City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening. Let's call to order the special council meeting study session of July 21st, 2026 at 533 p.m. The city does not tolerate disruptive behavior in our meetings. This city council meeting is considered a limited public forum, which means the council can regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. Speaker comments must be limited to the agenda item being considered by the council. If a speaker's comments are not related to an agenda item, the presiding officer will rule the speaker out of order. A speaker will not be ruled out of order because of disagreement with the content of their speech. Location and online meeting details are available on the council agenda. Scan the on-screen QR code or click the language access and translation link on the council agenda to read and listen along in more than 60 different languages. Use the show caption button to view captions on Zoom. Following the study session, the regular council meeting will begin at 7 p.m. Mr. City Clerk, may we please have the roll call?

Mayor Klein. Present. Vice Mayor Mellinger.

Present.

Council Member Cisneros.

Present.

Council Member Srinivasan.

Present.

Council Member Sell.

Present.

Council Member Chang.

Present.

Council Member Ley. Present. Seven present.

Thank you very much. The topic of this study session is file A26-0246, eliminate the use of chemical pesticide on city owned or leased property. Is there a staff report?

There is Ramana Chinnakotla, I'm the environmental services director for the city, at least as of Monday of this week. I have Emma Hinojosa, who's our environmental programs manager, who will be making the presentation today. We also have Emily Cam, our environmental program specialist, who worked on this project. And even though environmental services led this project, it was in partnership with Public Works, and our parks division was an integral part of getting us the information we needed to work on this. And Jim Stark here is also our deputy director of parks. He's here to also answer questions after the meeting. With that, I'm going to hand it over to Emma.

All right, good evening. As Romana said, I am Emma Hinojosa. I am environmental programs manager within the environmental services department. I work on watershed protection. So the stormwater compliance program is really my normal day to day. I am certainly not a pesticides expert, but I've learned a lot through the process of conducting this study issue I'll just reiterate and I want to thank my colleagues and parks for their cooperation their effort and helping us conduct this study issue and then of course their regular day-to-day work to keep all of our city parks beautiful and functional for our residents I hope I'm gonna be able to make this move all right Let's start with an agenda on this study issue. We're gonna do a little bit of study issue background. We'll cover pesticide policies and regulations, the city's current pesticide use and application process, alternatives to synthetic pesticides that we looked into, benchmarking other cities, and then findings and draft recommendations. So starting with background, this study issue proposed an evaluation of the city's current pesticide use practices and the feasibility of eliminating chemical pesticides on all city-owned or leased property. The Sustainability Commission originally raised concerns that chemical pesticides, including the suite of insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, and rodenticides, may contaminate water, soil, and pose negative long-term effects to human health and non-targeted species such as bees, creatures that live in the aquatic realm, birds, pets, and other beneficial insects. The study issue was elevated to city council in 2017. It had been deferred for several years before it was brought forward again in 2023. The study was ultimately initiated in 2025 after it was ranked above the line by the city manager. It was budgeted for two years originally and $100,000. Staff had initially seek to have a contractor conduct the study, but after an initial effort, it was determined that the study could be conducted in-house by ESD staff in collaboration with Public Works. The study was also accelerated to one year, and we did not spend the allocated budget in doing so. These are the components of the study scope and study elements. We covered all of these as part of the study issue, but considering we have a limited time forum for this, we're not going to go into depth on all of these elements, but we will cover the majority of them. I will note that we did review the IPM policy and it was evaluated to be found to be in compliance with applicable regulations and requirements. IPM policy also went under review as part of the 2022-23 fiscal year 2022-23 stormwater annual report. It was also determined to be compliant at that time and in that year we focused on revising and updating the IPM standard operating procedure that is used by internal staff and pesticide applicators when they apply within the city. Okay we're going to shift to pesticide policies and regulations. So before a pesticide can be used in the state of California, it must be evaluated, registered, and pass inspection by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at the federal level, as well as the California EPA's Department of Pesticide Regulation. Pesticides of concern, those that are acutely toxic in aquatic environments, are also regulated by the municipal regional permit from the San Francisco Regional Water Quality Control Board. And that permit actually also requires us to maintain an IPM program, which we are in compliance with. Additionally, pesticides that are known to cause cancer or reproductive harm under certain circumstances fall under the requirements of California Prop 65, must be clearly labeled, and have warnings. It's worth noting that the City of Sunnyvale is in compliance with all of these listed and other applicable pesticide regulations in our current use. So one of the most important elements that comes from the pesticide regulation from DPR or Department of Pesticide Regulation is the use of signal words that indicate the risk associated with a chemical compound. There are three categories from the regulations of caution, warning, and danger, caution being the least toxic and danger being the most toxic. In addition, there's a category four chemical category that requires no labeling because those compounds are considered the least toxic. So these signal words dictate important information regarding the toxicity of the chemical, the appropriate handling and mixing requirements, as well as the level of PPE, personal protective equipment, that's required to be worn by staff during application. The toxicity of chemicals is determined by their lethal dose, something short-term referring to as the LD50. And LD50 is the amount of toxic product that it would take to kill 50% of test animals. The larger the LD number, the less toxic the product is. These signal words are applicable to products beyond just pesticides. They are also applied to household products and organic pesticides. Common products you may be familiar with with a danger label include Clorox bleach and other Clorox cleaners. Other household products with a caution label include products such as spray and wash. In an example of organic products, horticultural vinegar has a danger label due to the fact that it's an extreme skin and eye hazard. It's highly corrosive because it's basically a much stronger concentration of acetic acid than the vinegar you would maybe use in your home cabinets. Sunnyvale uses a variety of chemicals, the majority of which are categorized as a caution signal word. There are only two products currently used that are a warning category. They are also being phased out. There are zero danger products currently being used in the city of Sunnyvale. Okay, so we're going to do a little bit of overview of pesticide types. This is an important part of the conversation because it helps us understand when, what, and how a pesticide will work to affect plant growth. Pre-emergent pesticides or herbicides prevent growth and proliferation of weeds before they emerge from the soil. So timing is key with these products. They are applied before germination, usually early spring or fall, and prevent weed seedlings from sprouting. Post emergent herbicides kill actively growing weeds after they have emerged from the soil, those that are visible. Selective herbicides target specific weeds, such as woody weeds or broadleaf weeds. For example, a selective herbicide for a broadleaf weed leaves turf grass unharmed, but will get what you would normally recognize as a dandelion, something with a wide leaf. Non-selective herbicides like glyphosate kill or damage all vegetation they touch. They're non-selective. They're best used for clearing sidewalks, overgrown areas, medians, places where you're not really concerned about what's going to survive. Systemic herbicides are those that are absorbed and transported through the plant's vascular system. Systemic pesticides kill essentially the entire weed from the green tissue to the roots rather than simply burning leaves off. It often acts slower to kill the plant compared to contact herbicides, but it can be used less often than other products because it does decimate the entire plant. Contact herbicides kill only the plant tissue they touch, most commonly the exposed leaves and stems that are above ground. So contact herbicides generally work very quickly, but they do not damage the roots underground and plants can regrow. All of these factors are important in considering the selection, efficacy, and the work effort associated with a pesticide's use. Additionally, there are two categories of pesticides in the synthetic versus organic. Synthetic pesticides are human-made compounds. They're more effective and persistent. They generally require fewer applications. Examples listed here are glyphosate and pyrethroids. Natural organic pesticides are derived from nature. They typically break down faster. Example are plant oils, copper sulfide, and pyrethrin. Both can be toxic and natural doesn't inherently mean safer for humans in the environment. You may notice here that there are two chemical compounds that look very similar. Pyrethroids are actually a synthetic version of pyrethrin and the main difference is that it was developed as a synthetic version to last longer in the environment and be more effective. Sunnyvale uses a suite of chemicals including selective, non-selective, pre- and post-emergent, synthetic and organic pesticides in our landscape management. Pesticides are used for a specific purpose and in a targeted manner. We'll cover some of the most common types a little later in this presentation. We also conduct annual training for our park staff that use pesticides. It's required by the Department of Pesticide Regulation. Training is conducted by a licensed pesticide control advisor. The PCA, or pesticide control advisor, offers recommendations on pesticide use, and they are required to write pesticide use recommendations annually for each product used by DPW. The training prepares staff for a qualified applicator's license and or a qualified applicator certificate, which is required for applying pesticides. This training covers all the pesticides that are used in the City of Sunnyvale, their application requirements, the re-entry rules, the personal protective equipment requirements, and other important safety information for their use. Internally, the city stormwater staff, so my group, we also provide training on the city's IPM policy and water pollution prevention strategies to our parks colleagues annually. Okay, so I'm gonna move into an overview of the city's current use and application. On this slide, you can see the chemical pesticides are used in a variety of different ways within the city. Different types are used for different purposes. Here we have an example of each category of pesticides, what it is used for, and an example of the type that's used here in the city of Sunnyvale. The most often used chemicals are non-selective systemic post-emergent herbicides used on landscapes and selective systemic post-emergent herbicides used on turf grasses. So pesticides are not used indiscriminately or excessively in Sunnyvale. There has been an interest in the industry for years and moving away from pesticides, but a clear and effective alternative that works in every case and in all applications has yet to be identified. As part of Park staff's application process, the five decision-making steps are followed as outlined in the city's IPM. Briefly, I'll cover them as the first one being education and monitoring, prevention, the use of mechanical controls, biological controls, and then chemical controls as a last step. When chemical controls are warranted, staff will choose the most effective chemical for the applicable need and the least likely to spread into air, water, or surrounding areas. Staff carry the required safety data sheets for the products they are using. Staff will apply pesticides using appropriate PPE, using a truck, a backpack sprayer, or by hand. The application does not occur in unfavorable weather conditions. If there are too high of temperatures, if it is windy or rainy, staff will not be applying pesticides. Staff also follow the specific reentry interval requirement for each of the pesticides that are used. This is the waiting period after a pesticide is applied before people can safely reenter a treated area. So staff will apply a pesticide and then remain on site until the affected area has reached its appropriate interval time before the public can safety re-enter the area. Staff will also post or notify as needed for safety concerns related to pesticide applications. For example, the tree team mails out letters to residents that have a tree that will be treated for pesticides prior to the treatment application. After the application is completed, they usually leave a door tag saying that the work has been completed and includes a number to call if there are additional questions. Staff also follow the Healthy Schools Act training from the Department of Pesticide Regulations. So as part of our parks operations, they are as strategic as possible and only apply as needed. Staff do not apply around play areas, including playgrounds, sandboxes, or other play structures. Application also occurs early in the morning, usually 6 a.m. or earlier, long before traffic gets heavy and the areas are in use by the public. I do want to highlight one example where the city's IPM process and the efforts of parks has been successful or is currently successful. The city's tree team has been dealing with damage to the hackberry trees, most of them located in the northern end of Sunnyvale. I'll also note that they are not native to California, so they are a little bit at risk for infection. They can be infected with something called a hackberry aphid, this cute little fuzzy creature. They are sap-sucking insects that damage the tree, and they produce black sooty excretions. It kind of looks like black mold. It can be very problematic. Staff was previously using products such as Safari and Freeway. Safari is worth noting. It contains a pesticide of concern, dinotefren, which is a neonicotinoid, and it's dangerous to the bee population. It's also a warning product label. To avoid continued use of this pesticide of concern, the tree team took the initiative to look for an alternative method. In moving away from this pesticide, they first re-implemented the IPM process, evaluating the best option to address this issue. They moved to a less harmful chemical product. They've also switched their application methods using a better spraying technique that reduces spray drift. It's referred to as bark banding, so it's applying the pesticide directly to the tree bark. Additionally, in 2025 they started supporting the overall tree health for the hackberry trees by applying a synthetic fertilizer that helps aerate the soil and provide potassium to the trees to help improve their health and make them more resistant to infection. So since then the staff has noticed an increase in overall tree health and a reduction in infection from the hackberry aphids. So this is just a good example of the successful work towards reducing a maybe more concerning pesticide and finding a better process for dealing with an issue. It's just one example. However, park staff is consistently trying new applications and approaches and alternatives to reduce pesticide use. OK, let's talk about annual pesticide use by type. This is the sum of the concentrated liquid chemicals used in 2025. Dry granular products are not currently included on here. It's important to note that this is the annual gallons used across the city, so that's almost 800 acres of land. uh we based on the data we've evaluated there's a steady incline in use over the last four years and just to cover briefly the top four chemicals used currently in the city of sunnyvale are roundup it's used as a general weed killer throughout the city it's a non-selective systemic herbicides it's not used on turf or golf greens it is a caution product and it is not a pesticide of concern garland 4 is used to kill stubborn woody weeds It's a selective systemic herbicide, also a caution label and not a pesticide of concern. Cheetah Pro is a Roundup alternative used anywhere that there are specific rules against the use of Roundup. It's a non-selective contact herbicide with a caution warning label or caution label, and it's not a pesticide of concern. And Speed Zone is a broadleaf herbicide for specific weeds. It's safe on grass types, so it kills a variety of weeds. It's a selective systemic caution labeled pesticide is not a pesticide of concern. This chart shows the breakdown of pesticide use by location in terms of broad grouping. It's important to note that this chart has some correlation with the locations that have the highest acreage throughout the city of Sunnyvale and those that are most managed by the city's parks department. Another way to kind of demonstrate this is here's annual pesticide use in gallons per acre. So you can see here the acreage of each of the groupings and then the annual average use of pesticides per gallons per acre. Romano wanted to make sure that everyone knew that a football field is actually 1.34 acres, 3.2 acres and not one acre. But for the purposes of a representative example, we have a football field as a one acre and a gallon of milk as one gallon. So when considering the acreage of each of these categories, the applied amount is shown here. Across the city, the average is less than a half a gallon per acre applied annually. This is also a good point to remind you that this is the total application over a year. Applications are not happening at high or regular frequencies. We're not having daily, weekly, monthly, et cetera. They're applied as needed and as part of the implementation of the city's IPM program. For example, pre-emergent compounds, as I spoke about earlier, are applied only in early spring and fall before the weeds would actually emerge from the soil. Okay. We're going to switch into some alternatives to the use of synthetic pesticides that we looked into. So over the course of the study issue, we looked for published studies, papers, and research conducted on organic pesticides and their efficacy as a potential alternative strategy. Overall, there's limited existing research on organic pesticides. We are highlighting this study here, which was conducted by the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources in 2023. They published this article with the results of efficacy tests comparing organic herbicides to glyphosate. In general, they found that organic herbicides controlled weeds effectively for about 14 days, while glyphosate typically protects or provides weed control for about 35 days. Organic compounds work best when they are applied during warm weather and in full sun applications. They are also mostly post-emergent products, so are applied after the weed has been emerged from the soil. In general, most weeds began to regrow or recover after about two weeks of treatment with organic herbicides. In this study, they did multiple successive treatments that were made after the regrowth of the weed, usually around within three weeks, and they noted that efficacy of most products had declined over time, and weeds once again showed regrowth within 17 days after a second treatment. The conclusion of the study was that the use of organic herbicides will require reallocating resources to account for increased applications, lower dilution rates, essentially higher volumes of the product mixed into water, and higher application volumes, overall higher volume of the product used. Additional alternatives, this is a mechanical alternative suite. So manual removal requires the removal of weeds before they have a chance to really establish a robust root system and go to seed. Manual weed removal is most effective if it's done frequently and it's most suitable for small scale maintenance. Manual, this hand removal is largely impractical for our large parks and landscapes. Another methodology is heat or flame weeding. It's effective on seedling weeds growing in hardscape areas, so usually concrete or other places where there's not a lot of other foliage. It should not be performed in areas where there are flammable mulch around plants or structures that might be susceptible to burning. This limits the application of this methodology. It's also risky to applicators and fire-prone areas due to the high heat use. It's also worth noting that it doesn't kill the plant, it just burns the exposed foliage and regrowth eventually occurs. This method has actually previously been used within the city and it's no longer in use to its low rate of effectiveness. Mulch is another mechanical alternative. It basically comes with a recommendation that four inches of mulch is used for an effective weed suppression. We use mulch throughout the city, an estimated 20 cubic yards annually to increase mulch to the extent to really reduce more weeds. We're estimating potentially a five times increase in mulch or more to provide more effective weed deterrence. but this is not a standalone application. It wouldn't be used in turf areas. We wouldn't be applying mulch to our fields to reduce weeds. Speaking of turf, an alternative turf approach really focuses on soil health and soil regeneration. That's the foundation of an organic turf management approach. It's worth noting this is not a weed-free approach. It's really working towards improving the soil health and creating a stronger, more robust system for the plants, or turf. This information that's highlighted on this slide is taken from a synthesis of consultant information and data from Menlo Park's turf management approach. The first step is establishing a baseline of your soil health through testing, understanding the amount of soil organic matter, organic carbon that's present. The second step is evaluating if the soil aeration needs to change. It could be looked like more aeration or less. The third step is to apply organic fertilizers as many times as four times per year, potentially at higher costs for organic material. A fourth step is that you should continue monitoring and test your soil to see if there are changes. Changes in root weight and size, changes in the plant mass, changes in water use. Another step would be to account for field closures and rehabilitate the turf fields regularly. This management approach really does require that there are some breaks to the turf to allow for healthy growth. We anticipate that there may be a significant labor increase to implement this, including more frequent mowing. I'll mention it again later, but it's worth mentioning here that irrigation systems also may need to be evaluated and replaced to support this approach. There are, of course, benefits to reducing or eliminating pesticides. There's a potential reduced health risk to city employees and the public. It helps protect our pollinators, although we are already doing work to avoid harm to our pollinators. It will also potentially reduce the potential runoff and contamination into our local waterways. As part of the scope, we didn't monetize the benefits of this. It wasn't included as part of the study issue, so I don't have a dollar amount for this, but these are the benefits that were identified through the study. Okay, we also wanted to note that there are actions that help support alternative methods. We'll likely need to implement some of these actions in order to be successful in an alternative approach, whether that's working on soil health for turf or moving towards chemical-free alternatives. I mentioned it just a moment ago, but considering evaluating potentially improving irrigation efficiency throughout the city landscapes would be helpful. Both underwatering and overwatering can contribute to weed prevalence. Adjusting plant pallets will be helpful, choosing plants that are robust, low maintenance, and native species. Focusing on that continuous soil regeneration practice, including increasing fertilization and support of the desirable vegetation. And additionally, conducting more outreach and education to the public that parks and landscapes may look different. There may be more weeds present. We can consider potentially installing signs that inform or identify areas that are organic or pesticide-free managed. There are a few other considerations with alternative methods, both the mechanical and organic approach. It's likely that line trimmers, weed whackers, weed whips, whatever your preferred name for those are, are the most practical mechanical alternative as opposed to hand weeding. We don't believe that's gonna be sustainable or practical for the city of size and the amount of acreage that we maintain. Line trimmers can be noisy. They do disperse material. There's potential for additional safety and nuisance concerns. They will likely require increased equipment replacement costs with high use. Both manual and organic chemical applications, the frequency and timing will likely need to be adjusted. Weeding will need to occur more frequently, whether that's trimmers or otherwise. Scheduling of the work may impact park usage. Both applications would be implemented during the day, potentially during peak park usage in order to be effective and reduce early morning noise. And as the UCNR study that I referenced earlier suggested, organic applications may be most effective during midday. It's also worth noting that it'll be a significant operational change. Weeds will no longer be killed or removed. It's a fundamental change in approach. They will be cut, burned, damaged, but regrowth will occur. And the community will likely need to adjust to an increased weed prevalence throughout the city. So as part of the study issue, we were asked to come up with a cost estimate associated with reducing or eliminating all pesticide use on city property. Currently, the city spends about $716,000 on the application of pesticides. I will note that the majority of that, over 90%, is the labor cost to apply pesticides. That includes our full-time employees, the training and licensing for staff. We actually spend about $47,000 on chemicals. That's an average over the last four years. So the majority cost is the labor. Removing glyphosate from use comes with an estimated cost listed here with about 76% increase in costs. This includes labor and training for an additional two staff, additional materials and equipment, an estimated increase in alternative chemical costs to substitute the use of glyphosate. That's based on a chemical cost increase based on the averages of known alternatives, including the existing alternative we already use in the city. In removing pesticides completely, we anticipate a significantly higher increased cost. This includes four additional staff, labor and training, additional materials and equipment, potential contractor support. It's worth noting that these costs would come from the general funds through the parks budget. these estimates do not on this slide do not include one-time costs so the potential need for additional vehicles or large equipment and does not include the organic turf management approach this is just removal of weeds across landscapes and it does not include the potential irrigation system improvements or other actions that may be required to help support the use of a new methodology or support the success of a new methodology We were also asked to look at and evaluate the cost of implementing a public outreach program to encourage pesticide elimination at homes, schools, businesses, and provide information on alternative control means. It's worth noting we have a robust existing public outreach effort. We do a couple of different tactics internally. We advertise through our various Bay Area news groups, utility bills, employee emails. We table at events, farmers markets, national night out, and our Earth Day event. We also provide workshops such as those at the senior center where they actually instruct and teach how to make a non-toxic pesticide for use in homes. We also provide regular elementary school presentations where we talk about water pollution prevention and not using chemical pesticides. These costs are already operationally absorbed. It's about $1,000 a year's worth of materials and about 100 hours of staff time. Additionally, there are external outreach efforts related to this. The countywide stormwater program in partnership with Watershed Watch is also very active in our county. If you go to one of the local hardware stores and happen to be looking for a pesticide to use in your home, you may notice that there are bright tags that identify the least toxic options. Those are put in place and promoted by our countywide program. Additionally, there is a statewide effort, the Our Water, Our World program, which also works to educate and provide outreach on the reduction of pesticide use in California. Some expanded options we can consider are the signage in parks where pesticides are used, potentially not used, increasing the posting pre and post application of pesticides, and potentially conducting a survey of residents and businesses to identify their level of awareness and concern on pesticides. We consider that these costs might be minimal based on the work that we're already doing. Okay, so the study issue also asked us to identify the cost of a pilot study, pilot park study in a selected city property to measure the cost savings, potentially to evaluate the cost and or savings in a real application setting. So in discussion with both parks and staff, we originally recommended Panama Park. It's a five acre neighborhood park with a large turf area and bordering landscape. because it has both landscape and the turf grass elements. It has a symmetrical layout. It is not heavily programmed or reserved. We would work to evaluate the listed study objectives here. I'm not going to list all of them for the consideration of time. We do have a preliminary estimate, but that's likely to change when a full project scope is created. We didn't go out to bid through this process. We were just trying to create an estimate. It's worth noting that the cost listed here does not include staff hours. It's a culmination of potentially multiple contracts, including a contractor to offer guidance on organic strategies, as well as potentially hiring a contractor to conduct the manual weed removal. And manual weed removal estimates generally come at a fixed rate based on square footage or the size of the park. So depending on the size of the park, that cost can increase or decrease. So full pricing options would be collected through the request for proposal process. And these estimates here in the presentation are just a preliminary estimate to help establish a potential budget. All right, I'm going to shift into the work we did benchmarking other cities. I'm going to kind of do an overview of three cities. We benchmarked several more cities, but these are the ones that kind of covered the major findings, and I'll highlight their experiences now. So the city of Windsor is a smaller city located in Sonoma County. In 2018, they implemented an immediate full ban on chemical pesticides. I guess I meant to mention they're a little bit smaller than us. They have 19 parks and approximately 180 maintained acres. The staff was given no additional funds to support the transition. In adjusting to the change, they ran into numerous operational challenge and infrastructure impacts, including a million dollar repair to one of their water retention basins where weeds had done damage to some of their berms. Menlo Park has implemented a gradual transition. They are a little bit, they are also a little bit different in size. They moved away from synthetic pesticides starting in 2015. They are using a three-pronged approach. They have a manual weeding contractor that works at 20 of their facilities, is the highest expense related to their change at a 200, no, sorry, $2.5 million contract over five years. They also have a separate landscape contractor for medians, park strips, and city boundaries, while their in-house staff is really focused on the organic turf rehabilitation process that they are implementing. Overall, they saw about a 50% increase in costs, and they are utilizing contractor support to implement their movement away from chemical pesticides. We also did some research into the city of Riverside, which is a much larger city, about 60 parks with over 2,000 acres that they maintain. In 2019, they did a moratorium on glyphosate. During that moratorium, they tested a variety of non-glyphosate alternatives. Their key outcomes that they noticed were much higher costs. They had generally lower effectiveness across the board. And when they brought staff report back to council in 2021, the council rescinded the moratorium and they are they've continued to use glyphosate again um they of course have also implemented an ipm program as well so they're reducing the general usage but they are using glyphosate So in summarizing some of the basic findings from our benchmarking summary, a pesticide ban cannot be successful without more funding, more staffing, and better planning alternatives. Overall, there's a significant increase in costs and they're reliant on support from contractors to achieve implementation. Cities with near or total bans are not comparable in size. We really struggled to find an apples to apples comparison bring forward through this study issue. Agencies of comparable size are continuing to use synthetic pesticides and across the board there were changes to the aesthetics and potentially infrastructure issues of the cities that we benchmarked. I'm going to shift into findings and draft recommendations at this point. So the study findings. We found that the city is using pesticides in a measured manner and only where necessary. Pesticide-free options have community benefits. Other cities have found mixed results in using alternatives to pesticides. Pesticide-free management will have lower aesthetics. Pesticide-free methods will cost more in terms of labor and equipment. estimated $300,000, over $300,000 in one-time costs and potentially over $900,000 in ongoing operating costs with four additional staff. The pilot study has merit and cost per year is kind of dependent on the size and approach. Potential transition impacts and effects worth highlighting. There will be higher costs to the city, mostly in labor, but potentially also in organic or other approved chemical usage, equipment, personal protective equipment, and supporting materials, whether that be improving irrigation, increasing mulch, or adding additional fertilizer. It will take time to establish new routines, processes, and experimentation on what works, potentially over the course of several years. Residents may need to adjust their expectations on the look and perceived beauty of our parks and the conditions of playing fields. There may also be an increase of complaints from residents regarding weeds, something we already experience. In 2025, the city received over 280 calls for weed complaints. There may be unforeseen consequences, whether those are good or bad, where changes in conditions may have unexpected or unanticipated results. The pilot project is likely to help us realize some of the actual costs and the best or preferred implementation approach. Last month, we took this presentation on the study issue to some of our commissions. We are summarizing some of the feedback we got from the commissions. This is what we heard from the Parks and Recreation, summarized as essentially the commissioners wanted additional information, more data transparency, We are including that in our recommendations. They provide us with the feedback that they'd like us to prioritize the elimination of the highest risk pesticides first, which is technically our current practice as part of the IPM program, to continue assess alternative weed management before considering broader pesticide elimination, which is included in our recommendations, and they were supportive of the pilot study. They also highlighted to consider maintenance costs, labor requirements, and the potential impacts on field quality and play hours. They also were supportive of using multiple parks with different characteristics for a pilot study. From the Sustainability Commission, we heard similar feedback. They recommended taking a broader long-term approach with irrigation improvements, focusing on native plants, and redefining weeds and their thresholds. They also were supportive of data transparency and increased public education. They gave us the feedback that they'd like to see expanded and refined pilot study scope with multiple sites and areas with higher pesticide usage, including medians, green belts, or the utility sites. And they also gave us the view that they'd like the pilot to inform policy decisions. From the public, let's see if I can make sure I'm clicking and matching my things. Okay, here we go. They also support the pilot study based on the feedback we received. They also gave us the feedback a broader scope is recommended. They'd like to prioritize public health and environmental impacts. It was not fully as part of the scope of this study, but it was given to us as part of the feedback. They'd like us to promote sustainable landscape management practices, which is recommended as part of our pilot, and shift away from an aesthetic-driven maintenance to healthier soils, organic turf management, and native plants. also support increased transparency in public outreach, and the reduction or elimination of Roundup use. They'd like to see a phasing out or elimination of Roundup completely, particularly in schools, parks, and other publicly accessible areas, and recommend using the pilot study to evaluate feasible alternatives. So with that, the draft recommendations from our study issue is that we do not recommend eliminating all chemical pesticides from city use. We do recommend completing a pilot pesticide-free park study to help inform and realize the cost and best alternative management approaches to increase the transparency by improving data collection and reporting on chemical usage, posting signage when necessary for safety, and directing staff to maintain or improve the city's existing IPM program. And that is my presentation.

