| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:00.03 | Jill Hoffman | to the Regular meeting of the Sausalito City Council. for October 6, 2015. Lily, would you take the role? |
| 00:00:09.48 | Unknown | Councilmember Weiner. |
| 00:00:10.75 | Jill Hoffman | President. |
| 00:00:11.62 | Unknown | Council member Piper? Here. Council member Withey? |
| 00:00:14.53 | Jill Hoffman | here. |
| 00:00:14.88 | Unknown | Thank you. Vice Mayor Hoffman? Present. Mayor Theodoris? |
| 00:00:18.04 | Jill Hoffman | Present. Can we have Tom Riley who's sitting in the first row lead us into the pledge of allegiance please. |
| 00:00:23.34 | Unknown | please. |
| 00:00:28.97 | Tom Riley | you to the flag. and I just take so care. Thank you. Thank you. Father. |
| 00:00:44.80 | Jill Hoffman | Moving on. Our agenda is 1C and D. There was no closed session, so there were no announcements and no public comment on the closed agenda. On the... on the closed session items for item E approval of the agenda because we have the Veterans Administration presenting today and because one of their key presenters needs to leave early, I would like to move the the item 5A on the Veterans Affairs update on the machine shop to right after our special presentations, and then we'll move the rest of the agenda as is. Anyone have any issue with that? |
| 00:01:27.59 | Jill Hoffman | I move approval of the agenda is modified. Thank you. |
| 00:01:30.50 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 00:01:32.02 | Unknown | So |
| 00:01:32.34 | Jill Hoffman | and then we'll be back in the |
| 00:01:33.00 | Jill Hoffman | Oh favor. |
| 00:01:34.08 | Jill Hoffman | I passage unanimously. So we will now have our special presentation. Sausalito beautiful volunteer day. Shelby Van Meter. |
| 00:01:34.09 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 00:01:34.70 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:01:44.35 | Unknown | Thank you. Lauren arranged for this, and I want to say to Lauren, thank you for putting us on the agenda. On Saturday, the 10th, Sausalito Beautiful and the city of Sausalito are co-sponsoring the second beautification day. And this year, we're going to be working around Viena Del Mar Fountain Plaza. And we have about 40 volunteers who are coming to weed and sweep. and plant and mulch and compost. So that whole area, the landscaped area around Vina del Maro Plaza, by noon on Saturday should be looking really fine. So I think you were all invited to stop by, and some of you cannot, I know, because you have meetings. But we want some dignitaries there if possible. So that would be you. If you can come by about 9 o'clock, we'll introduce you. And I know the volunteers would love meeting you or seeing you. Some of them don't know much about the city. And I think this example of working together as a city and as a volunteer organization and a cooperative effort is really a wonderful thing. We at South Little Beautiful, as you know, are interested in being positive and in being helpful in some way that is constructive. That's been our premise from the very beginning. And so this, I think... is an example of showing on the ground work that reflects that. However, we do have bigger things in mind and we'll be talking with you more about that. We really look forward to getting the Civic Center phase one landscape project moving along now that it is funded. funded in June, so we're eager to begin helping you with that. And also the medians. We have some thoughts in our strategic planning process going on right now about how we can work with the city and really be of benefit in addressing the medians. We have a number of ideas, and Jonathan and I have discussed some of them. So we urge you to support us in encouraging the staff and everyone involved to address. these really important two big important locations that really reflect, we think, the health of our community. And I'm sure you agree you have other things to do, but we are here to say let's try to get that started when we can. So thank you, and if you can stop by on Beautification Day 2015, it would be lovely. That applies to everyone in the room. If you'd like to come by, I think we could still use a couple more volunteers. Nine o'clock at the plaza. Thank you for your time. Thanks for listening. |
| 00:04:20.88 | Jill Hoffman | Shelby, thank you. Thank you for all your work and all those in Sausalito Beautiful. And most of the council was at the first beautification day, and it was a lot of fun. So I encourage everyone to do it. And they're doing great work, and we're doing great work, because it's really a combination of Sausalito. and working closely with staff. So thanks for all the work of pulling it together. So see you Saturday. Thank you. Okay, now we move on to, um, Item business item five a and that's the veterans affairs update on the machine shop. Danny Castro, our community development director, will lead it off. |
| 00:05:20.06 | Unknown | Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. This is an update of the machine shop, a status update of the machine shop. I'll give a brief background. Representatives of the machine shop of the Department of Veteran Affairs met with city staff and members of the city council on an informational meeting to discuss upcoming activities concerning the machine shop building located at 25 Liberty Ship Way. This evening, Matthew Zetto, facility planner with the Department of Veteran Affairs, will present information concerning upcoming activities. And with him are other representatives of the VA Veteran Affairs, including Gitta Appal, she's the Director of Strategy and Research, Robin Flanagan, a planner, you Judy Chiri, Director of Public Affairs, and Jackie Post, the Veteran Administration Rural Property Specialist. I'll give you a brief background and then turn this over to Matthew Zetto. The machine shop is located at 25 Liberty Ship Way within the southern portion of the former Marinship property in Sausalito. |
| 00:06:36.83 | Unknown | The machine shop is an approximately 27,400-square-foot, two-story industrial building. It was built in 1942. It is closely associated with the production of Liberty ships and takers during World War II and is an example of an industrial building built from one of the emergency yards constructed in the Bay Area, San Francisco Bay Area, after Pearl Harbor. The machine shop is one of six industrial buildings and warehouses that survived from the era of the former Marinship Yard. |
