City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening. We're going to go ahead and call this meeting to order for the Visayas City Council session. We are going to start off by allowing citizens to comment on issues within jurisdiction of the Visayas City Council and items listed on the closed session agenda. The council asks that you keep your comments concise and positive. Creative criticism presented with the perfect courtesy is welcome. The city does not tolerate disruptive behavior in our meetings. This council meeting is considered a limited public forum, which means that the council can regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. Speaker comments during public comments must be limited to matters within the jurisdiction, or the council's authority, generally referred to as within the council subject matter jurisdiction. If a speaker's comments are not related to the council subject matter jurisdiction, 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. Each speaker will be given three minutes to speak. The presiding officer may establish a reasonable overall time limit for public comment period and may adjust that time limit as necessary to ensure the efficient, orderly, and fair conduct of the meeting. Please step up to the podium for those calling in. Raise your digital hand now by dialing nine. on the phone to indicate you wish to speak and six to unmute yourself. You may begin your comments by stating and spelling your name and providing your city of residence. At this time, we will invite people who are currently here in this meeting room to speak first.

But it would be on closed session items.

Okay. Bill, do you have any closed item sessions you'd like to speak on? No. No closed item. Okay. So then you can come back at 7 o'clock. Okay. Very good. City Clerk, is there anyone online who is here to speak?

As a reminder to the callers online, please use your raise your hand feature, and we will add you to the meeting queue. Mayor, at this time, there are no hands raised.

Okay, very good. So we will go ahead and adjourn this meeting and we will go into closed session. So we will see everyone back at seven o'clock. Welcome to the Visayas City Council meeting. We're going to go ahead and call this meeting to order. We're excited to have so many people in the room today, and we love all the energy that the players are bringing, so we're excited to be able to recognize them today. So we're going to go ahead and start our meeting off with our Pledge of Allegiance, led by Council Member Puchigian, and after that, we ask you to stay standing so we can have a Pledge of Allegiance. Pastor Chris Archer will be leading our invocation tonight.

Please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Let's pray. God, we thank you for the opportunity to gather together this evening. We are grateful for this community and for the many people who serve it faithfully every single day. God, tonight we celebrate the young athletes being recognized as regional champions. Thank you for their hard work and their dedication and their teamwork and for the coaches, the parents, and the families who have encouraged them along the way. God, may they continue to grow not only in their skill but also in their character and their integrity. God, we thank you for our city leaders and our employees and volunteers who work each day to make this a place where people can live and work and thrive. Give them wisdom and discernment and a heart to serve as they make decisions that impact our community. God, we pray for your protection over our police officers and our firefighters, paramedics, and all our first responders. Would you strengthen them as they serve others, keep them safe, bring them home to their families every day. And God, as this meeting begins, may every conversation be marked by respect, wisdom, and a shared desire to seek the good of our city. Thank you for the privilege of calling this community home. In your name we pray, amen.

Thank you, Pastor Archer. We appreciate your invocation tonight. All right, so we're going to start off first by recognizing our Cal Ripken Blue All-Stars 11 and under and our Cal Ripken Blue All-Stars 12 and under. So we are excited to be able to recognize these youth today. What we'll do is we will introduce the coaches, and then we will have the coaches read off all the players, and then we'll have the players come up, shake our hands, and then they'll stay up here. We'll take a photo. Parents, feel free to stand up, take photos. This is your guys' time to honor your kids. But we just want to say thank you, first off, to all the coaches and all the parents. Getting to this level is really impressive, to go on and representing not only our city, but our whole state within the United States is a huge achievement in their life. As someone who has kids who plays baseball, this is a lot of time and effort that you guys put in. So we definitely want to recognize the kids. You know, the kids who are out there playing sports are some of the best youth who lead our community, who work with, you know, other players to make them better. And we just want to say thank you to the coaches who have really put in so much time. I know these coaches are not paid. They're here because they love the community. They love the sport. And so we're just excited to be able to recognize these youth. So we'll go ahead and recommend – Yeah, we'll do one team at a time. And we will recognize first head coach Brandon Peters, coach Derek Miller, Clay Chesser, who I guess is not here tonight, and Ricky Rios. So coach, if you want to go ahead and just read off the players of your team. Well, actually, if you have anything you'd like to say first, feel free. If not, you just want to go ahead and read off your players' names and tell them to come on up. And then they'll stay up here, and we'll take a photo.

The speech is mandatory, so you've got to say something.

I definitely didn't prepare for this, but...

Speak into the microphone.

So I'm Brandon Peters, the manager of the 11U Blue team. Super proud of my group and all the families involved on my team. We've got a solid group. We represent this town with a lot of pride, and that's why they're getting to this point, but... yeah we're just happy to be doing what we're doing and you guys are backing us and that's all good and we're uh pumped to take it next week and hopefully bring home a championship uh yeah as far as our our town goes and fields i'll be back at another meeting to talk about that we got some of the best fields in the in the state and we don't get to use them as much as i'd like but uh We do have some great stuff going on around this league and this town, and I'm proud of this whole organization in general. So thank you guys for having us here. So do you want me to read off from right here and have them line up right here or have them come up to you guys?

And then when they come up, they can stay up here too. We'll take a picture. All right, awesome.

So I'm Brandon Peters. Clay Chester's not here. I got Derek Miller right here. Sorry.

