City Council - Regular Meeting

Yeah, we have a little bit of a closed session.

Yeah, yeah, it should be coming up pretty soon.

Oh, really? They're already? Oh, okay.

I thought they'd start that at six, but no, they'll... Oh, okay. Yeah, you do a closed session online, and then we can do that at six.

Oh, okay. And then we're working here at the top? Yeah, we're on the agenda. here or just general They come in waves with projects.

I've seen that per capita number.

Yeah, and then the clicker's right here.

Yeah, so swipe forward, and then the microphone will be off to talk.

Thank you.

I Would like to reconvene the the meeting city attorney is there a closed session to report I

Yes, the City Council met in closed session, excuse me, the successor agency met in closed session pursuant to one item, conference with real property negotiators with a property known as MC&C 3. No reportable action was taken. The City Council also met in closed session with regard to two matters, conference with real property negotiators on MC&C 4 and a property with the system parcel number 8005.

0 1 5 0 4 9 direction was given and no reportable action was taken this concludes my report All right, we will now continue with the rest of the meeting I Would like to call upon Jaylene Ayala to lead today's invocation Please bow your heads

Heavenly Father, we ask your blessing on this council as we meet tonight. Grant us both wisdom and compassion as we make decisions about the future of our community. We ask you this in your holy name. Amen.

Amen. Real quick, though, Jaylene, I'm going to do something different. Can you let everybody know what you do here for the city of Santa Fe Springs? Of course. And also your other job.

Yes. So I am Parks and Recreation Program Leader One. I work for events and especially at Town Center Hall. My other job too on the side that I do is door dashing where I run into the mayor at the... at the Sushi and Roll joint, and he did give me advice to go ahead and keep going back right there, and that's where I made a lot of orders that night. So that is my second job that I do on the side. But yes, I am Parks and Recreation Program Leader One. My director is Gus Hernandez, and I love the city, born and raised. I'm resident of the city of Santa Fe Springs. Thank you.

Thank you. And where I met her at was at Sushi and Artesia. And actually, the Sushero actually told us, hey, if she wants to make more money, during these days, have her come around. We get a lot of orders. And they did, man. There was a lot of orders there. So it's good sushi. It's called Oz, just in case. Ozen. Ozen Sushi and Artesia. Not that I'm giving them a commercial now, but hey.

All right, thank you.

All right, I would like to call upon Angel Corona with the Youth Leadership Committee to lead the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you, Angel.

I'd like you guys to pay attention toward the flag, please. Place your right hand over your heart. Ready, begin.

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. Before you leave, Angel, can you let everybody know what type of activities, what high school you attend and what you're involved in here in our community?

I'm enrolled in Santa Fe High School. Past activities I've been involved in, football, ASB, leadership community, obviously. Christ before all, avid, and tennis. And tennis. I believe that's all. Pickleball, you know, the weekends, we got to get it in. So...

Come on, I'm already cramping up thinking about it. So how active is the youth when it comes to pickleball? I mean, I know when we've had our Parks Master Plan, a lot of them came in to talk about pickleball. So can you give us any feedback?

I'd say it's been a trending sport lately throughout this year. I can tell you a lot of people... Pick up, I don't know, Jaden Brown, if you know her. She's very famous around here. Her and her boyfriend, they're trying to start a league, and they get a lot, obviously, with their popularity, they get a lot of people to join them, and everybody has fun. I think Pickleball brings a lot of people together, and just the hype alone, they love it. It's challenging. I wouldn't say it's like ping pong, but yeah.

It's like if ping pong and tennis had a kid.

Yeah, the same, yeah, together. It's pretty cool, amazing.

But yes, definitely recommend.

Well, thank you, sir. Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Mr. Bovadilla, any changes to the agenda? Mr. Mayor, we have one change. Our city attorney will describe that change.

Yes, with regard to item number six under regular business, there are some changes to resolution 10023. I will read it into the record. And for members of the public who want a revised version, there are fully revised versions available in the back. All council members also have a revised version. The resolution reads, a resolution of the City Council of Santa Fe Springs amending the city's comprehensive fee schedule of fees and repealing prior resolution 10023. That is the new title of the resolution as it relates to section number three. Section number three of the resolution now reads, Resolution number 9963 and any attachments regarding this comprehensive fee schedule are hereby repealed and superseded by this resolution. That ends my report.

All right. Would you like us to go over the voting now on that, or would you prefer us just go back in order?

It's a regular business item, so when you hear the report, you'll be able to take a vote on it based on this new resolution. All right, cool.

All right, thank you very much. All right, public comments are now open. The public may address the City Council on any non-public hearing item on the agenda or any other matter within the Council's jurisdiction. You will have an opportunity to speak for three minutes once the City Clerk announces your name. City Clerk, do we have any members who wish to speak?

Mayor, we do not.

I will now close public comments and move on to the next item, staff communications.

Mr. Bovadilla, do we have any staff communications? Yeah, Mayor, we have staff communication from Parks and Recreation, our Director, Gus Hernandez. Thank you, Gus.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council, members of the community. I have three quick announcements. We had our first watch party last week here at Town Center Hall. We invite our community to go to our next watch party, which will be Thursday, June 15th.

26th. No, 18th.

18th. I'm sorry about that. June 18th. We do have watch parties scheduled throughout the months of June and July. We also kick off our free concerts in the park this year. We're theming them as Summer Nights in Santa Fe Springs, kicking off Friday, June 28th over at Heritage Park. Those start at 6 p.m. June 26th. June 26th. I'm sorry.