okay thank you very much i will now open it to my colleagues for questions in the interest of leaving time for public comment and getting done by seven o'clock for our regular council meeting start i'm going to ask that we limit try to limit questions to around five minutes and i will signal when you are at four minutes council member cell

Thank you for the presentation. I am interested in the pilot park study and I was reading about Menlo Park and how they started with four parks in 2015 pilot herbicide free and then they went in 2017 they continued the program to expand into more parks. And they chose the more parks with the greatest level of public interaction. And then, as was said, they had contractors that were helping them. So I would be interested in having contractors that specialize in organic methods and have had success with other cities. The other one I wanted to point out is there is this Toxic Use Reduction Institute. It says UMass Lowell, and then they talk about there's this town of Marbelow, and they have 20 acres of park, and they're able to have organic fields and have high usage of water. 1800 hours of play. So when you're looking at other when you're finishing up the study, I was wondering if you might look into that and if you want to, I can give you the link to it. The other thing that how much time do I have? Yeah, half minutes, OK. Yeah, and I thought the Menlo Park was sort of feasible. They have the contractor, and the contractor does herbicide-free landscaping maintenance and has done that for seven years for Menlo Park and has 30 years of experience in performing herbicide-free landscaping. So that type of experience would be great if we could find that for our parks. And the other thing is when we're posting signs, I think that's a great idea. And posting signs may be an order of I don't know maybe you know a few at like maybe 72 hours or something like that so we're definitely sure that if the pesticide has gone away and there's also prop 65 and they list some chemicals in there and I thought those would be good to target to try to have more strategies like you listed strategies that we were trying to get rid of certain chemicals. So if those Prop 63 chemicals could be prioritized and I think it would be good to have a diversity of sites. also sites that maybe use a lot of roundup so that we could have a test case of these methods this park or whatever used to use a lot of roundup and now we have a case where that would be what we're testing this organic method replacing the um the pesticides that are in the prop 65. so i think those are my uh comments thank you for the work you're doing um most of the comments i agree with so thank you for making those recommendations and most of the comments from the other commissions i also agree with so thank you for your work thank you council member cell council member cisneros

Yes. Thank you, Steph, very much for the work and the excellent presentation. A lot of information in there that I felt was really well distilled for the lay person. I know it's quite a lot. So when we talk about city leased, are we talking just land that we lease from somebody else or that we lease to someone else or both?

I think for the purposes it would be both, but I would defer if I'm wrong.

Yeah, I mean, in this case, really what we're basically talking about is we share a lot of the fields with schools. So that's really what this was meant for.

OK, that's very helpful because that is an interesting situation there that involves a lot of greenery and sharing that, which is a wonderful arrangement. Have we ever been party to a lawsuit or workers' comp claim due to an illness or injury due to suspected pesticide exposure?

I'm not aware of anything, but I'm not the expert on that.

Yeah, we don't have to go back through like Sunnyvale history through the ages. And we used to have some really wild chemicals that we exposed humans to, right? But yeah, so within the last like 20 years would be where my interest, but it doesn't sound like anything's coming up. Okay, that's helpful. And then I know that the orchard, especially in the questions, the very helpful question document that was put together, the orchard is kind of a separate issue because that's a working farm and and it's a working non-organic farm and you have a contract with an orchardist. I know that that has recently, that contract has been subject to change. And I was wondering if anything regarding pesticide had been or is looking to be included in the new contract. um it's something that we would consider when we are doing that it's it's a few years away but yes we can look at that okay yeah and and i agree with the rationale around kind of that is a different situation and that's very fair to hold out it's also somewhere that's in the middle of a neighborhood where a lot of people live as well so which is unusual for an orchard i think probably and so we have i want to be a little flexible to both I've heard a lot from those neighbors there. And then I noticed we are just talking about weeds, but pesticides mean so much more. Sometimes we get invasive species, insects, et cetera, coming in from... other parts of the world and we all get notices from the county look out for this beetle it is kill it with fire basically it can't be here it's going to destroy it everything around so we use pesticides in those cases but also i wanted to hear what is our management policy and what does it look like for pesticides that are meant for things that aren't plants the more things with legs

So the city actually uses a contractor mostly for things with legs, if we stick with that terminology. Ants, rodents, et cetera. They are... They are in agreement to use our IPM policy. They actually have to submit exemption requests if they're going to use a pesticide of concern, including rationale and justification if there is something like a large infestation. But they are subject to the same requirements as our city staff applicators, and they go through the same process in terms of the IPM policy going through the five steps before they are approved to use chemical compounds for things with legs.

That's very helpful. And then I'm very interested in the pilot study, too. I think it's very helpful for us all to be able to see and then get everyone gets on the same page. We're looking at the same impacts from the same controls. And I think when we're talking about issues like this, we can better weigh those pros and cons if we can all go out and touch and see it in the same way. Oh, yes. And so I think, and my preference would be to have a median as well because it does use different chemicals and it will, it's also has a different visibility to the community, a different impact. And I think that that's a worthwhile thing to understand. And then also I wanted to know real quick, how long without pesticide application at all, will it be before those pesticides are no longer effective and we're observing just a no pesticide environment? What is the half-life of the current application?

I can't speak to that specifically. I think it would depend on the chemicals that we're using on a site. I think that would be some of the information we would look to observe, study, collect through the pilot park study.

Okay, good. I just want to make sure we're thinking about that before the data starts at that point. And that's what I'd be looking for. So, all right. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Council Member Cisneros, Council Member Srinivasan.

thank you first of all congrats on not hiring contractors to do the study my question was i i remember uh some time back there was a roundup case with a huge settlement in i think new york or something i don't know whether we are liable for anything like that uh

I can't speak to that specifically. I'll just add that as part of this study, we kept it broad to all pesticide use and didn't focus specifically on Roundup.

OK. And then sometime back 2018, when I was part of Fartiga Park neighborhood, there was a state grant to do a pesticide free park implementation. Is that grant still available or do you know?

I am not aware of any grants, but I'm going to also see if Jim is here, and maybe he can answer the question. He was here at the time.

He's shaking his head and saying… Yeah, he was asked specifically about the park, Ortega Park. And then, what's the cost comparison of gallon of organic versus chemical or the synthetic pesticide?

it varies depending on the chemical um but we saw generally uh anywhere between 80 increase to 155 increase in cost and generally a much larger increase in dilution rates um so a larger quantity of the chemical that needs to be used application correct and then

Do neighbors know about the pilot program happening in Panama Park, or are they aware?

Not yet. At this time, the pilot park is still a proposal.

Regarding the outcomes, what are we expecting from the pilot program, the scope? And I know a couple of commissions ask for increased scope.

We would plan to incorporate that as part of the scope to really outline those effective outcomes based on the feedback we have received. But in a broad sense, we'd be looking to determine if we could identify an effective management approach and the efficacy of the alternative practices at a pesticide-free park.

Okay, thank you very much.

Just want to also add that we're not really married to Panama Park as a location. It's really based on the size of the park and the budget. If you increase the size because of the cost for weeding, mechanical weeding, it increases the cost. But we definitely got feedback so that we would include, we would find a location that would have more diversity of pesticide use. like they have more you know Roundup use for example things like that so we can kind of do a more broad-based uh pilot that we can learn a lot more from and then the park is rectangular in shape so it's very nice geometrical yeah thank you thank you very much Councilmember Srinivasan uh Mayor Klein

thank you um good to see this finally coming back after um was on council when this was first proposed so finally seeing some results i'm happy to see that of the 800 acres of land that the city has or the city manages um they're not all equal and you know that to me is the biggest thing as we're looking at this is you know what what we can do at schools greenbelt parks and golf is i think primary and then to me you know it's like definitely you know where children are parks you know where people are commonly using this i think is critical what we do on medians what we do in other other portions of the city i have you know not that i don't care but to me it's it's less direct touch of the public so it becomes critical from that standpoint um You talked about from your questions that the community center orchard wasn't called out separately. Are we, and I'll second what Council Member Cisneros said, are we at least tracking what chemicals are being used there completely? I understand it's outsourced to an orchardist or the group right now. Are we tracking exactly what chemicals they're using? And is it part of this list that we have here or not? I understand we might not know quantities. But do we know at least types?

I'm going to check with Jim. He has the most knowledge.

Not sure. Jim Stark, Deputy Director of Public Works. To know exactly, I could get back to you on that. I knew they'll typically make like one insecticide application if necessary in the late winter and then one fungicide application if necessary about the same time. But I can certainly circle around.

Fungicide or... Yes, phrase that they're doing.

OK. Yeah.

And so just having that detail, I think, is important. Understand we might not know quantities. And if we could have that added. Sure. I think it's important because we're setting ourselves up for the future. And especially as we're looking at new contracts, making sure that they're keeping track of that and whether or not we go fully organic in the future or, you know, or organic pesticides or whatever. It's good to have at least a touch point of where we are now.

Sure.

Stay stay there. Yeah. Yeah. So part of this, as far as improvements, is looking at irrigation and all this from a field standpoint. And I understand you're not tied to Panama Park. One of the parks that we're looking at to improve, of course, is Lakewood Park. And the fields there, the irrigation, the conceivably new grass, is that a possibility for trial for this process? Or is it too big and too many new things? Or because it's new, we have a better kind of touch point of, OK, this is how long it's going to take to grow.

know i i think we have to establish what goal we're trying to achieve with lakewood right if we wanted we can absolutely do an organic program out there you know there's no secrets about it we can do it it's not difficult it's more expensive obviously but if we're trying to maximize playable time for athletic groups going strictly organic and pesticide free will be a huge challenge i understand yeah okay and and i appreciate that but

Let's be interested to find out, you know, there's also the difference between, let's say, Roundup and a synthetic or an organic equivalent to Roundup. How much additional, let's say, organic pesticide has to be applied in comparison to Roundup? Do we have that feel?

No, I just want to clarify, we don't use Roundup on any of the grass fields because it would kill the grass.

Understood. But in general, if we said Roundup is no longer used,

Yeah, I think we are using an alternative to Roundup in the Baylands Park, but I think that's also inorganic, right?

Yeah, so we're using an alternative at Baylands called Cheetah Pro. It almost sounds like glyphosate, slightly different chemical name. And the county has asked us to do that. So we're doing it there. You talk to staff out there, anecdotally, they spend about twice the amount of time spraying that they would with a Roundup. So it just becomes much more labor intensive.

Okay. Thank you.

One thing I will share though about chemical use, because it was brought up earlier, there's a huge variety of chemicals we use, right? One we're considering using at Lakewood, it's called a plant growth regulator. I'll try to keep this brief. What it does is it restricts the vertical growth of the grass and it transfers that energy to lateral growth and root growth. It's used a lot in golf courses, especially on putting greens. That's how you see that super dense, tight turf, right? So those are some other chemicals we're considering using as part of the toolbox to provide as good of playing conditions as we can, depending on how much wear and tear it gets out there. So, you know, we talk about pesticides. Roundup's a big one, obviously. Us and every other municipality in the world uses it because it works. If we could get away from it tomorrow and still provide the same results, we would. You know, I'll just say while I'm here is we have a lot of our staff are residents and their kids go to school here. So I think if any park staff could step away from chemical use, we certainly would. But the performance metrics would have to change at the same time.

Understood. And so, yes, thank you for that. And lastly, two things. how well adopt a park. You know, it's basically a hidden program from a city standpoint. And I think one of our parks has it and how, whether or not we actively utilize residents to help out and whether or not it's a weed standpoint, we're not, because we're using MSU pesticides, we're not utilizing them from that standpoint. So in the final report or at an update, in between the final report would be good. And then lastly, we looked at cities of similar size. Menlo Park is recent. Palo Alto and Mountain View, our other neighbors, have been doing this for a long time and just trying to get more information from them also on where they are in the kind of the elimination. And most of them had, I think both of them had gradual elimination. It wasn't an immediate ban and where they are in that process or in that timeline would be useful. So thank you. Sure. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor.

Council Member Chang.

Thank you for the presentation and the update. I had a couple of questions. Could you go into a little bit more about the difference in pesticide use by park? Because some have a lot of variation. So, you know, say Fair Oaks is using 0.1 gallons per acre on average and Washington Park over a gallon and they're roughly the same size.

I'm going to hand that back to Jim.

Sure. It's pretty straightforward. You look at Fair Oaks Park, we converted to synthetic grass, so we just don't have the amount of, well, I take that back. We don't have the amount of ornamental landscaping that we do at Washington Park, for example. If you look at Washington Park, during the last drought, we converted a lot of grassy areas to wood chips. We were asked to reduce irrigation by 20%. So if you look around all the parks and all the wood chips on the edges you see, it wasn't like that 30 years ago, right? That was done to reduce water usage, right? It was a good move. But that's where you'll see a lot of the Roundup being used are these big, broad, bare areas where it might be wood chips or dirt or things like that. So the big difference between those sites, you have one that has very little ornamental landscaping and the other one has a lot of ornamental landscaping.

Thank you. And in, I guess, the study, I have seen that residential roundup has eliminated glass, or kind of phased it out. Have we considered using the residential one at smaller locations or smaller parks?

When you get the residential, you're really talking about it's more diluted product. So it's really, it's the same chemical, but when you buy it like at an Ace Hardware, it'll be much more diluted, so it's safer to use. The product we use is more concentrated because it's way cheaper, but our staff is also trained. I think about half of our staff are qualified applicators through the state of California. So we go through a ton of training every year. So it's really the same chemical. It just comes in a container that's much more diluted.

Thank you. I do want to echo the comments that my colleagues have made that I think, I mean, it's still approved by the EPA, but it's a different application for agricultural than at parks where children are kind of playing and putting their hands and their mouths around the grass. So I do have some concerns about that. And for the pilot, I would like to see kind of different types of parks and different sizes and different levels of use that we're using it just for more variation.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Council Member Chang, Council Member Lay.

Thank you so much for the presentation. I have a question based on the council questions. Panama Park looks like it was selected, as you said, in the presentation based on a variety of factors. But according to the table provided in council questions, it's also one of the parks that receives the least pesticide use currently, at least per gallon. I'm interested in seeing that pilot potentially I'm looking at Braley and at Fairwood Park, both of which are associated with schools and both of which are somewhat of outliers in pesticide use, nearly a gallon, 0.08 at Braley and 0.0747 at Fairwood. So that would be my preference if we were looking at places to do a pilot, places that are farther away from children. And the acreage is comparable. I don't know if the acreage for the lawn is comparable. Fair Oaks, Fairwood has and Braylee both have fairly large playgrounds, but at least for the park itself. I think that Lakewood, as the mayor pointed out, since there is so much stuff going on there, that might be more difficult. But I would like to see that as a criteria as well, the distance to schools. This is hard to conceptualize for me because so many of our parks are used for different things. So that when we see a table how these things are used in parks, like there should be, it's difficult to, I don't know what all our parks are used for. Like some of them are athletic fields and some of them are more recreational or more used for picnics and such. So for example, when I go to Seven Seas Park, there's, flowers in the grass and to me personally that's fine because my kid's probably going to pick it up and not get in a fight with it because he needs to kick a soccer ball through it. But I think that I would like to see and am curious to know I guess and maybe not would like to see if there are objective standards currently for lawn maintenance for if certain parks that we know are used for different things get away with a little bit more. I would like to see, as was recommended by one of the public commenters in an email that came today, revisiting the city's IPM. I guess I'm signaling this to my colleagues that I would like to see us revisiting the IPM to approach it in a more systemic way. I don't think that having a single pilot for a single use case is a good scientific design. It's not going to tell us useful things that we don't already know about pesticide use. And I also just wanted to clarify something from one of the slides. Let's see. Slide. The one with the football field and the gallon of milk. There's two different scales here. The scale on the left is the yellow dot, right? And the scale on the right is the acreage? Okay, cool. I was just wondering about that. And then additionally, I wanted to ask about Baylands. Baylands wasn't included in any of these charts. Is it considered a park? Is it just something else that we manage? I don't know who this question is for.

I'm going to default that to Jim. Okay.

Yeah, I'm not sure, you know, obviously Baylands is County owned land that we, that the city maintains and operates. But I'm not sure why it doesn't show up in the study.

Okay. I guess in the future if we do manage bay lands with pesticide use, I would like to see that included as well because of its proximity to the bay. And I'm under, we just heard that it doesn't use ground up. I was actually under the impression that Cheetah 4 was a stronger pesticide. I think of pesticide sort of analogous antibiotics almost, and I was looking up Cheetah 4, and it seems like it's something that you use when something is Roundup resistant. That doesn't seem like something that we should be introducing to something that's so close to waterways. Could someone correct me if I'm wrong about that?

Did you say Cheetah 4? Cheetah Pro, sorry. Cheetah Pro, yeah. That's not my understanding. I have to go back and read again, but Cheetah Pro is the Roundup alternative. So I would have to dig a little bit deeper into the science on that. But the way it's couched is it's the glyphosate alternative. If you look at the chemical name, it's very similar.

Yeah. Yeah.

And the efficacy we find is much less.

Okay.

So I question that because, yeah, we have to go out and reapply much more often with Cheetah Pro than we do Roundup.

Okay.

So, yeah, I kind of question that. Yeah.

Okay. what is do you happen to know the warning label associated with it if it's pretty sure caution it's caution okay thank you um how am i doing on time i'm on time okay i'm i am done thank you that's good thank you thank you very much and uh please give me five minutes as well mr mayor thank you uh and thank you very much staff for an excellent and very informative presentation

I will start by echoing my colleagues' comments on I'd like to see additional diversity on the pilot. If that requires additional council funding, I'm okay with that. There are a couple of sites I have in mind. First, yes, I think it's a good idea to pick a median for a pilot. I like what Councilmember Lay said about maybe doing Fairwood instead of Panama because of the elementary school nexus. I think either the John Christian Greenbelt and or the Civic Center make excellent locations for a pilot because you can do half of them. There are natural dividing lines where you can say on John Christian Greenbelt, this segment gets synthetic, this segment gets organic. And similarly with the Civic Center, there are natural breakpoints where you can say this segment gets organic, this segment gets synthetic. And because of the high pesticide use at Civic Center, that also makes it a natural target, especially since we made a big point of the Civic Center being kind of a sustainability statement piece. So I would very much encourage staff to look at including either of those sites. Medians, which seems to be sort of the primary use of Roundup. My understanding with mulch is the point of mulch is that four inches of mulch is basically going to stop things from growing, correct? Yes. Have we looked at mulching our medians?