I have a – All right, boys, as in say your name, come on, walk in, and then – Yeah, this is my coach, Derek Miller, and then Ricky Rios.

I got – the first player is Henry Miller. Good boy, Henry. And then I got Jack Peters. Bo Chesser. My next two players are Julian Acevedo and Leo Villarreal. They weren't able to make it. They're already headed to Indiana. My next player here is Ricky Rios. I got Judah Pitkin next. Jackson Han. The next guy on my list is Evan Upham. He also wasn't able to make it. My next player here is Tyler Sweeney. Sebastian Rodriguez. And Jace Chua. And then I got my bat boy, Jace Rios. Again, thank you guys for having us, and we promise to represent our town the right way this next week. These guys play with their heart on the field, and we should all be super proud that they're representing our town.

All right, so next we're going to be recognizing the 12 and under Visalia Blue All-Stars, our 2026 Kyle Ripken Regional Champs. Their head coach is Kyle Newton, and then their coaches are Clay, Lucas, Isaac, and Matt Maxson, who is here tonight. So we'll have the coaches come on up first.

Unlike Brandon, I know how to use a microphone. Yeah, my name's Kyle Newton, head coach of the Visalia 12U Blue team. I've been coaching this team for the last five years, and so it's a big honor to make it this far and represent this city at the World Series. So three of the coaches are not here today. Clay Allison, Lucas Lichtenwald, and Isaac Martinez. So I do want to acknowledge them for all the time they've put in. And my last coach here is Matt Maxson as well. So a couple of things. I mean, mostly it's thank yous. Thank yous to my parents, all the support they've given us. And we get a lot of support from the community all the time. And once we knew we were going to make this endeavor, for the last two weeks, this community has really stepped up for us. And we've raised a ton of money to make this possible. So I want to give a good shout out to our community. It became very clear that baseball is a very popular sport here in Visalia. So we appreciate that. I'll go ahead and start with my players then. First up is Jaden Aldape. Next is Owen Newton. Easton Salazar. Eli Lichtenwalt. Grayson Iden. Harrison Sechrist. Iden Franco. Jackson Calderon. Kaden Abushon. Owen Maxon. Roman Martinez. Ryan Mantooth. Ryan McGovern. I promise you this one's 12 years old. Wade Allison. And the heart and soul of this team, our bat boy, Tate Allison.

Let the coaches get up there.

Ready?

One, two, three.

Wait.

All right. Well, it's always exciting. As you know, Visey's got a strong history in baseball. And we've actually won quite a few World Series. So it's exciting to see two more teams going off to represent our community. Hopefully they'll be successful and bring home some championships. So congratulations and best of luck to them. So we'll go ahead and move on to the public comment portion of our meeting. Citizens are now invited to comment on issues within the jurisdiction of the Visayas City Council and items listed on the agenda. The council asks that you keep your comments concise and positive. Creative criticism presented with appropriate courtesy is welcome. The city does not tolerate disruptive behavior in our meetings. This council is considered a limited public forum, which means the council can regulate time, place, and manner of speech. Speaker comments during public comments must be limited to matters within the council's authority, generally referred to as within the council subject matter jurisdiction. If a speaker's comment are not related to council subject matter jurisdiction, the presiding officer will rule the speaker out of order. A speaker will not be ruled out of order because of disagreement with content of their speech. Each speaker will have three minutes to speak. The providing officer may establish a reasonable overall time limit for public comment period and may adjust the time limit as necessary to ensure an efficient, orderly and fair conducted of the meeting. For those of you that are here, we'd ask you to please step up to the podium and those who are calling in, please raise your digital hand now by dialing star nine on the telephone to indicate you wish to speak and star six to unmute yourself when it's your time to begin with your comments. Please begin your comments by stating and spelling your name and providing your city of residence. At this time, I will not call on anyone who's here presently in this room to come up and you are now able to speak on public comments.

Jim Reyes, Visalia. On April 24th, I filed a public records request regarding the city's flock automated license plate reader system, and I asked for three things. Logs showing which outside agencies had accessed Visalia's data, a list of active data sharing agreements, and images of my own license plate captured by the system. What followed was a three-month exercise in government bureaucracy. The city repeatedly pushed back deadlines from May into August. When attorneys claimed my plate records were exempt absent proof of ownership, I immediately emailed them my vehicle registration. Yet, the delays continued. On June 29th, after I posted publicly that the City was nine days past its own deadline, they responded in two hours, providing unrequested records while extending their timeline once again. Today, August 3rd, the City officially closed my request and refused to release my tracking data. They cited VPD policy 428.2 and claimed the interest in withholding my personal information outweighs my right to receive it. It is absurd to claim that privacy exemptions for automatic photos taken on public roads where no expectation of privacy exists. The city provided general audit logs but denied my request for data about me to me. Furthermore, VPD recently removed the reason for lookup column from the public search audit file on its transparency web page. Captain Swarthout has not responded to my inquiry asking why that data was removed and who ordered it. Numerous cities across the country, including LAPD, are canceling flock contracts due to privacy concerns and abuse. Visalia should do the same. Between 24-7 flock camera surveillance, fully encrypted radio channels, and the deliberate reduction of public transparency data, the Vice City Police Department is sinking further into secret policing. Secret policing never turns out well for a society. Thank you.