| 00:07:14.06 | Unknown | The machine shop is located within the public institutional general plan land use designation and the public institutional zoning district, and within the Marinship Overlay Zoning District, It's federally owned. The property was listed on the local historic register in 2006 and is eligible for the National Register of Historic Places. That concludes my brief background and overview of the machine shop. This evening, no action is requested of the city council. I will now turn the presentation over to Matthew Zetto, the facility planner with the Department of Veteran Affairs, who will provide a presentation and an update on activities. |
| 00:08:06.81 | Matthew Zetto | Thank you for having us. Matthew Zito, facility planner, and this is Jackie Post. She's with VA Central Office in our Real Property Service Department. We're just here to give you an update on our current plans for in the short term and as well in our future planning for this. I'm gonna give the update on the short term. We do have the plan to mothball the building, which includes adding new siding and new roof to it, as well as replacing all the weight. |
| 00:08:35.92 | Jill Hoffman | Excuse me, did I ask you to speak in the microphone? Sorry about that. Because we are on television and telecast, so it's very important that we do. You don't have to link too closely, but make sure that it picks it up. Thank you. Perfect. |
| 00:08:37.91 | Unknown | Sorry about that. Because we are on television. |
| 00:08:43.48 | Matthew Zetto | Okay. to repeat that. We do have plans. Currently, we are working with Danny and we sent him the original mothball plans to replace the siding, the windows, as well as replacing the roof. And that is our current short term plan. I'm going to pass it on to Jackie how we're approaching the long term of this. |
| 00:09:06.58 | Jackie Post | Good evening, thank you for inviting us here to speak tonight. As Matt mentioned, the idea is just to open the door to having conversations with you all and with the community. |
| 00:09:13.35 | Matthew Zetto | THE |
| 00:09:19.50 | Jackie Post | about the status of the building at the Marin Shop, and to also talk about what some of our plans are. As Matt mentioned, we've developed both a short-term and a longer-term plan, As some of you know, Sausalito, this building is a standalone VA presence, and that's kind of unique for VA. in that most of our owned buildings are on campuses where we already have healthcare services and other benefits for veterans. Because there are no healthcare functions operating out of this location, for a multitude of reasons we don't have money beyond the current mothballing uh, I guess project to spend on this building in terms of capital dollars. So what we have done as an agency is uh, We've taken this location as a pilot project for a national program. Under the National Historic Preservation Act, essentially there is an authority for federal agencies that allows us to enter into long-term outleases or exchanges of property. and the idea here is to see if there are other folks in the community that might be interested in adapting the property for productive use instead of you know having it continue to sit vacant So as Matt mentioned, we do have a project that's funded and in process essentially to mothball the property. That's kind of our baseline. so that we can protect it from further deterioration. But what we're hoping to do and what we're running concurrent to that project is to move forward with this pilot that might allow folks in the community or in San Francisco at large to reuse the property. When I say reuse, please know that we've spoken with the California State Historic Preservation Office and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation and the Army Corps. some other folks to make sure that all of the stakeholders and all of our neighbors understand that we are hoping to have this building adapted to maintain the historic integrity of the building. And not just for the shipyard context, but also because it's important in the civil rights context as well. So we just wanted to kind of let everybody understand where we are. let you know that we've been running a feasibility study. Some of you all may have seen some of our folks at the site recently. and we hope to have the results from that study in. in the near future and we'll understand whether or not whether or not there might be interest in the community to redevelop it. And just to give you a little bit more detail, In addition to some of the stuff that Danny just mentioned, typically with historic buildings, you have site condition issues that you have to address. In this case, in addition to those typical issues and the fact that the building has deteriorated, there's also... environmental restrictions on the property. and the foundation needs to be basically redone. So those costs, are basically being examined in terms of what the current zoning is to see if there might be enough of an opportunity out there So if the feasibility study comes back and says that there might be interest out there and that it might be practical to redevelop the building, We'll come back and talk to you all about it and explore what that means. We wanna have informational meetings with other folks in the community as well. and potentially put a project out for competitive procurement, which would allow folks in the community to bid on reusing the property and we would work with everyone in terms of what that might mean for the scope of what that reuse would be, design meetings and the like. That's a little bit far down the road, but I'm sure there'll be questions about it, so I just wanted to get it out there. I'm not sure. And I just want to also apologize in advance. I took the latest flight out tonight, but I have to leave here at 8 to make it. So... but if anyone has any questions that we don't get to during this conversation, Matt is the primary point of contact for the Sausalito project, and we'll be sure to give you all his information so that we can follow up. Okay. Thank you. |
| 00:13:56.10 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Jackie and Matt. So we'll start off with questions from council. Who would like to start? |
