Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Good morning everyone. Like to call this Stanislaus County Board Supervisor meeting to order. The date is April 28. The time is 09:03AM. I'm going to ask everyone to please stand for the pledge of allegiance and then remain standing for the invocation by Dallas Jackson from Renew Church.

Let's pray. Heavenly father, we come, before you today with gratitude for the gathering, the responsibilities entrusted to those who serve in this wonderful community. We ask for wisdom, true wisdom for, the supervisors and and many decisions that they face and grant them clarity of mind and discernment with this right and just, encourage them, and we just thank you for them. And we also pray for, encouragement for those who will come and share and just pray for clarity of mind and speech. We also pray just, the encouragement, Lord, just as the responsibilities that they are great.

And, Lord, also today, we just lift up all those who are represented here today. Let them, as they share, just share with voices to be heard with dignity where truth is spoken with grace and where conversation leads towards understanding. May all this be done in your great name. I pray this in your name, in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Thank you.

Thanks very much, pastor. Okay. This is the time we're gonna open up the public comment period. It's an opportunity for the public to comment on any item that is not on today's public agenda. Please state your name for the record, direct all comments to the dais. And so to spare for every speaker, please keep your comments to a five minute time limit. I'm gonna ask, do we have any written comments before we start? We do not have any written comments. Alright, the first one I have is Brett Kotel.

I get to speak first today. Hi. I'm Brett Cottell. Gary, I believe you and I went to school together a long time ago. I'm here. I live at 4306 Esmar Road in Series. We're out in the country. We're a residential ag neighborhood. And we have a number of properties that are Rancho Pecan, Rancho Sepulveda, Rancho Ceja, and there are noise problems. We've gone through the county.

German, I think his boss is here, Very nice gentleman doing the best he can. But these people are not paying attention to our zoning law. And, you know, you guys are telling us now, please call the sheriffs. We're doing so. They're getting really tired of coming out. They're like, Brett, we've got better things to do. I mean, all my neighbors are calling them. So I'm here to ask what else we can do to help the county enforce the zoning out there. That's basically why I'm here. I have a slideshow and all that, but you don't have time for that.

So, you know, German has told me that because they're not advertising, that's an issue. Yet we've shown their advertising on TikTok, on Facebook, on Instagram. And they're doing wedding venues. They're doing events. They're doing kincincheras. I'm not sure if I pronounce that right. And we had one Sunday night up at Rancho Seja and I'm a half mile from them. And I can hear the bass inside my home, which is way in violation of the zoning and the law, you know, the the noise ordinances. So that's just why I'm here. I I wanted to throw that out to you guys. I don't know if you're willing to discuss that later.

Yes. So what what we're gonna do here first, are they under code enforcement action? They are currently under code enforcement action. Right. So Rob, right here. And Lane, if you guys could meet him in the back and discuss that. Sure. This is the right one the right ones for you.

Okay.

Alright. Thanks for making us aware of Thank

very much.

Alright. Thank you. Alright. Next up, Brian Abbott.

Morning, guys. Morning. Abbott. Anyway, I came in to talk about a $100,000,000 here and a $100,000,000 there. Anyway, it's ours. We wind up spending a $100,000,000 on 1,500 prisoners that are at our jails. We want to spend a $100,000,000 on our drug addicts. This is a Thor can, and this is this. This is given away free now in the stores, and a lot of the drug addicts pick this up to the stores for free, and then they wind up selling this on the street so they could get more drugs. We're not helping this situation by giving away this stuff for free.

We're just putting more of a burden and a cost on our taxpayers. And I'd like to see that maybe we could change this since we're spending all this rehab and trying to get them in a better community when we wind up spending 700 and something million dollars to make that betterment. You know, if we're gonna be spending that much money, almost half of our budget, to make a better community, and all we're doing is giving away free drugs, I mean, what's the cost just to have the lady deliver this to all the stores? Not counting. They take this stuff, and they're selling it on the streets.

It's ridiculous that we're just promoting this stuff. How do we change this? This isn't a good way of fixing things, you know? And this is where it starts. We have to fix it. We shouldn't have started the problem anyway. We won't police the doctors that prescribe it. We had the two zero nine for a while. We had some of them that were given off the drugs just like it was nothing like it was candy, you know? And now, we sit there and we cut it down.

Well, all we did is create more street problems. Now, we've got more robberies, more thefts, and we don't even seem to arrest the people that break into our houses anymore. We'd arrest the homeowner before we'd arrest the drug addict that stole them. And that's what I found over and over again because I've owned multiple properties, and I'm the one going to jail because they don't do their job to arrest the people. They just come back and steal it again. I got assaulted vehicular assault. They tried to run me over. Some drug addicts, little Nortinos, little kissy lips on the neck, And instead of them arresting him, they didn't do anything to him. He came back and he broke into the property, stole all the memorabilia that was in there. You know?

This is what we go through. And then another burglary I had on another piece of property. The guy stole everything with a cop as a witness. This is your meddestopedia, a witness. And I go, well, I'm gonna arrest him. He goes, I'll call him and have him bring this stuff back. He never brought this stuff back. Instead, the same cop came and arrested me, put me in jail because he said I threatened him. I'm still fighting that. Three years later, I'm still going through a civil action against someone else's OPD and the sheriff's department because what happened? I wound up in jail and I got scabies. I got MRSA. I got sores on me for three years. And Bo's over there. He won't settle it.

You guys won't settle it. All I've asked is the money that I lost on this back. And I don't know why you guys don't wanna give it to me, but you make me go through the process of a civil case to sue when there isn't really a thing. Give me my bail money back. It was a false arrest. It's all I'm asking for, and pay for my time that I lost, my health, my safety, my skin, you know, because we don't keep a clean jail. And we sit there and say, oh, they're bringing drugs and stuff in our jail. I don't even understand how they could bring drugs or weapons into our jail when we have a three d scanner. And then, first of all, why doesn't our sheriff look over the records before they take a a man in from that is being arrested by the police? We're supposed to police our own police in these communities.

That's what the sheriff department does. Read these reports and see if that man should go to jail. If he shouldn't go to jail, then you know the officers. There could be collusions these days with officers, with those criminals, so we have to make sure that we protect it. Even the bailiff in the court is supposed to be there to protect you and the judge. That means your civil rights too. So the same way the sheriff's department needs to work. Read these reports that come in from these local police departments. Make sure that they're not conspiring in some way because you have too many drugs going on the street, stuff to fix them so they can keep moving. But here, it starts from you guys, and I don't see anything.

I mean, I haven't you've never offered me anything. I've been attacked by seven different officers, and it's ridiculous. Your brother was one back in 2009. All I was there was with my kids, 12 and 13. An officer came in. There was a homeless person in the back. I made sure my property was locked up. I walked away with the kids. Next thing, he comes running up on on me and the girls with weaponry. Then they beat me, broke my ribs and everything else, but I got nothing because there again, you guys just say, oh, well, we're not gonna settle it.