Good evening. Bill Yacht, Willis Avenue, North Visalia. I wasn't gonna comment on Flock, but I already talked to Captain Swartout. And stealing cars, gray alert, or kidnapping. I was 100% against Flock, because my brother got a ticket in Maryland for going too far on the stop sign. He said, talk to Captain, I mean Captain, and he said he's reviewing it, he's in charge of it, and I 100% agree with the city's flock camera system at this point. So good job, City of Visalia. Catch the people stealing the cars, please. Okay, here's why I'm speaking. 20 years ago, just so everybody who doesn't know this, these are my journals of volunteering. Clean trash, graffiti, 350 other items, but we'll leave that out. 20 years ago, I started. I have 20 of these volumes. This is half the year. The city listened. Leslie's been here pretty much every step away, and so has this person, Tracy Robert Shaw. And we got, in June of 2024, a sweep team. Sweep is so amazing, I don't even see stuff anymore. They get to it before I'm running around in the streets, and I leave at 4 in the morning. I like to be the first one on the street because I want to see it first. So kudos on Sweep. You can't see my photos because I sent it to staff. I was hoping to show it up here, but I've tweaked it. And I only got 1.39 left, so I got to make my speech quick. I now have a sweep to another level. I have a bike and a trailer and a dog that likes to get exercise. And I run around the core of the city from Walnut to Ferguson, Mooney to Ben Maddox. And I clean up small stuff. So the trucks and the sweep can go for the big stuff. And that's important. But the small stuff's important too. And if I was to show you my trash can right now, single guy, I've got a big trash can. It ain't none of my trash. And just keeping that mentality that I coined 25 years ago. And that's what I kind of operate from. It's four simple words. Clean is less mean. I believe it. I operate on it. I volunteer it. This is my... And I even got it in Spanish. So if you're a Spanish speaker, I'll say the Spanish words. I don't speak any Spanish. But I've gotten a very good reaction from my Spanish speaking neighbors when I say . And they get it right away. And anyways, I'm going to continue to do it. I just wanted to share that because Leslie's listened all these years. I think that's why there ended up being a sweep. And who knows? We might see bikes and trailers and trash cans like I do. You never know. Anyways, thank you, council. Thank you for what you do. I couldn't do that. And I respect it because I got to be doing stuff, as you can probably observe. And thanks again. I made my time limit.

Irene Lappin, Visalia. I'm a lifelong Democrat, but when it comes to expenditures, I'm definitely on the conservative side, especially now when the Trump administration has made it impossible for the ordinary citizen to live. Many in the lower income bracket can't even survive. So about America's 250th birthday display at the convention center, putting the Lights on trees in the summer make it look like Christmas. Cost taxpayers more than $18,000. I don't know if the display would have been worth it if it didn't look so tacky, but that's my two cents. Back to the new bike lanes. I call them obstacle courses from hell. When I drive my car past Tulare Avenue, those pointy bars trigger a visceral reaction in my gut I've never experienced before, and I've been here for 25 years. Now you know that silly cliche, age is just a number. Well, transparency can be just a buzzword unless you recognize that one application of it happens to be state law. In light of this, there are still no answers or justification for the following. I don't know if you remember my questions last time about the mammoth non-infrastructure contract the city entered into with a New Zealand company. love to ride since then i've had to fight for answers and now the few i've received don't offer any comfort for the so-called highland community leg of the project for half a million dollars each there's another one and maybe there's a third one there will be no public input this is as you may recall when even with input that is to larry avenue there is a sizable objection from the public who only found out about it afterwards. And by the way, there's still no explanation for those painted white lines I've asked numerous times. As to names of partners cited in the contract, I've heard from only one of three, and that individual is president of the Southern Sierra Cycling Club, who says he was recommended by some local bike shops. Obviously, someone like me isn't going to identify with these folks because they go on treks like Climb the Coast. climbed the coast, and just recently, they did a day of patriotic Paul Revere-themed speeding along the Sierras with the help of some Michelob Ultra. Now, that isn't veiled elitism. I don't know what is. The other two partners have left to ride VRPA and Safe Routes Partnership did not respond. Last, a city engineer answered my question about whether this leg of the overhaul will purchase bicycles for kids who don't own them. No they won't. And the fifteen hundred dollar tool kit containing wrenches nuts and bowls will they be left to the city or the schools. And the answer is likewise no. This is an outrage. Please stop.

uh hello i just want to make sure i'm in my rate according to the last sentence there each speaker tonight may speak up to three minutes during this general comment period on a matter that is not on the agenda am i in my right okay thank you i guess you can start the time now um so as i i did not have time to go to fedex to print this so i apologize My name is Dr. Esteban Verdusco. I was born and raised here in the central San Joaquin Valley and went to UC Davis Medical School. So greetings to all the council members, esteemed Mayor Taylor, and my former, my winning classmate, Brian Puchigian. I'm very proud of you, sir, for what you have accomplished. So I'm a resident of Visalia, soon to resume my outpatient practice in this great community. And I apologize if this statement appears trite, but it is of high importance to me. So I also practice telemedicine from my home. The electricity has been cut twice now and has prevented me from seeing my telemedicine patients. There is no secured and HIPAA compliant Wi-Fi in the city of Visalia anywhere. I checked on Google. This places me at risk of the following things. Accusations of patient abandonment. Today I could not see 16 patients. Medical malpractice for missed prescriptions that I did not fill. Breaches in patient confidentiality if I have these visits in a non-secure Wi-Fi. Lost wages, which is tough in this economy. And ultimately, potential termination of my telemedicine job. I also had to spend time preparing the statement in a respectful and positive manner, according to the published guidelines, all at no fault to me. I imagine other residents in my neighborhood are having similar problems, so I kindly and respectfully ask to please help with this problem, which is at the municipal level. I do not have the time nor responsibility to call Southern California Edison to solve this technical problem, which they should have solved in advance of cutting our power, and there are zero places in Visalia, according to Google, where there is secured and HIPAA-compliant internet service. It is 2026. I fully believe that Southern California Edison has the technology to think ahead and to solve this problem. So please help me. I graciously thank you for your time. And if any of you want or will allow me to practice in a secure place in your own home where I have secure internet, I am open to it. So thank you very much. I end my statements.