| 00:14:02.09 | Jill Hoffman | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:14:02.31 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:14:02.35 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Good evening. Thank you for that update. You mentioned a feasibility study that you're conducting. Could you elaborate a little on its scope and timing? |
| 00:14:16.59 | Jackie Post | Sure, as part of that study, we wanted to understand what the property could be reused as in terms of what the current zoning allows for, what those environmental restrictions might prohibit. For example, it can't be reused for residential purposes. unless it's remediated and the like it also looks at the appraised value of the property the costs associated with reusing oh sorry is that better start to migrate, the costs associated with adapting the property for the items that I mentioned. And also because when it is adapted, it'll be to the Department of Interior standards for historic buildings, and that's a little bit more expensive in construction dollars than a regular construction project would be. Thank you. |
| 00:15:09.61 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:15:11.47 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 00:15:12.12 | Jill Hoffman | good evening thank you for coming thank you um what uh matt when is the when do you expect that the siding and the roof and the window work would be started and then completed |
| 00:15:12.29 | Unknown | Good evening. |
| 00:15:12.88 | Jackie Post | Thank you. |
| 00:15:13.81 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:15:25.30 | Matthew Zetto | That is all contingent on the. I mean the timeline and the feasibility but If that's the baseline, the start would be March 2016 is our planned start. |
| 00:15:37.08 | Jill Hoffman | When do you expect the feasibility study to be finished? |
| 00:15:40.00 | Matthew Zetto | We expect to have responses or excuse me, the final feasibility by the end of this month. |
| 00:15:46.35 | Jill Hoffman | Is there, you know, we're just getting ready to start our rainy season, so I would expect that some of the holes in the roof and the open windows and stuff will, if they're not at least patched before this rainy season starts, there'll be further damage. Is there any thought that you're going to do some temporary patches before the winter |
| 00:16:04.30 | Matthew Zetto | That will be discussed internally in our facility, but that will be something that will be brought up and have a high priority with our engineering department. |
| 00:16:11.02 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:16:14.54 | Jill Hoffman | Hold on, I'm sorry. I noticed in our packages, and this may be a question for Danny. Is Danny still in the room? Thank you. I noticed that there's... that there was an application for the National Historic Designation. that it's eligible for National Register of Historic Places, but it isn't actually designate as one yet even though we've designated locally in Sausalito as one. Do you anybody know what the status on that? I'm sorry, usually I let people know these questions from left field before the city council |
| 00:16:53.71 | Unknown | Jackie Post, she has probably more latest information. Okay, sure, yeah. |
| 00:16:56.41 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:16:56.43 | Jackie Post | Okay, sure, yeah, whoever knows. |
| 00:16:57.83 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:16:58.13 | Jackie Post | Um, in the microphone so we know that the city prepared a nomination and we appreciate that |
| 00:17:03.84 | Unknown | AND WE'RE GOING TO BE ABLE TO |
| 00:17:07.33 | Jackie Post | have been working internally with our federal historic preservation officers who handle managing the historic assets of the department nationwide. And she let us know that that nomination had the history regarding the Liberty ships, but it did not include the Civil Rights Era information. So what she wanted us to do was to essentially revise that nomination and move it forward in a complete sense to the SHPO. for the register. |
| 00:17:38.21 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 00:17:38.53 | Jackie Post | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:17:38.70 | Jill Hoffman | And so you guys are gonna take care of that or do we? |
| 00:17:41.23 | Jackie Post | As part of the process for the reuse of the building, we would ask that the folks that are bidding on that project take care of that nomination process. |
| 00:17:41.67 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:17:52.56 | Jackie Post | If. it's not feasible to move forward with that process or no one responds to our request for bids, then we'll speak with you about the best way to move forward. OK. Yeah. OK, thank you. |
| 00:18:08.23 | Unknown | Yes, so I want to thank you for your sincere efforts in preserving this beautiful, this building that's been neglected for so long. And I'm very hopeful that this funding will go through and we'll be able to restore it to, you know, its true character. I was also just wanted to confirm your comment that you were looking at current local zoning, which is very much appreciated. Is that correct? So your light industry and? Yes, that's correct. |
| 00:18:42.99 | Jackie Post | Yes, that's correct. Even though the property is exempt from zoning because it's owned by the federal government, we would ask that anyone working on the property coordinate very closely with the city and all of the entities within the city that would be important to understand such as fire police, that sort of thing. you know, if and when we get to that point, we'll make sure that we involve folks and informational sessions or design charrettes or whatever you know, whatever that ends up working out to be so that we incorporate folks, everyone's needs the best we can. |
| 00:19:22.70 | Unknown | Do you have a copy of the Marinship specific plan? |
| 00:19:26.09 | Jackie Post | I think we do, yes. And we also have copies of the information that the city put together, which was helpful as well. Thank you. |
| 00:19:34.65 | Unknown | And the feasibility study, what is the timeframe for that? |