Yeah, mulch helps suppress weeds. Eventually mulch becomes a seed bed itself. We have looked at mulching medians. It's incredibly labor costly. Because when you think about a median, one thing you don't think about is you have to do lane closures. So you're setting up lane closures, doing that work, you're working in traffic. So it's not the material cost so much, but it's really the labor to put the mulch in and then to put the mulch in again about every three or four years.

Three or four years. So it's not like a one-time thing. Oh, no.

Yeah, yeah.

Stay up, no, no, no, no, no, no. Stay right there. So playing fields, there's obviously standards for how nice a playing field needs to be. What's the sort of tolerance for weeds in playing fields? Like is it it doesn't look good or is it is a danger to players if you've got dandelions?

Yeah, so the way our standards work, we go safe, usable and attractive, right? So safety is the big one. So and again, our current standards are Very few weeds, you almost see no, you know, you don't see any weeds really. That's what we shoot for. It's almost impossible, but that's what we shoot for. And one of the things that came up earlier is like, you know, what is a weed? And it's important to understand this. It sounds flippant, but it's not. If you Google it, right, it's gonna be something growing where you don't want it. And it's a good, that's the definition, right? Now, an example I'll give you when you talk about sports fields, I credit Romano. He sent me up there to Menlo to take a look where they're doing. And it's pretty neat, right? And I met with their grounds guy up there and we were looking at one of their baseball fields. Really green, look good from a distance, right? And then you get up on it and about half the baseball field is white clover. And you're like, okay, not such a big deal. But in the sports field industry, we consider clover a hazard. The reasons being, one is when it gets wet, it gets very slippery. The second is if you're playing in the dew or that kind of thing. The other one is it's a very un-uniform surface. So when a ball comes rolling at you, a baseball, it's much more likely to jump up out of the blue and hit you in the face. The third and more concerning is it is really good at attracting bees. So whenever we get complaints about the clover, it's usually the bees, my kid got stung, my kid's allergic. So if you're ever out in the fields and you see a big old patch of white clover, go spend some time there and there's a lot of bees. But Menlo has made the decision that we're okay with that. We are no longer going to classify white clover as a weed. We're going to grow it and you can do that, but there's trade-offs.

Thank you. Something I'd like to echo. Actually, one last question. If we're talking about adding line trimmers, would these be electric line trimmers?

likely so right now for what used to be two cycle equipment we're about 40 electric because it's just getting better you know we've been investing in that for gosh probably 15 years we've been buying a little bit every year just to test it out but also invest in the industry it's getting a lot better so right now if you're around city hall typically all this the weed whackers and blowers and edgers pretty much are all electric now at this point so we're around 40 total great

last thing i'm going to say is i'm going to echo the mayor's comment about the adopt a program that program is not currently heavily used i would like to see as part of this that leverage much more extensively there are people in our community who love to go out and weed i find this incomprehensible but they exist there are many of them um and i would love to see that leveraged more And something that I might want to see is a formal council policy that we're going to try to minimize the use of synthetic pesticides and try to ratchet that down over time rather than trying to do an immediate ban or an immediate phase out policy. And with that, we're going to move on to public comment. And I have five speaker cards and two hands raised. So members of the public will have 90 seconds to speak. And first on my list is Janet Farabao, followed by Mark Farabao.

Thank you. A group of us have spent many hours reviewing

Is this on?

In members of the City Council, a group of us have spent many hours reviewing detailed Sunnyvale pesticide records as well as the IPM policy and research done on this project by staff. We have sent you a presentation noting significant issues with the proposal and methodology used. I will highlight just two facts from the presentation we sent you. First, pesticide expenditures in Sunnyvale have increased 188% over the past four years. And from the data we received for 2024, we were only given 10 months of data. I don't know what happened to the other two months, but we have calculated based on the concentrated gallons that you were shown in this presentation, that when we dilute them over, 49,000 gallons of pesticides have been sprayed in our parks, schools, and meetings, hardly in measured use of pesticides. Here's the changes we think are most important to make. First, the governing IPM policy last updated 16 years ago needs to be significantly stronger and more prescriptive. It has to include a list of permitted least toxic pesticides. Second, greater transparency is needed. A quarterly report by staff to city council is necessary. Third, no robust public notification should be implemented with 72 hour notification before and after application. Fourth, the pest control advisor should be an independent and should not be the city's pesticide vendor to avoid conflicts of interest. Thank you.

Thank you. My understanding is that Mark Faribault is not going to be speaking. Is that correct?

Yes.

Okay. Susan Hinton is next.

See, I'm expecting slides. Those are not my slides. Okay. Yes, that is my slide. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Good evening. I'm Susan Hinton, Conservation Chair for the Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter. This first slide contains PRR data supplied by city staff for 10 months of 2024. The gallons shown are diluted raw chemicals according to the EPA. I'm going to focus on the approximately 4,000 gallons sprayed on Sunnyvale Medians Boulevards and Sound Walls, shown on the right, and suggest an alternative approach. The city of Richmond has a cost effective measure for beautifying their city. They allow citizens to adopt a spot as seen in this copy of their webpage. One, a city resident, Anita, who has gardened California native plants for decades, decided to adopt a Richmond median strip in 2021. This slide and the next describe her process. She started with a single median strip and went to five. She starts by hand weeding, and that's very intensive at first. However, over time, the weeds diminish and so now she can spend only less than five minutes a week on each meeting strip. She uses native plants. Oh, finally, the meetings require zero irrigation right now. She watered until the first rain and then not afterwards. She uses absolutely no chemicals. The cost is cheap, a total of $500 for five median strips. And here are two photographs showing her results.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Andrea Wald, followed by Courtney Jantz.

I am in favor of the pilot to look into organically managing properties in Sunnyvale without the use of chemical pesticides, specifically Roundup. Panama Park has been mentioned by staff as a possible site for this pilot. This is not going to accomplish much and provide information on how Sunnyvale can transition away from chemical pesticides because Panama Park is basically a grass field used most likely by sports groups and it's mostly the shrubbery there as opposed to the grass that is being treated with Roundup. The pilot should involve more than one location, preferably somewhere where Roundup has been heavily used, such as a median strip. Having more than one location will allow the city to gather more data on transitioning away from chemical pesticides, specifically Roundup, which is the most harmful that we've been using. I hope that the information provided by myself and others will better guide the pilot that has been proposed. I am anxious for Sunnyvale to do the right thing for all of us and avoid harmful chemicals pesticide use big time. the last thing i'd like to mention is the cost that was stated to go pesticide free of 80 to 150 percent more than than pesticides there's a video made by a golf course grounds manager who went pesticide free and end up saving money having beautiful golf courses i shared that video previously with many but i will resend it to council and to staff so you can see that it is possible to go without pesticides and not increase the cost Thank you.

Thank you. Courtney Jansen, followed by Charlene Liu.

Good evening, everyone. Courtney Johnson. I'm speaking on my own behalf today. So I want to start with a thank you to staff. As I mentioned, they gave this presentation to the June Sustainability Commission. They did a great job. They answered all the questions and I really appreciate it. And I'm also really excited to see that some of the requests that I made showed up in this presentation tonight. So thank you for all the hard work on that. I'm excited to see the focus of the pilot on an organic or regenerative practice approach. Having said that, though, I will make one clarification. We don't need a pesticide-free plan. We need a plan that is an organic land management plan. It's a plan that looks at things like the root causes, not, I see a weed, what pesticide, organic or synthetic, should I buy? But rather, I see a weed, why is it there and what's wrong with the soil health that is allowing this weed to happen? It should look at things like irrigation over seeding and irrigation within the fact, of course, that our irrigation is several years old. And it should look at applying organic fertilizers and pesticides on a monthly basis, all in support of the soil health and soil biology of the park. Maybe even someone who wants to . So we need less of this management overall. That last point, I want to make sure the time limit is long enough. We have a lot of synthetic pesticides in our grassland parks today and it will take time for the soil to get rid of them. So we need a timeline that's like three to five years so we can really understand what would happen with organic management and consistent maintenance costs would be. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Courtney Jansen. Next up, Charlene Liu.

Thank you. I'm Charlene Liu. I am against pesticides, especially synthetic pesticides. It's so poisonous to our environment, to our humans, and to our animals and plants. I believe that natural means of controlling weeds is the best approach. It's actually the most efficient approach and the most effective in the long run. This includes choosing native plants, which are more sustainable and are more able to fight off weeds. I used to have a weed problem in my garden, like I didn't weed for many years. And then I used natural means to get rid of all the oxalis and a bunch of other weeds. And I used cardboard mulch and I used wood chips. over two years I aggressively weeded and now after two years it's really gone like not completely gone I still spend on average a few minutes every week weeding and during the high season it might be an hour a week but it's nothing compared to what I would spend otherwise so just I really I really am for natural means it's so much better thank you

Thank you very much. I will now, does anyone else want to speak on this item before we hear from remote speakers? No. Remote speakers are warned to limit their comments to the agenda item being considered. Speakers who are ruled out of order will not be given another chance to speak on this item. The title of this agenda item is eliminate the use of chemical pesticide on city owned or leased property. City Clerk, do we have any remote participants wishing to speak on this item?

Yes, Vice Mayor, first up is Carrie L followed by Crystal W. Carrie, you've been unmuted and you have 90 seconds to address the City Council.

Hi, greetings. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay. I am urging the city to phase out the synthetic pesticides with the goal of eliminating them totally, adopt organic management pilot study and use alternatives such as California native and natural material. I think there's too much weight given to the low cost and a set of synthetic chemicals over the safer organic methods. The use of Roundup ignored the public health and environmental liabilities. So I really consider the city, consider adding Baylands Park as part of the pilot study. This park abuts an ecologically sensitive native habitat, and it's being exposed to the chemical Chita Pro, which raises more questions. Note that it is banned in the EU due to its harmful health impacts and the level of chemical danger. Why was this pesticide omitted from the breakdown of pesticides used per park per square foot in the response to the council question on July 21st? And how much of it is being used in the sensitive habitats? The fact that some of the highest annual usage rate by location of these pesticides at the city parks are mostly vulnerable to our children, and they are at risk of long-term exposures and health risks, regardless of how it's applied and when they're applied. I'm deeply concerned with health and safety for our residents and delicate cultural habitats. This climate action requires it to eliminate toxic pesticides. Thank you.

next up is crystal w followed by rika g crystal you've been unmuted and you have 90 seconds to address the city council hello this is crystal wickham i proposed this study issue originally so i thank you to the city council and the staff for conducting the study and bringing this conversation to the fore The city should hold itself accountable to be excellent stewards of our open spaces and ensure the public and employees are protected from exposure. Besides the excellent council and public ideas noted, I have three suggestions for moving forward. First, the city should investigate options to utilize park developer fees for transitioning landscaping infrastructure to support lower pesticide use per acre. Second, I hope Council could suggest progressively lower caps on pesticide use per acre by use type. In line with that, if additional budget is needed over time for labor, we should find those dollars. And standards should be evaluated as well. Third, the IPM should be fully re-evaluated since it hasn't been updated in the 16 years. Thank you all for your efforts. I yield my time.

Next up is Rika G. Rika, you've been unmuted. And then I'm pulling up your slides. Please let me know when you'd like to advance to the next slide.

Let's go ahead and go to the next one because I'll go very quickly. My name is Rika Gopinath. I'm here in my personal capacity. I live in Marin and have for 13 years served on the Marin County Parks IPM Commission. So very familiar with this. Usage is going up. And if we can go to the next slide. uh it's with very toxic products one recommendation we would have is the ipm policy must be revised it is functionally as staff said a storm water permitting requirement but it does not scope human health The second thing is EPA signal words are not the best practice in any other city or municipality in California that I know of. In addition to those signal words, which is only about acute toxicity of one active ingredient with manufacturer supplied data, but it's only about acute toxicity for one ingredient for really the applicator. It does not consider all of these things that are happening with the products being used. Also a quick, just go on to the next slide. I think it's easier to read. Well, maybe not. Triclopyr or Garlon, Council Member Lee was correct. It is now in the consumer version of Roundup, the active ingredient. and both um triclopyr and triclopyr is bad for water glufosinate ammonium is banned in the eu and very quickly let me get to the most important part which is immediate recommendations post signage for safety uh it's required by health by the healthy schools act already and second thank you thank you for your time thank you very much mr city uh and uh mr city clerk are there any other members of the public wanting to speak on this item

no vice mayor thank you very much before i bring this back to my colleagues i would like to ask the city manager if you need if the direction and commentary you've received from council is clear or are there specific questions you would like us to answer before we close out this item

No, I think we've heard the feedback. It's a study session, so we'll hear your opinions and your feedback, and we'll incorporate those as we look to close out the study issue.

OK. And I did have one other question, which is for the pilot program. Is that going to be determined operationally, or will that be brought back to Council for a vote as to what sites will be included on the pilot program?

So I think we heard the council feedback. I think we'll be able to accommodate that feedback. So we can do an informational memo once we decide on the location and the different areas we are considering, and then we can provide that information to the council.

There's a big question. I agree with Director Chenico. I think council's goal here is to provide us policy direction, which is to determine the best way to gather information through a pilot program. So we will bring that back hearing your feedback and look at alternative sites if we think they would yield better results.

Okay, great. Mayor Klein.

Yes, very quick. So in searching the website, I wasn't able to find our current IPM. So if you could provide that to council would be useful. I'm assuming the goal for the end of the study is to have a new IPM. Is that true or false?

It's not a specific goal, but with council direction, we can make revisions or updates.

Okay, because definitely I think the information is captured here as part of that. Is rodenticide, and I forgot to ask this question earlier, part of that IPM or where and how we're using basically pest, different types of pests?

Yes, our contractor that we utilize that applies pesticides for the purposes of rodenticide and insecticide, they are subject to our city's IPM policy before they apply pesticides.

Okay. So it seemed like the majority of our report here was all basically weeds and all that. I'm hoping when this comes in front of us finally, we'll also be getting an update on rodenticides?

We can provide that given the amount of time we focused on. Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. And I thank you for, Director, I think it's important to provide several options and the cost from a council standpoint and staff, of course, cost. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Klein.

Council Member Lay.

Thank you. A quick question. Could you please address the assertion from the public commenters that the pest control advisor is a contractor from pesticide lobbies?

Sure, we use a woman. Her name is Dawn Medina is her last name. She does work for Target Specialty, which is a distributor. She's a licensed pest control advisor. She also is the past president of the Pesticide Applicators Association of California. Yeah, so yeah, she does work for Target Specialty. it sounds like she's an industry specialist with the current pesticide and who's familiar with current pesticide applications very much so yeah she also does our a lot of times we'll have her come do our laws so we train on laws and regulations every year to stay up to date on what the most current laws and regulations are for noticing or what you have to have in your vehicle things like that so she has she she has her thumb on the pulse of this industry yeah okay

But she's not a city employee.

She's from... No, not a city employee, not a lobbyist. Yeah, yeah, works for distributor, but also works for associations providing education.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you very much. I want to thank staff for an excellent presentation. All the members of the public who came and engaged my colleagues for insightful questions. And with that I am going to close the study session. And Mr. Mayor, when will we be back here for the regular meeting?

We'll take a six minute break and come back at 710. Thank you.

Good evening.

Let's call toward the council meeting of July 21st, 2026 at 7.13 PM. The city does not tolerate disruptive behavior in our meetings. Sunnyvale prides itself on the rich diversity of our residents. We are committed to creating a culture of belonging where members of our diverse community feel included, safe, and respected. This council meeting is considered a limited public forum, which means the council can regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. Speaker comments must be limited to the agenda item being considered by council for public hearing items. Speaker comments during oral communications must be limited to matters within council's authority, generally referred to as council's subject matter jurisdiction. If a speaker's comments are not related to an agenda item, the presiding officer will rule that speaker out of order. A speaker will not be ruled out of order because of a disagreement with the content of their speech. Location and online meeting details are available on the Council Agenda. Scan the QR code on the screen or click the Language Access and Translation link on the Council Agenda to read and listen along in more than 60 different languages. Use the Show Captions button to view captions on Zoom. Comments on matters not on the agenda must be submitted prior to the time I call the item for oral communications. Comments on agenda items must be submitted prior to the time I close the agenda, close the hearing on that agenda item. Speakers are requested to keep their comments to the time period set for the public comments for that agenda item and time limits will be strictly enforced. Guidelines are posted on the city website and on the council meeting agenda. First, please stand if you're able and join me in a salute to the flag.

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.

Next up is roll call. City Clerk, may we please have roll call?

Mayor Klein. Present. Vice Mayor Bellinger. Present. Council Member Cisneros.

Present.

Council Member Srinivasan.

Present.

Council Member Sell.

Present.

Council Member Chang.

Present.

Council Member Lay.

Present.

Seven present.

Thank you. Next up is oral communications. This is now the public's opportunity to address council on topics not listed on tonight's agenda. This section is limited to 15 minutes and may be extended or continued after the general business section of the meeting. Individuals may only speak once during oral communications. This council meeting is considered a limited public forum and council can regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. Speaker comments during oral communications must be delivered to matters within counsel's authority, generally referred to as counsel's subject matter jurisdiction. If a speaker's comments are outside of counsel's subject matter jurisdiction, this presiding officer will rule that speaker out of order. This allows counsel to conduct its business in a reasonably efficient manner and protects the rights of other speakers. A speaker will not be ruled out of order because of a disagreement with the content of their speech. Please submit a speaker card to the city clerk. raise your digital hand or dial star 9 on your telephone to indicate that you wish to speak. I will call on members of public participating in person first, followed by remote participants. Before I get to the public, Vice Mayor Mellinger has several announcements.

thank you very much mr mayor uh first of all sunnyvale has been awarded the achievement of excellence in procurement award sunnyvale's finance department recognizes their procurement team which was awarded the annual national procurement institute achievement of excellence in procurement award for 2026 This marks our 27th year receiving this honor. This award recognizes organizations that demonstrate excellence by obtaining a high score based on criteria designed to measure innovation, professionalism, productivity, e-procurement, and leadership attributes of the procurement organization. Congratulations to our procurement team. The city expresses gratitude and recognition for your hard work and outstanding professionalism. Next up, Lakewood Park Playground ribbon cutting. The wait is over and the brand new space-themed Lakewood Park Playground is ready for launch. Join us for a ribbon cutting ceremony to mark the completion of this stellar, all-inclusive playground. When Wednesday, July 29th at 10 AM, where Lakewood Park 834 Lake Chime Drive. The playground is located in the southeast corner of the park. Also ready for enjoyment are a new tot lot and new exercise equipment. While the playground is officially open, please stick to the open areas as the rest of the park continues to get its makeover. The John W Christian Greenbelt pathway and the basketball, tennis and handball courts will remain open for public use. We hope to see you there. And that does it for the announcements.

Thank you very much. Now we'll go to the public. I have a good number of speaker cards, so speakers will have two minutes to speak. I will list off two names. First speaker, please come to the lectern. And the next speaker, please wait in the wings. First up is Russ M., followed by Courtney J.

good evening mayor and council thank you for the opportunity to speak russ melton ceo of the sunnyvale chamber of commerce and while the city clerk is bringing up my slides let me echo the vice mayor's congratulations from the national procurement institute achievement of excellence awards for over 20 consecutive years just a phenomenal achievement congratulations I just wanted to mention some events that we have coming up at the Sunnyvale Chamber of Commerce. And the first one that I'll mention takes place in two days on Thursday. It's our summer mixer that will be held at the AC Hotel, which folks know is at El Camino Real in Remington. That's Thursday, the 23rd from 5 to 7 p.m. We'd love to see the council members there if you're available to attend. And then next up on Wednesday, August 5th, we're very fortunate to be able to have breakfast with Congressman Ro Khanna. Congressman Khanna will be joining us and that's at 8.30 a.m. to 10 a.m. Hope to see many people here. It's $25 and that includes a hot breakfast and a great conversation with our federal representative Ro Khanna. And I also just wanted to say a huge thank you to Vice Mayor Mellinger, who will be attending the event and introducing Representative Khanna on the event. So thank you for doing that. And then the final thing I'll mention is our inaugural golf tournament. This is going to be on Thursday, September 17th. This is the continuation of the Chamber's incredible partnership with the City of Sunnyvale. Our event will be held at Sunken Gardens on Wolf Road. That's a nine-hole executive golf course. and then an awards banquet afterwards at Old Greenwood BBQ at the Gold Rush Saloon. Hope everybody can make it and invite all members of the public to attend as well. All of these events are available to register at our website svcoc.org. Thank you again for the opportunity to speak.

Thank you. Next up is Courtney J followed by Vicky H.

Good evening again. Courtney Jansen still speaking on my behalf. As you know, I am a resident of North Sunnyvale. I have two kids and tonight I actually just wanted to shout out a huge thank you to city and staff for all the work that you have been doing for the summer opportunities and activities. My kids are in a handful of camps that the city does this year, and so far they've loved them, and I hope they continue to love them. And as a working parent, it is amazingly helpful to have so many options with such a wide variety of activities within Sunnyvale. So I don't have to drive to Mountain View or Powell. Also, I can just run over to the rec center or wherever else and drop my kids off. So I know it takes a huge to put the camps together, but the thoughtfulness and the effort that has gone into them is both simple and super appreciated. uh also found the one having the option for a drop in shorter for like weeks long in town otherwise has been great and i want to call out to the people the staff boy there for that they made my kids feel super welcome they kept them entertained my kids came home braving about it and we did it twice and i was like i should just put them in that for all of summer And then, of course, the Thursday nights, the library things that we're at Washington park, and we'll be moving to Fairwood. I can't remember what those are called, but those are great. And we're super excited to go the next couple of Thursdays and my kids look forward to it every year. So a really huge shout out for making summer amazing. Oh, and so July 4th, I didn't go, but my kids and my husband did, and they had a great time. And so they didn't have to deal with the lines and they came home. just talking about it and super happy, and it was amazing. So thank you for all of that. And then, of course, finally, thank you for the work on Liquid specifically. We're super excited to have the playground open next week and to check it out. And we are extra, well, maybe me, very, very, very excited for the branch library that's going to open at the end of August. And I know it's taken a lot of time and dedication on your behalf and on the behalf of staff. And I just want to say thank you so much for all that work.

Thank you. Next is Vicki H. followed by Angie H.