Hi, my name is Kathy Faulkner. I live here in Visalia. And I have two areas of interest that I wanted to approach. That's the data centers and wildfires. First, currently we have anywhere from nearly 300 data centers here in the state of California with 50 more projected developments. With the discussion here in Tulare of having one, this brings a great concern for me. Besides the acres of beautiful fertile land and generated light and heat, each requires two finite resources. Number one is water. If you are one of the larger data centers, you take the amount of water that 1.2 million would accomplish using daily. If it were a smaller one, it would be the same as Woodlake might be for their water. And then the same goes for energy for Woodlake, the same amount of energy per day. But if you were to have a larger one, it would take the amount of water of an 80,000 home property, which would include four per home. With VICEA Council, I wanted to know these questions if you could answer them. How has the City of VICEA prepared for a potential permit that might request a house of a data center here in the city or a surrounding area? Have you prepared or discussed a unique zone or would you be doing a special use permit for a given zone? Have you prepared or developers offer proof of their local water supplies and electrical grids that they would have to handle without hiking up residential utility bills or rationing water? Or also maybe requesting a guarantee that that company not exceed the limits they've stated and indicate penalties or provide their own water or electricity. Could you include a minimum noise level emission limit and limited nighttime light pollution? Can you enact temporary moratorium, maybe even to start this, for a data center request so that guidelines can be established without you being hit with a permit? If you were to consider a permit, will you demand and share to the residents the power load projections, the tax breaks, the utility agreements, and require an open public comment period before approval of any permit? Might you create even a community task force of local experts to pursue the potential for development and comprehensive resource study? My second request is wildfires. 50% of our normal snore pack has occurred here in this area with extreme record temperatures. In fact, this is the highest record temperatures that we have. Nationwide wildfires are rapidly spreading, and with a lovely city in the city of Spokane in Washington, we've watched these homes burn to the river that it adjoins, plus the Los Angeles area is now hitting again. As local residents...

Thank you ma'am.

Hi, I'm Mickey K. Give me a couple moments because I actually want to address the data center issue. I just need to find the flyer. There is a group already of people that are going across the counties because Kings County and Tulare County are both approached with the data centers on the fairgrounds. And so While the fair board has taken the meetings off of the website, it supposedly is supposed to be happening August 18th for anybody interested. And so there is going to be a group around who, and we're already very closely watching what's going on with the data centers. But also Hanford has a, sorry, they're having a town hall about the data centers. And that's what I'm trying to pull up. I apologize for not being more prepared. Okay, it's right here. So there's a data center town hall August 28th and it's keep data centers out of Kings County that happens after when the supposed fair board is supposed to be happening here in Tulare County. there's going to be a whole bunch of people there and so if you're interested it is online but it's august 28th it's from 5 30 to 6 and it's at the episcopal church of the savior at 519 north dowdy street in hanford thank you okay anybody else wishing to speak who's here

Good evening. My name is Sam Shaka. I live at 1401 South Burke. This is my wife. Every time I've come here, I always try to get away with using her to try to squeeze six minutes instead of three, but it never works. Our city manager already warned me. So I want to tell you what I want to tell you today. In 1924, a gentleman came here and migrated from Italy and bought 17 acres of ground on the east end of Tulare Avenue. There was no Tulare Avenue. There was no Burke Street. All there was was his property. And when he died in 1969, he left that property to his only son, and he never saw his grandkids, and asked me, which I was the son, and that migrant farmer's name was Concheto Shaka. And I've kept that property since 1969, and I farmed it, and our city manager and our staff and the planning commission has to deal with noise, pollution, street problems, our city police chief has had to deal with parking, our city fire chief's had to deal with dust in the street. Anyway, thank you city council, thank you planning commission for approving an 82 unit subdivision. The appeal period is over with and we're gonna move on and that's going to be a substandard subdivision with small lots which we want to make the workforce available to buy homes. It's something that I've always wanted to be able to offer the community is housing because I've been a real estate broker. So I want to thank you today for everything you've done and putting up with me for all of those years. My father can't see us today, but he gets to see what's going to happen there. And we feel we're bringing a really, really good tradition to Visalia by making affordable housing. My wife is here today to tell you that I've been asked to help the downtown association again and some of you are going to be called on again and I've met with city manager and one of the new events that we're planning and I can speak out of turn because I've already talked to the police chief about 10 minutes ago so he has a little notice and the fire chief I got a little bit of chance to talk to and our city manager. And to let you know, one of the first events that we're gonna have is the Jaws of Life demonstration on Main Street. The fire department's gonna bring a fire truck in, we're gonna have a wrecked car, we're gonna use Jaws of Life to get the person out of the car, ambulance, we're gonna go through the whole routine. Why am I doing this after 10 years being away from downtown? We've closed our clothing store 10 years ago. So why is she here today? Because we are going to work on bringing some more activities to downtown Visalia in the next four or five years before I retire. And I intend to do that in October. And I want to thank you again for the opportunity to be here in front of you for the 70th. eight years that I've lived in Visalia, I want you to know that our downtown is primo, one of the best, one of the best that we'll ever see. And I've seen a lot of downtowns, for example, San Luis Obispo, and I bring a lot of ideas and I feel a comfort level. I love our downtown. I sold papers in front of the building. I've got four minutes.