Sorry, Gus. My eyes are bad today.

And then finally, the 3rd of July, I can't mess that one up. 3rd of July will be on July 3rd, celebrating Independence Day over at Los Nietos Park, beginning at 3.30 in the evening. Our evening will finish with a spectacular fireworks show scheduled at 9 p.m. Thank you very much.

Mr. Morales, just real quick, on the big screens we bought, Mr. Morales, can you tell us how we purchased those big screens? Oh, Mr. Morales, Julio, Julio.

Thank you, Rene, Mayor, members of the City Council. We used transportation fund monies for what are called changeable message signs. So those are there to direct traffic during events such as this, and we happen to utilize them at down times when we don't have these events. So they were paid for from Prop C monies, transportation grant monies that were provided.

And Julio, we typically rent these over the year.

At the tune of approximately $4,000.

$5,000.

And that's per? Per event. No, no, that's per screen, right?

Yeah, when we rent them, yes.

Yeah, so if we have to rent more than one screen, of course, so.

I have been tasked by the city manager to find creative ways to leverage the monies that we have to utilize them to the best extent. I do believe if I say this is a creative use of those monies.

So zero general fund dollars were used for this?

Zero general fund dollars. If anything, it helps us fund the things that the citizens get some benefit for and probably enjoy. Thank you.

And for anybody who ever wishes to speak to Julio with regards to our finance, he would love to talk to you.

What do you have a question? Um, I've just brought I just noticed it right now For the summer nights. I see now that we're charging for premier seating upgrade So we came up with so we came up with an idea to try to you know offset some of the concert cost that the city spends and

And we came up with this idea of kind of VIP seating. It's a fundraiser. You're right. It's not like you're getting 10 extra feet of space. But it's a cool way that you get your own seat. It's always there for you. You can buy it for the series. It's set up and it's really to raise funds to regain some of the cost of concerts in the park.

Correct?

Correct. And that's for all six concerts as well. And you're right. Heritage Park is a beautiful venue, but being seated up in the front is that premier experience. Great value.

Yep. Absolutely great value.

Thank you. I just noticed that.

So if you haven't bought one, get one.

It also says bring your lawn chairs too, but I don't know if that means if you paid the $75. All right, anybody else have any questions?

Are chairs provided for that premier seating?

Recliner?

They're really nice seats.

Massage chair? Somebody crack your back while you're at it. Not that premier. Let's move on to public hearing. Public hearing item number four. 2025-2030 Urban Water Management Plan and Water Shortage Contingency Plan, Public Works. I would like to call upon Mr. Bovadilla.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The Urban Management Plan, it's an Act AB 797 that was enacted in 1983 and requires all water providers that provide service to at least 3,000 customers, which we fall under, or supply over 3,000 acres per foot per year to develop and adopt an Urban Water Management Plan. So before you, is that plan for you to consider in a public hearing setting to adopt the urban water management plan? So, Mr. Mayor, we're available for any questions, if you all may have any.

Anybody have questions? Hearing none, the public hearing is now open. Anyone wishing to be heard, please approach the podium and state your name. City Clerk, do we have any speakers?

Mayor, we do not.

I would like to close public hearing. Is there any discussion or motion for the approval of item number four?

I'll move. I'll second.

Moved by Round, second by Martin. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those opposed? So ordered. Public hearing item number five, public hearing to consider adoption of resolution number 10020, confirming the fiscal year 2026-2027, engineer's report for the annual Heritage Springs Assessment District number 2001, 1 Hawkins Street and Palm Drive and levying such assessments. I would like to call upon Mr. Boadilla.

Thank you, Mayor. Back in the day when the development around Hawkins Road and Palm Drive was developed, the city levied those property owners to pay for the construction of that road and maintenance of the road. So over the years, we've collected a levy to pay for the maintenance. This will be the last year of that levy. So before you is the actual assessment and the engineer's report for you to consider for the levy for 2026-2027. And we're available for any questions.

Any questions from the council? Hearing none, public hearing is now open. Anyone wishing to be heard, please approach the podium and state your name. City Clerk, any speakers?

Mayor, we do not.

I would like to close the public hearing. Is there any discussion or a motion for the approval of item number five? I'll make a motion. I'll move. I'm second, sorry. Moved by Rodriguez, seconded by Mora. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those opposed? So ordered. Item number six. We already had our city attorney address that. Comprehensive fee schedule update, Parks and Rec. I would like to call on Mr. Bobadilla.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'd like to call on our Parks and Recs Director, Gus Hernandez, to report on this item.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of the City Council, and community members. As part of the City's ongoing commitment to fiscal responsibility, transparency, and efficient service delivery, staff periodically reviews fees to ensure that they remain current, equitable, and reflective of the actual cost of providing services. The proposed update includes revisions to selected fees across multiple city departments and incorporates new fees where necessary to address current operational needs and service delivery costs. The recommended adjustments are intended to better align fees with the cost of providing services while reducing the general fund subsidy and ensuring consistency throughout the city's comprehensive fee schedule. Those fees are listed in the staff report and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Does anybody have any questions for Mr. Hernandez? No questions. None. Is there any discussion or motion for the approval of item number six?

I'll approve. I mean, I'll move. I'll second.