| 00:19:39.36 | Jackie Post | So we're expecting to get the study, we're expecting for it to wind up in the next month. we do need to basically brief the senior leadership of the agency as far as the potential opportunities and the options based on the outcome of that study. So we hope to basically circle back with everyone in November. And that's what we've told the State Historic Preservation Office and the Advisory Council as well. |
| 00:20:08.40 | Unknown | Okay, thank you. Yeah, I have an opinion, but I'll save it for comments. |
| 00:20:13.70 | Unknown | Yeah, I got one question. Has most of the asbestos been removed from that building yet? Thank you. |
| 00:20:21.90 | Matthew Zetto | The siding has been, and there's no other known asbestos in there currently that we know of. But we go through the process of retesting. Okay, thank you. |
| 00:20:34.42 | Jill Hoffman | may ask and you said that the mothballing or the protection of the building won't start until March of 2016. Why the delay on that you're going to have the feasibility and you're going to be doing something with it. I think our can our main concern is that we protect this because it's obviously been neglected for years and whether it's when it's put on the register that can take some time, but certainly we don't want it deteriorate any more than it has so far. |
| 00:20:57.96 | Matthew Zetto | Thank you. We're anticipating that due to numerous, I mean, right now it's still in design. We're working, we sent, we're looking for comments back from the city, from Danny, as well as the SHPO letter. We've done a, started section 106 SHPO consultation for that particular mothballing project. And then once we have to factor in, once we get the complete design for that, we would have to go through our contracting process, which again takes, and we're factoring that timeline as well. |
| 00:21:35.51 | Jill Hoffman | I do have another question. And we appreciate your approach to this, which had been different from our perception of what was going on in years past, so we certainly welcome that. And but I was just wondering if you could comment on that. It looks like the VA owns the property and it's going to refurbish it and make it into its historic status hopefully depending on the feasibility study but you will use you will then lease it for other purposes and not use it for va for va purposes is that correct |
| 00:22:05.12 | Jackie Post | I'm not sure. Not necessarily. So the options, I mean, we're basically exploring all options because we want to understand what might be possible. But what we're thinking is that if folks want to |
| 00:22:08.03 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 00:22:08.28 | Unknown | So, |
| 00:22:19.75 | Jackie Post | adapt this building that they will look at what might get them revenue. And that could include public educational spaces, leases back to VA or to the city or to other folks in the community who might need space that have kind of made themselves known to us. And we would love to gather all of that information before we go out with the solicitation if we get to that point hopefully so that folks bidding on redeveloping this property understand what would make the most sense. Um, So that's really what it comes down to. I mean, we do need space in the short term, and that was something else we just wanted to make folks aware of. There are a lot of construction projects going on at our Fort Miley campus in San Francisco, so we may be putting up a couple of modulars because we'll need to decompress folks. in the short term, but that's not, that's only intended to be a short term solution. |
| 00:23:19.07 | Jill Hoffman | Before we go on your question, if we're going to open it up to public comment in a moment. And so would anyone who would like to make public comment on this or any other items, please fill out speaker cards that we have on the table. |
| 00:23:32.99 | Jill Hoffman | Jackie, this is probably a question for you. We had a meeting with a bunch of people back in August with Councilmember Withey and myself and you know, a big group of people from the VA. And at that meeting, you referenced the code citation under which this pilot program, and I didn't write that down. Do you happen to have that on the, and sort of give us a two or three sentence summary of how, you know, what that means. |
| 00:23:58.52 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:23:58.57 | Jackie Post | Sure. Sure, so the authority that we're using here, it comes from the National Historic Preservation Act from Section 111. of that act, section 110 requires that agencies protect and preserve historic property. Section 106 requires that we enter into consultations for projects or actions that might impact those properties. Section 111 allows agencies to enter into agreements to manage, outlease, or exchange. historic properties. So we're using Section 111, and that's what people term it. I can get back to you with the actual code citation, but if you Google that, it'll probably come up. And we spoke at length with the General Services Administration, DOD entities, to understand the extent to which they're using it and get some lessons learned. So just for some other folks in the room, there are some beautiful historic properties that have been adapted in the Washington, D.C. area. The old post office, for example, is being adapted by the Trump Hotel Organization. They ended up winning that process but it's a beautiful building that was basically very underutilized and costing a lot in terms of overhead. Thank you. |
| 00:25:17.92 | Unknown | I have a follow-up question. So with the feasibility study, are you going to include in that the criteria that you will use when you are weighing? In other words, it's not going to be like just highest and best use. You mentioned the current local zoning you're going to consider. So will criteria and selection be part of that feasibility study, or can you comment on that yet? |