Hello, my name is Vicki Huber. I have been a resident of Sunnyvale for at least 42 years, maybe longer. And I'm here to speak on behalf of the Las Palmas Park and excuse me, council member sells district, but it pertains to all of the council members. This park is used by many, many people in Sunnyvale by many different groups. From my personal standpoint, I raised two boys at this park and now I'm raising grandchildren here. They played ball, soccer, the kid playing the kids area we utilize the dog park even climbing the big tree although they have cut the branches off the big tree so the kids can't really climb it anymore but in my boys day they did um currently there are many groups that use this park harmoniously the volleyball players the cricket players the baseball players the boy scouts the schools i mean i can go on and on and i know you've heard it from many different people But I'm here to implore you to consider no fencing and no lights. The fencing would, if erected, would become then exclusionary instead of it being in the wonderful, inclusive community park that we know it now. And even we need green open spaces. There's a lot of new condos and apartments being built for affordable housing. These people have no green area to go to. They need this park to stay open and green for all usage. And finally, the lighting is not good for the birds, for the wildlife, and the environment. So your constituents are asking for no fence and no lighting. Please help ensure that representatives from all these different groups are included in the small group reviews that are supposed to be taking place. You are elected officials, and I hope you listen to your constituents. We are speaking. Thank you for your attention. Thank you.

Angie H., followed by Charlene L.

Good evening, Mayor Klein and Sunnyvale City Council members. My name is Angie Hinson, and I am with Las Palmas Green and Serene. I represent the people that use Las Palmas Park. Thank you also for letting me talk again, because I'm sure you see me walk up here and go, oh God, not her again. But yes, I'm back. But it's short. The City of Sunnyvale's General Plan Policy CC-11.1 mandates that park designs favor the highest community utility. Option 1 of the park design is against that policy. Fencing 75% of the grassy area converts a flexible shared public asset into a private, you are not allowed, reserved space. It strips away the city's own policy of highest community utility by locking out the very residents that the policy was written to protect. I urge the council to reject permanent fencing and preserve this open, flexible, and accessible multi-use park for all ages, like my age group. Thank you.

Thank you. Next is Charlene L., followed by... I think it's Kim G, Karen G, sorry.

Honorable Council, thanks for taking my input. My name is Charlene Liu, and over the last two to three years, I have observed a serious problem in our city. Our city is implementing street designs that have made cycling actually more dangerous rather than less. Of great concern, these implementations are on school routes, so endangering our children. Here's an example of Cascade at Mary. It used to have no car lanes on Cascade. Cyclists could stay on the right of Cascade. They had that flexibility to cross Mary. However, the city recently painted in these right turn lanes, eliminating the shoulder. Now a cyclist is straight jacketed into merging onto the left turn, leftward into the center turn lane to go straight on Cascade. And a driver coming up behind the cyclist who wants to cross Mary goes into the right turn lane because they don't want to be stuck behind the cyclist. As cyclists and driver proceed into the intersection, their paths crisscross as they try to resume their default positions on the road. The chance of collision is high. On my rides through the intersection, drivers have repeatedly overtaken me using this illegal, unexpected, and dangerous maneuver. This is another example of the turn lanes that the city put in at the Dahls, a block down from the Cascade intersection. And now cyclists are forced to take, they're not forced, but they don't, they take the sidewalk instead. And I see high schoolers doing that on their way to school. other salient examples are the class 3b bike boulevards which force cars to tailgate cyclists while doing nothing to reduce car volume and speed and the curb extensions that force cyclists into car traffic my question for you is how can the city change the process of street design so that we actually improve safety perhaps all new street design should go through bpac review perhaps design should adhere to the nacto all ages and abilities Perhaps Sunnyvale transportation engineers can take continuing education courses to keep up with modern street design. I hope you can turn the tide. Thank you. Thank you.

Karen Gee, followed by Tony M. Hello, Mayor Klein and City Council.

I'm Karen Goff, and tonight I'm representing the Save Las Palmas group. I have here the second installment of our petition to remove option one from consideration. As you recall, option one would fence in nearly five acres of open space, add six stadium lights and two additional tennis courts. This is a crazy plan. Fencing in our parks open space would exclude our diverse general public from enjoying the space. Also that 13 people could be on the field by themselves to play cricket. And by the way, calling it a multi-use sports field doesn't change the fact that it would fence out every diverse, the word you guys so much like to emphasize, it would fence out every diverse group who freely uses that space now. Our petition now has a total of 1,450 signatures plus 94 volleyball player signatures. And I'll give this to the city clerk. Thank you for listening.

Thank you. And my last card in the room is... Mayor? Oh, sorry.

I have a follow-up question for city manager.

Go ahead.

Is option one and option two still valid since we will be doing a different study?

We're still in the process of restarting up the public outreach. I don't know what options we're bringing to council at this point. So I don't think valid or invalid is the right way to look at it. We haven't removed or added anything at this point. We're still in the public outreach process. So when we bring the options to council, you'll have an opportunity then to weigh in.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And my last speaker card is Tony M. Tony Murphy?

Yes.

Okay. First, I'd like to say thank you to our city council and the city officials for your service. With regard to Las Palmas Park, our family doesn't live in the immediate perimeter of Las Palmas Park. So transforming the park would not directly impact us at home in our house. But we don't live far away either. And transforming the park would greatly impact our family in other ways. One of our favorite walking loops is to gorgeous Las Palmas Park. My husband and I both have desk jobs, and as soon as we step foot onto the park grounds, I feel as if a big weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I can exhale the stress of the day and inhale the nature and beauty of the park. Our young adult children enjoy the open access green space with their friends for recreation. We are surrounded by expansive green space and nature in the middle of a city. How great is that? It's indescribable and invaluable to say the least. The residents of Sunnyvale elected you all and are trusting you to do what's best for Sunnyvale residents. We are trusting you to not enact policies that represent special interests outside of our great city. We are trusting you to not enact policies that benefit residents of other cities at the detriment of your own residents. We are trusting you to not provide an opportunity for outside interests to influence Sunnyvale City decisions and or even profit from them at the detriment of your own residents. It's difficult to understand why anyone would wanna radically transform the park by adding fences and lighting. perhaps those who want to do so are people who do not currently utilize the park as it is and who covet it for their own purposes i don't understand why sunnyvale residents are on the hook for outside sports organizations or private sports owners wish lists there's an old adage if you build it they will come please don't build it that was my last speaker oh councilmember lay

Thank you. I have a question for the City Manager as a clarification to your answer to Councilmember Sweeney-Vaughn. When you say that it hasn't, the outreach process has been restarted, does that mean that the conceptual designs have been scrapped and that we will be looking at new conceptual designs for after the public outreach has concluded or are we keeping the current designs?

I'm going to ask Ramona Chenico to come up and replay his role as Interim Public Works Director.

I can comment on that. I think what we're planning to do is we have a facilitator who is experienced with doing public outreach on projects like these so that the facilitator is on board. We're working on an engagement plan, which essentially includes how are we going to basically present information to the public and the residents? What feedback do we get? What kind of groups we will meet with? We want to get, you know, public input from diverse groups so how do we do that so that process is going to happen first people have already seen the the two options so we're not actually touching those right now what we're going to basically ask is what are people basically looking for and what are some of the things that and what are some of the things that basically they are very passionate about and not passionate about. We'll take all that feedback, come back with most likely options that reflect that feedback. So I think that's the best I can tell you.

Thank you.

Thank you. That was my last speaker card in the room. City Clerk, do we have any remote participants wishing to speak under oral communications?

No, Mayor.

Okay, I'll go ahead and close oral communications. Next up is our consent calendar. I'll go ahead and open up public comment on consent calendar items. Please submit a speaker card to the city clerk. Raise your initial hand now or dial star nine on your telephone to indicate that you wish to speak. I will call on members of public participating in person first, followed by remote participants. Speakers will have three minutes to speak. I have no speaker cards to speak on consent. City clerk, do we have any remote participants wishing to speak on consent?

No, Mayor.

Okay, I'll close public comment and bring it back to Council. Vice Mayor Mellinger? Move the consent calendar. Thank you. Council Member Srinivasan? Second. Thank you. City Clerk, can you please conduct the vote?

The motion for the consent calendar passes 7-0.

Thank you. We'll go ahead and move on to our general business. Our first item is item 26-0590, continued from June 2nd, 2026, proposed projects basically to take multiple following actions to establish lower density residential design, objective design standards for single family dwellings, two family dwellings, and dual urban opportunity housing developments. and repeal the single-family home design techniques. Is there a staff report?

Yes, we do have a staff report. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and I'm going to present to you the residential objective design standards. Just an overview about this project. So this is to replace our existing single-family home design techniques that were adopted by City Council back in 2003. And in 2020, City Council authorized the update to these design guidelines through study issue paper CDD 20-01. These standards will apply to single-family homes, two-family homes, and dual-urban opportunity housing, except for those located within Eichler and T. Francis heritage neighborhoods. Those properties will be subject to the respective standards. The planning commission hearing for this item was held on April 27, and they unanimously recommended adoption of these new standards and the related modifications. So here's an overview of the process. So from we we hire down group, which includes architects and urban planners in 2022 to help with developing these design standards. The community outreach meeting was held in June 2022, and since then we had three planning commission study sessions. Our first public draft was released in December last year. We have launched and maintained the public web page since over two years now, and we have regularly provided notification to interested parties, including the architects and designers that typically work with Sunny Hill and neighborhood associations. He was just a graphic representation of the process and timeline so far, so this item was continued from June 2 City Council hearing due to lend the agenda and also request to provide feedback on a public comment letter we received a few days before the City Council hearing. So the letter we received was from the principal of Passive Homes on May 21st. And the key concerns included building articulation, second floor design, concerns about the design standards not meeting environmental sustainability, energy efficiency, thermal influx, seismic safety, and ability of traditional homes to comply with the proposed standards. So both planning and building staff, we reviewed this letter very closely, and we have also included a detailed response to that as an attachment to the staff report. And we found that the design standards, they have no adverse impact on compliance with California building code, including meeting seismic standards and thermal performance. It also does not have A negative impact on the opportunities to install renewable energy systems for the projects, or it does not limit traditional residential design. These design standards in conjunction with our building code, as well as green building program and green building program is is an award-winning program and it's a very key implementation measure for cities climate action playbook and these design standards in conjunction with the other requirements further cities sustainability and climate action objectives Just to add a few more clarifications. So overall, these proposed standards, they offer greater flexibility. They support architectural diversity and design flexibility compared to the existing single family home design techniques. They also include provision for exceptions from most of the design standards. It also includes alternative compliance that addresses the projects that have more unique context. initially we took this as an opportunity to streamline our review process, essentially minimizing the hurdles to development of these projects by increasing our design review thresholds. So design review is the planning permit, which is needed for these projects. So we have increased it substantially. We have also addressed the evolving household needs of the years, which is to have larger homes to accommodate multi-generational living, aging in place. And keeping that in mind, we also propose increasing our load coverage allowances. Additionally, in response to the letter, we also added clarification to three of the standards to make it more readily achievable and allow for further architectural diversity. Next here, these are the overall goals of this project. So the recent housing laws, they prohibit cities from applying subjective design standards on housing development projects that also include single family homes. So one of the biggest goals for us was to create this very clear objective and measurable design standards for these kind of projects. As mentioned before, we also took this as an opportunity to streamline our permit process to make it more predictable, consistent, and transparent for the homeowners and developers. They also emphasized on promoting architectural variation. Our goal was to ensure consistency with the established building scale and pattern of the neighborhood and not really encourage an architectural style. So it does offer more diversity. We also worked on modernizing the document to address current trends. We incorporated sustainable design goals to further support our green building program code and cap goals. And one of the other key goals was to balance the property owner's need while also minimizing impacts on the neighborhood to minimizing privacy concerns and other visual impacts. The slide here provides an overview of the revised design review thresholds. The design review has three levels of review, staff level, staff level, with noticing and planning commission. We have worked on substantially increasing the thresholds at all the level to minimize the requirement of permits for these projects and to further streamline it. Additionally, we have. We are also proposing several zoning code updates. So, as mentioned before, we are proposing to increase the lot coverage allowance by five to ten percent. We also took this as an opportunity to update our accessory dwelling unit ordinance in light of the recent state laws, and that is also part of our housing element implementation program to keep it updated. uh we are also proposing minor update to green building program just to be consistent with the revised design review thresholds we are proposing to repeal the existing city council policy 1.1.12 which is the maximum standard for small lot single family residential development the policy is subjective in nature and in light of the other updates we are proposing it's redundant uh during the planning commission hearing on april 27th um we uh the planning commission unanimously recommended approval with some minor modification they recommended updating the related design guideline documents for consistency purpose and we identified that there would be a section of our I clear design guidelines that need to be updated in light of the revised design review thresholds and personal municipal code. These edits can be made by staff without coming back to planning commission or city council. They also are requested to add further clarification text for images that are included in Appendix A, which is architectural style guide. And these amendments are already incorporated and it's included in attachment two. So to conclude, staff is recommending alternative one, which is to find that the proposed actions are exempt from California Environmental Quality Act, adopt a resolution to establish the lower density residential objective design standards and repeal the single family home design techniques. introduce an ordinance to amend three chapters of sunnyville municipal code adopt a resolution to update and adopt green building tables for 2026 and repeal city council policy 1.1.12 this concludes staff's presentation thank you for your time today

Thank you very much. Let's go to council questions. First up is Vice Mayor Mellinger.

Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much, staff, for an excellent presentation. I especially want to thank staff for the extremely detailed response to the concerns we heard from the member of the public that you provided in attachment 10. That was extremely enlightening, and I'm very grateful for it. One question I had, I do have a couple of sort of What ifs, if that's all right? In general, would flat front windows, windows that are just flush with the wall, be permitted under the single family home design guidelines? Because these windows typically are lower maintenance, more energy efficient.

Yes, those will be permitted. So we haven't included a design standard that requires windows to be recessed.

Okay. Or bay or whatever.

No.

Okay. In general, my understanding is that The requirements for sort of change in front or change in elevation can be met by a change in color or material rather than a change in frontage or plane. Is that correct?

That is correct. And that's one of the clarification we recently added since June 2nd.

OK, and these standards. So if I want to put solar on a single family home roof and for whatever reason the roofline standards are impeding the ability to put solar on, is there a way to sort of to get around that too? Is there an exception or a process that as a homeowner I could use to get the solar?

So these standards do not dictate the roofline as much. And we did work with our building staff closely to make sure that none of these standards would impede opportunities for solar panels. So we don't anticipate that that would be the case. But as we look at these, as we implement these guidelines, if these design standards will be, we'll be evaluating if something needs to be addressed to something which is limiting and can be addressed and we'll come back to the city council with the proposal.

And that was going to be my last question is, could a motion and this might be more for the city manager. You know, could a motion have something like report back in 2 years if. just track if there are any issues or complaints with the standards and report back in two years, especially if it has anything to do with energy efficiency, solar, etc. Yeah, you can add, yes, you can add that to the emotion. Okay, great. No further questions. Thank you.

If I might just also interject, when it comes to solar installations, we do have some restrictions from the state to assure that we encourage and enable solar installation. So the angle of the roof would not mean that you couldn't install solar. You could have a solar above the roofline, as an example. Okay, thank you.

I see no other questions from Council. Oh, Council Member Cisneros.

Yes, thank you, Steph, for this presentation, for working through this. The value of having these is just tremendous in terms of our development process and making sure that everyone's on the same page. I do have a couple of questions. So there have been a couple of instances where we have a larger development that includes single family homes on that development is one of the build types, but it's near town homes, condos, apartments, you wouldn't exactly call it a single family home neighborhood. So when we're talking about these particular, I just wanted to make sure I was understanding right or correctly that these design standards would apply to those single family homes in that situation.

Yes, these standards will only apply to single-family homes and not townhomes, and we do have a definition of single-family home. It needs to be detached, and it could be only one unit on one lot.

Oh, okay. So one unit, one lot.

One single-family home.

Okay. It's on a bigger lot with others, but it's technically a single-family home. It would go...

it this would apply if it is technically not a single family home it will um most likely it's uh the city-wide objective design standards will apply so for example townhomes the city uh white objective design standards will apply on not these standards so these only apply to single-family homes two family dwellings which can be a duplex in most of the cases but it can also be detached two units on the same lot and also dual urban opportunity housing which is by the provision of sb9 senate bill 9.

If I could add on to that, I think I am remembering which project that you have in mind, and I think that illustrated that we do need to make some adjustments to those guidelines for that product type, because we were seeing that they were asking for exceptions when we were

otherwise we were happy with the design it just didn't meet the letter of those objective standards and so we we have that as a note to to go back and refresh those at some point in the next couple years okay that that's and yes i think we do have the same one in mind because there it did become an issue at that point um and it's an edge case because it doesn't happen very very much but i do appreciate it because it It was also cited by members of the public and it just kind of made a hard situation harder. Okay, my next question is, if somebody has a JADU, they've had one and let's say they wanna build a second story, give themselves a little bit more room that they're missing, would that JADU count toward FAR for the purposes of these?

uh so adus uh up to 800 square feet per edu is exempt from both lot coverage and floor area ratio and for a single family home three adus are permitted um including one jdu so those won't be counted

Okay, that's great. And I was just going to say, I also really appreciate the thorough investigation. You all engaged in a response to a letter from the public. It was a really helpful letter. And then how seriously you took that and how you presented that information, I think, has made a big difference. So I wanted to thank you. Those are my questions for now.

Thank you.

Thank you. Next up is Councilmember Chang.

Yeah, thank you for all your work on this. I wanted to appreciate the clarifying updates and the responses to the public comment letter and that we haven't received any additional public comment, but I'm wondering if you had sent this response to that, the Brown and Berry.

We haven't specifically sent it, but it's published and we sent out the notification to all interested parties.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. That was all council questions. Let me go ahead and open up the public hearing on this item. One second. Please submit a speaker card to the city clerk. Raise your digital hand now or dial star nine on your telephone to indicate that you wish to speak. I will call on members of public participating in person first, followed by remote participants. Speakers will have three minutes to speak. Okay, I have one speaker card in the room, Zachary K. David, can I have the?

Before you are the design review thresholds from the draft staff presentation, that's what was available earlier, that was available on legislature. What is being attempted to be done is rather concerning. Presently greater than 45% floor area ratio or more than 3,600 square feet floor area triggers a design review and hearing before the planning commission. Those are rather large amounts. What is proposed is to not care about the square footage of the structure and only initiate a planning commission design review with hearing if it is a massive 60% floor area ratio. What the planning commission would have heard now goes to a staff level design review or a staff level design review with noticing if you are lucky. I believe presently if a member of the public had an issue with the planning commission outcome, they could appeal the decision to council. There, at least, there is some level of accountability to the voters. I wasn't aware of the planning commission being overwhelmed. The sounds is jamming things and not having to answer for the results. I had some more about garage doors, et cetera, but I found a flaw, so I'm not gonna, I'm gonna skip over that. Thank you.

And the next speaker card is Steve S.

wasn't going to say anything until i heard the word adu mentioned so i need to bring up something that i went into detail with your either your planning department or the building permit people there is a glitch in the adu stuff from the city that allows adus to stick out and changed the character of the neighborhood completely. ADUs are supposed to be screened. They should be behind a fence. But it turns out some properties are interpreted as a side yard instead of a back yard. And therefore, they get away with not doing screening. I've identified several that I've found. One is very close to me, where they put up posts during the construction. Unfortunately, that ADU took almost four years, so it really disrupted the neighborhood for a long period of time. But in the end, they had the posts, then they had construction chain link fences, and then they took them down. And I went to the city and I said, Are they required to put up screening on here? We don't need to see the side of this ADU coming there. And it was interpreted it was a side yard. So I think that's something that in the standards for single family homes, we need to talk about screening of storage sheds, screening of ADUs, whatever, and not let it be stuck in a side yard or partly in the front yard without being attractive for the neighborhood. So please, maybe the staff can tell us if that's already in there. But when I spoke to the city departments, uh we we looked at the the applicable code from the the state and we looked at the plans that were put in and stuff and it was just interpreted to be a side yard um and part of it was the warehouse was oriented on the lot and part of it was that the adu's roof line did not go past the the major roof line of the original home. So if they were back an inch or something from the original home, all of a sudden it qualified as a side yard because of how it was oriented, but it's not screened. So I would ask you to look at that and look at that tonight before you approve things, add that as a modifier so that we can keep our neighborhood characters not broken up by random additions of buildings that are different shapes different orientations and that kind of stuff so six foot fence or some juniper bushes or something would help thank you thank you that was my last speaker card in the room city clerk you have any remote speakers wishing to speak on this item no mayor i'll bring it back to council for any final questions or a motion

Vice Mayor Mellinger.

Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. I'm ready with a motion. Go right ahead. I move alternative two, which is going to be alternative one with the following rider. The staff is to collect feedback on these guidelines from users, especially as pertains to sustainability and energy use, and to provide a report to Council back in two years.

Council Member Cisneros.

Second.

to your motion.

Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. And I'm just going to start by thanking staff for an excellent report and an excellent presentation, and in particular for attachment 10. Attachment 10 changed me from a no vote on these standards to a yes vote. I'm going to emphasize many of you know that I have I generally dislike requiring excessive articulation in facades, roof lines, et cetera. And I was very concerned when I saw the first draft of this that this would lead to such excessive articulation requirements. I want to encourage everyone here to read an article by Mike Eliasson in 2018 in The Urbanist titled In Praise of Dumb Boxes. And that article is about how essentially a box shaped design for buildings is the most energy efficient, economic, resilient, et cetera, et cetera. And so I was initially very concerned that the standards that we were putting in place would be essentially forcing too much deviation from the box, causing energy inefficiency, et cetera, et cetera. After having read attachment 10 and the staff response to the concerns that were raised by the architect who wrote in, I'm very satisfied that this is not the case, that these standards do provide increased flexibility for residents looking to build or modify a single family home, that these do strike the right balance between maintaining an attractive neighborhood character and allowing innovative traditional energy efficient designs any of those any or all of those um i think that by including the writer for a report to council which i kind of suspect was happening anyway but having that explicit is always good um we'll make sure that any problems are caught and fixed fairly quickly uh and so my concerns have been completely allayed and i respectfully urge my colleagues i vote and thank you again to staff thank you vice mayor and i'll be supporting this motion uh definitely i i think especially the new guidelines uh

make it very clear to homeowners or developers they're trying to renovate to do additions onto homes on what the what the requirements are and it is a balance and i'll second what the vice mayor said about the response especially from an energy efficiency standpoint and you know ultimately how you add solar panels, all that, I think it does a good balance as far as trying to better codify and set expectations. I think that's what Sunnyvale's very good at, is setting those expectations for developers so that it isn't left to the whim of the planning officer, as well as it makes it very clear, hopefully, that the architect, the contractor, consultant immediately know what to do. So I appreciate that. And it was very concise to a large degree in kind of going through the document. I also want to thank the Planning Commission for their efforts in kind of going through this in depth. and what was incorporated from a staff standpoint in the final product so so i appreciate that and happy to support this and encourage my colleagues to also support this motion and with that city clerk one second can you please read the ordinance title and conduct a vote

Yeah, so give me one moment to find the ordinance. And I should have had that up.

Sorry about that. That's actually a resolution.

Oh, and an ordinance.

Never mind.