Two seconds.

Always trying to tell me what to do. Thank you again. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Thank you, everybody.

Hey, Sam. Sam. I don't believe you're going to retire in five years. I figure you're just going to keep working nonstop continuously.

I'm out of time, so I'll let her do it.

We have a retirement party on October 3rd. There will be invitations coming out, but you're right. I don't believe it either.

Hi, I'm Kathy Connolly from Visalia, and I'd like to talk very briefly on two subjects. The first one is the flock cameras. I believe that they can have many good and valuable uses, but my concern is who else has access to that information. They've had some cases in other states like Texas where they have gotten a hold of flock records and used it to chase down women using their right to choose in like 30 states. And so I just want to ensure that our cameras will not be used to help criminalize people that are not doing anything wrong. My second one is on data centers. AI has some valuable uses, but it is also being used in ways that are not beneficial, like eliminating jobs that humans can do that we need. and doing deep fake, things like that. And I think data like that needs to be regulated. And the data centers themselves can cause a lot of environmental damage like spoken before. Even one short AI request uses a water bottle worth of water. And think of how many of those happen every day. So, you know, if we got one in this area, it would use so much water. And as it is, we don't have enough water to go around really. That's why we have to have all the watering restrictions. They use a ton of electricity, which will probably raise all of our rates. Excuse me, sir. I am talking. I'd appreciate it if you weren't playing on your phone. Oh, okay. I'm so sorry. I've been a teacher before and saw that happen so much. So I just want to say that I really don't think we should have them in the Central Valley where, especially Visalia, where we're so limited on resources already. Thank you so much and have a wonderful evening.

Good evening, City of Visalia, Council Members, Mayor, Vice Mayor. I just want to say, The flaw cameras is something that I'm concerned about. Hopefully you can look into more. My name is Efrain Becerra. I live in District 1. So I wanted to just mention the flaw cameras. If there can be more transparency, that would be much appreciated. The second thing I want to mention is, first off, I want to thank the city and the community that makes this city great for supporting what I've done and I wanted to also say thank you to you, Vice Mayor, for your kindness towards me, even though we had an election quite a few years ago. I know that sometimes it can get ugly. And also thank you to the council members that are here for also supporting me. I know that you guys hear a lot of negativity sometimes and it's not easy being a public servant. One of the things I wanted to mention is I've had the opportunity to attend other sister city councils and A lot of the times that I know that we disagree, but I wanted to bring up, you have a great staff that educates you all, like our city attorney and our city manager and our co-manager that basically tells you guys what can and cannot be done in this city. And that is something that I see as very appreciative as a citizen because from witnessing unprofessionalism with other cities. I think that sometimes we take the lack of professionalism or we're not aware for granted. So here in Visalia, at least I can say that our city council is being a little bit more professional with each other. And that's something that I appreciate as a citizen, just letting you guys know. And another thing I wanted to mention is the opportunity of the city, the county-wise, the exhibit has grown that I've done. And I wanted to mention to you all that it will be, it's displayed at the Tulare County Museum on Mooney Boulevard. I've added more countries, about 32. So in case you guys want to come to the event September 5th, that will be held there. That would be appreciative. And again, you know, it's not easy being in politics. I wanted to say thank you to all, including you, Council Member Soto, for the community efforts that you do. Not many see that, right, because they don't attend the events, but you guys, at least I can say that I see some of you at these events. Thank you, guys.

Okay, nobody else from this room is wanting to speak at this time? City Clerk, do we have anyone online wishing to speak?

At this time, Mayor, I see no hands raised.

Okay, so if that's the case, we'll go ahead and close public comments. And we'll be skipping items of interest and going on to the consent calendar. Consent calendar items are considered routine and will be enacted in one motion. This is a time for members of the public to provide public comments on an item on the consent calendar. Comments will not be taken individually by a public if an item is pulled by a council member. Each speaker is allowed up to three minutes and a timer will notify you when your time is expired. Please begin your comments by stating and spelling your name and providing your city or residence. Do we have anyone who is present in this building who wishes to speak on an item that is on the consent calendar? Seeing none, do we have anyone on lines, city clerk?

Mayor, I see no hands raised.

Okay, thank you. So we will, Council Member Nelson, do you have any items you'd like to pull? Item number three. Item number three. Council Member Pichigian, any items you'd like to pull?

No items at this time.

All right, Council Member Soto, any items you'd like to pull? No items, thank you. Thank you. And Vice Mayor Nguyen, any items you'd like to pull?

No items to pull, thank you.

All right, if that's the case, I'll entertain a motion for the remainder. Make a motion to accept a balance of the consent calendar as presented. I'll second. We have first and second. All those in favor, please vote. The remainder of the consent calendar passes with a 5-0 vote. Thank you very much. At this time, we'll go on to item number three in the consent calendar, which is a ward contract for Fire Station 54 parking lot rehabilitation project. Councilman, would you like a report or do you have a specific question on that that you'd like answered?