| 00:25:48.75 | Jackie Post | So I think what you might be asking for would be in a solicitation that would go out to the community. But what the feasibility study will have is it'll look at the highest and best use as is in terms of the zoning and the environmental restriction and some other. compatible land use issues in the area. what the demand in the market is. They'll also look at the costs that I mentioned before, and they're going to do pro formas from a financial standpoint to understand if it's cost prohibitive for someone to reuse this or if someone could actually get financing, if it's possible to be done with private dollars. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:26:36.76 | Jill Hoffman | Well, now we'll open up the public comment. And I think I only have one speaker card. David Sudo is, or is this? THE END OF THE That's for the bike? Oh, general, not on agenda. Okay. Anyone else like to speak on this subject from the public? Okay, seeing none, we'll close public comment. We'll move on to council comment. Who would like to start? |
| 00:27:04.47 | Unknown | So I want to thank the VA for coming and presenting. I was here, what, about five years ago or something when we had a very different presentation. And so it's very, very nice to see the focus on legacy and historic preservation for this area and the architectural preservation of that character. I think that the key here is the preservation of the vision of the Marin ship as well in terms of the vision of local use, maritime services, light industry, focus on employment and jobs. And that is something that is, I think, very, very key because the Marinship was all about work. It was all, you know, and it provides important economic diversity for Sausalito in that regard. Thank you. |
| 00:28:00.73 | Jill Hoffman | I welcome you back to Sausalito as well and we're you know anytime you talk about the machine shop and the you're talking about something that's very central to our identity, I think, as Sausalito. And part of our history and our heritage has sort of been Lost which was is the story of the Marin ship and also I'm happy to see that you're including some of the civil rights aspects of it and the fact that it was a site a lot of equal opportunity for work during the Civil, sorry, during the World War II and that women and minorities were some of the integral workforces unlike other shipyards that, because we were the last one one of the last ones that was built. a very important part of our heritage and we're very happy to see that you're thinking about coming back and preserving that, and I hope that that's part of the vision as well. So, welcome back. you Thank you. |
| 00:28:51.73 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:28:52.99 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. I really have nothing to say other than a look forward to receiving and reading the feasibility report. |
| 00:29:04.92 | Jill Hoffman | I want to thank you both for coming and really thanking you and all of the VA for the different approach for being sensitive to local concerns. and our historic preservation. So it's really wonderful. Looking forward to working with you and making that It's a special spot, it's a special building to make it something important for all of us, so we really appreciate that. And so thank you again. And we look forward to, feasibility study and we encourage you to make sure that all steps are taken to preserve it. That's our probably our biggest concern right now. So that, you know, we can work from there, but if it starts deteriorating, you know, we don't want to lose it in any way. |
| 00:29:38.67 | Unknown | I do have one more comment really quickly is I'm wondering if you could both send us your contact information Just send the whole council perhaps an email with your contact Yeah, you can go through city staff. Yeah, okay great. Thanks |
| 00:29:40.77 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:29:52.58 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:29:52.73 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:29:52.91 | Unknown | You can go through. |
| 00:29:53.94 | Jill Hoffman | City staff. Well thank you very much, now you have a half hour. Schmitty's is down the road, so you have time for a beer before you leave. Well, thank you again. Thank you very much for your time. And it's very important, and I'm sure when there's more detail, we'll be taking more time. Thank you so much. |
| 00:30:03.70 | Unknown | TODAY. |
| 00:30:04.04 | Unknown | Well, thank you again. Thank you. |
| 00:30:05.77 | Jackie Post | Thank you very much for your time and support. Absolutely. Thank you so much. Thank you. |
| 00:30:12.58 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:30:12.79 | Jackie Post | you |
| 00:30:22.99 | Unknown | Let's see. |
| 00:30:25.33 | Jill Hoffman | we move on to item two public communications. This is the time for the city council to hear from citizens regarding matters that are not on the agenda. except in very limited situations, state law precludes the council from taking action or engage in discussions concerning items of business that are not on the agenda. However, the council may refer matters not on the agenda to city staff. direct that the subject be agendized for a future meeting. So I think I have David Sudo not on the agenda. |
| 00:30:56.77 | Tom Riley | Hi, David Sudo, 411 Locust. I'm not sure why somebody else is in here talking about this, but I've been talking to people about things like Measure F this week and last week, and something that seems that tourism is even a bigger hot topic around here. I'm sure if you've kept up with Nextdoor, you've seen a lot of posts. And I would just like to see the city council maybe consider refocusing one or more of the current committees. I think the big opportunity would be to refocus the hospitality committee and maybe make it a hospitality and tourism management committee and maybe breathe some new life into it. You know, PVAC has had some new life managing the bicycles in town, and the sustainability committee has turned from just kind of managing garbage contracts to doing a lot more in town, and maybe, you know, one of these other committees could take on some tourist topics, because I think that's not a forum currently in the city to discuss these issues. So they're being taken place in informal places and things like that and maybe not producing productive results. So I guess that's basically one that I wanted to talk about. Maybe my big suggestion would be adding a couple of residents who are not business people in town to one of these committees and then getting some input just so that we can see some movement in planning for our future. Thank you. |
| 00:32:39.79 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Keto Carp... Pinsky, is this an item not on the agenda? Okay, thank you. Please. Thank you. |
