City Council - Special Meeting

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Good morning. This is the Tuesday, April 21st, 2026 special meeting of the Santa Barbara City Council. Would you please join me 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. Madam clerk, would you call the role, please? Certainly. Council member Friedman here. Council member Santa Maria, not yet present. Council member Gutierrez not yet present. Mayor Ras here. Mayor Petston here. Council member Harmon here. And council member here. All right. Very good. And you have some close session items to read.

I do. I will read both of them. Item one, conference with city attorney existing litigation government code section 54956.9 D1 as described in agenda item one. And item two, public employee performance evaluation, government code section 54957B1 as described in agenda item two. All right. Very good. And I have one public commenter present to speak. Matthew Lens like to come forward. You have three minutes at the dis please. And it will be on this specific uh Yes. On the agenda item. And would you tell me if you're speaking item one or item two? Uh about the uh SBRPA lawsuit. Okay. Yeah.

Um good morning council. I just wanted to come here today to talk about the lawsuit against the city and as it pertains to city action as a whole. Um, it's been pretty clear to me listening to the representatives of SBRPA and their press release and everything that this lawsuit has almost very little to do with the rent freeze in itself. It seems much more likely that it is trying to hold the the city hostage for the rent stabilization ordinance and all items relating to that. So, first and foremost, I want to say first off, thank you for the rent stabilization ordinance being so such a public process thus far. Um, and I want to urge you that please don't negotiate any part of the rent stabilization ordinance away within this closed session talking about the rent freeze. I think it's highly inappropriate and hugely undemocratic to be able to hold a separate piece of legislation hostage over a barely tangentially related uh lawsuit and it would just set an unbelievably dangerous precedent not only within this city but a as a whole. So, I just want to make sure that you consider this going forward into the session. And if it ever comes up, please just like bring it back to topic of the lawsuit. It's it's just not appropriate to talk about the rent stabilization ordinance within a closed session outside of public view. Um, beyond that, looking at the lawsuit, it it doesn't really have any merit to it. And I feel like they

really should just be ashamed of themselves for bringing it forward to begin with. It's again, just trying to hold the city hostage for something that they don't agree with because at the end of the day, they're not really worried about being able to provide housing. They're more worried about their profit margins at this point because they're already making handoverfist money on us. So yeah, I just want to urge you again just please be sensitive to keeping this as a public process. Don't negotiate anything away within a closed session. Thank you. Are there any speakers online, Madam Clerk? No, Mr. Mayor.

Okay, with that we're going to adjourn a close session. We do not anticipate a report out on either one. and then we'll reconvene at 2:00.