Go to court for the next three to five years, and then we'll just give you a crooked judge. I'm not gonna change. And then we'll have all the officers in combat here. But we need to change this. Stop making more and more. All you're doing is giving them this so they go do more drugs tomorrow.

Thank you very much. Anyone else? That's the last speaker card I have. Anyone else wanna speak during public comment? Alright. Seeing none, we're going to move on to the consent calendar before the board takes action on the consent calendar. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide public comment on a matter? I know Ron, I have yours. Does anyone else want to comment on any of the consent calendar? Any board member want to pull any of the consent calendar? Okay. We're going to pull C1. That's the only one. So beyond C1, I'll go ahead and entertain a motion.

Motion to approve all lighting other than C1.

Second. We have a motion. And we have a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries five zero. C1 is the approval to adopt the public works roadside memorial policy. And just get a quick update as to what what this is about.

Good morning, board. CEO Hayes, County Council both. Excuse me. It's become more apparent as we go through time here that roadside memorials have grown in size and scope. And we would like the Board's blessing on adopting a policy that puts limits on these things.

We've had one where we've had citizens call for years, hey, when can we take the doghouse down? It was at Langworth and Clarabelle. And it's one of those things. If we put rails around a thing, then we know with more certainty what and how long something can last. And so that's what we're looking for is Board approval on putting some rails around this. Were there any specific questions?

I do have one speaker card. Before, what after six months, what are you going to allow to be placed?

They're small objects. It's anything that's on the I think it's the it's the grave. It's the veterans yeah. It's been a veterans administration symbols of belief. So crosses whatever. There's, like, 20 of them that Yeah. You you can have.

They can have some there are some options available to them Right. To have something that's to memorialize this.

Eighteen, twenty four inches high, something small and not not in the way. It doesn't block site distance. That that's what we're looking for.

Yep. Alright. Thank you. I have a speaker at one Ron McMurtry wants to comment on it.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the board. Ron McMurtry here. Yeah, I noticed this item and my I'll just say what my belief is in the beginning of this and then there's little specific items that I have to follow-up on. Number one, because this affects people at the street level, this is, you know, the down to earth people, you know, someone they love has, you know, been killed, and they're going to put out a memorial.

And there I feel like there needs to be more of an outreach on this, because people are going to be putting things out, and then they're going to see that removed. This has slipped in into the consent calendar. I think that's not appropriate for something like this that affects the public at the street level. So, I would like to recommend that this item be a public hearing item, and then become a consent item, so that people can comment, maybe request tweaks to the policy. Number two well, now this one, we can't do anything about it. I'm just gonna like sometimes Catholic particularly, I don't know if any other religions, but they're gonna use candles. And I know that's a fire hazard. So, you know, you'll probably hear complaints about that. But I don't have anything to say about it. I agree.

It's a fire hazard. We don't want that. And I understand this policy is probably pretty boilerplate based on Caltrans. It said so in there. So, it makes sense since Caltrans has a policy to try to emulate them. But for our county based on county residents, which a lot are Hispanic, I think it makes sense to get maybe some feedback about tweaks. Maybe something we should do a little different than Caltrans. Number four, certainly this policy, I think there should be an outreach, but in addition to that we should, we do certainly have to have this policy published in Spanish. I didn't see any mention of that. I actually read the whole darn thing.

So we need to have this in Spanish for sure, because that's where you're gonna see a lot of memoirs, again the Catholics, particularly Hispanic people. And then number five, I don't know how this affects the Avery Millbrick Memorial on Grayson And Shiloh. I did talk to Adam at Stan RTA, and I think we're gonna when we have a bus stop, we're gonna put the memorial on there. Are we gonna be charging Stan RTA an extra fee? Because it did mention about fees. People have to pay a fee. And I think there needs to be comment about the fee schedule. When do we charge? Can we do something small like put flowers out? Will we still have to pay a fee? You know, those little details the public deserves to know. So I request that this become a public hearing item. Thank you.

Hey, Ron, can I ask you one question? Is there something in the policy itself

Okay.

Besides the outreach that you disagree with? Is the actual policy?

Not particularly. I just think there's probably tweaks that the public would like to recommend, and I just don't think this is a visible enough item being a consent item like this. And so that's what I'm requesting is a public hearing. I don't have any objection or whatever either way, I've read, yeah, the signs have to be 24 by 30. Yeah, I read all that. But I didn't see, unless I missed it, whether it has to be published in Spanish, which I think it really should. And again, the Avery Miller Brick issue, will Stan RTA so those are my questions. Will Stan RTA need to pay a fee? And of course, I'll be talking to Adam about this item that it exists or will exist, and that he needs to, you know, take a look at this. So that's all. Thank you.

Dave, on the fee.

Should I should have printed out the the policy? I don't think we have a fee adopted for this, unless it's just a standard encroachment permit. I I don't think it's our intent to really charge a fee. We're not looking to recover costs here. We just want to make sure that when somebody we identify something, somebody comes in, then the sixty day timer starts. And we would be okay with an extension depending on what the circumstances were. It's just it can't live out there for years and years and years like some of them have. The bus stop on West Main and Doghouse on Clarabelle, they have names. They grow.

So typically, you only have three or four that are really a problem, but we have to write a policy that covers much more similar to the item that was after that d c two encroachment policy. We're trying to do a line of sight issue. It's not Right. But because some people don't follow the rules, we end up writing a policy or a stricter policy Right. Which is difficult. So alright. Will, board David,

could you speak to the translation services just so that's addressed

as well

for Sure.

I I think this would be appropriate to have the county PIO do a couple media posts, so we could do one in English and maybe one in Spanish. That sounds like a great idea. So we can work with, PIO and, get that done.

Well, and the materials when people come to apply, the materials will be bilingual as well. That'd Mhmm. That could be an issue. Right? And I know that we've already kind of drudged up this conversation in the past about having accessibility to language services. But if someone were to come in and apply, we want to make sure that there's materials there.

I think with public works, I think we've got something like 20 plus Spanish speakers. And I think we would just translate the official English document right there verbally. I don't know that we're in the habit as an organization of producing bilingual written materials, as I understand it. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Yeah. And if I if I could just add that, we do have tools, within our IT systems here that for documents that are, public facing on our website, we have translation applications that will translate those for the public as well. Mhmm. And if there's any difficulty in the process, as Dave said, I I think it's over a quarter of our workforce is bilingual, and we have lots of bilingual staff that support the community, through interacting with any of these procedures.

K. Will the board? We're off to move.

Go ahead and

make a motion to approve. And I second.

Okay. Have a motion and a second. Got that? All those in favor say aye.

Aye. Opposed?