| 00:32:51.71 | Unknown | This is about. you pop out. And. going back to the original meeting when it was put on the ballot. And everyone... on the council other than Linda Pfeiffer were shocked by Pat Zook having to implore you to remember that 1128 existed. and that this is a democracy. that we get to vote. on important matters, and certainly one in which you're taking an $8 million loan out Thank you. on MLK. with no plans of real any sort, and using buzzwords like kids in parks, WHEN In fact, We have less than 200 kids in this town. of which maybe 25 years are the ones that use Robin Sweeney Park. So we're putting 1.2 million. for 25 kids. I know there's other things involved there, But the point is, that's how many kids there are. I read in the paper yesterday that Theodorus had the to say there's younger families moving here. Is there someplace they check in and tell you they're moving in? They're younger. This town has always had kids, but it's not a go-to place, particularly now in the current financial climate, for people with families. This is not what Sausalito is about. It's had them. My son grew up here. Other friends of my sons did as well. It's a great, great town. But the... Going back to the parks, the parks, such as Sweeney or cross-street At Dunphy, I was there every day for 10 years at the cruising club. Every day. The only people in that club other than the three or four special events or the anchor outs, which is no problem. And when Jennifer Tata was here, she cleaned up the issues that we had with them. and the violence she's got now. spending money And using this French-American school as the the payback. when their lease is up in five years, anything can happen at that point. The economy can go south at that point. The economy can go south at any time. And then what are you going to do? You came in with no plans. Everybody seems to have their hand out for something in this whole deal. I noticed that You finally got something on the IN THE today. which is another issue I want to talk about real quick. This is a great deal. was sent. around. And it's with the South Lado city seal. along with the currents doing the same Pro-F articles on parks and shrouding them in this informative sort of jargon when in fact it's all pro-f. And I called the Fair Practice Political Commission today They told me they didn't handle that, but the district attorney should. because it's a clear misuse of funds. It's not fair. And it's illegal. for you to be siding with them. Thank you. |
| 00:35:56.64 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Anyone else on item on not on the agenda? day. closing that we'll move on to item 3 a minutes of the regular City Council meeting of September 15 2015. Do we have any comments or corrections to those minutes? I think we had a minor correction to item 5A. Is that correct, Lily? Or? Or? |
| 00:36:22.54 | Unknown | There was the addition of the word with. |
| 00:36:25.02 | Jill Hoffman | with and on five there was just if you look at the um uh other than that can I have a motion to approve |
| 00:36:32.33 | Jill Hoffman | Move to approve the minutes as corrected. Thank you. |
| 00:36:35.27 | Jill Hoffman | Exactly. All in favor? Aye. Passes 5-0. Move on the consent calendar. |
| 00:36:37.32 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 00:36:42.34 | Jill Hoffman | Matters listed under the consent calendar are considered routine and non-controversial, require no discussion, are expected to have unanimous council support, and may be enacted by the council in one motion in the forum. listed. There will be no separate discussion of consent calendar items. However, before the council votes, I have a motion to adopt the consent calendar. items, council members, city staff, or members of the public may request that specific items be removed from the calendar for separate actions. Do we have a motion to approve? Or do we have any comments on the consent calendar at this point? |
| 00:37:15.29 | Unknown | I have a quick question about item B. 4B, who would I direct that question to? |
| 00:37:20.98 | Jill Hoffman | Jonathan? 4B? I believe so. |
| 00:37:32.17 | Unknown | So 4B is the sewer project. And I just had a question about that. I know we have the EPA mandates and we've had just, what, 10 months ago, we had a tax increase, a fee increase on property for sewers, second time in five years. What is the total, do we know the total amount that we're aiming for in terms of how much money we need to fix our sewers? To meet all the mandates and to get it done. Because I remember when we discussed the two earlier fee increases, the message was that this would move us forward and satisfy EPA, but not meet you know, the total requirements. So I'm just wondering, and you don't have to answer right now. You can say, you can get back to me on that, but. |
| 00:38:34.62 | Jonathon Goldman | Thank you. Jonathan Goldman, your public works director and city engineer. First of all, let me correct something that I may have misheard that you said about how many times we've raised sewer fees in the last five years. We have raised them twice since I've been here, and I've been here longer than five years. So we've not raised them twice in the last five years. Then in more direct answer to your question, we don't know how much fixing everything is going to cost. Because that's not the way we go about the process of figuring out, of prioritizing what needs to be done. We focus on the highest priority projects, and that, for example, is why the project that's before you this evening is here, is that it was identified as an urgent project several years ago, and the funding available at the time was inadequate to deliver the project. So, unfortunately, I can't tell you how much it would cost to replace all of the sewer infrastructure in the city that needs to be replaced. |
| 00:39:44.84 | Unknown | So thank you, Jonathan. And I do stand corrected. I think the first increase was in 2009. So I guess that was, and the second one was in 2014, I think, correct? So I think that's more like six or seven years. But anyway, in that ballpark. So your answer is that right now we only have the price scoping for the urgent or high priority projects, sewer projects. We don't, as opposed to the full scope of the problem. |