I mean, I'm in favor of the necessary work. I think what caught my attention is that the first scope of doing the parking lot and the cost analysis was done in 2022. Since that time, the scope has changed on the work that's going to be done. And then you have an increase in cost of the project. My question would be, why didn't we update, say, in 2024 or update in 2025? Because now we have to pull the money out of the general fund. I'm trying to figure out, was the ball dropped? which is possible, but there is a big gap between, especially in the change of the scope of the project, and as soon as you do that, you know there's gonna be an increased cost in doing the project. But you also know in a four-year gap, the cost of products has gone way up. I just wanted to understand why we missed it. Thank you.

Yeah, and I, you know, with the staff that the city has, I wasn't here for part of that time, obviously, Council Member Nelson, but as far as staff that was here, we had some turnover from what I understand, things like that. Like other projects had to get prioritized over probably this project as far as grant funding. I mean, some of the huger projects we had, like getting shirt done for the Costco, for some of the developments around there, for rigging. There's a lot of stuff that's going on that kind of, I think, resulted in some of that delay that you're seeing between 22 and now with getting that done. There are costs increases that's happened over the last three or four years. And also the other thing is that some of the newer staff members here, we went out to the site, we looked at the fire station, and a lot of the fire stations that we're building now or made out of concrete for good reason, because those fire trucks tear that asphalt up. And if we did what was, I think in that, I can't remember off the top of my head, but I think in that original cost estimate, there was probably asphalt they were putting back in. But the problem with that fire station was, is that if you get to the back of it, those fire trucks do like two 90 degree turns right there. And that's typically a movement that tears up that asphalt pretty bad. We didn't want to do something that was going to be put in and then 10 or 15 years later we're going to have the same problem. So what was done for that is kind of a cost saving measure for what we could is that the straight access aisle where the fire trucks come in but they don't turn is going to remain done out of asphalt. Like the simpler parking areas that don't have much traffic load on them are going to be a microsurfacing to save money. But that area on the north side of that fire station where the trucks turn all the time is going to be made out of concrete. So we don't have to deal with this again. And that concrete will probably last like 40 plus years. So it's a thing now. And I think we had... Jonathan, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think he had set up that bid so that we had an option to do asphalt and an option to do asphalt and concrete. And I think the difference between those two options is only like $40,000. So to fix this thing right for like another 30, 40 plus years was all the difference was $40,000. So that's the reason why a lot of that stuff was just a relook at the technical parts of what we're doing, making sure the fire station will be fixed for a long time.

I appreciate the comments, and like I said, I'm in favor of it, and I understand the need to be concrete versus asphalt. It's amazing to me they even did asphalt at that time. And I appreciate the aspect of we kind of put it on the staff on 2022 to 23, I guess, and 24. It just amazes me. We have quality people in the Department of Engineering. And everybody knows once you change the scope of a project, the cost of the project goes up, even if it's in current time. And I think what bothers me is why this wasn't caught in a four-year period to say, hey, we're changing the scope. We got a new bid. The cost is now this. I mean, there's a four-year gap. But I'm fine. I mean, I'm a favor to the project. I just think we need to have the people understand once you change scope, you change costs.

Yeah, let me just add a little bit to that, just to answer a little bit more of that, Council Member Nelson. We went through with this budget cycle, and off the top of my head, I don't remember what we did with that project, but we've got a big template that everybody's using now that also incorporates staff time costs, soft costs, construction, management, materials, testing costs. There's a number of those things that probably weren't accounted for, as good in the past as they were now as far as accurately and everything. So some of those costs has increased are probably for things like that too.

Perfect, thank you. Any other questions for staff? Any other comments? I'll entertain a motion.

I move to authorize the city manager to execute a construction contract with Toasted Asphalt for RFB 25-26-44 for parking lot rehabilitation at Fire Station 54 in the amount of $176,479.84 and authorize the appropriation of $115,000 from the general fund. I'll second. First and second. All those in favor, please vote.

Item passes 5-0. Thank you very much. Next, we're going to regular items and public hearings. Comments related to regular items and public hearing items are limited to three minutes per speaker for a maximum of 30 minutes per item. The mayor may reasonably limit or extend public comment periods to preserve the council's interest in conducting an efficient, orderly meeting. Item number one is a shopping cart ordinance update. Staff report, please.

Good evening, Mayor Taylor, Vice Mayor Nguyen, and City Council. My name is Jeff Reedman. I'm a City of Visalia Code Enforcement Officer, and I'm here to present for your consideration of and the direction on initiating potential Municipal Code updates to the Visalia Municipal Code Chapter 8.70, Abandoned Shopping Carts Citywide. Okay. Did I do it wrong? That's going to be that one.

Okay. Oh, there we go.