Moved by Martin, second by Rounds. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those opposed? So ordered. Parks and Recreation Master Plan, Parks and Rec. I think Gus just stayed there, right? I would like to call upon Mr. Bovadilla, who's probably going to call on Mr. Hernandez. So go ahead and proceed.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. We're extremely excited to present this item to you. If you recall, back in February of 2025, the city authorized us to enter into professional service agreement with KTUA to start this first-ever Parks Master Plan, and we're excited to present the fruits of those labors. I'd like to call on Gus Fernandez to present this report.

Thank you very much, Rene. Again, good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and members of the City Council and community members. This item is the Parks, Recreation, and Community Services Master Plan. We are extremely excited to present this plan as it represents a significant milestone for the city. and it establishes a strategic roadmap to guide the future of our parks, of our recreation programs, of our facilities, and our community services over the next decade. Before the presentation begins, I would like to take a moment to thank and recognize our consultant team from KTUA, including Joe Punselin, Alex Samarian, who's here today, and Nicole Rogue from KTUA. I'd also like to thank our parks and recreation managers, Leanne Yates, Rick Brown, and Ed Ramirez, and our management analyst, who's also here today, Ashley Doshi for their hard work, collaboration, and commitment to this project. This project was launched a little more than a year ago, and tonight we're pleased to present the recommended master plan for your consideration and adoption. And so at this time, it's my pleasure to welcome Alex Marion of KTUA to present the master plan.

Good evening.

Let me make sure this is working. Thanks for the intro, Gus. My name is Alex Samarin. I'm with K2A, a planning and landscape architecture firm in San Diego. Is that AI? Did I miss a joke?

Oh, oh, oh.

He did ask for a time off request. That was your break? I'll just leave it on this slide for a bit.

Well, congrats on completing your first parks master plan. I just wanted to give you a brief overview of the process, results, and where you get to go from here. We started in April of last year and it was a pretty thorough process starting with community engagement. It's good to see that a lot of people in this room were present at community engagement events throughout the last year or so. We conducted analysis looking at the level of service citywide and in your and presenting that throughout the community engagement. Use that analysis and community engagement to develop recommendations in terms of what the community might want to see in each park, what the city does well, where there are shortcomings. And we presented those recommendations in draft form to the public and then finalized them in a final report which we've submitted and I'm giving you the highlights of today. Outreach consisted of pop-up events as some of your very well attended community events. We had a statistically valid community survey that went out in several forms. We had focus group meetings with teens and seniors and actually even just city staff all together in different sports and school groups as well. We also had a project website where we gathered input and helped keep the community up to date on the project goings on. The community engagement results, our statistical analyst team was actually very happy to see that we got almost 500 surveys for a city this size, which is very statistically significant. Some of the top needs that were identified in the survey and other methods of outreach were walking paths and trail in the park, improved safety, updated play areas, dog-friendly amenities like a dog park, and then sports amenities for your organized sports, baseball and soccer and football.

Is that a real rendering that somebody drew?

Yeah, so this is one of the activities that we have for kids at our events. Just kind of draw your favorite memory at a park.

Just my first baseball game plus go Dodgers. That's awesome. That's amazing. It hurts seeing the Dodgers being presented.

I'm from L.A. originally, so you know Dodgers are okay. Yeah, it's pretty great to see what kids come up with for these.

And the basketball without the Lakers or what? Renee, you're going to bring up the basketball without the Lakers too? No, there was no. Because they knew.

I don't blame them. All right. Some of the key findings. So it's a goal in your general plan to have every resident within a 10-minute walk of a park. And you are remarkably close to that. You don't have to worry about it. I shouldn't say anything with that certainty, but your parks are very well distributed within your community and on a acreage level you meet your city goal of four acres per 1,000 residents and even in the future you'll need to develop parks to meet population growth. But right now, in terms of acres per resident and distribution parks, the city does very well on that. You have very well loved recreation programs to the point where they're growing out of their facilities. There's plenty of areas to improve within existing parks, and one highlight also is that as a city you spend well above the national average per capita. So it's impressive to see that. So some of the recommendations we came up with to improve your parks, these are all based on community feedback and city staff input. Adding new facilities, which you're undertaking already with a new park facility, we just call it the river parcel. It's out by the 605 northwest side of town. town and also use creatively the facilities that you have with Santa Fe High School and your joint use agreements there or reestablishing joint use agreements. You have opportunities to add new soccer fields and improve ball fields and sport courts like pickleball, come to mention it. One simple thing that you can do to improve parks is just to add walking loops. A lot of people like to, you know, we had someone at outreach events talk about just skateboarding in a park. Just not trick skateboarding, just cruising and being able to go around. And people like doing walking, biking along those lines as well. So that type of thing is an easy thing to improve a park experience in your community.

Also park safety.

There were some concerns that came up through outreach. There's a lot of discussions going on in the city about how to improve both the perception of safety and actual physical fences, things like that. There's opportunities to strengthen your programs by aligning the community needs with what's offered. Some programs are currently underutilized and you might look at how you might use that space and time better for other programs. supporting the dog-owning community with, as I mentioned, dog parks or dog-friendly amenities. A dog park is included in the design for the new park, the River Parcel Park. And one bigger idea out there that we've also looked at and designed some options for is the Clark Estate renovation, which is pretty exciting to have bring back into use a historic resource like that to potentially generate some revenue for your city.

Alex, can you go back a slide? Sure.