| 00:39:56.09 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:39:56.11 | Jill Hoffman | MAKING A LITTLE BIT OF A |
| 00:39:56.40 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:40:16.84 | Unknown | you Thank you. |
| 00:40:17.43 | Jonathon Goldman | I think it's a good thing. Thank you. Yes, except, as you may recall from the last rate increase that council proposed and the Prop 218 process resulted in the increase on, we have a long list of priority capital projects that was originally identified shortly after we received the EPA administrative order. And as time has gone on, as we do on a regular basis, we revisit those projects and the cost estimates that we have associated with those projects. So I don't remember. I think there were on the order of 10 priority projects that were identified with this last rate increase that we did have cost estimates for. But that's only those 10 projects. Those 10 projects don't represent complete reconstruction of the sewer infrastructure. |
| 00:41:29.11 | Unknown | Thank you, Jonathan. So that answer, I have a lot more questions, and I don't want to take up more of your time, because then we start going into pulling this item. But I'll follow. |
| 00:41:39.57 | Jonathon Goldman | You're welcome to ask me questions any time. The item before you this evening is a request to award a contract for construction and for construction management and construction inspection associated with that particular urgent project. |
| 00:41:58.47 | Unknown | Yeah, I understand. So I'll follow up. Thank you. |
| 00:42:03.94 | Jill Hoffman | before we make a motion do we have any comments from the public on the consent calendar would anyone from the public like to consent on any of those items Okay, scene 19. And we have a motion here or any other questions from council? |
| 00:42:19.50 | Unknown | So moved on the motion. |
| 00:42:23.16 | Jill Hoffman | And the motion is to approve the consent calendar, item four, A through E, I believe. We have a second. |
| 00:42:28.43 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:42:28.48 | Jill Hoffman | Second. |
| 00:42:29.17 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. We do this by acclamation all in favor. Thank you. Aye. That passes five zero. |
| 00:42:32.63 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:42:32.64 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 00:42:35.50 | Jill Hoffman | And then we move on to. item 5B. Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee progress record with the chairman of the pedestrian and bicycle advisory committee chair Ed Foch and Captain John Rohr Barker of our police department. |
| 00:42:56.18 | Ed Fotch | Good evening. |
| 00:43:08.17 | Ed Fotch | We have a... I think, an update for you tonight. And I just wanted to preface my comments. First of all, thanks for the time. I want to preface my comments by saying that tonight's update is not exhaustive of all the work of the Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee, but it's really focused on progress made specifically vis-a-vis rental bikes this past year and some very specific asks for the following year. A lot, if you look at this, attempt at a graphic here. A lot of the focus in Salt Slita was on the number of bikes that come into town and that's clearly a factor. One of the things I learned running an emergency department that I had, and when I had 10 rooms, I'd keep rooms free. And to do that, you either had to control the number of people who come in, which turns out to be difficult in an emergency department, or you control the number of people who leave, which we called triage and a lot of focus has been on how many bikes come in. But as you'll see tonight, we also have some issues with what happens when bikes get here and also what happens when they try to leave as it relates to controlling the number of bikes that come in. I think our committee has looked at a number of options and the ones that sort of jumped to mind Our staging, which we've discussed before, both at our committee and at the council, and also limiting areas for parking. We don't have a lot of other arrows in our quiver. They're public streets and these are vehicles that are, or these are bicycles are considered vehicle, as we understand it, under the California vehicular code so they can ride in the public streets. It's tough to, Just say no. The second thing we can do is manage them when we're in town, and I'm pleased to say we've made a fair amount of progress there. So how do you do that? You do that with organization and ambassadors, with education, in our case with valet service and valet parking, with ordinances and with enforcement. And I think we've made substantial progress on that largely thanks to the collaboration between the city and the ambassador program. But there's also the issue of how people exit from town. And I think, as most of the folks here in town know, bike visitors leave or try to leave mostly on our ferries, either the Blue and Gold Ferry or the Golden Gate Ferry Service. So what we'd like to do is get your assistance with trying to improve the egress of bikes from Saucyut because we really have some challenges there. And the way to approach that we think is through organization, education, engagement, and frankly increasing capacity, either increasing capacity through increased efficiency of existing ferries or by adding ferry capacity. And all of these things take resources. None of this stuff just happens on its own. So we have to look at means for paying for whatever we have in mind. Despite the the improvement to the bike tourism industry challenges we have this year, we do have a wish list, but we start with our sort of top 10 list of accomplishments for this year. So the ambassador program staffed on an average day 12 ambassador locations, starting on the south end of town and leading up to Tracy Way, and that was seven days a week, typically 10 or 11 in the morning until six or seven in the evening. I think everyone in town knows that the number of bikes on the sidewalks, both riding and parking, has been reduced dramatically. I think that's also an issue of collaboration between the city and and the ambassadors. I would say that without being able to put hard data on it, I think there's a sense in town when you see a combination of some more senior people and some young kids in