Yeah, attachment four. Sorry, it took me a second to find it. An ordinance of the city council of the city of Sunnyvale amending chapter 19.32, building heights, lot coverage, and floor area ratios, and repealing and replacing chapter 19.80 design review of title 19 zoning of the Sunnyvale municipal code related to the implementation of lower density residential design standards and make other minor corrections, clarifications and technical changes and amending chapter 19.79 accessory dwelling units of chapter 19 zoning of the Sunnyvale municipal code to conform with new state ADU law AB 1154 and SB 543. And council members, go ahead and vote, please. And the motion carries 7-0.

Thank you very much. OK. Let's go ahead and take a seven-minute break and recess and come back at 8-10. Thank you. Let's go ahead and reconvene. Our next item is item 26-0484, continued from April 7th, 2026. Proposed project for consideration, consider applications on a .77 acre site on Carlisle Way.

Before we get started, Vice Mayor Mellinger has a statement. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. I will be abstaining from this item and leaving the room due to a close personal relationship with an interested party. Thank you.

And with that, is there a staff report?

Good evening City Council, City Mayor, and members of public. My name is Mary J. Prakash. I'm the planner working on this well and water tank project. The site is surrounded by Panama park to the best and single family homes on other sites, the project triggers a use permit and a year city conducted and neighborhood scoping meeting in early 2023 applicant cal water health neighborhood outreach meetings in 2025 we had a planning Commission hearing early this year before this meeting. This is the site plan showing the various components of the project. The new groundwater well is shown in purple. Water tank is shown in blue. And you can also see the other components of the project, such as emergency generator, chemical cabinets, and pump station. The distance of the proposed well is roughly 50 feet from nearby- Could you speak up just slightly more?

I think the mic's turned down. Move it. There we go.

Are you able to hear me better?

That's better. Thank you.

Okay. Do you want me to start? No. Okay. Okay. At least I'll start from the beginning of the slide. So this is the site plan showing the various components of the project. The new groundwater well is shown in purple. The water tank is shown in blue, and you can see the emergency generator, chemical cabinets and pump station. The distance of the proposed well is roughly 50 feet from nearby property lines and roughly 80 feet from the abandoned well. Next few slides are elevation drawings. This is what you would see from the street facing the front of the site. This is elevation drawing from the park. This is seen from the rear of the site. This is seen from the left side of the site. Okay, this is a slide that lists all studies that we did as part of CEQA. The highlighted ones are tailored specifically for this project. We studied geotechnical analysis, where we studied the stability of the soil due to drilling. We studied groundwater quality, studied sustainability of groundwater. We also did project-specific noise and vibration analysis, and I'll get to that in the next slide. The project will result in significant noise impact due to drilling specifically into two homes, the nighttime noise will be higher than the standard. This is because drilling is proposed to occur continuously to prevent for collapse, the drilling is going to go for four weeks in two stages to mitigate the noise impact during drilling cal water will construct sound walls. Okay, so this slide shows proposed well in blue circle in the middle of the slide the two homes by the nighttime noise will exceed the city limit is outlined in red numbers in blue area blue shows the left nice levels before installation of the sound wall and green shows the noise levels after the sound walls. This slide lists some of the key concerns from neighbors. Noise and vibration are the biggest concern of all. There are other concerns on how the project will affect the ground stability, concerns regarding massing of the proposed tank. There are concerns regarding construction impact because the drilling is going to go for 24 hours. um concerns about overall safety because there's going to be chemical cabinets on site and there's also going to be a large water storage tank on site responses to all these concerns and all the other concerns are included in the attachment in the staff report These are the changes made after the planning commission meeting. So the tank height is reduced from 24 feet to 17 feet. Cal water also relocated emergency generator away from single family homes to reduce any impact from diesel fumes. Planning Commission asked additional hotel vouchers for all neighbors adjacent to the project site. So 10 neighbors will be receiving hotel vouchers and this is added to the conditions of approval. Planning Commission also asked for an alternate site and alternate equipment analysis. It was conducted and the report is added to one of the attachments. There is an errata that's drafted to the EIR to show the tree numbers consistently. Um, I would also like to point it out to you that there's one of, one of the neighbors, um, had brought it to us that, um, and also Cal water is aware of a tree that is not in the 2016 Google map, but shown in the harvest report as a dead tree. This tree is proposed for removal and they're providing replacement for it. Um, Cal water will talk more about it when it's their turn to present. This slide lists control measures based on CEQA requirements and non-CEQA measures that the applicant is providing for this project. So the CEQA measures includes providing noise monitoring, installing temporary sound barriers, and provide hotel vouchers for two impacted neighbors. The remaining measures are non-SEQA that the applicant is providing in addition to the SEQA measures. They are hotel vouchers to all 10 neighboring homes, continuous noise and vibration monitoring, though vibration is not a SEQA impact. and also providing daily report made available to the city and to the neighbors and the report to include on a daily basis what are the exceed if there were any exceedances in noise or monitoring and if so how Cal water address those exceedances um this slide list overriding considerations so based on sequa alternatives were studied and concluded that there are no feasible alternatives to the site or equipment and it's evident to staff that this project would benefit the city by providing portable water serving sunnyvale residents Cal Water wells are aging, and according to Cal Water, they cannot afford to lose this well. This project will increase their water supply, making their supply more reliable. And the project also meets General Plan goals to support utility infrastructure and to help promote adequate water supply. and the site has been in operation from 1955 up to 2016 and has been a compatible use with the surrounding land use the number of connections and residents count listed in this slide here is is different from information we just received from cal water today couple of hours back. So Cal Water is checking their numbers and they will share more on this when it's there to turn to present. This slide lists the alternatives of the EAR and the use permit separately. Staff recommend City Council to certify the EIR and to approve the use permits subject to their findings, statement of overriding consideration, MMRP, conditions of approval. This concludes my presentation. We have here the applicant's team with their technical consultants, and we also have here City's environmental consultants, Nick and Christy. We can answer any questions you may have. Thank you.

Thank you very much. So just for Council's knowledge, the applicant will come up during the public hearing portion and you'll be able to ask questions of the applicant at that point. With that, do we have questions for staff? First up is Council Member Srinivasan.

Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thanks for the clarification. I would have asked that. I have a lot of questions for the applicant, but more importantly, thanks for the presentation. I watched planning commission meeting. I was confused on the steps.

this project will take let me start by from drilling to there is construction and then final cleanup could you explain me and then also give me the timeline okay um so total it's gonna the drilling is gonna go for roughly four uh four weeks so the first two weeks roughly 12 days there will be pilot hauling and there will be two weeks roughly a pause where they would procure any materials they need and they would during that time they would analyze the soil and come up with exactly how drilling needs to be done and then the 15 days they would do continuous drilling And during this time, the 12 day period and the 15 day period is when they have the 24 seven drilling. And during this time, they would do continuous noise and vibration monitoring. And on a daily basis, they would send report to us and the reports will also be available to the public. We have built it in the medication monitoring and reporting plan and in the conditions of approval that during drilling, they would do continuous monitoring. And if the noise levels are within one decibel of 80 decibel, which is the limit during daytime, they would stop drilling. If it's within one decibel, they would stop it and evaluate the situation and do the remediation. And it's all written in the mitigation monitoring and reporting plan.

Okay. Thank you for that explanation. Now I have a follow-up question. So our understanding is 21 Votel Vouchers, whether it's for two people, two families or 10, it's for 27 days, but it appears that it will be 12 days. There is a break and then 15 days. Is that correct?

The first 12 days, they call it pilot holding, and the subsequent 15 days, they call it actual drilling.

Correct. But then, hotel vouchers are for...?

Both the times. Hotel vouchers...

But there is a gap of two weeks, right? You said there is a procurement period, so it's not 27 days of continuous drilling. Is that my understanding? That's what I thought. I heard it in the planning commission, but I want to understand. So which means that let's say 12 days plus 14 days of pause getting procurement and then another 15 days, right? The total drilling itself will be close to 26 plus 41 days. Is that correct?

The total time is, yes, you're right.

not the drilling not the drilling the the operations on the site the last 40 projects you're right right for example if I am a neighbor I have to be prepared for 41 days because there is a break of two weeks in between is that correct yes you're right right so that's what I thought I understood and then also on the planning Commission uh they also mentioned about when it reaches 79 DB or 49 They will approach CalWater noise assessor or some title like that. And then they didn't say they would stop, but they said that they would evaluate the cause of the noise. But anyway, I will wait for Karl Water for that clarification. And then I had a general question on SQL noise and SQL vibration calculation, which is a modeling. Since there is a, drilling portion, drilling phase, construction phase, during all this time, there will be vehicles and then other activities going on. Did the noise modeling consider everything together or did they say, okay, drilling is, we'll manage it within 80 decibel or what exactly did that happen?

I believe the noise consultants would be able to help address that question. Yes.

Similarly, I had a question on the vibration level also. Sorry. Accumulative noise. And then I had another question on EIR. I will wait for the consultant. And then nice threshold, all these things. But yeah, those are the general questions on this presentation. But I have a lot of questions. Anyway, thank you.

Those are good questions. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember. Next up is Councilmember Cisneros.

Yes, thank you for the presentation and for all of your work on this. A very interesting issue. I'm trying not to be duplicative with my questions and also make sure that I'm not asking either staff questions and save the technical stuff. So I mentioned the hotel vouchers for the entirety of construction, but I'm also sensitive to the fact that some people may have pets or other special circumstances that would need to be accommodated. Is the applicant willing to work with those residents if there is a special accommodation That comes up with one of these 10 places.

Yes, the applicant is willing to work with that. And we also have it written in the conditions of approval that the applicant has to evaluate the needs of every house separately and they have to decide on the number of rooms based on that.

Very good, I really appreciate that and how so you mentioned because it's 24 hours so and lights are mentioned, you have to work with lights, how many are affected by the lights, even if they may not be within that 10 resident is that something that would affect other people in the neighborhood.

So it is brought to me that they are going to install 30 foot tall noise barriers. And those barriers are walls, continuous walls, temporarily during the time of drilling, going to be surrounding the site envelope. So there is discussion responding to a similar question where it was said that it's highly unlikely for the light to dissipate out of that wall. But even then, there is a lighting plan of exterior lighting. The city would evaluate after this entitlement. That's a separate process. They have to apply for, Cal Water has to apply for a lighting plan and we would review it closely and decide on what's going to be length of the pole heights and how many poles are going to be how many light fixtures are going to be shielding glare luminance on all of that will be evaluated that's very helpful thank you for reminding me of that next step and so there's an entire thing to capture that

Who is the point of contact for residents? Is this the city? Is this Cal Water? Is this somebody else? And is that something that can be clearly posted?

This is going to be both the city and Cal Water. At the time of drilling, the 24-hour contact would be at the time of drilling, it will be Cal Water. But generally, there is also a city person on contact.

Okay, fantastic. I want to make sure that everyone has the ability to know, like, this is exactly who I'm going to contact if I have this concern during this phase. So that part is at least easy. Totally. That sounds good. And then we mentioned, okay, once it starts, if we're evaluating it, we're monitoring it, what is the process if it's, say, louder or there's more light than we anticipated? Would you... then pull the entitlement? Or is there a process within it to address the difference?

So the modeling is done on a worst case scenario. The modeling is studied when all equipments are in operation, which is highly unlikely, but the modeling is done on a worst case. And also where we are measuring the noise, it's on the property lines and people are going to be inside during night when there is actual exceedance. and generally with common construction practice inside to indoor to outdoor noise difference is 25 decibels that that's a lot so that would easily get them out of the exceedance so um if there is exceedance they they would have to stop the work because they are not permitted to do it without without the mitigation measure so they have to have the mitigation measures and all that in place and it is concluded that for two residences it is going to be high um on the outdoor but indoor it's not evaluated on the indoor so we are thinking indoor it would be by standard 25 decibel difference it would be much lower um but we don't know um we don't know so definitely um that's you want to add something to it

Yeah, thank you. Thanks for the question, Council Member Cisneros. Matt VanWa, Assistant Director of Community Development Department. Just wanted to follow up on that too and just mention that the entitlements themselves wouldn't be taken away if there were to be an exceedance in the noise, for instance, based on what we've modeled. The applicant is required to continuously monitor the noise and vibration throughout the project. And anytime those are tripped, it is required of them to immediately address that exceedance with further mitigations to bring that, whatever that exceedance, back down to what we've approved tonight. Approved.

okay okay that's very helpful and i'm very sympathetic to this issue i can see cal train from my living room window and see the actual train and i'm under a flight path so i get it but hopefully it is it is lighter indoors and i look forward to continuing the convert more technical conversation with the applicant as well thank you both very much thank you council member next is council member cell

Hi, thank you for this information. And it was mentioned that there's this place, Warner Avenue, which is kind of where they have a well there. And then it was mentioned that there's different screening fencing there than here. And then that here we could, as a condition of the project, ask for improved fencing. What kind of fencing could we ask for that's improved or who would define that?

Improved fencing can be installed. This is just for visual after the construction is over.

Yeah, I think some residents were making letters. There's gaps in the fencing, so they would like it to be closed and I assume new fencing. And is that something we would ask for an emotion or how would we do that?

That could be incorporated into, yes, it can be asked as a motion. It can be included as a condition of approval. And we can include that asking for a solid, good quality wooden fence to replace what they have existing.

Okay, that's something we would pin in motion. Okay. The other thing is, so there's that diesel generator. So the diesel generator, it's just on, how often is it on?

Bi-weekly. They have to test it for 30 minutes on a bi-weekly basis. So it's not for ongoing operation. And also when emergency happens, it'll go on. So these are the only two times that emergency generator will be on. Okay. Okay.

And that testing would be during the daytime as well.

Okay. And I was just wondering why they choose diesel instead of something cleaner like electric and quieter like electric.

That question was asked to Cal Water, and their response is that for this type of operation and the power and all, they are not able to find an equivalent electricity-driven motor generator. So that's what they choose to do it. And that's one of the reasons initially they asked for a 230 kilowatt power diesel generator. And after the planning commission, that is reduced because the same question came up. It is now reduced to 140. And also the distance between nearest home and the diesel generator is increased. According to Cal Water, they couldn't change it to electric motor also for the reason that that's not the type that's available in the market that they can use for this operation. So for those reasons, they are proposing diesel powered and they did make accommodation by pushing it further away from the property line and also by reducing the power of the diesel.

okay and uh council member saw i did just want to clarify to uh bi-weekly in this case means every other week every two weeks not twice a week thanks okay and then my last question is um about the hotel rooms so if a family is larger then cal water would probably give them multiple rooms and so for each room you negotiate like how much for each room three hundred dollars okay so if you have two rooms that each room could have a budget of three hundred dollars you're right okay and then with that three hundred dollars you uh went and estimated that um it could maybe have a little kitchenette yes okay okay those are all my questions thanks you're welcome thank you uh next up is Councilmember Chang

Thank you. I'll have questions after the next presentation. I just wanted to make a quick declaration that I used to live in a home approximately 915 feet from the parcel. I received a letter from the FPPC allowing me to participate in this item dated July 23, 2025.

Thank you. Next up is Councilmember Srinivasan. Go ahead. Thank you.

Actually, I had a question on the diesel generator, but it's 135 kilowatt, which is quite available everywhere. But because of that design, now it's pushing everything towards the property line. But I had a question on the The well layout, it's right now 51 feet from the property line. What was the distance the old well was?

From the current well, the rough distance is 80 feet. The distance between the two wells.

80 feet vertically? Because I couldn't see that you... I asked this Monday morning question, but... They asked me to refer to an attachment. There was no indication on the old wealth. The reason why I'm asking is that will directly impact the vibration, right? And then that if the design can be changed. it will not only improve the vibration levels for the property owners but also the diesel fumes and other things i will wait for kyle water i i saw their response during the planning commission 135 kilowatt everybody has even power walls at homes are about 40 kilowatts so i don't know i don't understand why that is a problem but i also wanted to talk about the vibration mitigation you mentioned about if there is a increase in any noise level or vibration mitigation they will stop and then immediately look at that but the question is vibration mitigation once it starts it's very very difficult to control noise you can stop right because vibrations waves will move so that will affect the structures so we need to include those kinds of things in the motion or whatever we will discuss But I will wait for my technical questions after the presentation and public comments because I have a lot of those things. Anyway, thank you.

You're very welcome. Thank you.

Thank you. I had several questions. Actually, Council Member Lay first.

Thank you. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you for the presentation. I have a question to, and I will have more for the applicant, but to clarify what we're being asked to do here, we're being asked to approve this resolution and the use permit for this space. Could you clarify what, we as a city are obligated to do with regards to the noise ordinances. I understand that the applicant will be providing hotel vouchers and the specifics of that will be hammered out with the various constituents who are affected. if they are going to be beyond the noise ordinance level, and it seems like they will be for nighttime, is this a situation where we are functionally excusing that? I for the night time for those two homes yes to the levels that is shown in the in our documents yes okay so okay so we're excusing that for as part of this um and then once again to clarify I think you mentioned this earlier that the um estimated noise level is based on the property line and not necessarily what's going to be experienced from within the house exactly Okay. And then I think that Council Member Sr. Boston was talking about this, but we talked about noise mitigation. Is there such a thing as vibration mitigation as well? Will that also be addressed or attempted to be addressed?

um so the when we did the vibration modeling there is no exceedance in vibration um it is not a sequa impact um and for those reasons and right vibration levels because it's not exceeding for those reasons there is no specific mitigation that is tailored in this project for that okay thank you you're welcome

Thank you. I had several questions. First, and so G13 talks about monitoring, reporting will be available and other things. The monitoring will happen daily and ultimately reading other portions of the document that it'll be available to the city and neighboring residents as far as what the noise thresholds are. If they're going beyond those thresholds, it's listed that they will take a corrective action. If there's multiple days of exceeding those thresholds, that they're taking corrective action, but the noise continues. I see nothing in here about stopping operations. I understand that they are saying that they want construction and according to their machinery needs to go on 24 hours a day for 12 days, 15 days, blah, blah, blah. If they are continuously exceeding or on a daily basis exceeding and not truly taking corrective action, what is city staff's action at that point? That's a good point. Because you're just getting a peak on a daily basis, that they're not meeting what their model said it was going to be. And if they're going beyond that, what is our action from a city standpoint?

So far, you're right. Go ahead.

Thank you, Mary Klein, for that question. One thing I do want to note, they are monitoring the exceedance prior to it actually exceeding those limits. So the goal of this monitoring program is to actually mitigate those before there's an exceedance. Okay. So that's one way we're seeking to not have these issues in the first place. Okay.

Mayor Klein, I'd also like to add to that that we have built a language in the condition of approval where they say that 60 days prior to drilling, they have to come to us for a permit where we look at the monitoring plan to finalize it. And we'll also look at other things like the noise barriers and other things. So we still have the opportunity during that time to that's a good point that you brought up. We can tighten the language. Say if there are a couple of exceedances, then you have to come back to us for a whole new permit or something like that. We can definitely beef up the language. We do have the hook to do that.

And from a motion standpoint, does that have to be part of the motion? that we give you. For me, and this was the whole thing, the corrective plan, which is kind of hand-waved around as it currently stands. We're leaving it to staff to ultimately figure out what that corrective plan is. That being said, if they've exceeded for two days in a row or haven't been able to meet their goals, what happens? I don't want to be too prescriptive, but leaving it to staff. That being said, please tell staff if you want that as part of the motion, just to emphasize that repetitive let's say failure to meet the the guidelines means that operation that the the operations fail it needs to stop and and you know this starts all over again which costly to the to cal water as well as the neighbors as far as that's concerned but it's it's you know the mitigation items that are being put in place is trying to reduce this effects overall so that that to me is critical um And I, this is a little bit of a rehash of Monday morning questions, but I do want to say, you know, on the, on the visit to the site, um, you know, there was a chain link and the chain link fence has been there for years. And, you know, from a city standpoint, we try to reduce chain link fence usage as much as possible. Does staff have a recommendation on you know, converting the chain link fences into either slats or a different type of fence. And I'd love to hear from the residents too, you know, whether or not looking at this chain link fence next to the park is something that they would want to be considered. But does staff have a recommendation on that? And then kind of, supplement to that of course is is the water tower color itself and you know we have multiple water towers and uh water storage facilities within the city and you know some of them have artwork some of them are you know one color and you know trying to say whatever happens whether or not it's a it's a chain link fence or or a um or let's say covered fence you'll be able to see conceivably a portion of the water tank. And so does staff have a recommendation on colored versus artwork or something of that nature?

there's a lot of concerns that we received on the water tank to conceal it they don't want to see it more than people who wanted to see artwork in it and look at it there are more people who wanted to conceal it by having mature trees around it by constructing fence around it having that said because it's also going to be only 17 feet it's not going to be a tall water tank it's just 17 which is in part with the other one-story homes in the neighborhood so we are thinking more in lines of um camouflaging it with like a foliage by painting it in green um but this is a question about then the fence so i'm fine with the color of the tank but but then you if you have a chain link fence

and especially with a driveway there, you will always see it as you're passing by on Carlisle. So it doesn't matter what color it is, and you're not going to put foliage completely across the northern side of the property to cover it because you always need vehicular access through there. So there will always be some sort of gate and all that. And so that goes back to the question of, Is there a recommendation trying to cover this up more? It's fine if it's a color to try to make it less noticeable and adding trees around the site helps. But from a fence standpoint, do we leave it open or conceivably close it?

It has been open all along, even from 1955 to 1916 with a 17-foot-tall tank there. It has been open all along. But if neighbors wanted to be covered, I believe that is fine as well because the other two sites have wooden slats, so it can be mimicked on the other two, the front and the side towards Panama Park as well. If neighbors want it that way, definitely sure. Yes.