I just want to point out to the council the previous slide before this, if you can. So if you look at the legend, the green box that has a dash that says 10-minute walk to parks, look at how much green dash area we have that is very walkable to parks, and I think that's really awesome that a lot of our residents can walk to parks within 10 minutes versus having to get in the car and driving to a park?

It is, yeah. So in orange is the residential areas. The green hash is the 10-minute walk shed from all parks. So seeing coverage like this, there's two things that we don't see a lot working in Southern California in parks planning. It's cities that are anywhere near their park acreage goal. Most cities are striving for three and are somewhere around two. acres per thousand and then often there's gaps for even for like driving to a park within a reasonable time and here you have walking to a park you have a great pedestrian network in the city you know sidewalks you don't have more crosswalks everywhere but that's okay in residential areas.

And Alex we're really excited about you know a residence had access to Pioneer High School in the past where a lot of our residents would walk to go walk on their track now we're going to be able to use Santa Fe High that'll be lit at night, that they'll have an opportunity to walk there, safely walk there and walk around the track and then walk to their destination. So we're excited about creating another walkable opportunity for our residents that's safe and lit at night. So we're excited about that in the next, hopefully next several months.

That's great to hear. Well, I believe that wraps up my presentation. Again, it's a big undertaking and accomplishment to get your first park master plan out there and I'm looking forward to see what you do with it. Very successful at implementing projects here. Any further questions, comments? Should I go back to the first picture?

Does anybody have any questions?

Questions?

No. All right. Is there a motion for approval of item number seven? I'll move.

I second.

Moved by Mora, seconded by Rodriguez. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those opposed? So ordered. Bless you. Approval of 2027 Tournament of Roses float design and additional allocation of funding. Mr. Bovadilla, please.

We are, oh man, you blew my thunder. We are excited to present to you the second annual Rose Parade float. I think this is gonna win a lot of awards. This float will be a performing float. So it will stop and perform, unlike just passing by. So there's only a few of them, maybe 10 or 12 of them that will perform. Maybe less. Maybe seven. So I want to bring up staff, Kylie, to present the concept and kind of tell you a little bit about what we're trying to accomplish here. But I do want to highlight This is super cool. And to have a performing float that is going to stop and perform for the entire world is going to be really neat. So Kylie?

So good evening, honorable mayor and members of the city council. I am very proud to be presenting this tonight. We are very, very excited for the 2027 Tournament of Roses Parade. So tonight staff are requesting approval of the proposed design for the city's 2027 Tournament of Roses Float, as well as an additional allocation of $30,000 from the Art and Public Places Fund to address increased costs associated with float construction, transportation, and related logistics. The proposed float, themed Bienvenidos a Santa Fe Springs, was developed by Phoenix Decorating Company and aligns with the 2027 tournament theme of Welcome. The design celebrates the city's rich Hispanic heritage through the use of traditional Mexican kiosk, a folklorico dancer, mariachi musicians, vibrant floral displays, and the prominent display of the word Bienvenidos, meaning welcome. The Heritage Arts Advisory Committee reviewed the design on May 26 and provided creative input. While there was discussion regarding use of flags representing Hispanic nations, staff recommend retaining the piñata element due to the tournament guidelines related to foreign national flags and government symbols. Staff continue to believe that the participation in the Tournament of Roses parade provides significant value to the community of Santa Fe Springs. The parade is viewed by millions worldwide and offers Santa Fe Springs a unique opportunity to showcase our culture, identity, and community pride on an international stage. Last year, as you well know, the City's Float was awarded the prestigious Queen's Award, recognizing the most outstanding presentation of roses in the parade. Building upon that success, staff are exploring the opportunities to make this 2027 entry even more dynamic. As mentioned by our city manager, Rene Bovaria, we're including the addition of a live musical performance by a mariachi band aboard the float to complement the theme and further enhance the experience for spectators and judges alike. This year's design provides an exciting opportunity to continue Santa Fe Springs' rich excellence while celebrating the city's rich Hispanic heritage. The requested $30,000 allocation is needed to address rising costs associated with materials, transportation, fuel, labor, floral products, and the public safety escort required to transport the float. These funds are proposed to come from the Art in Public Places Fund and will not impact the General Fund. Following the parade, staff once again planned to bring the float back to Santa Fe Springs for a community viewing event and are also exploring opportunities for residents to visit the Phoenix decorating facility during float construction so they can see the beforehand dynamics and get to experience that. So thank you all for allowing me to present here tonight and I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Thank you. Mayor and Council, I just want to add that we are working with a big name sponsor that if we are able to get cooperation, if we're able to finalize a deal we're working on, we could potentially get a sponsor on this. So we're not quite there, and hopefully we can get there, but we potentially may get a commitment for three years for a sponsor. So we're working on that. They would probably pay for half the cost.

Thank you.

And the mariachi, we can't release the name yet, but I would say it's probably the second largest mariachi in Mexico. They're very popular, very well known, and most people know about them, but we're not there yet with negotiating that, but they've committed to doing it. So it's not us.

It's not, no, we're not going to be playing instruments. No, we're not going to lip sync. We're proposing costumes. Are we going to be on a horse at least? That might be the backup. That might be the backup, yeah.

But we are thinking of Flor Corico dancers in the front of the float to perform as well as we're moving.

To escort the float as they're walking to just enhance the overall experience and be the sidewalkers along. So you'll have moving dancers.

Where are the piñatas?

It's in the kiosk.

No, no, no.

We're just waving.

Where would we fit? Right there. You see that girl in the front? There's my physician.