City staff is seeking direction from the Visalia City Council related to abandoned shopping carts as Chapter 8.70 of the Municipal Code and to consider information presented in this staff report. City staff has gone over Chapter 8.70 of the Municipal Code, abandoned shopping carts, And it's found that it can now be revised due to changes in state law that would allow for an increase in the amount that shopping cart owners can be fined if they do not pick up their carts after being notified. Staff is also recommending that Chapter 8.70 be revised to add language that requires companies with shopping carts to install a physical containment system when a new location is built or when significant improvements or expansions occur to an existing facility or shopping center that utilizes shopping carts. In 2025, California Business and Professions Code section 22435.7 was amended per Senate Bill 753. The amendment increased the amount of a city or county can charge under cost recovery measures for the retrieval and return of shopping carts from $50 per shopping cart to $100 per shopping cart. State law requires cities and counties to approve an ordinance to implement these cost recovery fees, and the current municipal code lists the prior authorized cost recovery charge of $50 per shopping cart. Staff recommends this amount be increased from $50 to $100 as permitted by state law. Just for clarification, the fines are only being increased for the abandoned cart retrieval, not for the non-installation of the locking mechanisms on a property. Just for clarification, or I should say to follow that up, to further illustrate the need for these changes during the 2025 calendar year, staff from the Neighborhood Preservation Division collected 1,630 shopping carts, and the data from January 2026 of this year through April 2026 has already identified 843 shopping carts collected over this four-month period. Based on this information, staff spends a significant amount of time collecting and storing shopping carts that have been taken from businesses and abandoned in the city right-of-way. Further costs are expended by city staff in maintaining the collection site and notifying businesses and owners to retrieve those carts.

Could I go back one? Oh, there we go.

Sorry about that. And then staff is also recommending a physical containment system be required when a new location where shopping carts is built or when existing facility is modified or expanded to the extent that a building permit from the city is required for the modification of the expansion. So considering the requirement to install physical cart containment systems as a condition of this new construction and expansion or modification of existing businesses would work to reduce costs for the city for city staff time on cart retrieval and storage for each business and expending funds for retrieving carts and being fined as well as provides benefits for the community by reducing the number of abandoned carts found throughout the community, thus reducing blight. If directed by City Council to proceed with revising the ordinance, staff will return within 45 to 60 days with the proposed ordinance changes with specific additional items to implement these proposed changes. Staff will also inform businesses that using shopping carts of the eminent changes of the shopping cart ordinance. Thank you.

Thank you. So Jeff, was that your first public report for city council?

Yeah, this is my first one.

You did a wonderful job. Thank you very much. You did a great job, so I appreciate your help tonight. So we'll start off with questions or comments by council. Council Member Soto, any questions or comments?

One question, thank you for the report. Just curious, does the sweep team ever pick up carts? They are.

Yes, sweep team does. That's one of the things they do. Also, code enforcement, any of us that have trucks do pick those up as well anytime we see them.

Awesome.

Thank you. Thank you for the report. Councilman Pucci again.

Yeah, great report. You know, just for public information, I asked this question when I met with code enforcement. And I said, isn't taking a shopping cart a crime? And they said, well, it has to be reported as a crime. Because if it's not reported, it's not a crime when someone takes a shopping cart. Because I would think you're walking out with a $1,000 car, however much it is, that should be considered a crime. It's not a crime until the store actually says, hey, they stole that and has to report it. So public knowledge, I didn't know that. I thought that was good information, passed it out. I appreciate all the work you guys do to clean up the shopping carts, and I'll be fully supportive of this tonight.

Councilman Nelson?

Great report, and probably when you look at it, it's probably way overdue to really look at this ordinance. I mean, the shopping cart situation has grown in numbers. And you guys do a great job in keeping the blight out of the city, but I think we're overdue in making this change, and I'm all in favor of it. So thank you. Thank you.

Vice Mayor Wynn?

Thank you again. Code enforcement, you come through as usual to help beautify our city, picking up trash, picking up carts. It's going to be a better-looking, cleaner city, and I think that just, as Bill says, clean is less mean. So I appreciate all your hard work.

absolutely thank you um our city continually demands that we keep our city beautiful and one of the big complaints i think we get is shopping carts and so you know that's one of the one of the reasons why we started our sweep team a year and a half ago was to make sure that our streets were keeping uh beautiful whether it's just trash shopping carts or whatever and so And it kind of puts us in a weird position because at the end of the day, these stores are victims because someone's taking their property, but then they're also not reporting it. So they're also part of the problem. And then obviously they won't press charges most of the time or 99% of the time if they are taken. So it puts us in a weird position of, you know, what do we do with them? And so I do appreciate the fact that we have our staff that's constantly out there finding hundreds and hundreds of these. getting them off the streets, collecting them. But I also want to make sure that we are getting the money back to be able to provide this service. And so keeping up with inflation of employees and vehicles and gas and everything else definitely seems appropriate. And then obviously I'm proud of the fact that You know, we're going to be implementing a new policy for new stores that are coming in to get different types of carts and systems that hopefully deter this in the future. So I definitely am interested to see how increasing the dollar amount is going to affect the shopping carts. If we don't see a major change, I know me personally, I might be interested in either having like a private sector Company going out and collecting them because they're they can be sometimes a little more efficient if there's a financial incentive to them or you know looking at other options of maybe heavier carts or different types of carts that are Not as easy to be pushing around which would persuade people from wanting to take these things. So Yeah, absolutely

A quick question, I know we said new businesses, but what happens if an existing business pulls a permit for remodel with this kick in?

Anything over $50,000 in improvements would be. Perfect, thank you.

All right, let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anybody from the public wishing to speak on this item, please come forward to the podium. And seeing no one coming up, do we have anyone online? Nobody online, fantastic. With that being said, we'll go ahead and entertain any further discussion or a motion.

I move to, I'm sorry, I'm on the wrong page. I move to approve the motion as presented in the staff report.