And you got my other questions in morning, Monday morning. Okay. That was all of council questions. Let me go ahead and open up the public hearing, so thank you. Let me go ahead and open up the public hearing on this item. Please submit a speaker card to the city clerk, raise your digital hand now, or dial star nine on your telephone to indicate that you wish to speak. I will call on members of the public participating in person first, followed by remote participants. Speakers will have three minutes to speak. The applicant is provided 10 minutes at the beginning of public comment of the public hearing to address counsel, along with five minutes at the end of the public hearing. um and so i'll invite the applicant to come to the lecture is there an applicant presentation

you good evening honorable mayor and council members thank you for your time on this project and the time for reviewing it reviewing it and we'd also like to take time cal water would like to thank mary and noren for their support throughout this process So to start, just want to remind or share with everybody that Cal Water has been in service for 100 years. And the team that put this project together is a very critical team that consists of engineering, water quality, IT and accounting support for our district. We have some of our team members here in the audience. And I have them listed up on the slide. And what you see next is the agenda. I want to say over the past decade that Cal Water has constructed over 16 or about 16 groundwater wells throughout our service areas. And we're here to discuss just replacing the one that we lost back in 2016. We tried to rehabilitate that well and we were not successful. This is a well that was had 50 years of a lifespan. And it reached its end of useful life and was no longer available to serve our community. At Cal Water, we pride ourselves on being a good neighbor. And throughout the construction in this project and through to the completion, we plan to take measures to preserve the character and peacefulness of the neighborhood and minimize any impacts to the nearby residents. The lead thing for Cal Water is providing safe and reliable water service, which requires ongoing investment in infrastructure our customers depend on every day. That is why our entire team remains focused on upgrading and modernizing our systems and to ensure they remain resilient for long term necessity. In this case, we're just simply trying to maintain what we lost, though. groundwater, well groundwater, it's an important part of the commitment and it will help strengthen the reliability, quality and resiliency of our water system. So the background, I hear there's been, Hold on. Sorry about that. Got you. So the positives about this project, you see them listed up there on the slide, but I want to delve into the fire protection in this area will be enhanced because emergency responders can draw from both Cal Water and the City of the Sunnyvale systems if needed. This places residents in a unique position with access to multiple water sources that can support firefighting efforts when needed, if needed. In addition, water utilities have a long history of working together through mutual aid and interconnections to help meet demand during emergencies or unexpected events. While situations that require this level of coordination are uncommon, it is reassuring to know that you have these partnerships and backup options that are available if needed or if it should arise. Having a reliable local groundwater source further strengthens, like I said before, the resiliency of the water system. And that's what we're trying to do. Have that additional protection, have that additional source, maintain what we have currently so that we can also continue to grow with the cities when you're growing in your residential endeavors. We have six other walls. in the Sunnyvale system. But this particular well that we lost, we went through a lengthy process. So from start to finish, it can take approximately three years just to secure CPUC rate approval. And to get into the rate sequence, we have to complete the design work, conduct the sequel review process and obtain the necessary city approvals before construction can begin, which to equate can equate to approximately about 10 years. This well has served the community for over 50 years, and it was there before most of the homes that were built in that area. Cal Water believes that we'll be successful in drilling this new well and have at least that lifespan, if not longer. So we're hoping that the few weeks that we're asking to drill to obtain this source and replace that source, that you guys will support us on that. And then once it's done, then you have another source that's reliable. And I know I've said that, what, three times. It's very important. Now, I heard there was mention to the Genset installation. And according to city standards, we will install the ginset and it'll be under the National Fire Protection Association guidelines. Cal water is approximately 300 generators throughout the company. And we've never had an issue where it was like a emergency or any kind of fire situation. They've always worked when needed when power failures have occurred. We purchased gen sets that meet the highest quality standards and the standards are strict that it's hard to find the generators that meet the new requirements. But with the help of the engineering department, we're doing the best we can and to get the best generators that are available to meet those requirements. We also adhere to the Bay Area Quality District who also plays a part in making sure that the standards are met for this project. So now we're going to talk about mitigating impacts on our neighbors. So we listened to your concerns and we lowered the height of our tank. So now it's 17 feet. And we also, we replaced the fencing at that location in 2011. And we hear you. We have no problem with replacing it now during this project. The only thing I do want to bring to your attention, the reason why we went to having the chain link fencing is because of security. You can see what's going on in there. You can't have people hiding in there. And there are residents there. And so if that is something that you require, that would be not a problem. We also mentioned that the vouchers are available. And yes, we're open to any discussion if there's something that we missed or if there's extenuating circumstances. So feel free to reach out to us for that. And then in regards to noise and vibration monitoring. So we don't plan on exceeding any noise. Guidelines are measures. Like I said, Cal Waters drilled 16 other wells within the last decade. We haven't had any issues in regards to noise and vibration. This is new. We adhere to this because we wanted to support your concerns and do what we can to monitor to make you guys feel more comfortable with the job that we need to do. So there is nothing that we can compare that to. We put that together to help you guys feel better and more, you know, comfortable with us moving forward with this project. This is a learning curve for us also. So, but we will do it and maybe it'll be a learning process, but we did have, we do have a plan that has been put together for that. And like I said, the other well sites, we've never been asked to do a vibration test or monitoring or anything like that. This is a first for that, for the vibration. Now, There's questions that were brought to our attention. And in regards to insurance, and will we have it available, we will have a liability insurance available. If there's any damage has occurred to any of the neighbors during this project, we will review and go ahead and submit a claim. And then there was another question in regards to the drilling and the vibration, and that's what I went ahead and addressed. But we will have our specialist address that further if you have more technical questions along that line. And then, uh, the last question, which I love you guys are next to the last question. Uh, you asked about our station on Warner Avenue. It was that visited that, that location. It will be much similar to that. Um, it's just that it'll be a larger well, that'll be pumping. And if you remember, I'll remind, and maybe the council members you and honorable merit. When I had the people at our location, that technology, those enclosures for the pumps that are there for the well and the pump, the booster, that technology has improved way significantly more to where you don't even hear the pump. So, and I explained that then I wanna remind you now, the tech, oh, can I continue talking?

So you'll have another five minutes at the end, but go ahead and stay up here because council have some questions and conceivably, whatever other question you were going to answer will be asked. So let's bring it up to council for questions. First up is Council Member Srinivasan.

Thanks for the presentation. And then you mentioned liability insurance. That was one of my list of questions I had. Thanks for bringing it up. So my question related to that is, how do anybody avail that or make use of just in case there is a damage they notice because of drilling or otherwise, how do they contact you or what exactly happens?

Right. So on any of our projects, we always send a notification specific to who to contact on Cal Water. There will be a person named most likely me to contact and I would go out and review and we would submit a claim, put a claim together so that it could go to our liability assurance for reveal.

Okay. And then, um, You also mentioned this is the first time you are doing vibration monitoring or noise monitoring. Vibration. Vibration monitoring. That is because this site is very, very unique. It's surrounded by Eichler homes, which are almost 60, 70 year old. Who knows what the structure is? The soil would have been settled. The icy settlement cracks. all the time in my home, right? So it's very, very important vibrations have to be monitored, not only during the construction, but possibly the soil movement because of water removal and all those things. So the other thing you mentioned, you have, did I hear you correctly, in the district, you have 16 groundwater wells.

Throughout our company, we have drilled 16 wells within the last decade. Throughout our company, Cal Water, not just our district.

Big drill. So how much, and then you said six wells are in Sunnyvale apart from this well. Correct. How many are outside Sunnyvale serving the other cities?

So that would be, there's like 12 or 12. A minute. So we have about over 20, like 12 outside of, there's a few outside of the Sunnyvale.

So totally about 19 while serving the district. Okay. I will follow up with my capacity question later on, but those are the questions for now. Thank you. And then I want to follow up on the power generation, the diesel generator. Jen said you mentioned, but that's a technical question I will ask when the time comes.

This is the time.

Okay.

Any questions for the applicant team?

Oh, okay. Then I will ask the capacity question. So according to my Monday morning question, this well, when it becomes operational, it will pump about 1,200 gallons per minute. Right? That's what staff said. Right. And then we also got the response that Cal water supplies 7,800 of our residents. Okay. Doing a simple math, that's about one hour or just over one hour of extraction water pumping from this well alone will serve the entire Sunnyvale of Cal water customers. Is that correct?

I didn't do the calculation, so I couldn't really speak to that.

Just rounding off the numbers, 7,800 customers multiplied by 100. And then if it is 1,200 gallons per minute, that's about 72,000. So that's what I said. Okay. So which means that around 20 to 22 hours of water from this well will be serving other non-sunny well residents right that's what i am i am trust me on my math okay so that's what i wanted to let you know and then regarding the generation so this generator is 130 kilowatts And then this is a diesel-powered generator, which means that it runs on diesel, converts it into mechanical energy, electrical motor and all those things. With the modern technology, when everybody... And then this project itself will have a lifespan of 60 years. Can CalWater look into... the latest, not even the latest technology, it's available for our home use. When the power goes off, we have backup power, right? This is a backup power system, right? And then for our home, on TV, you will see the advertisement for 40 kilowatts, right? Which means that you need four of them to operate this pumps and switches and valves. The reason why I'm saying is because of that, not only the layout of the site is also getting affected, maybe you could have pushed the well still farther out from the property line just to alleviate some of the concerns our residents have because they are living in a very, very old home. And then as you heard, diesel fumes affect one of our senior citizens and then a lot of pets are being affected. I am glad you moved it away, but then the question is, with the modern technology of renewable energy and then power cells and all those things, that should be a simple decision, I think. And then this will last for 60 years. So we shouldn't be tied to what existed some 40, 50 years back, right? We should be looking at the future. And Sunnyvale is very, very big on reducing greenhouse gases. Granted, this is not a big greenhouse gas emitter, But then 135 kilowatt generator is equal to running a Toyota Corolla or Honda Civic, right? So even if we remove that and then considering coming up with an alternative is a good one. That's my suggestion and then my ask.

Okay, so just as a reminder that you can bring up any part of your team. So if there's experts on your team that you want to answer this, you can always do that. But go ahead.

All right, I'm going to try and answer it and see if this fits what your question is in a whole. So I've been to, we had a couple of... council meetings where we had to, where we're proposing chin sets. And so what I can tell you is that our engineering team, which is prepared to come up right now, but I'm going to give you the cliff note version. And if you want an extension, they can come up, but I will, I will explain to you that when we looked into solar power, we looked into battery powered, Gensets versus the diesel, we don't have a large enough footprint for what's required to meet the enough power to run our booster pumps and our wells because these are three phase boosters and that requires a lot more power than what you see that is offered for powering your homes. Your homes don't require three phase. These booster pumps and these wells do require that. And we don't have the capacity to have the amount of batteries or even enough solar power panels that would need to be erected on a building to hold that load. Does that make sense to you?

I understand the three-phase power. I am an engineer. But on the other hand, what I don't want to be locked in is a diesel alternative. which will last for many, many years. These kinds of technologies are improving, right? That's what I'm, how do we even say that 10 years from now, or God forbid, 60 years, we are still running diesel, right?

I will call up our engineer, to give you that information.

And Council Member Srinivasan, just a reminder, critical infrastructure, like the City Hall, has solar panels, has battery backup, has diesel generators. That's correct. And so understanding that the applicant can't design for 10 years from now is basically... I won't answer for them, but keep in mind the questions you're asking.

Thank you, Amir. And then I was more interested in the battery backup rather than the solar.

Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Gurkiran Kaur. I'm the capital delivery director at Cal Water. So the diesel power generator that is required to power this well pump and the booster pump facility will require more than 100 kilowatt of power at 480 volt three phase rating. Inverter, solar panel, and a battery system of that size will have a massive footprint. It will only last for 10 or so years because that's how the battery life is. And the technology like that, the site doesn't have the room that is needed to install solar panels and the battery storage system of that size. Also, that technology is very dependent on weather because the use of this diesel power generator is not for normal operation of the facility. It is for emergency backup, including when power goes out at the facility. So any power outage longer than four hours or so would require double the size of the footprint that is needed to provide power to the pumping facility. on site. In the case of rainy or stormy weather, when you don't have the solar energy available to recharge the batteries, you will have to then rely on a backup generator to charge the batteries. So that kind of diminishes the advantage you get by installing using diesel power generator as only your emergency backup power source in case of a power outage.

Thank you for that explanation. And then what is the lifespan of these generators?

Around 25 years.

We are stuck with the technology. Regarding solar panel, I had another suggestion. Why don't we mount solar panels on the tanks? Is there anything going on the tank, the top of the tank?

Yeah, I can answer that. So that would be a possible water quality issue. You can't have anything on the tanks because it could diminish the actual, the core, the actual material on the tanks. So there's nothing on there that can, we can't do solar panels on tanks for that reason. it's not like when you have the garage or you're using the solar panels for something like that we cannot have anything like that on the tanks um because it could cause water quality issues period okay those are the questions for now thank you thank you council member council member cell

Okay. So for the fence at Warner, I guess you have a wooden fence, but you said you can have a wooden fence here. But some people were concerned about, you know, somebody being behind there. So at the Warner location, you have a wooden fence. How are you worried about people being there? How do you alleviate that issue?

I have security there, cameras, and I've had issues with people trying to enter there because it is a wooden fence, but we have extensive security at that location. And that's what we could do with this location on Carlisle if it's needed to make residents feel more comfortable with this.

Okay. Okay. And then about the liability insurance. Um, you know, sometimes when you, um, have liability insurance, you have like, um, a certain like maximum amount of stuff like that. So all the houses around here are, um, millions of dollars each. So, um, that liability insurance, um, what is the amount that it could cover in terms of the damage? Is there like a maximum is there, you know, has, um, Like, I think one of the letters that the residents said, like, could it be like, you know, be able to cover 500 K of damage per house around there.

Talwater is prepared to cover that and realize we've done many projects and we will never not make someone whole. If we cause damage, we will definitely take care of it. And you heard me saying that, and I know my whole staff here, that's what we do. We don't stray away from if we cause any kind of damage to our customers or neighbors, even if they're not our customers.

Okay. And just as a reassurance to the community members, where can they find that in writing? Like, That commitment of the amount you'll cover in terms of the damage and anything like that, like a policy or anything like that, your insurance policy. the ability to post it somewhere or something or give a copy to the residents or anything?

We could give a contact for that. That's what the contact person would do, which would be myself or my district manager. I hesitate to just put a label of a number because it just seems so It could be 10,000 or 500, but we could probably post something just saying if you have any kind of claims of something that's been damaged, contact us immediately so we can come out and capture the data so we could put a report together so we can get that taken care of immediately. We could put something up there like that that says any claims that need to be addressed, please call us at XYZ is going to be my number and we will address it. We'll come out and address it immediately. It doesn't need a number attached to it because whatever the amount is, if we do damage, we want to make sure we don't cause damage. whole thing that's whole reason we're here and why we're trying to work with you guys to make sure everybody's comfortable um and we can like i said would that be feasible just to post something that says if you have damage here's the number to call it doesn't matter what the amount is just let us come out there and address it is that fair um i guess the residents can comment what they'd like to see okay we'll see what they say in public comment and we can see if we can meet that residents tell us what uh you'd like to see there um

I think those were mainly my questions. Oh, so this well is a certain distance from these houses. And you've done 16 wells locally. How does those other wells compare to how close it is to your other 16 wells? How does that compare to this?

Well, we have some locations. It varies. It depends on the plot that we have. How does it compare to this location? Yeah.

Is it unique in any way or is it similar?

It's similar to most lots. We try to have them big enough, especially if we have tanks. It's necessary to have a large lot as possible when you have a tank and two booster pumps. I mean, a booster pump, a well. So they're probably similar in the end, I would say.

And then just to make like the residents feel more comfortable, is it possible to in some way convey to the residents that you're here in this case, the well is this distance from this house, and looking at all your 16 wells that you did in other places like this is pretty similar to what you're doing here and in that other case we didn't have any problems so it would I don't know the residents can also comment if they'd like to see examples of your other 16 wells and if you if they did if they did want to see that then could you in some way convey to us and them um how you know this the this well in this case is very similar to um your case here and this is the experience that we have there if that's possible right yeah so it's my understanding that Warner is a popular location so it'd be similar to that and right now I'm going to call our district manager up Dawn Smithinson so she can speak to it also

good evening mayor and council members my name is dawn smithson i'm the district manager but in a formal life i was an engineer and i drilled several wells for the for cow water um longer ago than 10 years ago and i just i just wanted to reiterate in my experience residential lots are actually very um desirable for drilling a well because it's approximately the right size. We need to maintain a certain radius around the well in order to make sure that, you know, a truck full of oil can't just go next to the well and drill. We're required to do that from DDW and residential lots really, really fit that that bill. So so many of our wells are in residential areas and we've proven to be very good neighbors. We don't throw parties. We're not loud. We check on the station every day. You know, we tend to have good relationships with our neighbors. So I just wanted to say that. And then as far as what was that? Was there another part to the question?

Yes. Like what I'd like to see is if you put side by side, like this well is this distance from this house in this case. on Carlin and this other of one of our 16 maybe the Warner or maybe some other one this is our well and this is how close that it was to the house and those two situations are very comparable just as another reassurance for our community that you've done that or you can say like you know of the 16 wells we did you know 10 of them were of the same distance as we have here on Carlisle just right so I didn't drill the well the last 10 years but the ones that I have drilled are very similar in fact I would say the lot here on Carlisle is larger than most the lots that we

have been able to drill wells on. So I would feel comfortable in saying that this is very, very standard. And Melinda can speak to the fact that this well site will be very similar to the one on Warner, and she does a very excellent job of maintaining her facilities.

OK. And then would there be any ability to give us a drawing that the residents could see and say, OK, Warner is that distance. And in this case, it's similar distance. And so just so we have that, if that's possible. Overhead view, distance, distance, and similar.

I could look into that. We could share drawings with you guys if that's a requirement. It's no. I just don't have it here with me now, but that could be arranged.

Okay. That sounds great. Thanks so much. I think that's all my questions. Okay. One last question. Back to the generator. You mentioned that the generator has to power two things. I was just wondering if you had two generators, because you said, you know, for a battery backup to power the two items, it would be very large. But if you had two separate generators, would they be smaller? And one powers that one of the things and one powers the other just doesn't work.

The goal for having a generator is to have it pick up the power when it's lost for everything, all the assets on that site. We would not want to have two different portables if we don't have to. And this is, like Gurkhan spoke to earlier, three phase booster pump and well. and you have dosing happening you would need um we would usually just have one generator and they like the technology is fine like we have diesels and um you don't even hear the sound anymore they have these enclosures that you can't even hear it when it when it starts up if you're standing next to it but most likely when they're running like that for longer than the 30 minutes just to make sure they are operating properly in case of emergency you won't even notice it But in an emergency, you want it going. So you wouldn't be caring about the noise. You'd just be glad the power and the water is still going, right?

Okay. That's the thought. And that's what you currently have at the Warner site?

I do not even have a ginset at the Warner site.

Oh, okay. And then what do you use at the Warner site for a generator? You don't need one there.

We have a portable if needed. But we haven't had to use it.

Okay, but this is much a larger, so that's why you need the, okay.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome. Thank you. Next up is Council Member Cisneros.

Yes.

Thank you for your presentation and for answering my colleagues' questions. Got across a number of them off my list, so I'll start with a smaller one. I'll just build on the question Councilmember Sell asked about security measures. It was mentioned you have really great security, obviously. That's a very, this is a very important site to you, you know, and of course everyone, right? Can you talk a little bit about what that security would look like during construction and then on an ongoing basis?

Well, because the construction is going to be for what approximately 40 something days, we're going to have someone on site consistently. It's not going to be not manned. But the security that we speak of after the fact is we will have cameras and then the ginsets will be tied into SCADA, and SCADA is basically our eyes that sends us alarms on my, I don't have my phone here, but my phone, it'll get a text saying like if there's a SCADA intrusion alarm, it'll let us know someone's there. If they're not supposed to be there, we can check it out. You have security that'll tell us if people are entering our system in the taps. If something's open, like a tank enclosure, or if they're messing with a booster enclosure, we'll get a notification. and then we can send someone out there. We actually have someone that monitors it 24 seven and then gives us a call to let us know if there's an issue and if we have someone out there and if not, then the police are called. And actually for station 21, your police department was very helpful with that for us. We had a couple of break-ins over there where people were trying to climb our tanks and they literally rammed into our wall. So thank you, Sunnyvale for that. But that's why we've upped our security and made it so it's 24 seven so that we can get notified and we hopefully won't miss anything.

Okay, fantastic. Thank you very much. And yeah, if there's going to be somebody on site too, I think it'd be helpful, like just introducing around like this is what person's car is. They're here for security just because it is 24-7. I'm wondering, you know, if there's people coming and going at two or three in the morning, it makes people nervous, right? So just friendly faces. That person's here for good reasons that we all appreciate. And, you know, hopefully during construction being a little bit, somebody always keeping an eye and an ear in the neighborhood will be a bit of peace of mind. If you couldn't build here, if for some reason it was like the well cannot, we cannot approve it, what would you do with the property?

We'd have to come back and revisit it. Oh, the well is necessary. So we would have to come back and revisit it. We would do nothing with the property. We'd come back again and try to drill again and see if we commit whatever concerns you guys had.

We just continue the conversation.

Yeah, but start necessary.

Okay, that's very helpful. Thank you. That's all actually all my questions.

Thank you, Councilmember. Next up is Councilmember Lay.

Thank you so much and thank you for your presentation and engaging with the questions that my colleagues have asked. And thank you for your colleague there who articulated what I think that a lot of the neighbors are worried about that in your business dealings with other customers that you have been good neighbors in these projects. I think that's the fear that a lot of people are expressing. I have a number of questions of my own. First of all, could you please clarify the purpose of the diesel generator i'm under the impression that it's only for emergencies when power has otherwise been cut off and what is the approximate anticipated time with which that will be running so in emergencies i can't dictate how long they'll run but i noticed that in the last few years we've seen power outages last longer than they usually do we had over uh and uh

Other areas where it lasted for two to three days and then some locations, not Cupertino, they get Apple up right away, right? So I can't determine an emergency. I can't give you that time frame. All I can say is though for maintenance purposes to make sure it will operate in emergency is that it will run every other week for 30 minutes to make sure.

support um emergencies it needs to run its load just to make sure it's okay so outside of emergencies as you said 30 minutes every other week right okay thank you um how is the location on that site for the well um decided like was it based primarily on how far it needs to be away from other things did you do i don't know how you decide where wells get dug is there some process by which you say oh yeah there's going to be water here i have magic that tells me, but how does that work?

It needs to be 50 feet from the last well that we had drilled there and that's pretty much what we are, that's what we're looking at and that's what we reported to DDW.

Okay and then so given that you haven't done other testing, is it possible that the location that you've chosen for the well won't give what you want and you'll come back because You dug the pilot hole in the wrong location?

No.

Okay. That's just not how it works because the groundwater is spread along all that side. And as long as you dig somewhere there, it's going to be, you're going to hit it.

right yeah so um it's actually spelled out in our plan um but yeah there there's we have a specific spot that's been researched by our engineering department we've spoken to ddw about this that's my understanding so we have to follow whatever the requirements are the regulations in regards to where we're going to locate the new well okay and so

And so we know that this will work, that the pilot hole will yield the ultimate place where the well will be, and that it will last for, how long did the last well last for?

Probably about 50 years. Okay.

And that sometime within that interval, there will likely be a replacement. I'm just recapping. As you told Council Member Srinivasan, probably of the diesel generator within, I think you said 25 to 35 years from now?

Our engineering said 25 years.

Is that consistent historically with what you've seen? Okay, thank you. And then with regards to the chain link or the wooden fence, I understand the neighbor's concerns and I want to express that even with either chain link or a wooden fence, I think it would be nice to see decoration or art otherwise put up on that.

Would you be open to that? When you look at, we do tank rehabilitation, I think it's every three to four years. And I don't think we can do decoration. I know we can't do decoration on the tank. That's why I think the... No, I mean on the fence. Oh, on the fence. You want to decorate the fence?

Yeah, possibly. I would not be opposed to that. Okay, yeah, something to alleviate.

I mean, actually, that might be that's unique.

Yeah. If the residents have ideas, give us your ideas. We're open to that discussion.

Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Just to alleviate what they'll see every day. And I want to thank you for the reasonable accommodations that were added after the planning commission. I understand it's $300 per night per room. And who will be choosing the location of the hotel? Is that up to the residents?

It's up to the residents.