We are in the process of, if you are comfortable with this design, we will arrange the logistics of how many people are on the floor. I think we need to know that in the next couple weeks or by July. So we need to finalize the amount of performers and then the amount of others that will be on the float. So... The council will be somewhere on that float. Just don't know where yet. Could be in the kiosko somewhere.

I might be the oh and bienvenidos. Quick question. We got that. It looks great, by the way. These guys do a great job every single year. But do we have any identifying markings for the city, whether it's a logo or a symbol somewhere besides? They usually have a banner in front.

Yes, the Tournament of Roses actually requires that each float identifies the supporting organization. So just like last year's float, the name of Santa Fe Springs will actually be on the backside of both ends, so it will be viewed on both sides of the parade, and it will have the new logo as well.

Thank you. And hopefully we'll have an award. And it will not rain next year.

Is that what the 30,000 is for? It's going into existence.

It will not rain next year. We're talking about El Nino this year, so it won't happen.

We'll get a break. Two years in a row?

Thank you so much. It looks great. Thank you. Thank you. Great job. All right. Is there any discussion? Any other discussion that you guys would like to talk about?

Looks great.

All right. All right. So we have a motion from Martin second by Rodriguez all those in favor say aye aye aye those opposed so or All right consent calendar before we start we are pulling item number 17 So public financing Authority water utility Authority housing successor successor agency IN CITY COUNCIL CONSENT CALENDAR, WE HAVE A TOTAL OF 17 CONSENT ITEMS, NUMBERS 9-26, EXCLUDING ITEM NUMBER 17. IS THERE A MOTION FOR THE APPROVAL OF THE CONSENT CALENDAR? I'LL MOVE.

SECOND.

MOVED BY ROUND, SECOND BY MORA. ALL THOSE IN FAVOR, SAY AYE. AYE. THOSE OPPOSED? SO ORDERED. OKAY, APPOINTMENTS TO BOARDS, COMMITTEES, AND COMMISSIONS. Council Member Martin.

None tonight, thank you, sir.

Council Member Mora.

None tonight.

Council Member Rounds. None. Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez. None tonight, Mayor. And I have none. Mr. Mayor, can we jump to items? Can we present item 17 for you? Go ahead and present item 17.

Is that you? Yep, Mr. Mayor. Item 17 is the fiscal year 2024-2025 year-end review and presentation of basic financial statements report, which now we call the ECFR. formerly known as the CAFR, but apparently that's a bad word. So we changed it to the ACFER, according to the state of California. So here to present the ACFER, Julio Morales, the floor is yours, sir. Thank you, Rene, Mayor, members of the city council.

We're going to go through this in a couple of parts. Today we have presented or provided to you, this is actually an unaudited basic financial statement. So next time we're going to come back with the opinion from the auditors. We wanted to get this out in front of the public and have them see that.

Just for the sake of the audience and those folks watching us at home, can you tell us what the ACFER is, what it does, why we present it, and where we're at in the process?

So these are financial statements. They basically help to provide to the public, to investors in the community, and to you, the elected officials and management, audited financial statements. Now, really what makes it an audited statement is an opinion, which it takes a few weeks for the partners at our audit firm, Vasquez & Company, to go review, go through a process. But it'll look just like this. They'll then have an opinion in the front. essentially what this provides you are the financial statements of all the notes, all the different funds in the city, the general fund, all the special funds like the art and public places, it's all summarized in here, as well as notes. I will come back one more time with a complete act for actually, IT WILL ACTUALLY HAVE THIS PLUS A STATISTICAL SECTION. BUT TODAY I WROTE A STAFF REPORT. IT'S AVAILABLE FOR THE PUBLIC TO UNDERSTAND WHERE WE ARE. WHAT IT STATES ACTUALLY IS LAST YEAR'S RESULTS, RIGHT? SO WE'RE CLOSING OUT THIS YEAR, BUT IN ORDER TO DO THIS, WE HAVE TO CLOSE LAST YEAR'S RESULTS IN ORDER TO LOAD THE BUDGET FOR NEXT YEAR. SO THE TIMING IS REALLY SICK.

SO IF I MAY, SO THE COUNCIL, AS YOU JUST DID AT THE LAST COUNCIL MEETING, ADOPTED THE 2026-2027 BUDGET. and you adopt a budget, it's a working plan, right? It's what we believe we're gonna spend. And then at the end of the year, we have an audit, so an independent auditor comes in and audits our books based on that budget that you all approved and gives us basically a final counting of how we did. So the budget is simply a document that we use with projections and what we think of estimates of how much we're gonna spend and how much we're gonna collect in revenue. THE ACT FOR ACTUALLY TELLS YOU EXACTLY HOW WE ENDED THE YEAR. IT'S A VERY IMPORTANT DOCUMENT. IT IS AUDITED BY A THIRD PARTY. IT'S NOT AUDITED BY ANYBODY HERE. SO A COMPLETE THIRD PARTY THAT WE HAVE, IT'S INDEPENDENT, BASICALLY COMES IN AND AUDITS THE WAY WE SPEND OUR MONEY TO ENSURE THERE ISN'T ANY FRAUD. DOING ANYTHING THAT THEY SHOULDN'T. BUT THAT DOCUMENT IS WHAT JULIO IS PRESENTING TONIGHT, AND HE WILL HAVE IT COMPLETE AND FOR YOU HOPEFULLY AT THE NEXT COUNCIL MEETING WITH A COMPLETE PACKAGE AND DOCUMENT THAT DESCRIBES HOW WE...