Okay. Motion carries four one. Okay. I'm gonna move on to public hearing item number five. First public hearing is to introduce a wave of the first reading of the ordinance to amend existing fees for the agricultural commissioner. Linda Pork Penfold. I don't see Linda. There she is. Good morning.

Good Good morning. Morning, your honorable board. So I'm Linda Pinfold, the agricultural commissioner for Stanislaus County. And I'm here to present our proposed fee changes that we would be targeting to have effective 07/01/2026. So as a little bit of background, we our fee schedule or or the authorization for us to have fees is established in county code 9.82.

And it authorizes the agricultural commissioner's office to charge fees for non mandated services, which includes things like apiary inspections, phytosanitary certification inspections, certified producer certificates, fruit and vegetable standardization inspections, and noncommercial device inspections. So the purpose of the fee adjustment is to align with the weighted labor rate with the actual costs for what it for providing services. We held a workshop on the evening of a a public workshop on the evening of 03/19/2026. We did not have anybody come to attend. Our weighted labor rate includes and and our proposed adjustments includes adjustments to the weighted labor rate and to the farm con farm labor contractor registration fees.

And here again, the goal what these fee changes are is they're proposed to go into effect 07/01/2026. So our current weighted labor rate is and our hourly rate is a $113 an hour, and our overtime rate is a 165. We are proposing to raise that to a $123 an hour in an overtime rate of a 180. Although it is over the average of the county comparison rates, it's still within the current the the range for the current fees that are charged over in that are charged in our immediate neighboring counties, Merced, which is at a $120 an hour, a 120 and 11¢ an hour, and their overtime rate is $240.22 an hour. And San Joaquin is a 154 and 41¢ an hour, and their overtime rate is a 177 and 31¢ an hour.

So what the impacts or the adjustments that these weighted labor rate changes would cause. For phytosanitary certificates, the current average charge per certificate based off of time and and and the average time is $85.20 per certificate. This would with this change, it would increase the average cost per certificate by approximately $4 and result in a net revenue increase of 52,288. Apiary inspections are here again, that's primarily for that's for strength, apiary strength inspections. That would the average is $480.25.

That would increase to 522 and 75¢ per colony strength inspection. So that would bring in about $800 increased revenue. Certified producer certificates are a 162 average is a 162 and 72¢ per inspection. That would increase to a $195.57 per inspection and result in $73 $731 of revenue for the department. Certified producer certified farmers markets, the certificate charge is $282.50.

That would increase to $295 and per certificate and that would bring in an additional $37.50. Industrial hemp, $395.50 per inspection up to would bring it up to 408 and increase it to $12.50. Non commercial devices, a $113 per inspection to a $123 bringing in additional 200. So the net revenue increase with these fee changes would increase the revenue by 54,060 by $54,069. The farm labor contractor fee, we base that on time to do that.

We we have California labor code section sixteen nine, sixteen ninety five gives us the authorization to charge fees for farm labor contractor registration. The current fee is $32. The proposed fee is $35 per registration. This is still below the county average of 37. Here again, we would be anticipating $44,444 dollars revenue due to this change for fiscal year '27.

So in everything done and said, the weighted labor rate adjustments and the farm labor contractor registration fee would adjust our net revenue for '27 for fiscal '27 to 54,513. The staff recommendation is to conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend the existing fees for the agricultural commissioner's office. That's my presentation. Are there any questions that I might be able to address for your honorable board? Any questions

for the commissioner? Seeing none. Okay. We're gonna go ahead and open up the public hearing, acknowledging written comments of which there are none. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide any public comment on this item? Please step forward. Seeing none, we're gonna close the public hearing, bring it back to the board for action or comments. Motion to approve.

Motion to approve. Second.

We have a motion to second. I will acknowledge really quickly for the audience because it seems like when we go through these that we haven't been briefed on them, we've all been briefed or we had the opportunity to be briefed on these and any comments or changes were done prior from the board's perspective. So now it's opportunity for the public to speak because the board has already weighed in on most of these issues. Okay. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries five zero. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

On the public hearing number two, introduce and waive the first reading of the ordinance to amend existing fees and establish new fees collected by the assessor's office. Sarah Lewis. Oh, Don. Hi, Sarah. Don, you're gonna work the PowerPoint?

If I'm counting, yeah. We'll find out. Chair Chiesa, members of the board, CEO Hayes, Council Boes, Don Gakel, Stanislaus County Assessor, and I want to introduce Sarah Lewis, Assistant Assessor of Administration. And Sarah is actually going to make the presentation this morning. As I say, I'm just going to try and run the computer.

Good morning, Chair Chiesa, board members, CEO Hayes, Council Boes, and members of the public. My name is Sarah Lewis, Assistant Assessor of Administration with the Assessor's Office. Today I will be presenting the 2026 proposed fee changes for the Assessor's Office. And you're good. You made it.

I'll begin by providing some background and the statutory authority that guides our ability to charge fees. I will then walk through the proposed adjustments to the existing fees, as well as introduce proposed new fees and associated services. After that, I will share how our fees compare to those in other counties and summarize the fiscal impact of these changes. Finally, I will present the staff's recommendation. Before we look into specific fee changes, I wanted to walk through the context, both why these changes are necessary and the legal authority behind them.

Our fees have not been updated since 2004. Since that time, the consumer price index has increased by roughly 75% and the cost of labor, technology and operations have grown significantly. To ensure transparency and fiscal responsibility, we must align our fees with the actual cost of providing services. These updates are authorized under several of the revenue and taxation code. Sections four hundred eight point three and four zero nine allow us to recover costs for both mandated and optional services, including labor and indirect costs.

Sections sixty three point one and sixty three point two specifically allow cost recovery for late filed exclusion claims with the board's approval. These codes provide a strong legal foundation for the updates we are presenting today. Next, I'll walk through the proposed fee adjustments beginning with updates to the existing fees and then introduce our proposed new services. We're proposing adjustments in nearly all areas of our current fee structures. These include the appraisal record reproduction fees, the parcel boundary change request fees, our valuation services fees, our research fees, the request by mail fees, and the custom report fees.

These proposed changes reflect our updated labor classifications and the actual cost of providing services. Let's walk through the details of each proposed change. This slide shows the proposed adjustment for the appraisal record reproduction fee. For the first page, the proposed increase is from $3 to $5 For any additional pages, the proposed increase is from 1.5 to $2.5 per page. Large copies of our assessment maps remain at $5 per page.

Duplicate copies also remain at 25¢ per page. It is important to know that property owners are not charged for the appraisal record reproduction, and this service will remain free to the property owner if approved as proposed. The assessor's boundary, the assessor's parcel boundary change request, is proposed the proposed changes include the initial request to split or combine two APNs will increase from a $115 to $200. For any additional parcels within the same request, the proposed increases from $25 to $40. Additional research time also increases from $37.94 an hour to $63 per hour, billed in fifteen minute increments.