Okay. And then it's up to the residents as well to hash out with you how many hotel rooms they need. For example, I have a family of five. I can't comfortably fit in one hotel room.

Right. Our team has discussed this and we're ready to be flexible and take it on a case-by-case basis.

Okay. And then in addition to that, we had a number of specific concerns from people with extenuating circumstances. For example, I understand that the hotel vouchers are voluntary and that they are expected to be used overnight and the residents will be able to maintain access to their homes during the day and during the night. And it's mostly to make sure that people get a good amount of sleep. It's difficult to move for some people, for people who have disabilities, who have mobility access problems, it's difficult to move a family of five. Are those part of the reasonable accommodations that you'll be discussing on the case by case basis? absolutely just reach out to us and explain what your situation is and we can review it and see if we need to make some changes okay thank you and i think this was i don't remember who brought this up earlier but um we talked a little bit about signage about how the residents can get into contact with you and i think we talked about that separately but is there going to be posted signs on the property about how to contact someone at the cal water if they're having problems for the people who don't make this meeting for example

Absolutely. So we actually have that as part of our process at all our projects, you'll be a board in front of the district manager's phone number, my number is usually on there also, as project manager. And I think we leave it like that you'll know who the contractor is, but we like to interact with our customers and not have the contractors deal with that. That makes sense. So you'll be contacting myself or my my supervisor directly, if there's an emergency or any time.

Thank you. That's all my questions. You're welcome.

Thank you, Council Member. Next up is Council Member Chang.

Thank you. I wasn't sure if the City Manager wanted to speak first.

Sorry. Thank you, Council Member Chang. I just wanted to, since it's come up a couple times, if... City Council Chambers, Council wants to add a condition of approval for public art i'd recommend that that'd be a pretty generic approval and that the condition of approval go through the city's public art program to ensure consistency with with our standards.

City Council Chambers, Thank you city manager Council member check.

Thank you, so I participated in the Warner tour with the residents last year and that site was a lot more obscured, so I do think the chain link fence kind of blends into Panama park a little bit. I think it will be important to have that kind of distinction between the park and the site and I was. wondering if you could speak a little more to the security measures there, so what is the response time of you, knowing or how local are your employees that you would know something is happening.

Are you referring to station 20, the Carlisle location or Warner? So that'll be rather quickly. During this project, they're going to let me know within a minute or less than a minute. Usually if there's an issue, if someone has a question, there's a concern, someone's upset, they contact me right away. And depending on the level, either I'm coming that way and then I'm going to let my supervisor know that we might have an issue. And it depends on what it is, but I hate to say it, but we haven't had something that we haven't been able to address. So I'm not a knock on wood, but... So the security will be hands-on during this project. And then afterwards, we will have additional security that will be state that will be continuing at that location, where will we have any monitored by a team that we've hired 24-7. And then they report if there's any kind of people entering the station that are not supposed to. And they do it rather quickly. And it goes to myself and my supervisor and another gentleman that's not here. And then we respond.

Did I answer your question? Was that?

I guess is I mean, how quickly is that response time?

It would be like it within just driving time is it? Yes.

Are you sorry, Councilmember? Are you talking about after the site during construction, or after the site is in operation after the site is in operation?

Okay, so it would be immediately. So it would be probably within 15 minutes. Thank you.

Yeah, I was trying to understand how local Cal Waters staff are that in that drive response time, what time that would take.

We respond immediately if there is an issue and then also we will dispatch police right away. And that's why I referred to Warner where we did dispatch the police and they did help us with two incidents that we had out there where people had entered our station and were actually trying to access the tank. So

Thank you. My next question is with the well-being decommissioned 10 years ago and since 2016, how have you been kind of fulfilling that water supply need?

We have other wells that have been supporting that well-being offline. And so it just increases the use of other wells to help support the loss of this one.

And on the drilling, could you just expand more on why the 24 hour is necessary and why it couldn't be split up into more days, but just during the day?

I will call our expert bill up for this.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm Bill. I'm the hydrogeology consultant working for Cal Water on this. So the drilling process, we would prefer not to do it 24 hours a day. It's done that way because of the technology and that's what dictates the schedule. The borehole has to stay, the fluid in the borehole has to stay in motion in order to keep it from collapsing. So we need equipment running. We need tooling down the hole, rotating and keeping that borehole circulating in order to keep it from collapsing because it's not a well yet. There's no casing in the ground. It's not supported. When you stop that operation, the borehole may want to collapse on you. So in order to prevent that, to keep the well a successful project, we need to continue 24 hours a day.

Okay, thank you. Those are my questions for now.

Thank you. I have a few questions. First, you talked about 16 wells being drilled. Are any of the others, Being drilled in you know, ultimately, this is info is the info site so so with homes nearby and all that of the 16 how many of them were also let's say in fill out Intel sites that that had homes as Jay as adjacent as these.

Well, like our district manager, Don spoke to most of them are located in residential areas. Um, none of these 16 walls that I refer to that Cal water drilled or not in our system. So I'm just, um, speaking to the expertise of our team of having familiarity with this process and, and, um, So I guess I did ask this question.

That's okay. And then you talked about the and I just want to clarify I've seen several different numbers the number of connections for Sunnyvale residents that Cal Water supports how many homes in Sunnyvale or We checked on it is there 1393 connections 1400.

Okay. Yeah, and I I'll leave it with that.

That's good. And then Council Member Leigh talked about hotel rooms, accommodations. She also got art on the fence. Okay. That was all of my questions. Council Member Sweeney-Bossom.

I want to start with hotel rooms and then go to liability insurance. Hotel rooms, as we talked earlier during Staff's presentation, it's split into two different periods, right? The 12 days and then the later on 15 days. Is that correct? Correct. So in between, there is a two-week period. Hopefully it's quiet and then nothing is happening in the project site.

I don't know if Phil would have an answer to that. Let's have him come up and speak to that.

Hello again. So yes, there's two phases. The pilot phase, the initial 24-hour phase, we're drilling a smaller diameter borehole to collect the data we need to design the well. So we'll drill that borehole, then we backfill it with the temporary material. Now we have our data that we're going to use. We pause on the site work, design the well, and come to an agreement on what the well is going to look like. And then all of that material is custom made for the well. So it has to be ordered, manufactured, and delivered to the site. So that is our break period. Once everything is on the site and we know we have what we need, then we resume the 24-hour drilling and we make that borehole larger and construct the well.

Thanks for explaining, but I have two follow up questions during that, uh, the design period after the pilot period, right? The two weeks period, will there be any activity which is producing noise or vibration in that site?

There shouldn't be there. There may be light site work going on if there's any sort of maintenance to be done. And delivery of that, of that material as it's available. That should be about it.

That's what I wanted to know. And then between these two phases, the pilot drilling, and then the actual well drilling, which is the niciest one, niciest period, and then which causes more vibrations and all those things.

Well, they're the same thing. It's using the same equipment to drill the hole.

But I thought this would be a smaller hole compared to a bigger one, right?

Correct. But the noise generated is going to be the same. It's the same engines, same equipment. So I would say that they're comparable.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. And then on the liability issue, liability, I know we talked about it. How do how do you or cal water or even the insurance provider determine this is caused by the drilling or this damage to the house or disclaimers by cal water drilling

Can you please repeat that?

So a resident observes some damage to their house, right, during drilling. You have liability insurance, and then they contact you. What are the steps they need to prove that it is Calwaters, the damages due to Calwaters drilling?

Well, we would come to their location to view the damage along with an agent from our insurance probably, and then we'll create a report and then we'd have to look. It depends on what damage they're talking about. It's kind of hard to just pull it out of there, but I mean, we would definitely come up to them and look and see exactly what it is they're experiencing and then create a report.

It's like car insurance, right? When you buy a rental car, you take the photograph or something like that before and then after. Should they take these kinds of precautions? That's the question residents are concerned about.

Right. We would come to your place to see what you're reporting, whatever the damage is, and we'd make a report and we would submit it. And then just if it's supporting documentation, most times if we know something happened, we're just going to support it and we'll put it through our claims for a review.

Okay. So those are my questions for now. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you very much. That was the last of council questions. And you have five minutes at the end. and I'll start going through comments from residents or questions and comments from residents in the room. I'll read off two names and you can come to the lectern and the next person be waiting in the wings. First up is Gita I followed by Raghu S.

Good evening, council members and mayor. My name is Geeta Iyer, and I have lived in... Are you able to hear me?

Go ahead.

Okay. Oh, I need to move a little closer. Okay. I've lived in Sunnyville for the past 20 years, and I'm speaking tonight on behalf of the residents living adjacent to the proposed Carlisle well water tank project. I have two concerns that I want to bring up tonight. I want to talk about vibration. As for the Eir, the condition of the nearest structures to the project. site is unknown it classifies all of our homes into a general category of historic and some old buildings and then it uses that category to set the safety threshold a generic vibration threshold of 0.25 inches per second was chosen to say that the drilling will not cause any damage it's hard to be confident about the vibration when the condition of the structures was labeled as unknown many of our homes are older slab on grade eichler structures they are designated as a part of a protected eichler neighborhood i am concerned that a generic standard is being applied to our homes that were built approximately 65 years ago furthermore we are being assured that we will not be bothered by the drilling yet the modeled vibration sits right on the edge of the distinctly perceptible threshold there haven't been any field tests which have been conducted on our property lines to quantify this. I'm not saying that the glass panes in our homes or our foundations will crack. We don't know that. But my concern is that nobody has looked at this carefully. The study skipped the question and the plan meant to backstop it does not inspire too much confidence. The second issue is that of the ground beneath our feet. Pumping a new deep well carries a risk of localized ground subsidence. We know that the old well suffered from excessive sanding. In the final EIR, this is addressed by assuring us that a design level geotechnical report will be prepared later. The environmental approval should not be granted before the actual risks are fully understood and mitigated. We are asking this council to be the residents' voice for the concerns we have about the risks it brings to our properties. Before you approve this project, we request that you mandate the following conditions. Require baseline field measurements and pre-construction condition surveys for all the adjacent homes. slabs and pools require real-time vibration monitoring during drilling with strict immediate stop work thresholds and finally withhold final approval until the design level geotechnical report is made public thank you thank you uh next up is ragu s followed by and b

Hi, my name is Raghu Srinivasan. I live on Kingfisher Way and our property shares a fence with the eastern side of the Cal Water property. And I just wanted to share my concerns about potential pollution from all the drilling. It was found that the diesel from the construction would push the cancer risk up more than 30% of what's acceptable. That was there in the report. And that's something that's a significantly higher number than sort of the baseline. And there is some mitigation in the report about doing things to get it down below the limit. But the report is kind of hazy and hand wavy about what those mitigations really are. There is a lot of fluffy language about if feasible, they'll do something or they may have to do something. And that doesn't sort of inspire a lot of confidence. What happens if they actually are not able to do anything? So that's one thing that I wanted to bring up. And I wanted to make sure that the language in any approval is sort of not hopeful and aspirational, but rather sort of specific and actionable. The other thing is that the usage of the diesel equipment is something that I've heard other people say is mandatory. It cannot be with solar or some other renewable portion. So it's all the more reason I think that people have to pay a little bit more attention to how they're going to mitigate some of the pollution concerns. And I'd like to also make sure that the monitor that's going to be checking these things is sort of either an independent person and not sort of just a one party representative. And if they find any issues that this person is empowered to either slow down or stop or halt the process as opposed to just reporting it and then the drilling continues as business as usual. So overall, I would say I feel like there's four things that I've heard before and even today One is that the drilling must be performed with, you know, diesel is unavoidable. The second thing is that this job sort of needs to run 24 by 7 for a month or something about this 12 day gap between, but still a fairly long time. And, you know, even by Sunnyvale's own city standards, this is a potentially higher health risk. and i want to make sure that the language is not sort of hopefully and if they can if feasible but somewhat more insistent and i just want to make sure that there is an independent verification and that this person has you know the authority to make sure that the job can either be slowed down or stopped or halted or what have you in case these thresholds continue to get exceeded in total i just want to make sure that Um, the council ensures that these safeguards are in place ahead of time. And that, uh, I urge you to require rather than just sort of request that these mitigation procedures are specified and agreed to. And I would urge you to insist that these safeguards, uh, are in place before you approve anything and that this demonstrable proof of this. So thank you all very much for your time.

Thank you. Next is Anne B followed by Anne H.

Good evening. I'm Ann Bogan. I live next to the Cal Water property for 20 years, and I want to thank the city staff and Cal Water for addressing some of the applications problems. First a disclosure, I'm actually married to a sitting planning commissioner, Mr. Davis. He had recused himself and he is not involved, but I just want to make that clear. Cal Water is an NYSE traded corporation that answers to shareholders, not to Sunnyvale. The city's own rate comparison that I found on the city's website shows that Cal Water customers pay nearly 32% more. for water than a Sunnyvale Municipal customer. This well grows CalWater's customer base in its bottom line, not our neighborhood. This parcel is zoned low density residential with a single story overlay. In 2016 and 2017, CalWater asked to be excluded from the single story overlay and the Planning Commission and City Council said no. for at least 43 years and possibly over 60, this parcel has been zoned for housing. And the city has had every chance to rezone it, but it has not. One correction to the record, I actually made a mistake earlier when in my letter, I misidentified a parcel on South Wolf Road as a Cal Water owned property, and it is not. And I've withdrawn that argument. I just wanna make that clear. CalWater's record is different. It destroyed a well on this site in 2016 and didn't tell the planning commission or this council during the rezoning process. It didn't file the required state report on the destruction until last year. That's nine years late. The code requires you to make one of two findings before approving this permit that it meets the general plan's objectives. or that it won't impair the use of neighboring homes. The city's own environmental impact report already admits that significant and unavoidable nighttime noise impacts the adjacent residents, even after the maximum mitigation. The record before you tonight doesn't support either finding. So to come back where I started, Cal Water already charges its own customers nearly a third more than the Sunnyvale Municipal charges for the same water. And if you look at who's being asked to bear the burden, it's not Cal Water's shareholders. It's not even Cal Water's customers in Sunnyvale. who at least get their water. The 24 hour drilling for nearly a month or more falls on the neighbors on Coventry Court and Kingfisher Way, who are not even Cal Water customers. We get none of the benefit that this project claims to provide, and we get all the harm. Thank you very much for your time and attention.

Thank you. Anne H followed by Maximilian P.

Thank you, honorable mayor and council members. I really appreciate the work you put into this and the questions you've been asking. I'm a resident of the Panama Park neighborhood. I am also somebody who has 30 years of utility experience in management and sometimes in private utilities, sometimes in public utility. I don't think you guys should feel obligated to approve this until you're totally comfortable and have good answers and, you know, not hand-waving, not, yeah, it'll be fine, and not any of that. You know, there are a lot of, I really appreciated your questions, Mayor Klein, about what's, when the mitigation doesn't work, what are you going to do? In my own experience, when people came and said, particularly when I was at public utility, and said, this is the only feasible option, we can't do anything else, I was really code for, this is the way we've always done it for the last 60 years and we don't want to think about anything else but if you center the residents and you're really concerned about them a lot of creativity comes out a lot of thought comes out opportunities come out maybe you don't have to drill all night 24 7. maybe there are other options I you know it's very important on a night you thought about pesticide use and the health impacts of that, to understand that chronic exposure to noise, even at a low level, for 24-7, week after week after week, disrupts sleep, elevates stress hormones, increases risk of heart attacks, high blood pressure, and depression. It's just another health risk. And we're being asked to potentially deal with that. I also want to give you a cautionary tale based on a reality that I saw happen in real time. In a different neighboring jurisdiction, but nearby, you know, the residents started calling the city manager. It's 3 a.m. There's this weird hum going on. What the hell is going on? What do you guys do? Who did you approve to let this happen? Is it that new thing down the street? And no, the city manager, I mean, it blew up on next door. It blew up on everything. They called all their council members. They wanted to recall everybody. City managers spent a good... I don't know, $10,000, $20,000 getting a sound engineer to find the problem. Guess what? The problem was miles away on the other side of town. But we live in a valley and certain weather conditions create an inversion layer and sound bounces. It can reach your neighborhood, can reach your neighborhood, can reach maybe not hers.

Maximilian, followed by Lily F or P.

uh good evening council members my name is maximilian polly i'm a material scientist and live and grew up at 824 coventry court right across the street from the site and i wanted to talk a little about physics as the proposed plans uh promise something that physics may not allow so the entire project depends on a sound barrier to mitigate the sound coming from the site a solid wall running about 600 feet along the property line with no gaps And the applicant's own memo specifies 35 feet taller than a three story building. So building this barrier would be less akin to building a fence and more akin to building a castle wall. A major flaw in this design is that a continuous solid surface that tall catches an enormous amount of wind. So it has to bear a lot of force. The building code requires a structure like this to be designed for gusts in the range of 85 to 95 miles per hour, and wind pressure increases with height. The top of a 35 foot castle wall carries a lot more force than a normal ordinary eight foot fence ever would. This distributed load causes a lot of force, which is all concentrated where the wall meets the ground. The wall would need a substantial foundation to actually be able to stay upright. You can't just set it and forget it. I looked at how California actually builds walls and sound wall, sorry, and the CalTrans design manual gives 3 foundations options, a spread footing, a trench footing or driven piles. All of these require drilling or driving into the ground. And as I thought, there's no option that just allows them allows this wall to sit on the surface and stay remain standing. Now, look at where the plan puts this wall, just a few feet from a row of mature trees that the same plan promises to keep. This is the important contradiction here. Sunnyvale's tree ordinance chapter 19.94 defines damage to a protected tree to include quote trenching, excavating, altering the grade or paving within the drip line. A foundation this close to the trees would require any or all of these harmful things, likely damaging those trees or the neighboring pool system. So physics effectively forces a choice here. Either you excavate in the root zone, which the city's own code describes as damaging a protected tree, or the wall cannot be built where it's drawn. And if it can't go there, the noise mitigation this entire approval rest on does not work as designed. nowhere in this proposal is the contradiction resolved either the ordinance is violated or the noise can't be mitigated the way they claim i'm not asking you to take my word on the numbers i'm asking you to notice that the applicant has not done what every fifth grader is asked to do which is show their work The foundation design, the wind rating, the effect on these trees, the neighbor's pool and house, all of it is deferred to a permit you will not see until after tonight. Please don't certify a mitigation whose feasibility hasn't been demonstrated. Ask them to show it can be built before you approve it. Thank you, council members.

Thank you. Next up is Lily F. P. Followed by Susan C. Or is that Uli?

Sorry. This one here.

Or Uli. Uli.

Uli, yeah. Uli, yeah. Sorry about that. That's right. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember, for the opportunity to voice my opinion. First thing, actually, before I go into my own thing, looking at Cal Water project manager, district manager, One suggestion that I have, we're talking about what if we hear a noise or whatever. You guys have all the sensors in place and the IT. Wouldn't it be much easier to actually put the noise levels and the vibration levels on the website that we can just log in because I think that we'll go a long way to diffuse the situation to get out of the, he said, she said, it was 80 decibels, 15. We've got a record and this is the Silicon Valley, right? We can do this. Should go without saying, not just for this construction project, I think that should be a standard and we will get off everybody's back. So that's on something unrelated. I'm here to actually talk about the power line. These are some pictures from my neighbor's power garden. And as you can see here, or maybe not that clear because pretty small images, but basically we've got live power lines at a certain level. And then flipping to number two, there is sort of an assumption that we're making what the power, what the wall would look like. 32 feet and definitely above the power lines. Main issue is when you look at the plan, this wall seems to be really awfully close to the power lines. I'm not sure if PG&E has weighed in on that. And the main reason why I'm telling actually this is I have a flashback from about 10 years ago. We have the same situation with the garden. I heard we had a very strong wind because a tree was swaying. And the power line, long story short, blew up. killed the squirrel and we had a live wire on the ground and I just want to know if has anybody from PG&E looked at that and signed off on that and say you guys are good to go because a live wire is a live wire. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you. Next up is Susan C followed by. Tina B.

Can you hear? I'm short.

Go ahead and pull it a little bit closer.

There you go. Okay. My name is Susan Charbonneau and I've lived at 819 Coventry Court since 1980. My house is in the northwest corner of the Cal Water property line, the closest house to the proposed new well and adjacent to Panama Park. I'm 82 years old. I garden, I sit on my patio, I have screen doors that I use for fresh air, and I've never needed air conditioning for 46 years. And I want to be sure that once this well is constructed, it's not going to affect my way of life. And I hope everyone considers that. And I'm the person who became ill from the Sprint's diesel generator. I wound up under doctor's care, and it was scary. Whether the doors were shut or windows were closed, it came right into the house. The diesel doesn't stop. Okay. I'm eligible for the voucher, but I do not feel safe alone in a hotel. And there's no way that's going to be my solution. And I'm not sure what my solution is, okay? Um, a big concern I have is the, uh, the wooden fence along the property line. And, uh, I've submitted a letter about this, that, um, it's, it's in terrible condition. It's ill constructed. the vertical slats have inches between the two and for years the ivy has grown through the fence and up on top up into the cross hatch and when the cow water worked on the ivy they left all all of the dead wood in the crosshatch. I don't know whether they thought that part of the fence didn't belong to them, but it's there right now and it looks terrible. And I hope they build a new one that overlaps and it's high enough so it will be some mitigation for sound. and uh and and i appreciate everybody's concerned about the diesel generator and um i'm very grateful for all the council questions you seem to have understood you know my problems and uh good luck okay thank you

Thank you. Tina B followed by Wei-Ling S.

Good evening and thank you for listening to me. My name is Tina Baumgartner and I live on Coventry Court. Today I want to talk about why this site was chosen and I'm going to use Carl Waters' own words. The ERI requires a serious examination of alternative location. So let's look what we got. One paragraph, about 150 words, and I summarize what it says. Cal Water does not have any other viable properties, and I quote, within the Los Altos Suburban Service District. That's pretty much it. And please notice the boundary, the district. Los Altos, Mountain View, Cupertino, and a few pockets of Sunnyvale. Now here's what CalWater wrote when the planning commission pressed them on why this site. It's in an appendix, appendix 15, a document we received five days ago and which I almost overlooked. CalWater's own engineer writes, and I am quoting, the issue is not whether any another existing CalWater station could physically be used for a new well. so wait he's conceding that other sites would work but that that's not the issue the eri said there is nowhere else so what is the reason the memo says this site is i quote better suited because it's not quote currently supplying water so drilling there won't disrupt cold water service what does it mean This site wasn't chosen because it was the only option. It was chosen because it is the option most convenient for cold water. The bottom line, they don't want to potentially disrupt their water service, but disrupting our lives. And for more than four weeks, there is construction before, there is removal, there is months of dirt and noise and vibrations. So they choose the option that is most convenient for them. But what is even more remarkable, their memo says there are five active wells in the city and only seven Cal Water stations total. Now here we come back to the district. It says in the city, meaning Sunnyvale. But Cal Water's district is four cities and most of their sites aren't in Sunnyvale. Their own ERI said the search covered the whole district. So why, when they had to justify this site, did they count only one city where most of the stations they have aren't and most of the water is not going to go to? A search limited to Sunnyvale is a search designed to come up empty on alternatives. I'm not asking you to find them a new site tonight. That's their job and they haven't done it. I'm asking you to see what their own memo shows. Other sites work. They just carefully selected one. They just carefully selected where to look so the result is the one site that is easiest for themselves.