THE NUMBERS ARE IN SUBSTANTIALLY FINAL FORM, BUT THERE ARE TWO PARTS THAT ARE MISSING. ONE IS THE AUDITOR'S FINAL OPINION, AND THAT TAKES A COUPLE WEEKS FOR THE REVIEW PROCESS. and some of these people are unfortunately on vacation. And lastly, the management discussion analysis, which is a memo that we provide that talks about these notes. Almost much of it will be summarized similar to the staff report. And lastly, a statistical section. So the numbers will not change. There may be a small adjustment here and there, but we don't anticipate the numbers to change. But these are things that make an actual annual comprehensive financial report. This is actually sufficient legally as what you have to provide. These are the final numbers, except you'd like to provide a little bit more per the GFOA standards and what we've done traditionally in the past at ACFER. So we'll come back and do that at a later date. Today I wrote a staff report. The numbers are very similar to what we presented in the budget, $102 million in reserves, $103 million in expenditures. We took then a transfer and we ended up with a balanced budget. Now note, That also included last year, actually an excess of revenue, of revenues when you, because there's a $10 million expenditure for a building. So really it was more like 102 and 93, because if you recall, we built the MTNA building, but when you add the numbers back in, it ends up being equal. So that's essentially what came out on the general fund. And there's a summary of what happened in the water fund. We had a slight operating surplus because we had collected some monies from the prior year. So we met our debt service coverage on the water fund. And then it has all the balances and all the various funds, all the grant programs and all the funds. That's all summarized in here, plus the notes and detail of things. Part of this has been catching up on some things that Renee had tasked me in doing. So I'm glad to report that we have a better handle on some small details in the notes. But there is one thing highlighted in the staff report, we'd say, that we had some staff turnover and some accounting issues. If you may recall, we had some... We had some delayed checks. That processing caused us to be delayed in auditing or reconciling our bank accounts. We replaced those accountants as they retired and had two new accountants. And those two new accountants eventually were replaced by two brand new accounts. So we had a little bit of turnover.

Can you remind us how much checks were in cash? What was that in dollar value?

Three and a half million, I think.

0.1 million dollars. Okay.

If I may, and I'll be very direct, the problem wasn't the $3.1 million of the checks. The problem is that that accounting staff caused us to be way behind in the process. It wasn't that we weren't that one amount that other staff came in and was able to record, but a lot of other work wasn't done in a timely manner. And this is why this report is so late. The good news is we're catching up. We have new systems. I think we have new staff. You've met my budget staff, the new accounting staff that we bring on board. We believe that we now have better control and ability to manage the accounting functions in a more timely manner. So we've had to do some catch-up. As you see, this is why the report is late. We will not be late next year, and we've taken steps to correct this, both in changing staff and our policies and procedures. Actually, I'll read from it, and I'll tell you the best way to say. As I noted, there were three things that happened, and we talked about this, about the audit timeline. There was a turnover of accounting staff. delays in processing and accounting, and lastly, a learning curve of a new audit firm. All of those collectively put together as a result of us having to delay timeline. Next year, we would be familiar with the auditor, we've had new accounting staff, and our delays have been caught up.

Was this the first year we used this auditing firm?

Yes, it is. It was unfortunate timing, but we'd already gone through an RFP and decided to select someone else, which you do every five years. So regardless, if nothing else had changed, we would have had a significant learning curve with the new auditor. And when they come in, they want to do things on their own accord. They have to go see all the paperwork. So we've been going through a number of checklists of, hey, can I see this? And lastly, an audit works like this. The auditor comes with you a list of 65 items. You go and provide all the supporting documentation, and then they ask you for additional samples within each item, or even more if they don't feel comfortable with the information they gave you. I know my staff is probably more glad than I am that they will no longer have to provide these samples, but that's generally the process. So also people mistake, forensic audit, like something is wrong, it really is a checklist. Here, tell me these areas. And they focused on the areas where we knew we had some weaknesses, which is bank reconciliation and water. And they went through a number of additional requests.

And Julio, and it's best practices that we switch the auditor firm about every five years, correct?

About every five years. And you can keep the same audit firm, but you have to change the manager, the generating partner, if you do. So the Actually, that's one of the things the GFOA says some people do three to five years and now recommending you keep them a little bit longer. So it's been a learning curve for both the audit staff. Next time, by the way, the auditor will come here and provide their opinion and be able to answer any questions for you or the public about the process, any material weaknesses, any issues you see in the accounting function.

Can you give us the name of the auditor and the company?

The name of the auditor was selected by an RFP process. It was Vasquez and Company. And Roger Martinez is the managing partner who will come here and present.

Anybody have any questions for Julio that he would love to answer?

I'm looking forward to seeing you in that mariachi outfit, Mayor.

