kuntz, And i've read a lot about there being physical threats on people who are trying to get their lives straight and needing help and they should get help, but if there are people in the these facilities that are being violent to other people that are living there. I would hope that that would be dealt with. And maybe if you unify the management from what I think of this understood, that would help. If I had a magic wand to wave and change this, I would, because I'm sure not having a house is just a terrible event. I've been there a couple of times, but anyways, thank you.

Raquel, come on down or maybe it's Rachel.

Hi, my name is Rachel. I am the founder and CEO of the new nonprofit in Santa Clara County and Alameda County and San Mateo County in regards to seniors and rapid rehousing and reentry services. On this matter here, the only concern that we have is the death tolls of overdoses that are happening in these programs and these housings. For instance, Second Street Studios, there have been a lot of people, 200 within the last seven years, who have died from drug overdoses. We just want to know who is overlooking these and who are seen and who's just basically overlooking these overdoses. Thank you. Back to counsel.

Thank you, Tony. Appreciate the public comment as well. Turn to colleagues. Colleagues, do we have a question, comment or motion?

I'll move approval.

Second.

Thank you.

Okay. Great. I don't see any other hands. Again, Eric, thank you for your work on this. I know we talked last year about finding operational efficiencies in security, food, property management, et cetera, and this is a no-brainer. If we can maintain high-quality standards and reduce the cost by 20%, that helps us serve more people and makes this system more sustainable. So thank you for that. Okay, Tony, let's vote.

Motion passes unanimously great.

Thank you We're on to open forum which is an opportunity for members of the public who would like to comment on city business That was not on today's agenda to do so Tony. Do you have comment cards?

Yes, I have several cards When I call your name, please come on down. The first one says trans services No name, so please come on down Anna or Ann Harris Rudy Jack Lachman, come on down and then I'll call the rest of the names.

Hello, my name is Rudy and I'm just here to express some concerns. I'm here to express some concerns about the homeless seniors and the homeless disabled. I've been having problems getting them housed. because lack of bunks, bottom bunks, they're out there for four or five months before they can get housed. I'm just hoping that you guys can help out the community with this and maybe give them their own shelter, right? The disabled and the... the seniors because they there's no way they can get to the top bunks and that seems to be the problem is the bottom bunks um so it you know that that's all i have to say if you could please look into it you'd be highly appreciated thank you thank you next speaker

Good afternoon, Inspector Mayor and Vice Mayor and Council Members. I take this opportunity to inform about my grievances for last, since 2019, trying to get a permit to do something in my vacant lot, but a lot of times I take received non-cooperation or discouragement from the different departments and also contradicting information. And I've been sending a lot of emails, but probably one or two percentage of the emails got responses. That too partial information saying the issue is closed. And when I go to the upper level, they say, we already provided the information, and so it's issues closed. And unless you have anything to say, go ahead and get into it. Otherwise, they discourage to contact...

Thank you. Next speaker. Also, ACOS, come on down. Mark Schroeder and Ted Scarlett.

I'm sorry, if you want to leave your email or any information here with the clerk or my staff, we can help follow up. Sorry, it's... Okay, I'll look for it. Thank you. Maybe you can connect with my staff member here.

Thank you.

Go ahead, sir.

Hello, good morning. Afternoon, I guess. I just had a question about the general social service I've been on it for years, and that was way back. But now you can see that a lot of the information that's coming out of there is that they don't know what they're doing. It starts with a lot of them are just referrals. It's just something you can look into. That's about it.

Thank you. Next speaker.

One of our modern transit members lived two blocks from the Capitol Expressway light rail station, but you prohibited him from using light rail because he could not drive a car into the park and ride lot. You also prohibit bus stops, shopping centers, and employment along all expressways except for car users. Highway staff from the county has cited your blanket prohibition of pedestrians from expressways as authority to destroy sidewalks. Your ordinance is being used to kill people, including a light rail patron in 2023. See my upload that proves this. Ramseys from SDOT agrees with me. that the city, not the county, has jurisdiction over prohibiting the BPAC requested repeal. Stop the discrimination and fatalities by repealing Code 113270. Thank you.

Thank you, next speaker. I also have two cards that are anonymous. One says vote no on parking fee. Another one says formal proposal on homeless. And then I have Antonio. Go ahead.

Hi, Mayor and city council people. My name is Mark Schroeder and I'm a member of, I live in D3. Nice to see you, Anthony. I'm here today to talk about an environmental disaster that's on the Coyote Creek in between William Street Park and Olender Park. That is south of William Street and up to I-280. This section of the creek has nine major large wood blockages. it's um it's incredible the blockages and the trash are are kind of astounding and this part of the creek is hard very hard to access i'm with a small group and we get down there in waiters and we pull trash out mostly every week but you have to be in that water and it's not something that everybody can do and at the same time this wood is going to have to be removed with heavy equipment Valley Water doesn't own the land. City of San Jose owns the land. We do. And every time I ask them for their help, they kind of say, talk to the hand. You know, you got to talk to the city.