I'll second it.

Thank you, first and second. All those in favor, please vote. And the item moves forward with a five to zero vote. Thank you very much. Next, we'll go on to item number two, which is a review, review the Visayas Police Department AB481 annual report and adoption of resolution number 2026-53. Staff report, please.

Good evening, council. I'm Lieutenant Dominguez, your professional standards lieutenant, and I'm here to present the annual update to our military equipment use policy. AB 481, which is the military equipment use policy, requires city council approval of an annual report summarizing the following equipment use, inventory, costs, and citizen complaints. Just a short history lesson. AB 481 was passed in September of 2021. It went into effect in January 1st of 2022. And it required that our city adopt our military equipment use policy by ordinance. That was accomplished on June 20th of 2022. That's when the policy was approved and adopted. And we are here after June 24th, 2026. which is the date when the current annual report was published and posted on the Vice City Police website for review. The Vice City Police Department has seven of the 15 military equipment categories in its inventory. I'll go through each one of those. We have robots, unmanned aerial vehicles, drones, an armored rescue vehicle, our Bearcat, command and control vehicle, our EOC. We do have specialized rifles, munitions, noise flash diversionary devices, and explosive breaching tools. Munitions containing tear gas, OC or pepper spray, and we also have kinetic energy weapons and munitions. And once again, I need to point out that the Viceroyal Police Department does not have or utilize any surplus military equipment. So these are the highlights. Calendar year 2025, we received no citizen complaints. We do have a dedicated complaint form on our transparency page where the annual report and each of the previous annual reports is located. We requested, and we have no inventory changes. And as far as equipment use, I'll refer to my actual notes. The print there is fairly small. We have the following use. We deployed our armored rescue vehicle and van a total of 15 times. Our drones were utilized a total of 221 times throughout the year. Our bomb truck was deployed 20 times. Bomb robots were deployed 10 times. We do have a regional team, so it gets deployed by other agencies as well. And as far as chemical agents and direct impact munitions, we had four deployments. That means only four incidents where that type of munition, tear gas, pepper ball, bean bag were used. So the recommended motion this evening is a move to adopt a resolution renewing ordinance number 2022-09, which authorizes the department's military equipment use policy.

Thank you very much. Councillor Nelson, any questions or comments?

No, very thorough report. And I appreciate the transparency that the department is showing towards the public and the use of the different equipment. So I really appreciate that. So thank you. Council Member Poochigan?

Yeah, great report. Quick question, this is all public knowledge, so at any time anyone requests, you have this information available at any point throughout the year, correct?

Not just this report, but each of the preceding five reports, yes.

Yeah, like, great report. It just upsets me that the state puts these kind of requirements on you guys. You know, we have this information out there for anybody that wants it throughout the year, and the fact that the state continues to make you guys jump through hoops for this, it upsets me, but I'll be fully supportive of it because it's the law and I have to do it today. So, thank you.

Thank you. Council Member Soto?

Thank you for the report and the transparency.

And Vice Mayor Wendt?

Thank you.

Yeah, we appreciate it. I mean, chemical agents and direct impact munitions. I mean, that's a really scary way to say less than lethal, you know, which is what we want. So we appreciate what you guys do. You guys are obviously a great asset to our community, and we appreciate the report. So we'll go ahead and open this up to the public. Anyone wishing to speak on this item, come forward and state your name and city of residence.

Efrain Becerra, I live in District 1, Vice Mayor Wentz. Just a question. First off, thank you for your service to our community. Clarify. This is a question that would be coming from the community, I guess. I'm one of those people that does read a lot of the comments on social media, like and Facebook, and a lot of the social media platforms that you guys use. I did see you said no complaints. So to educate the public, my question to you would be, you mentioned they have to formally file a complaint if they have any issue on your website, correct? That is what the question that I wanted just to educate the public because You know, to be transparent, there are complaints. I mean, they're online, they're there. It's just they're not filing in accordance to what I would say the right paperwork online that you mentioned. Because I'm just trying to be transparent and also, as a citizen, ask for any suggestions or any improvements, the paperwork has to be done on your website, correct?

So we have a dedicated complaint form for this specific type of activity. As a department, we take complaints. We take complaints verbally, by phone, via email, and obviously we also have a general complaint form. So with the general complaint, we will take that complaint. It does not have to be submitted directly on this form, but if it were a matter of an issue that specifically mentioned the military equipment use policy, then if someone did not fill out that form, we would obviously present them with that form because it would belong under this type of complaint.

Thank you. Anybody else from the public wishing to speak? Okay, seeing none in this room. City Clerk, do we have anyone online?

There are no hands raised at this time.

Thank you. I'll go ahead and entertain a motion at this time.

I move to adopt resolution 2026-53, a resolution renewing ordinance number 2022-09, which authorizes the department's military equipment use policy.

Second.

We have a first and a second. All those in favor, please vote. Item passes 5-0. Thank you very much. All right, next we'll go on to our closed session reports. City Attorney, anything to report?

Yes, Mayor. The City acquired a small piece of right-of-way from Able Industries for the Shirt Capacity Enhancement Project, and the details of that transaction are published on tonight's agenda in accordance with the Brown Act.

Wonderful, thank you. At this time, we'll go ahead and adjourn our meeting, and we welcome everyone to come back to our next meeting, which will be Monday, August 17th, 2026. Thank you very much.