The proposed increase takes into consideration changes in our workforce. In 2004, a cadastral technician did this work. Since then, this position has been retired and replaced with a technology specialist too. For evaluation services, the proposed fee changes include the abstract, which is a fee for preparing a report which breaks down the assessment into base date and ownership interest, is proposed to go from $44 per hour to $70 per hour. This work is done by our senior appraisers.

For the Williamson Act cancellation valuations, the proposed increase is from $50 per hour to $86 per hour. The Williamson Act cancellation valuations are done by our supervising rural appraiser. These services are also billed in fifteen minute increments. For research services, the property ownership research fee increases from to $58 per hour and is done by our senior assessment technician. The senior assessment technician position was added to our workforce in 2005.

Property description research increases from $37.94 per hour to $72 per hour. The proposed increase takes into consideration changes in the structure of the workforce. In 2004 a cadastral technician did this work. Since then, this position has been retired, and this work is now done by technology specialist three. Again, these services are billed in fifteen minute increments.

For requests submitted by mail, ownership or parcel number requests increase from $5 to $10. Each additional ownership or parcel number requested increases from 2 to $5. Custom report fees also have a proposed increase. Custom computer report fees have a proposed increase from $200 to $215 per request and include two hours of programming and 4,000 parcel characteristics. The fee for any additional programming time needed is proposed to increase from $57 per hour to a $108 per hour.

The proposed increase takes into consideration the changes in the structure of the workforce. In 2004, a software developer two did this work. This work is now being done by our software administrator three. And it will be billed in fifteen minute increments. Beyond the initial 4,000 additional parcel characteristics increased from 30 from 3¢ to 5¢ per parcel.

Now, please allow me to introduce you to our proposed new services, which are a response to our local needs, the associated proposed fees and the related statutory authorities. We are proposing new services in the following areas, a USPS mailing fee and an electronic delivery fee, both structured to recover staff time and costs with no charge to the property owners. A property description of record report intended to improve clarity and reduce title errors. New data new assessor data services products include secured and unsecured role downloads, cumulative sales data, and assessment map subscriptions are all designed to meet the local needs of our customers. And finally, a late filing processing fee for intergenerational exclusion claims, which encourage timely filing and recover reassessment costs.

For USPS mailing, we propose a minimum fee of $5 per mailing or actual cost if greater. This fee is in addition to the appraisal record reproduction fee. Property owners will not be charged a mailing fee and the service is authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code. For electronic delivery of records, the proposed fee is $4 per electronic delivery. This covers, the cost of the actual cost of staff time required to prepare and send the digital appraisal record.

As with mailing, property owners will not be charged an electronic delivery fee. This service is authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code. The proposed service of a property description of record report would provide a map which depicts a boundary representation of a property as described on the deed. The proposed fee is $56 and includes forty five minutes of research. Any additional research time required will be billed at $63 per hour in fifteen minute increments.

This work will be done by our technology specialists too. This service is anticipated to enhance clarity and may reduce title errors. This service is authorized under four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code. The next four slides will introduce proposed services as it relates to assessment data. The first is a proposed fee for secured or unsecured role data downloads and is $375 per request.

This includes monthly updates for one year. This service is authorized under, 408.3 of the revenue and taxation code. The next is a proposed fee for cumulative sales download and is $400 per request. This data download includes parcels with reported sales prices based on documentary transfer tax for the past two years. This service is authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code.

The third proposed fee under the assessor data services category is a secured role data standard report and is $220. This download would include owner name, parcel number, site is in mailing address, use code, and assessed value as of lien date. Customers are required to demonstrate a business need for this information. Customers need to certify under penalty of perjury the use of assessor data fulfills a business need and requires a signed user agreement. This service is authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code.

The final proposed service in the assessor data services category is an annual subscription for assessors assessment maps and the proposed fee is $80. This subscription includes monthly updates. This service is authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code. Finally, the last proposed new fee is a processing fee for the late filing of intergenerational change in ownership exclusion claims and is a $175 per claim. When a late claim is filed, the assessor has already reassessed and enrolled a change of value for the qualifying property.

The late filing of a claim results in additional costs related to labor efforts and the duplication of work to the reassessment on the annual roll. The proposed fee would apply only after the owner's failure to respond to two written requests made by our office. The actual cost is roughly $210 to rework the reassessment when a late claim is filed. However, section 63.2 prescribes the statutory maximum is $175 The goal of this fee is to encourage timely filing and to recover at reassessment labor costs when late claim is filed. This fee is authorized under section 63.2 of the revenue and taxation code and requires the board's approval.

It is important to note that we conducted a survey with our comparison counties. Overall, our proposed fees are consistent when considering the mandated services required under section 408.3 of the revenue and taxation code. There is naturally more variation for optional services that reflect our local needs, staff and staff resources. These optional services which make up the vast majority of our services are authorized under section four zero nine of the revenue and taxation code. If approved as presented, the fiscal impact will include increased transparency and aligned fees with the actual cost of services.

It would also reduce the general fund subsidy of optional services. In addition, it will increase timely reporting of intergenerational change in ownership exclusion claims. If approved as presented, the proposed fee amendments and new services will be effective 06/18/2026 and will be operative for the budget year of 2027. The gross annual revenue for the department for these proposed changes is estimated to be $14,000. Staff recommends the board conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance, amending existing fees and establish new fees collected by the assessor's office.

Thank you for your time and for your consideration. We are available for any questions the board or the public may have.

Thank you. Any questions, staff on this one? All right. I'm gonna go ahead and open the public comment period. Acknowledge any written comments, of which there's none. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide public comment on this item? Seeing none, I'm gonna close the public hearing. Oh. Come on up, Brian. Reopen.

I don't see much, Brian. Doesn't seem much, but kind of 30%. Now how come that this isn't just done yearly based on the same amount, which is one, one and a half percent per year, and then it's just not changed every year to keep up with this. Instead, all of a sudden, bam, there's 30 difference. That makes no sense at all. You know? So how come we just don't balance it out? It's the same way with you guys. I mean, if you get a raise, you should get a one and a half percent raise. Our taxes go up one and a half percent.

It seems to keep a balance in that. Let's just do it every year. I mean, we have the technology to keep up with this. So sometimes when you just throw a ball at somebody and say, well, we're not gonna do it for a few years, but now all of sudden, we're gonna do a 30% difference. I mean, that kinda racks it out here for the public. The public can't stand that highway. How come it changed so much? They wouldn't notice the one and a half percent. You know? So so maybe we should just keep up with this stuff instead of letting it go for, what, two thousand and four, twenty years.

Doesn't make any sense. Are we smarter and have more technology than that? It would automatically do the increase. And so she wouldn't even have to be up here, or he wouldn't have to be up here.

And I wouldn't have to

be here. Alright. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Oh, six.

Even else?