Thank you.

Next up is Meiling S followed by Terry G.

Good evening. My name is Mei-Ling Stephan. The worst impacts arise from the close proximity of the new well to neighbors to the south. According to Cal Water's response to the city, a new well has to be at least 50 feet from an old well and 50 feet from a sewer line. Actually, only 100 feet from a sewer line. That was the first response. actually only 50 50 feet to the sewer line is required by law the correction was made later by cal water engineer but in the same email he pointed out a well has to be at least 50 feet from a property line It turns out that Santa Clara County currently does not have a property line setback requirement, though in the next year or two, a 50 feet setback will be required. This is information from Jeff Camp from the Santa Clara Department of Environmental Health. Ken Walter simply located the new well at 50 feet to the south property line, as close as possible to the neighbors to the south. The map shows in magenta lines the northern and eastern boundaries of a permissible well location, at least 50 feet from both the sewer line and the destroyed well. We see the new well can be moved north by 30 to 40 feet at least. If compliance with an unborn rule is not necessary, the well can be moved even further north and westward. In conclusion, we have learned that Cal Water's responses should always be fact-checked and examined. The map demonstrates an unexplored alternative that will reduce the worst impacts. Cal Water has not done its job in coming up with alternatives. For this and other reasons detailed in my recent letters to council and for the issues brought up by my neighbors, please reject the current EIR. Further studies and meetings with residents are needed. Thank you.

Thank you. Next is Terry G followed by Paul H.

Good evening. My name is Terry Grossman, and I live on Coventry Court, and I am 86 years old, and I have lived in my home for over 40 years. I'm not an engineer. I can't tell you about decibels or thresholds or vibration levels. Other people here tonight can do that. I can only tell you what this plan looks like from my perspective. The plan is to drill next to our homes around the clock day and night for almost a month. Now, the city has two lists. There's a list of neighbors who get a warning ahead of time. and there's a list of neighbors who get offered a hotel room to escape the noise. I want you to know that I am not on either list, but I am close enough to hear the noise and maybe even feel the vibrations day after day, night after night for a month. So this is what the plan looks like to me. I'm close enough to be kept awake, but not close enough to be counted. The line they drew, I fall just outside it. And I think that that's worth you noticing it because I am probably not the only one. I am 86. This is my home, my bed, my kitchen, my quiet space after my husband's death last year. At my age, those things aren't small comforts. They're what keeps me healthy. Amount of drilling through the night is a hard thing for someone my age, and there's no way for me to escape it. You're being asked to approve this plan tonight as if it's finished, but it isn't finished because it doesn't account for me and my sitting right here. If the plan cannot even see a neighbor as close as I am, then it's not ready. Please don't certify it tonight. Send them back to finish it and please vote no. Thank you.

Thank you. Next up is Paul H followed by James B.

Okay, thank you. Good evening. My name is Paul Haley. I have lived next to 800 Carlisle for 39 years. I share the concerns raised by my neighbors. Here I will focus on the issues related to the tree removal plan and the missing sound wall plan. There are continuing errors and omissions in the tree removal plan that are significant. The applicant complains tonight in the tree removal plan that 10 trees will be removed, seven protected trees and three non-protected trees. It's important to note protected and non-protected trees. This is again documented as recently as today in the report to council for this agenda item. The reality is that up to 37 trees are likely to be removed with this project. One of the non-protected trees in the tree removal plan, eucalyptus number 424, was removed in 2016. You can see that roughly in the center of this document. I guess you can't. It's quite distant. But in about the middle of the lot, there's a tree that was removed. You can, anyway. I think this speaks to the level of carelessness of the applicant. Um, The bigger discrepancy in the tree removal plan is the installation of a temporary three-story sound wall around the perimeter of the site. This wall will require the removal of the perimeter trees, about nine 60-year-old olive trees and up to 20 oak trees. The layout of the sound wall was published in a noise analysis on July 24th, 2024, that's gonna be two years ago on Friday. This is not new information to the applicant, yet the applicant continues their deceptive representations in their official tree removal plan. An additional issue with the sound wall is the applicant has not disclosed the manner of construction, nor the precise location of this massive structure. I understand that drilling and or pile driving The supports of such a structure is common. Pile driving so close to our fragile Eichler homes is completely unacceptable. Collectively, I think these issues represent significant violations of CEQA. Their absence from disclosure in the official plans deprive us of the opportunity to seek and review mitigation measures And the piecemeal disclosure of the full scope of the project is distinctly illegal under CEQA rules. For this reason, the council cannot vote to certify this EIR. Real quick, a question for .. Thank you very much.

Last up is James B.

Thank you for your time Council. My name is James Becker. I've been a resident here for 22 years and I live very close to Panama Park. I'm not adjacent to the project, but I am in that park 3 days a week. I exercise very regularly there and I know a lot of the people that are in that park very regularly. I was particularly surprised and I apologize that I'm coming in late to this project of the ongoing. We're signing up for something for 50 years for a diesel generator to be run in this park that it has beautiful clean air that people exercise and enjoy. And I just. I would hope that we're not getting diesel fumes just pumping into this park that we have enjoyed all this beautiful clean air within. I would ask that part of what you guys could do for us, and I apologize, I don't know where your diesel generator was located, but can you pour the fumes not into the park, but out of the park? Please. I don't want to sit and breathe your fumes for the next 50 years every time I go to work out in your park, and neither do I want to see the kids that play soccer there do the same thing. So as part of the consideration, I would ask that you... consider where you're putting your fumes. I appreciated one of you guys mentioned that it was a very low level sound. I was worried about firing up loud noises near all these things for the next 50 years. Again, 50 years is a disturbing thought. It sounds like these things are pretty quiet. But I would still ask, you say it's done during daylight hours or during the day. 8 AM is still not a really pleasant time to be woken up. So hopefully we can constrain this into times that people won't be woken up. We've had a lot of experiences where people say I'm entitled to make all the noise I want at 8 AM. And I hope that's not you. So anyway, thank you for your time. Thank you.

Thank you. That was my last speaker card in the room. City Clerk, do we have any remote participants wishing to speak on this item?

Yes, Mayor. First up is Liam D, followed by Tom G. Liam, you've been unmuted and you have three minutes to address the City Council.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor and Council Members. I sent a letter about one week ago expressing my concerns for the EIR. Since then, the memo on the public comments has come back and I want to reiterate some of the same concerns that are still present with the memo. First, I'd like to point you to Appendix B, Section 6, where the memo says locations alternatives outside of the city's jurisdictional boundaries were not evaluated as they are infeasible because the city lacks the legal authority to approve and permit the project outside of the city's boundaries now according to the sequa guidelines jurisdictional boundaries are just one of the seven listed criteria for an alternative site. So it cannot be a standalone bar by itself. And that directly contradicts the CEQA guidelines. And we also have to remember that, first of all, Cow Water's district line applies almost entirely outside of Sunnyvale. And this particular well is serving predominantly Los Altos. So we don't need to pretend like Cal Water here is here to serve the people of Sunnyvale to do good things for us. They're not, they just want to use our resources. And that brings me to the second part of the memo, Appendix B, Section 5, which states that, in quotes, the draft EIR acknowledged that Cal Water does not currently have any alternative offsite properties that are feasible and viable. And by the CEQA guidelines, acknowledgement is not enough because, as I said before, in the EIR, it's 137 words that state there are no other feasible sites. But the CEQA guidelines state that you must provide reasons, defensible reasons, for why these sites are not feasible. And these are provided nowhere and excused in the memo. So it seems to me like Cal Water is a proponent of sloppiness, laziness, and failure to read to the... failure to read the fine print. And I'd like to point you to the last part, Appendix B, Section 5 again, which states, although these sites are not listed specifically in the draft EIR, the evaluation of their feasibility to serve as alternative sites for the proposed project is contained in the administrative record. Now, the CEQA guidelines say very, very clearly that the EIR must identify any alternatives and an administrative record can provide additional reasoning, but they cannot be introducing the alternative sites analysis by itself. So it seems to me that as the state of the EIR is right now, if it were to be approved, it would be up, it would be risking serious litigation. I yield the rest of my time. Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, Tom G., followed by Sherry. Tom, you've been unmuted and you have three minutes to address the city council.

Oh, well, all right. Hi, guys. I'm Tom Gill. I live at 1403 Kingfisher Way, which is adjacent property line to the Cal Water Works area. I've been a mechanical engineer for 32 years at Lockheed and one of the practices that we did when we were doing vibe tests on a spacecraft was to get a survey of the spacecraft. Now, I would ask that Cal Water or the city of Sunnyvale give us a survey. Come and survey our property. And then place a 5K bond. Because you know how Cal Water said, okay yeah we'll do whatever we can for you we'll come and look at your problem we'll bring our insurance agent uh but you know when we think about what insurance requires uh to collect or provide a drilling cause of damage you're gonna have to have the home condition uh documented before the um the event took place. Otherwise, there's no proof that it happened because of the event. So I would suggest that, well, I think that the insurance, you know, you've got to prove all of that. And without a survey before it happens, insurance is not going to pay for anything. So it leaves us without being protected. And I think it would just be in Cal Water's own interest to put up a 500K bond as good faith, because I don't believe their insurance group would pay for the damages. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Next up is Sherry. Sherry, you've been unmuted, and you have three minutes to address the city council.

All right, good evening. My name is Sherry. I live on Coventry Court. So first, I understand it is an important project, but it is also one of the most complicated projects our neighborhood has faced. Because of that, I believe we need a much stronger plan to protect nearby residents. First, we need a clear communication between call water, the city, and residents. If something goes wrong during the 24-hour drilling, who will be responsible right away? Who has the authority to stop the work if there's any safety concern, for example? So residents should not have to wonder who to call in an emergency. Um, so second, my neighbors and I are both concerned because Colorado has not always followed the rules. Earlier this year, there were multiple construction activities happening outside the allowed hours. So that history just make it difficult for us to simply trust that everything will go as planned. Calling the police should not be the city's response plan. There should be a more dedicated team that can understand the project and can act quickly. Third, I believe this current monitoring plan focused on documentation, but it does not clearly explain how this rule will actually be enforced. For example, the handling and disposal of the millions of gallons of water should be carefully monitored, the environmental impact report says. Water should not be discharged onto land, but there also needs to be a clear plan to prevent unauthorized discharge into the storm drains. So for those reasons, I just respectfully ask the council not to approve this current environmental impact report or the conditional reuse permit until this concern has been addressed. I also believe residents should be more protected if the property damage occurs um happens including through a financial bond or another clear compensation process so yeah i think that's pretty much it this project will just affect our neighborhood for years and our concern these are more careful consideration thank you thank you mayor that was the final remote public speaker for this agenda item

Thank you, City Clerk. The applicant now has five minutes to address public comments and present additional information as needed. So go ahead and come to the lectern.

Thank you, Council, and thank you for the residents who came out to provide your comments in person. I just want to start out by saying that we are a company who I'm proud to say has been here for 100 years, and we anticipate being here for another 100 years, and we don't take that lightly we take that very seriously and the way that we got here we believe is by taking care of our customers by providing clean safe reliable water for our customers in the communities um that we serve um and then also on top of that providing uh support for our firefighters and we take that also very carefully very seriously and hence the generator conversations this is a critical station and we need to make sure that our firefighters have the the water available to them so i'm just in one second i'm going to have our engineer talk about the the generator just to hopefully allay some of those concerns But we are committed and I am committed to doing the most that we can to work with the residents and our customers as much as we can. We understand any construction project is going to be uncomfortable and we are not going to try and pretend like you won't know we're there. It is a construction project and we'll do everything we can to try and help make it as comfortable for the community as possible. This well is important. We all know that the Bay Area and the peninsula is growing. I won't say growing like wildfire, that wouldn't be funny, but it's growing very rapidly. And we need to make sure that we're able to keep up with the demand of our growing citizens in the area. But we don't just serve our residents, we also serve the community. We serve stores and grocery stores and gas stations and restaurants. So while maybe our water may not be going into someone's faucet, we do provide support for the community and we provide, like we mentioned, the mutual fire aid with other neighboring water agencies. We are proud that we've worked with the city for several years now. We've also worked with all of our regulators. We've worked with Sigma to make sure that our groundwater stays sustainable, the Air Quality Control Board, the Department of Drinking Water. We've worked hard to try and make sure that every I is dotted and T is crossed. i just want to make sure that i assure you that um but i wanted to also mention a couple of things um we are always looking for property to build wells on always it is it is hard it is I'm going to say near impossible because I'm leaving the option open to actually find a property that we can purchase to put a well on because, as I mentioned, we are growing. We're growing and we're going to need to continue to build more water. We can't put wells on stations where we already have wells because they'll start fighting for that same water. Then you're just burning energy trying to pump up the same water. So we really don't have many options and if we had options we'd put wells there too which we're not doing yet but we hope to soon and then also this this water is met for Sunnyvale the well won't be running 24 7. it will be filling takes and then drawing down and then filling tanks and drawing down however If there is an emergency, we can run that well and we can try and push it to wherever maybe that fire is. And likewise, if there is a fire in Sunnyvale, we can also run the sources in our neighboring communities and push water to Sunnyvale too. So that's how we have that flexibility to operate. But it's not like this water from this well is providing water for other communities. It is going to be used in Sunnyvale. Now, if everyone in Sunnyvale turns off their water, the pipes continue, that water could go to somebody else. But Sunnyvale has first right of refusal. That's just the kind of way the pipes work underground. But I want to reserve, oh, for Gregor to mention our generator and the fumes that have been discussed.

As you know, California has some of the strictest air quality requirements and a year or so ago, Bay Area Air Quality Management District became the second air district in California to impose air quality requirement that imposes a 50 horsepower generators or above stationary engines to have tier four generator compliance. So that means that this generator will meet those air quality requirements.

Thank you very much. And we have council questions. So stay at the lectern. First up is Council Member Srinivasan.

Okay. I'll start with the CEQA question for our city attorney. Sorry.

These should be more focused towards the applicant, but understand if it goes back and forth, go ahead.

Yeah, I'm just teaching the public's comment. Yes. one of the actually two questions one is the alternatives alternate sites and then the second one is geotechnical reports can you look into that and then let me know if there is any concern for us for going at it with the food

So we've done a very robust environmental analysis. We've had expert consultants who have been involved in this analysis and we feel we've done, you know, the job we need to do on the environmental documents to meet the legal requirements.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. So now, I'll start with Soundwall. A couple of public commented on the tree roots it will destroy. And then also they talked about the physics of it. I love physics, but anyway, the 36-foot wall, how it will be protected. Can you explain that? And then Once again, should it be part of the application or how does that work?

Go ahead and hit the mic again.

I would like the noise consultant of Cal Water to respond to that question because it's originally coming from their report, which we also peer reviewed. So our consultant can also speak to it.

Okay. Are they online? I think that she's available online.

I'm available. I'm Carol Colby. Hi, I'm Carol Colby. I am the sound engineer who did the EIR portion, the noise and vibration portion of the EIR. So these sound walls are temporary. And so the wind loading that they were describing is typically for a permanent construction. We usually pile into the ground very shallow, not shallow, but it doesn't take up a lot of footprint, but we do pile down. So we use factors of safety, but they're not as stringent as if they were a permanent structure. And with, you know, the wind loading does get reduced depending on how long that wind sound wall is up. The actual erection of that would be my colleague who's not online. I'm more of the, you know, analysis of the sound reduction when you erect a certain wall of a certain height. But, you know, we do these, we erect these walls at very many locations, construction, various types of operations. If they've never been an issue, we do take all the precautions required to make sure that we account for the wind loading that's appropriate for the time they are up.

Okay. And then there was also an issue about tree root damages because of this wall. Any response to that?

I am not sure of the tree removal.

We just replaced... Tree roots damage. Damage to the tree roots.

I don't I am not an expertise on where the trees are positioned. We position the walls around the property where the maximum sound reduction would be. Those specifics would probably be in field verifications before we even erect these walls. So I'm not too informed on the actual position of the trees and how deep the roots are. That is not my assessment.

I can add to that. So then the sound wall was defined. it's overlaid on the landscape plan where we have the existing trees there and when it was reviewed this was more than two years ago it was a cat was taken to make sure they're not unnecessarily interrupting or damaging any tree that are that has to remain in place But we do have one other shot because they have to come to us before drilling. We have it in the COA. We have a language there saying that we will finalize the noise barrier design before the drilling activities occur so they have to obtain a miscellaneous plan permit from us and the soundboard will be re-reviewed at that time and the height and length and specifics as to where it has to align all those things will be taken care at that time about the effectiveness of the sound wall that is now we are estimating that it will reduce by 25 decibels what happens if it doesn't i would let calvados noise consultant to speak to the effectiveness of the sound wall because the original design is from them and they did modeling before the sound wall and after the sound wall so they should be able to speak to it

But that was modeled, right? So we don't know the actual reality. So will the staff have the authority to say project cannot go on or how does that work?

The noise and vibration study relies heavily on the modeling.

I understand that. I understand.

Yeah. They should be able to talk to it about how effective the noise walls will be reduce the sound of the sound.

Yes. So once again, Carol Colby here. So this is all predictive. And just note that this has been a conservative model. So this is assuming that everything's operating at the same time, which is always unlikely because not every piece of equipment that is going to be on site for that operation will be running at full capacity. you know, at the same time. So this is already an overprediction. So it could be that the noise levels are actually lower because we're already over predicting because we're assuming that everything's running at full capacity simultaneously. So our models are typically conservative. And, you know, as long as that they don't add additional equipment that hasn't been listed in the assessment, we're pretty comfortable that you know, will our walls to obtain those reductions shown?

OK, thank you. So the next question I have is for one of the public talked about well location, and then now it has moved closer to the property line as opposed to the previous well. And then the suggestion was, can we move it away more distance

assessment and response to that so I'll just address it somewhat generally so when we look to place a well we need to there are certain distances we it does need to be 50 feet from the property line which is what I explained earlier and that's a requirement from the Department of drinking water it needs to be a certain distance away from various utilities there needs to be the ability to to get to it later in case we need to do maintenance on it you know So there are parameters that need to be considered. The recommendation is at least 50 feet from an abandoned well. And so this is the perfect location.

But it's 100 feet from the existing well, right?

it i believe i heard it's 80 feet from the okay yeah from the old from the old well so so while um you know 50 feet it's just you because you don't really know what's happening underground you want to be far enough away and that this was a sander there is a possibility that the that there the earth in that area might be um in a way that you don't want it to impact, to be close enough to impact the new well. So the further away you can be, the better. They say at least 50 feet and more is better.

50 feet? Okay, you're talking from the old well to new well, right? But then the same logic applies to the property line, right? There could be some structure, geo structures, which might then affect this property. How do you...

so the the question is can it be moved a little bit not i'll let our engineers speak to the i'm telling you high level of what we was considered but this is this is the location that was determined that it really needed to be in order to accommodate all the restrictions on the site um but do you wanna

Due to all the restrictions that Don mentioned, this is the best possible site. We did look at other moving it further north. One of the neighbor comments suggested moving it further north, but it wouldn't meet the property line requirements. It was only 21 feet away from the property line. So this is for maintenance purposes and drilling and the separation requirements from the state. We this is the best location for the well.

But moving north would move away from the property line. I don't understand why that would come in the way, moving north, because the homes are on the east side and south side. So moving north would not, in fact, it would increase the distance between the property line.

but that would be moving it closer to the abandoned well and we want to stay as far away from that as possible are you open to looking at uh that option you want to talk

i'm sorry that um but that is the best locations there's other factors like don mentioned and just being part of a operation part that has to deal with maintenance pump maintenance any other kind of water quality issues that we might have to address our assessments or what have you this is the best location we'll be required to have deliveries here for other stuff in regards to chemical or disinfectant and what have you oh i was doing that And that's why there's just so many different things encompassed that make this the location that's necessary to best meet all the needs and requirements that this well will require.

Okay.

Then another public talked about having the data sound and vibration online. I checked your consultant's report. They are suggesting a vibration monitor, which seem to have an app built into that. So the question is, if that is the vibration monitor or measuring equipment you will be using, can our residents have access to the vibration that way we know what is this sound and then all those kinds of things um so that this is uh we will do what we're asked to do this is a requirement by the city okay sounds good um do you have any more questions we can come back to you yeah okay sounds good thank you uh council members

Yes, well, I want to thank you for addressing so much of what was brought up proactively and, of course, thank the public for coming out to give input on this important issue. I have a question. You mentioned, so at the very beginning when you came up, well, you are a customer of Sunnyvale. It's how the pipes work. Can you explain that to me a little bit more? Because I didn't quite get it. who in Sunnyvale would be drawing from this water?

Let me go ahead and explain. So our system is, it works together. So we have a hydraulic model and it's hard to say, it's definitely the pipes serve coming from the top of our system. So let's say it's North Los Altos coming all the way to the end of our system, which is a portion of Sunnyvale. And then you have Cupertino. What Don's saying is that, Depending on the demand and how it moves, at any time, you could be receiving water from Los Altos if we have something, like if there's something happening and the demand pulls, then that well will be surveying. You could be helping Los Altos or vice versa. It's hard to dictate and just give you a flat-out answer because it's a moving instrument. It's a moving service. We have this model, and we try to monitor and maintain and give you facts, but It depends on the day, the time, the weather.

Yeah, so I guess my question. So does it come out of taps? That are not attached to Cal Water because I would expect Cal Water to help here.

It's a separate system, so we have we have 90% of our 90 plus percent of our residents get the SFUC and and Cal and Valley water water and the 1400 homes. that's part of the Cal Water system, specifically gets it from the wells that Cal Water is providing. So it's a separate pipe system. That's very helpful. And metered separately. Thank you.

That actually totally answers my question. I got there. Let's see. It was mentioned, and you've spoken with utilities and PG&E. You've interfaced with PG&E about the power lines, especially around that. Around the property. So just to make sure that when you're presenting a plan for, say, a wall or anything else that could get near those power lines, that we can be assured that you've spoken with PG&E and that they think that that's going to be okay.

So what will happen once we get your approval? That'll be a process that we'll take afterwards to make sure that there are no issues. There's also looking at the power of physical support this project if we'll need an upgrade, which I believe we will.

I'll ask you.

Okay. So that's on the to-do list post-approval. Okay. Who is empowered to stop work?

anybody that is our contractors and Cal Water employees, myself, if we see anything unsafe happening, or if there is something in exceedance that's happening, we can stop work.

Okay, so anyone on site can stop work and anyone who works at Cal Water on this particular project can stop work.

Not just this particular part, but just so you know, yes, we will be able, that's the way we operate. If we see something unsafe or something's happening in exceedance, we would stop work if it's something we can't mitigate. But once again, I want to say that, and that's what our noise consultant's stating, that we've overprotected because we want to make sure that we're not going to exceed. And that's why I started my statement with, we don't expect to fail in that category. But if we see it, we're going to be transparent.