Thank you. That's your time. Next speaker.

That's me?

How you doing? Mr. Rios. My name's Antonio Gutierrez. I live on 12th Street. I've met the mayor and I've met Mr. McCauley. And what I would like to do is I'm following dovetailing Mark and that we need some attention there at Coyote Creek. I'm not sure if you have something scheduled at the Olinda area on Brookwood, but we need some help. So I'm wondering if we can get everyone that can be a part of coalescing and getting together and Helping getting that cleaned up, it's probably worse than Los Gatos and the Guadalupe. But I think if we all work together, we can get something done. I was talking to Sergio. He lives in the corner of Brookwood and Williams. And he's been there, I think, about 20 years. And he told me that there was a council member that told him that they can work and make it look like the council

Sorry, that's your time Sir, if you'd be willing to share your name and email with Stephen He can connect with the council office and and my team is our team as well I'm sorry Well, we're limited to one minute per speaker, but we'd love to follow up and help and we can also connect you to the council members office It's all it's okay. No, no Stephen here would be happy to take your name and email All right

Thank you, everybody. Talking today about a pile of leaves and trash on the corner of Lucchese and Speak Lane that has been there for a very long time, and it's causing almost an accident if someone's ahead of you when they go to make a right turn on Lucchese, causes problems. I've almost rear-ended people a couple times. I want this on record. If there's an accident, maybe you guys won't have to shell out the $75,000 like you just did today. to Mrs. Martinez, which it was on the agenda, but no one spoke about it. Also, the parking meters, half of them are broken. You can't see the digital screens. It's kind of broken like this two-minute clock right here. You have to go look up here for your time. Maybe you guys should get this thing fixed. And after you do that, fix the parking meters, because you know how many times it's stolen my money? Let me tell you, not happy. Parking, you need more of it if you want to have all these events. Mayor Mahan, you seem to like events.

Thank you. That's your time. Next speaker. I also have one speaker online who I'll go to when the in-person are done.

Rachel Ariano with Ike and What Industries Nonprofit. We would like to submit a formal proposal to the mayor and to the city council in regards to seniors and disabled mobility impaired adults that are having problems getting housing. Everything from the shelters from a boat to

shelters so we would like to propose a proposal to you guys if we could submit it thank you sure you can feel free to submit to the clerk thank you thank you counsel again Ted Scarlett and mayor like I said I've been asking to meet with you for over two years so my offer is I'll take you to lunch And all you guys got in this business because you want to do good and you want to help people. I've been coming here for more than six months now. I need help. I submitted a claim into the city for how I became homeless, which was a San Jose police officer told me I could not go back in the place I was living. This officer has assisted the landlord with the self-help eviction. There were over 20 police calls to the house regarding this illegal eviction, and then ultimately a police officer is why I'm no longer housed. And let's not forget, I was mowed down by a drunk driver. It's his fourth DUI.

I'm going to Brian online.

Hi, thank you. I would like to bring up Tammaty Hall. And I'm not going to repeat any, because I'm sure the people who were involved in this were just blown off steam, I guess, to some degree. But the city is being, if I'm correct in what I've read, the city is being sued again for not making records public. If I did this when I was a teacher, I wouldn't be a teacher. And it would be made public almost instantaneously, along with if I was a, I think it was probably released for political reasons, I guess. But people wonder why a lot of us just scratch our heads and try to wonder, are we really making, we just want people to come clean with stuff, that's all. And it was a pretty serious situation. The council people are supposed to be at the top of the pyramid, not the bottom. Thank you.

Next speaker. I think Ann, I saw Ann come down the stairs. Did you want to still speak?

My name is Ann Harris. Do you have a Betty DeYoung on the podium? Is Betty DeYoung here? No. No.

We have no Betty DeYoung here.

Okay. She's the person who is my supervisor in my district. I need help because I've been tormented by the system itself. trying to get housing for 62 year old son who's disabled. They don't have a list now like they had before. They just got a $50 million grant. So now they go out and they contact people and they put them in tents, tiny houses and motor homes. My son has mental and physical disabilities. So they said, well, they didn't want me to help him and support him. But if he could do things, he would have done them already. So he lost his house in 2000.

I'm sorry, Ann, that's your time. Did you say you lived in District 7? Yes. Yes. So Councilmember Duong, she's in your district. And I think we've already connected you to Eric and Steven before the meeting.

Yes.

Right, so come on over here. Back to council. Right, back to council.

Okay, we'll follow up offline and try to be helpful for everyone else. We just want to thank you all. We are now adjourned.