Well first and foremost I just want say good morning to everybody and I know I have arrived here a little bit late. The item that was just discussed is obviously a probably not particularly aligned with what I just very briefly want to discuss very fast but right now being Tuesday at 9AM, I just wanted to take a quick opportunity just to very briefly address this. So, yeah, I just wanted to thank you more than anything, chair councilman, and just wish everybody a good morning, happy Tuesday. Just a quick moment of your time.

You're speak on this item? Is it on this item?

Respectfully, may I may I ask a question real fast?

Okay. As long as it's on this item.

Yes, sir. So have we already discussed any items involving involving our water, involving, like, any future plans for for farming?

No. Today right now, we're on public hearing. This is the second public hearing regarding fee increases in the assessor's office.

Okay. So are we moving to any items during this meeting that involve water, involve farming, involve anything?

Next next public hearing is on fees from the environmental resource department followed by the planning and community development, followed by the public works department, followed by the sheriff's office.

Yes, sir. Okay. Well, with that being said, respectfully, I just wanna ask a quick question. That's all. And I'll be out of your guys' hair. I appreciate you. So I'm a member of this community. I just wanted to follow-up on a quick statement made by our chief executive officer, Jody Hayes, from our last meeting regarding the Del Porto Canyon Reservoir project, specifically the clarification that the county has not allocated any funds and does not intend to. I appreciate that clarification. However, I think it's important to expand the conversation beyond direct funding.

In that same statement, reference was made to the county's legislative platform, which allows the county to support grant out applications from other agencies, including providing letters of support for state or federal funding. My question is this. As Stanislaus County in any capacity formal or informal provided support, coordination, or advocacy for this project, including letters of support or communication with agencies seeking funding? Because while direct while direct funding may not be involved, those forms of support can still pay play a significant role in whether a project moves forward. For a project with this level of environmental and community impact, transparency should include not just financial contributions, but also any form of institutional support. I'm simply asking for clarity.

That's all. So I appreciate it. Next time, public comment. This is appropriate for public comment, or we can try and agendize. It's not appropriate on this issue. Right. Anyone else for public comment on this item?

And I apologize for that, sir. No

problem. You got to say we heard what you had to say. I gave you the opportunity to do public comment during an item which I shouldn't have.

But Well, thank you, sir. I appreciate that. For next time, for a Tuesday meeting like this, is there, like, a better way that I can approach this public comment that's perhaps in a more appropriate

Oh, no. No. During public comment. It's perfectly appropriate during public comment period, which is at the beginning of our meetings. So it's usually nine 09:05, 09:10, something along those lines. Right. Because I apologize

for just intruding in a bad way. I don't mean to intrude in a bad way.

You know? Didn't take it that way. It's just right now, we're doing public hearings on fee increases. So that's what we're we need to handle.

Okay. All right. Well, thank you again, Svan. Thank you. God bless.

You bet. Likewise. All right. Anyone else for public comment here? All right. Seeing none, I do want to go back to Brian's question. And Brian I think Brian had left, we do encourage our departments to update their fees more than 2,004 from 2004 for that exact reason. It is better to do it yearly a little bit at a time and make sure we capture the cost because for many years we haven't been capturing the cost. And although they're small amounts, I think it was $14,000 and $52,000 on a $1,900,000 budget. It's money that's relieved because they're doing the job for individuals.

Individuals are supposed to pay that fee in a I mean, in the structure of a fee rather than general fund subsidizing. So we encourage and you'll see other departments do do it every couple of years. It does take time and effort, so they don't want to do it every single year. And 20 what twenty years twenty two years, and I think the highest fee was 30% ish. Not a bad. It's less than 1.5% so. Alright, so now I'm gonna bring it back to the board for any comments. Alright action

Motion to approve.

Second by supervisor Wither. I heard

it. Second by Terry.

Alright. All those in favor, aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries five-zero. Thank you very much. On the public hearing number three, introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to establish new fees. And amend or eliminate existing fees for the Department of Environmental Resources. Garrett. He'll be presenting.

Although I see The whole team showing up. It's good. Morning, Rob. Like when the department heads work the PowerPoint.

Well,

morning, Chairman Case, members of the Board, CEO Hayes and County Council Boes. Rob Costello, Director of Environmental Resources. This morning, we will be presenting to you the department's proposed fee adjustments. The recommended changes we will discuss this morning include an adjustment to the weighted labor rate, fee adjustments related to the environmental health and hazmat, and clarification of fees within our milk and dairy division. These adjustments are necessary to ensure cost recovery for the program DER administers. With me today is our business manager, sitting to my right, is Garrett Hill. We have our hazardous materials manager, Alvin Law and environmental health manager, Carl Quinn. I'm gonna hand it over to Garrett. Thank you, Rob.

Good morning, chairman, members of the board, CEO Hayes, and county council Boes. I'll begin with the proposed changes to our weighted labor rates. We are recommending an increase to the department's weighted labor rate of $13, bringing it from $1.37 per hour to a $150 per hour, an increase of about nine and a half percent. In addition, we are proposing to increase the clerical weighted labor rate by $6 from $54 per hour to $60 per hour. These adjustments reflect rising costs due to inflation, including increases in program and support staff costs, as well as services, supplies and overhead costs.

They are consistent with the growth in the consumer price index since our last fee update in 2023. Even with these proposed increases, our rates remain at the lower end compared to the weighted labor rates in similar counties. With that, I'd like to pass it over to Carl Quinn to discuss the environmental health section.

Good morning Chairman Keiva, member of board CEO Hayes and County Council both. Carl Quinn, manager of the environmental health division. We respectfully request the following adjustment to the environmental health fee. Starting with the food program, the division has proposed a 9.5% increase to 29 fixed fee categories based on the consumer price index. On this page, you will see several permanent food facility categories.

Permanent food facilities are categorized using a risk based system that reflects the complexity of their food preparation steps. For example, a full service restaurant with multiple preparation steps is classified as the highest risk food food facility category one. While facilities with fewer or simpler preparation steps fall into lower categories accordingly. The fee for the food facility shown on this page will also increase by 9.5% based on the consumer price index. These are bed and breakfast establishment, county fair concession stands, and and all mobile food vendors which are categorized using the same risk based system as their brick and mortar counterparts, satellite foods distribution facilities, and the certified farmers market.

Continuing from the previous page, produce stands and the swap meet site will also see the same 9.5% increase as previously mentioned. On this page, these existing food facility fees are no longer being used and have confused our customers. The division is requesting that these fees to be removed. For the liquid waste program, the division is proposing to increase the septic pumper truck fee by 9.5%, bringing it to $210 Even with this adjustment, the proposed rate remained the lowest compared to the similar fees in the neighboring counties. This concludes the environmental health portion of the presentation.

Mr. Alvin Lau, has a materials division manager, will continue with the presentation.