HEARING NONE, COUNCIL COMMENTS, AB 1234, COUNCIL CONFERENCE REPORTING. LET'S GO WITH COUNCIL MEMBER ROUNDS.

the report on two conferences that I attended. One was at ICSC, or I can say ditto to what they all said at the last meeting. But real briefly, the ICSC, I'm sure everybody's aware of the big four that we started here in Santa Fe Springs. We had a booth there. We manned it. We had consultations. We had briefings. And then we split up and we went out to the ICS, to the whole area. And I think the mayor reported out something about walking. We walked and we walked and we walked, but we had great meetings. We met with developers and a lot of good things are gonna come out of that meeting. In fact, I think they already have. So I'm looking forward to that and everything that's gonna happen. The other one was the Contract Cities Conference. There were six panel discussions over two days. We had LA County Supervisor Hahn Horvath, our former city manager Thaddeus McCormack was there with a panel, along with some of his fellow council members from Lakewood. The mayor of Norwalk, Jennifer Perez, was on a panel. Supervisor Barger, Sheriff Luna, and LA County Fire Chief. And the main topics, everything's dealing with homeless and how to prevent it. Limit liability cost to your city school districts and declining Enrollment and funding as we all know here right here in Little Lake School District Council rolls during a crisis budget finance funding and police and fire and one thing that I mean there were a number of things I took away and I know that we're all having watch parties, right and for the soccer and uh... the sheriff stressed everybody there says okay you're all entitled to your watch parties but just remember one thing we can't be there to assist you because we're going to be working our own facilities in downtown l.a. so if something happens You're on your own kind of type of thing. But I've attended a couple of the watch parties here in Santa Fe Springs. They've been a celebration. There hasn't been any trouble. I know they talked about the monitors that we had there. Amazing, amazing. But it was great. I hope to see more of you out there. As stated earlier, the concerts are coming up soon. And... Looking forward to see you there and on July 3rd. But, Renee, I'd like to ask for one thing from staff. It's been brought up before, and I'd like to see us create an ad hoc committee and to look at the tree policy we have and any revisions we can make to that. Bring it up to date. Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, without any consensus, if that's okay with counsel? If I can get a second volunteer that could join Bill.

I'll join Bill if he wants. Do you want to... Oh, Mr. Reynolds, do you want to be on the ad hoc committee?

Oh, sure. I'll be on it. Yeah.

I'll join it with him.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Okay. Council Member Martin.

Thank you, Mayor. No conferences to report. Everything was pretty quiet. I just want to say I took my dogs to the... annual pet fair that we had. Arlene, you and your staff did an awesome, awesome job. I brought all my three girls. And I think I won the biggest contest for the biggest dogs there. And they behaved. That was the most important thing. But the staff, all the vendors that you have did such a great job with all of them. So thank you so much. That was awesome. Just want to make a comment right now. We just had an accident outside. And it was awesome to see our staff jump into action. Captain, you rushed right out there. I saw Gus out there. I saw Paul. That just tells you how great our staff is. Without even a second guess, you guys are out there taking care of the situation. Thank you so much for doing that, for jumping into action on that. So thank you so much.

Council Member, I heard your dogs have a new fragrance.

Yes. Pepe the Pew. Be careful with skunks and dogs right now, let me tell you. And don't let them in your house after they get skunked. Also, the pageant's going to be this Saturday. It's going to be my first pageant I missed. It's Father's Day weekend, so I'm not going to be in town. But please go and support the girls. We actually met with the girls this last week, really good girls. Can't wait to see our new court and stuff. And we had in-service, and in-service was great. Gus, you and your staff did an awesome job with our in-service. Great to see the new faces and stuff. And that's it. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Council Member Moore?

No conferences, but Council Member Browns and myself were able to attend the chamber installation last week. I also popped in last Saturday for the kickoff, or at the library for the summer reading. This summer's going to be busy, but just to kind of piggyback on what Nina said, our park and rec, the staff there, you guys handpicked the very best. And I think you guys always, always do. Because like you had mentioned in your in-service, these guys are the face of Santa Fe Springs. People come to our parks, they go to our facilities, and that's who they see. So it was a great staff and it's great to see everybody there. We're going to have a busy summer, as you guys all know. Whoever worked on that website, have you guys seen it, the new one? Today. It's awesome. So whoever put that together, great job. Really?

Okay. Who put it together? Raylene? Okay, well.

It is so much easier to navigate. It's incredible. So thank you for that. Great job. And happy Father's Day. Thank you.

Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez.

Thank you. Good evening. No conferences to report out. I wanted to say it was a great event yesterday. Juanita and Bill Rounds came to the Miss Santa Fe Springs so we could meet the contestants. They're just fabulous. We talked to them a little bit about what they want to do with the And when they go on into the world, the real world, and they all are great. They talked about just how the Miss Santa Fe Springs is, what they've been doing. They were actually making pink cowboy hats, putting all the little fun colors on them, and having lunch. And then they were going to do karaoke. They didn't invite me for some reason. Maybe they knew I'm not a singer. I wanted to say to the Parks and Rec, Gus, thank you so much for your team. The in-service was great, like you just said, and I went to the soccer for the youth, and they're just so amazing. These young people, the staff have already been trained. People were coming up to me saying that the staff are great, the kids... that they deal with a lot of kids. There's one coach to every 15, maybe 10, maybe 10, maybe 15. But they call them friends. They tie their shoes. If you can hear me, clap once. If you can't hear me clap twice, and the kids will clap twice sometimes, but it is very cute, and we have Coach Jasmine. These coaches, they know what they're doing, and they've been trained so well. We're just so proud to have them, and that's because of our leaders that make sure that we get the right training, so our coaches can be great leaders with the kids, too, so they really know how to work with the kids. I'm really proud to to be in Santa Fe Springs and see these coaches in action. I'm looking forward to the concerts in the park. The first one is Michael Jackson. They have some competition. Our mayor said that he's gonna get up and sing too, dance. We are going to be so fortunate.