Good morning, Chairman, members of the Board, CEO of Hayes and County Council Pose. I'm Alvin, Hazardous Materials Manager. And today, we respectfully propose a 9.5% fee increase in three Cooper programs, It stands for a certified unified program agency. That have not received an adjustment since 2019 for the Cal R program. 2020 for the hazardous waste generator program and 2023 for the above ground petroleum storage act program.

The hazmat division currently regulates approximately 2,800 facilities in Stanislaus County, and recent regulatory changes have significantly increased the staff time required for inspections, training, supervision, record keeping, reporting. The proposed adjustment is necessary to sustain mandatory program operations and inspections and maintain compliance and continue providing essential public services that protect community health and the environment. Before you, the current rates for the APSA, which is in five categories, range from $475 to $10.43. The proposed rate will increase to $5.20 to $11.42. In the CALR program, we have three program levels, program one, two, and three.

The current rates are $4.50 to $17.55. The proposed rate will go up to $4.93 to $19.22 dollars. For the hazardous waste program, we have three categories. The current rates are 127 to 930 13, and the proposed rates will increase to a 140 to 1,000. Lastly, within our hazardous waste hazardous materials division, we propose amending the conditionally exempt small quantity generator, which is acronym CESQG, to be named very small quantity generator, VSQG, to align with the, federal regulations that is adopted in the title 22 of the hazardous waste regulations within the Department of Toxic Substance Control.

That concludes my presentation for the hazmat division.

Garrett Hill again, presenting on our milk and dairy, program. Our milk and dairy program is responsible for inspecting dairy farms and ensuring good milk quality and sanitation requirements. Milk and dairy program fees were last amended in 2023. I'd like to clarify we are not proposing an increase in the fee, rather clarifying the fee to include the minimum the $250 minimum charge for both grade a and b categories. Regarding our public workshops, the department conducted two public stakeholder meetings in March to provide information to the public regarding these proposed proposed fee changes and to receive input from the public.

Overall, stakeholder feedback from the two workshops was fair favorable to the proposed changes in the fees. We conducted this workshop on March 16, one in the morning and one in the evening. We had a total of five people show up in the morning and six show up in the evening. Public notices for the workshops were printed in the Modesto Bee and published on March 6 and again on March 8. The proposed fee changes were also posted to to the department's website.

Staff also conducted county fee comparisons, the results of which are included as an attachment to the agenda item. The comparison showed DER's proposed fees to be in line with what other counties comparable demographics are. We also mailed out around 6,000 flyers to all of our businesses and then also conducted those workshops. In conclusion, staff has the following recommendation. Introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to establish new and amended or eliminate existing fees for the Department of Environmental Resources.

If approved, fees will be effective 06/18/2026 for the fiscal year 2027. Thank you for all your time this morning. Now we'd like to open up to discussion for any questions you may have.

So I didn't see a number of what the revenue means to your department. I guess I'm going to ask that of all the departments if they're not in here. Do you know? Total revenue?

Total revenue would increase about $600,000 $600,000 Yeah.

Any other questions? Staff? Okay. Open up the public comment and acknowledge any written statements of which we have none. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide any public comment on this item? Alright. Close it, bring it back to the board.

Just a quick, quick comment. You talked about, we've seen these fees, we all know this before, before this meeting. But still just to reinforce it for everybody, we're just trying to cover our costs, right? We're not here to make a profit and it's all about covering our costs. And I think about even within my own firm, we have to raise our rates as cost me more to pay CPAs to come work for me to get this stuff done. And that's a blessing that I'm able to do that and hopefully people will pay it. And I was just thinking about the farmer, looking at Vito here. They don't have that possibility to raise the rate, you know, that they're going to get for their product. That's what's sad about this is that we you know, nothing we can do about it. We've got to cover our costs, and this is the way it works.

But the farmer sits there and just takes whatever the price is and what's allocated or what they're told they're going to get for their crop that year. And they don't have that option to pass it on to their to the consumer. But nothing that we can do about that. But just as I sit here and think about this and I think about my own business and things, it's just a it's a tough spot for the farmer right now. But anyway, totally support what we're having to do here.

Yeah. Based on the labor weighted rate, fully burdened cost. It's typical. Do you wanna clarify?

Yeah. Can we just clarify fiscal impact real quick? I know that was a question that was added towards the end. I'm reading the agenda item and unless I'm misunderstanding something in the agenda item. Under fiscal impact, it quotes the increased revenue as 313,404. So I think the number was 600 that was mentioned. What am I missing here?

Yes. I do have to apologize on that. I was trying to remember off the top of my head if it was 300,000 or 600,000, and I went with the higher. My mistake on that. Okay.

So for

no worries. So for members of the public in the agenda item itself, total fiscal impact increased revenues three thirteen four zero four. It also breaks down the individual amounts in the different divisions of the department. Thank you for the clarification.

You. Apologize for that.

Ready? Alright. Do we have a renewed motion?

Okay. Motion to approve. Staff recommendations. Second.

Motion to second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries by zero. Thank you. On to item four, which is the public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend existing fees for building permit services, planning and community development.

Good morning, Chairman Kiesa and members of the board, Mr. Hayes, Mr. Bose. I'm Angela Freitas, planning director, and I'm here to present the next two items, one for building permit services and one for planning services. With me are the deputy directors for the department, Denny Ferreira, who will be sitting next to me, thankfully working the PowerPoint for me.

And behind us, Carmen Morello and Kristi Dowd. The first item is the building permit services fees. Building permit services oversees building permit administration, which includes the abandoned and dangerous buildings, and has oversight of the county's one stop shop permitting process, which includes calculation and collection of the county's public facility fees. Building permit services is a 100% funded by fees, with 90% of those being valuation based and 10% being flat flat based. The department is proposing a 5% increase for all valuation and flat rate fees since our last update last year.

The consumer price index has increased 3%, but the weighted labor rates have increased 4.7% for those staff that are assigned to this work. Proposed, in addition to the increase, is one new fee for Building Code Appeals Board, which would be a flat rate of 2,600 refundable if actual costs are lower than the fee calculated. For valuation based fees, those fees are based on two variables, the value of construction per square foot and the gross area of the building. Building valuation is established using building valuation data, BVD, that is published by the International Code Council. It is based on market value averages of construction costs throughout The United States, and we are currently utilizing the August 2020 BVD, and no change is proposed.

The valuation based permit fee is the product of applying applying the established valuation to the valuation fee table. The proposed increase is being applied to the valuation ranges using the calculation used to calculate the fees within the table. Included in your agenda packet is this comparison of existing and proposed common permit type fees. It shows that the highest fee increase would be in the five would be $501 for a single family dwelling and that's using an estimate of a 3,300 square foot single family dwelling. And the lowest fee would be for a water heater replacement at $8.