I'm not going to do the moonwalk. I'll bring a moon pie, but not moonwalk.

He said he's going to twirl.

The white glove.

Yes, yes. And I want to just say congratulations to all fathers this Sunday. Have a great day. We know that all the things that you do with the kids and the one-to-ones that you have with them, it's very important. And we just want to say thank you for being dads and grandpas and great-grandpas and just doing your thing out there. Have a great Father's Day. We might cook you breakfast if you're lucky. And we'll see you at the concerts in the park. And thank you very much. Have a nice evening.

Thank you. Thank you. I do have to report out. the United States Conference of Mayors 94th annual meeting out here in Long Beach. And I do want to give my shout out to Mayor Rex Richardson from the city of Long Beach. He threw an event that I don't know how other people are going to talk about. He really showcased the city. It was a great thing. And Some of the topics, they started off with the bank. Before the conference even started, the day before, they were already talking about data centers. And you have so many mixed messaging when it comes to data centers. A lot of people don't want them in their city because they're hearing about environmental issues and these other things. And then other people... They don't mind them. So you get a lot of people that are split. And some, you know, when you sit with younger people, usually they're the ones who don't want them at all. And so when they asked me, they asked me during lunch, I didn't want to, you know, this was the following day. And when they asked me about the centers, they asked me, like, what do I think about them? I told them, I picked up my phone. I said, you see your phone? And then I go, you realize it has data, right? They're like, the data center is to you? And I go, so if you don't want a data center? I said, don't use your phone. Don't use your tablet. Don't use any of your devices. And they looked at me like... I didn't realize it had to do with our stuff. And I said, of course not. Nobody wants to hear it when it has to do with your personal life. But that's what we have these days. So we have to find a medium when it comes to that. I'm not saying I'm for them or against them. It's just sometimes people have to do their homework and just do more research on them. And we'll go from there. Another interesting topic was water control. Remember, this is all across the country. You get to hear from different people speak about our water, and I know that we've had some water deficiencies here, so that's why I wanted to attend that one. Of course, substance abuse, mental health, it's always at a high risk here. And, of course, some people don't want to talk about it, I think, by ignoring it. It's going to go away and it's not. Community development, housing. It almost seems like everybody's having these issues, these difficulties. Everybody's talking about adding housing in places that don't really... You can't have housing. And it's almost like Santa Fe Springs. We're kind of different because of the oil wells underneath us. And people think, oh, let's add housing. Let's add different things here. And it's like... We really can't. There's only certain places that we can't. So I think everybody, I think that's why, you know, we talk to people about the big four and, you know, letting them know maybe other cities around us can take the housing and we'll take in the businesses that people don't want. And, you know, of course, people were really intrigued about the big four and, you know, They actually, you know, we're giving our city kudos. They're like, man, you guys are ahead of the game. You're thinking about, you know, being innovative. And I was like, that's a good point. You know, we also talked about public-private partnerships. I'm a big fan of public-private partnerships. I've been a big fan for years. And City of Long Beach, if you guys don't know anything about public-private partnerships, just look up the City of Long Beach. And a lot of their things, a lot of the stuff they have, amphitheaters, just different things is done with. The three Ps. It's amazing. Of course, homelessness, I think we're always going to be thinking about that. WE TALK ABOUT IT AND IT ALMOST SEEMS LIKE EVERYBODY JUST KEEPS THROWING MONEY. OF COURSE, WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT. AND, OF COURSE, SOME OF THE THINGS THAT I BROUGHT UP IS THAT SUBSTANCE ABUSE, MENTAL HEALTH HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH HOMELESSNESS. BUT IF WE CAN TIE IN AND ONE OF THE OTHER TOPICS WAS JOBS, EDUCATION, AND WORKFORCE, ANYTHING THAT WE CAN DO TO HELP OUR HOMELESSNESS PARTNERS, YOU KNOW, EVEN LOOK FOR VOLUNTEERING JUST TO HELP THEM TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE IN SOCIETY. And technology innovation. They also talked about policies. And some of the things when it comes to policies that we had sidebar conversations and you talked to people and they were telling you. Of course, anything that you do when we go into closed session, we can't talk about it. Doesn't matter what it is, whether you're a school system or a school board system or a city council system. Closed session means we can't talk about it. And, you know, and of course, people were bringing up, well, it seems like sometimes we get staff, other people that do talk about it and other people have information out there that they're not supposed to have. And if they do have it, they don't understand what they're really doing with it. Because sometimes you can give that negative feedback of what's going on in your community. Or you can hurt your community if there's somebody who's trying to come in to your city. So there's a lot of different things. And it was just great to talk to these different mayors. The next person who came in as mayor was Todd Gloria. He's our new president when it comes to the United States Conference of Mayors. And when it comes to the city of San Diego, it's a massive city. So, you know, being able to talk to these individuals, you get to hear the things that they're dealing with. And of course, when you look at their budget compared to ours, it's like, you know, we're not even, you know, these guys just, it's ridiculous. They're dealing with over a billion dollars. And you're just like, we're like, wow, we're at a hundred million. I could just imagine, you know, the headache of trying to deal with. So, Other than that, I mean, it was a great conference to attend. You do learn a lot. You do get to meet different people from different areas. So it was great to be there. So it was just one of those things that I'm glad that I was able to attend. Other than that, when it comes to our city, I mean, you guys have been doing amazing, the watch parties. And, you know, I did see Bill.