In preparing these fees, we did do a comparative fee survey with the county's eight comparative counties, excluding however, Madera and Merced, because we were unable to get their information. And we did include the cities of Siris, Houston, Modesto, Patterson, and Riverbank. The survey focused on the common construction permit types typically utilized by the county to show the impact of the proposed fees. And the survey showed that the county's fees are in line with the jurisdictions surveyed, with some fees higher and others lower. Looking at the comparative fee survey itself, the higher fees were found in Monterey, Patterson, Sacramento, Ceres, and Riverbank with the lower fees found towards the South end of the Valley and into Larry and Kern, along with one in San Joaquin County for the HVAC sewer, system replacement.

Again, we are neither highest nor lowest. General factors to consider in comparing fees is if the jurisdiction's fees are based on actual cost providing services or if they're being subsidized by the general fund. And then varying different factors with respect to staffing levels, salary levels, and indirect overhead costs associated with the operations necessary for service delivery. The county's building permit services, again, is a 100% funded by fees and does not receive any general fund to cover costs of operation. The revenue that it's being projected for the with these fee increases based on 2025 activity would be a $132,000 if these fees were were adopted.

The Notice of the proposed fee amendments were provided to persons and firms known as regular representatives and applicants seeking building permit services along with the Stanseless County Farm Bureau and the California Building Industry Association. And as of the time of this meeting, we have received no objections or concerns with regards to the fees that are being proposed. Staff is recommending that you conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend the existing fees for building permit services. If these fees are adopted, they would become effective July 18. That concludes my report. We're available if there's any questions.

Total amount of will be collected?

132,000 would be the revenue generated based on 2025 Okay. Activity levels.

Perfect. Thank you. Any other questions?

Okay.

Open the public hearing. There are no written comments. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide any comments? Public comment on this item? Seeing none, close the public hearing. Bring it back to the board for questions, comments, action.

Motion to approve.

Second. Having trouble finding seconds today.

Nobody wants to increase freeze. Okay. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries five zero again. Thank you very much. Oh, same. Now we're gonna move on to item five, which is public hearing to introduce some way first reading of the ordinance amending fees for the planning services.

Okay. The second item planning services is, the planning services division oversees land use entitlements, lot line adjustments, land divisions, the Williamson Act administration, and review of alcohol beverage control licenses, business licenses, and building permits. The department again is proposing a 5% increase for all the flat rate fees and a few of its lower cost deposits. Since the last update in May, we've seen weighted labor rates for the staff working in these areas increase by 4.7%. No new fees are being proposed.

The increase in proposed amended fees range from $2 to 247 per application for, the most common applications that we see. Parcel maps in the agricultural zone would increase 205. Use permits would increase by $202,111. The department will continue to provide no cost services in the form of predevelopment meetings where we coordinate and facilitate meetings with various county departments and having planners on call for in person phone, email, and to address inquiries general inquiries. The goal of these services is early identification of potential issues and to provide direction on the process applications need for development.

Included in the agenda item is a comparative fee survey again we looked at the eight county comparisons along with the cities of Modesto, Patterson, Riverbank, Turlock, and Ceres. The survey focused on eight common application types ranging in size from those handled at the staff level to those requiring Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors action. The survey showed that the county's fees are in line with the jurisdiction surveyed, with some fees higher and others lowered. As with the building permit, fees, some of the general factors to consider in in comparing fees is the jurisdiction's fees are based or whether the jurisdiction's fees are based on actual costs of providing services or subsidized by general fund. And again, those are your your different staffing levels, salary levels.

The county's planning services collects fees with the goal of recovering a 100% of its application related costs. So using the twenty twenty five permit activity levels, we would anticipate that the revenue that would come from these fees would be $7,100, as reflected in your fiscal revenue section. The comparative survey, when we're looking at different fact different the different counties and cities, the different factors that kinda play into those fees is we don't know the relationship between the depart the deposits collected and the actual costs collected. Sometimes applications with two or more actions may be charged multiple application fees. There's variations between flat rates versus actual costs and then the naming conventions for the different permits.

Some agencies charge a separate fee for preparation of environmental reviews. For us, we charge everything collected into into one fee. And fees may or may not collect may or may not include fees charged for other departments. The fees that we're proposing to have increased, we did provide notice again to persons and firms known to the department and reg as regular representatives including, and we included the Farm Bureau and the BI, BIA. To date no objections or concerns have been raised.

Staff is recommending that you conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend existing fees for planning services. And as with building permit service fees, if adopted, these fees would become effective July 18. If there is any questions, we're happy to answer them.

Any questions? Angela or Denny? Seeing none, we'll do the same. Open the public comment period. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide any public comment on this item? Seeing none, close the public comment period. Bring it back to the board.

Move to approve.

The motion to approve. And the second. All those in favor, say Aye. Opposed. Motion carries 50. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Onto public hearing number six. Public hearing to introduce and weigh the first reading of the ordinance to amend existing fees for the Department of Public Works. Andrew and Dave.

Morning, chair Kiesa, board members, CEO Hayes, County Council Boes, Dave Lehman, Stanislaus County Public Works Director, and I'm here with deputy director Andrew Melitzia, and we're gonna walk through the proposed 2026 Public Works fee update.

Good morning. So we're just gonna go over the our our general services provided here. Excuse me for that. So our development services group provides right away encroachment permitting. This is typically, you know, utilities, excavations, sidewalks.

You know, roadway work that is non public or excuse me, non public works work. We also inspect new construction. This is typically through new subdivisions or new commercial development within the right away. We have our stormwater group, which enforces our MS four permit. Transportation permitting group, which are for permit loads, our county surveyor's office, our floodplain administration, and we also work with our building and planning department for land use entitlements, grading permits, and building permits.

So our fees were last updated in 2024. In 2023, we had a comprehensive update to reevaluate all of our fees. In 2024, we did an inflationary update. Last year in 2025, we did not do an inflationary update. We do at the time, our labor unions were still in negotiation. We weren't sure exactly where we were going to be. So we just held off for the one year. This year we are proposing to do the inflationary update to include last year's negotiated rate as well. So one other change here is we added a development plan fee. This was a fee that planning already had in their fee schedule.

I believe we had it at one point, but it was removed. So what we did there is just included our developed or approved development agreement fee in its place and kind of slipped it in there. And we also clarified some fee descriptions and notes. So as I mentioned in 2023, we did the comprehensive fee update. Last year's county labor rates were increased by 4%. And then this year on July 1, they will increase another 4%. So, as we compound that, it it comes to about eight. 2%. So, the eight. 2% is what we're proposing as an update this year.

We do have a few fees that will remain. These are due to various reasons. In particular, transportation permits are legislatively limited. So they'll stay exactly where they are. Our record of survey review, and talks with the county surveyor recommended to not increase those as he believes that we're we're in an okay spot with those in terms of recovery.

Our parade permits are not changing, and our corner records can only be charged at the recorder's cost to record a document. As mentioned, we are adding the development plan fee. This is just consistent with the development agreement fee, and this is really just to to work with the Celetta community plan update. We wanted to make sure that it was in there. We did not increase our ag grievances fee.

It's a very rarely used fee, and so we just left it as it is. And then as I mentioned, we clarified a few of the items with the fee administration, whether it's a minimum deposit, actual cost, or just a flat rate. So we also sent this out all of our fee updates to the local industries. To this date, we have not received any comments on the fee update. We did do a comparison to our neighboring counties and there were no significant changes in their fees or in our fees that would that would stand out.

The recommendation here is is to conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend existing fees for the Department of Public Works. And with that, if you have any questions.

What do the fees total for you?

It'll add about $50,000 worth of revenue to This unit.

Any other questions? Staff? Seeing none. Acknowledge we don't have any written comments on this. Does anyone in the audience wish to provide any public Comments. Seeing none. Post public hearing bring it back to the board for action.

Motion approved. Second.

Motion and a second. All those in favor, aye. Aye. Opposed. Motion carries five zero.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, guys.

Alright. Move on to item seven public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of the ordinance to amend the existing corner fee for the sheriff's office. Lieutenant Howard will be presenting. Yes, sir. Nice to see you again. Good to see you.

Good morning, gentlemen. I'm lieutenant Howard. I'm the chief deputy coroner, in charge of the coroner's office for the sheriff's department. This morning, I'm gonna propose, the coroner's fee, increase. The coroner's office is mandated by law to investigate certain deaths as set forth in California government code section twenty seven four ninety one and California health and safety code section ten two eight five zero to determine cause and manner of death.

The government code section twenty seven four seven two allows the coroner's office to charge and collect fee for removal of a dead body, a decedent. Although government code section twenty seven four seventy two sets a $100 fee, it must be read in conjunction with section fifty four nine eighty five, which grants the board the authority to adjust fees to recover the cost of providing services. The last increase by the coroner's office was adopted in 2007. This increase was tied to salary cost of a deputy coroner. That's the increase proposed today.

Proposed increases from 175 to $2.50 for the coroner's fee. This is projected to be estimated of increase of $54,000 There was a eight county comparison. There was comparison with more than that, but eight county comparison. Some are more, some are less. The average, I believe, is around $2.55 between those eight county comparisons.

The staff recommends to conduct a public hearing to introduce and waive the first reading of an ordinance to amend the existing coroner's fee for the sheriff's office. I'm open to any questions if you have some.

Expected I'm sorry? How much is this expected?

It's estimated 54,000.

54,000. Alright. Thank you. Any questions? Lieutenant? Nope. Alright. We can open up the public hearing knowledge. We do not have any written comments on this. And does anyone in the audience wish to provide public comment? Please step forward.

Thank you, mister chairman, members of the board. Ramik Murtree again. A small thing. I understand that some people may have no connections or whatever and may just, you know, expire some public place and so therefore bodies must be collected, you know, regardless. And so I assume there must be some general funds somewhere that must be within the coroner's budget or the sheriff's budget. I was wondering what fund takes care of those unaccounted for things where you can't collect a fee from anybody.

The indigent? You're talking about the people who indigent? Okay. Anyone else? Lieutenant Howard, you want to answer what you do with indigent, those that don't have the ability to pay?

Yes.

So there is an indigent program with the coroner's office. So there's a process, when somebody doesn't have, next of kin or the ability to pay, there's a packet they fill out, to provide the coroner's office. Once that's approved, then the indigent or the decedent will be at the county's expense, taken to a cremation service. They will be, stored for one year, and in that time, the family can reclaim the, remains. And, if they supply the coroner's office with with the funds of the cost of the cremation. So there is a process in place for

that.

Thank you. Alright. Guess I better close the public hearing. If there's no other comments, bring it back to board. Comments or action?

Motion approved, staff recommendations.

Second.

Motion and a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries five zero. Thank you very much.

This is just a little color color commentary. This is, I think, for all of us is one of the worst meetings that we have when we have to go through this. We don't do this very often.

Yeah.

And maybe that's part of it too. It's just difficult to have have to go through this and I'm glad we do it all at once though. That's great that we get it all over with.

Yeah. For sure. Okay. Do not have that's the last of the public hearings. We do not have any discussion items. Board of supervisor reports, item seven.

Just have a quick report. Last night, I took a ride along with Sirius PD. I went out with sergeant Viera. I wanna thank all of our officers in Sirius for doing a wonderful job in keeping our community safe and protected. And thanks again to sergeant Viera for letting me tag along.

Any other comments? I I wanted to comment on something that kinda plays off of what we're doing here, but I had I did a lot line adjustment, paid my fees, and I just received yesterday a something from the clerk recorder's office asking if there was potentially fraud. Not not there was fraud, but they asked the question, did is this something that you initiated because we have our fraud detection, real estate fraud detection, which is great. And I know that that's another discussion we need to have if we if we wanna fund that to a higher degree, but it it's always good. A lot of the stuff slips through the cracks before where we were the person who was registering a or recording not registering, recording a document for a lot line adjustment.

It could happen without their knowledge potentially. So I thought that was really good. And then back to the predevelopment meetings, we talk about all of these fees and and people paying, but the predevelopment meeting is free. I've found that that is the the best way to get everyone in the room, Public works department, maybe fish and game usually isn't there, but you can get all these people that are gonna charge a fee potentially, and you can get an estimate of what the costs are. So I always encourage people before you come in and pay your fee, do a predevelopment, tell them what you want to do.

And there's a generally a lot of really smart people in the room who can give you the best path forward. So a couple of comments. Alright. Seeing no other board comments, item eight legislative fiscal management report.

Real quick, kind of a quiet week on the legislative front, although we are looking forward to the governor's May revise. We'll be out in just a couple of weeks here. There are some consequential issues being considered in Sacramento as it relates to counties and the state's budget. We'll report back when that May revise comes out. I also want to make an announcement that the County Office of Emergency Services will host a virtual public workshop on Wednesday, May 13, 6PM to receive input on the multi jurisdictional hazard mitigation plan update. Please grab a flyer on your way out today or visit stancounty.com later today for some additional details. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We do have a closed session. Tom?

Yes. We have closed session this morning.

Hold on. On. You go ahead. I'll let you come. Okay. Let's let him go first. Go ahead.

Closed session. This morning, existing litigation pursuant to government code section five four nine five six point nine subdivision d one. One case, Alex Brown versus Stanislaus County Department of Aging and Veteran Services. That's in Stanislaus County Superior Court, and the case number is CV25007326. Appropriate for public comment. Okay.

Come up here.

Can I do one more thing?

Come come up to the microphone. Keep it short if it's not about

Okay.

This is very short. I just wanted to ask you guys, do you guys have any idea when the library is gonna reopen

or We will have someone answer that for you in in the back and I'm gonna point at someone in the back back there.

Okay. Alright.

Any public comment on closed session? All right. Seeing none, we'll adjourn to closed session.