vests, controlling, parking, and otherwise organizing the bikes, that there's a sense in town that something is being done. To accomplish this, over 35 ambassadors had to be trained with training materials and obviously insurance and workman's comp and so on and so forth, Over 30 summer jobs were created for local folks. And I'll just say this, that these aren't hamburger flipping jobs. These are actually good jobs. I wish these jobs were available when our kids were of that age, because you're engaging people. I mean, you've got 17-, 18-year-olds, 20-year-olds engaging 40-, 50-year-olds, 60-year-olds, 70-year-olds from Europe and from Asia. You're in a position of authority. They want to know where to go. They want to know where to eat. And you're really squaring these people up, so I think it's an excellent a job particularly for young people to get some experience in communicating with the public. The valet program, as I'll discuss just a little bit, was very successful. I know I stood before you and said, oh, yeah, sure, people will pay for parking on Tracy Way. But the truth of the matter is no one had done that before. So I will share with you that I and others were sitting down there the first day that that opened up. hoping to God that someone would pay for bike parking on Tracy Way Um, It was appreciated though not just for parking. It was appreciated because there's bike security. There's somebody there watching the bikes. It's also appreciated. because By my count, roughly four out of five people who park there then ask one of our ambassadors where's a good place to take a picture of? Or where's a good place to get a smoothie? Or, Where's a good place to get beer on tap? And so there's a concierge component of this. that I think added to the value, and as a result of that, as of this week, that valet parking services generated roughly $140,000 I'll say that that's year to date, but let's recall that we didn't start charging until June 15th, or actually just after that, So on a run rate basis, If you operated this from the beginning of the year, it's roughly a $200,000 a year top line effort. Along the way, obviously, you create training materials, standard operating procedures, and things that will support this effort going forward, assuming it does go forward. And very importantly, there was zero safety issues associated with ambassadors. We still had the cuts and bruises and scrapes and people coming into town and bikes that fall over on the way. Now, that's the good news. The bad news is that even with the ambassadors on a busy day, This is the scene at the end of El Portel. We have a whole bunch of folks. that unfortunately for locals can be a combination of local folks as well as visitors who are trying to get on one of our ferries to get into San Francisco and simply aren't able to do so. Now, the congestion on El Portel and Tracy Way was improved, and the ambassadors working with the police were able to clear these kinds of things. But the reality is that on a typical busy day, there's a mismatch between the ferry outflow and the demand to get back to San Francisco that is measured in hundreds of bikes. So, we're going to be talking about the ferry. It's typically cleared out by the end of the day, either because someone waits and gets the seven plus ferry or the eight o'clock ferry, and oftentimes, you It's because people take a taxi. The way to think about those taxis that you see queuing up in town is that THE challenges with leaving this town are so bad that people pay to get out of here. That's the only way to equate it. A group of four pays $80 to $100, typically $20 a bike, but there's some AT TIMES. uh peak pricing uh escalation but think in terms of 20 bucks to get out of here and and that's a real indication that we're not being adequately served and when i say we it's it's all of us it's it's the tourists it's the locals because when the tourists can't get out of town they have to go someplace and the someplace that they go is our streets our sidewalks and our parks So because of that, we have a relatively detailed two and a half page plan that was part of your packet And what I'm trying to provide here is sort of a nod to David Letterman, just start without the humor. Our sort of top ten list for the things that we are hoping to see put in place for next year. And the key, and the reason that I was really glad to get time on your very busy schedule tonight is, if we don't get started now, this stuff won't be in place for next year. Spring break is right around the corner and that's when the bikes start to roll in earnest. Or as Herb often points out, if the weather stays warm in November and December, it's anyone's guess as to when the bikes start to reduce. So I'm taking these one at a time. You'll see in that detailed plan a suggestion not only to get the bike loops that we removed back in the downtown to install more of them. One of the things we heard from residents is I like to be able and I like to be able to ride downtown in the morning. get some groceries. get a cup of coffee at Starbucks, go wherever, park my bike adjacent to the shop, and leave. And I get the fact that at 2 o'clock in the afternoon, That may not be a very good idea. But at eight o'clock in the morning or nine o'clock in the morning, it's a small town. Why can't us locals just park there? So the concept here, is to put in more bike loops. but use those bike loops for what the public works folks, or I guess Jonathan is blamed for this, slip over them what they're calling a cozy, which turns the bike loop into a sign that says during these hours, which I've defined in the revised bike parking ordinance as peak our signs. So during the non-peak hours, which is before 11 and after 7 o'clock during the warm weather months, Locals get to park. adjacent to the shops. But during the peak times, these essentially turn into Thank you. direction for bike visitors, please park only in designated spots. And the concept here would be that the ambassadors or some staff but the ambassadors for now would take over the job of covering these these uh... bike loops with the cozies associated with that is to revise the current bike ordinance to allow Saucelito residents to conveniently park their bikes during the non-peak hours. and have more places for them to do it. And in your packet, with suggested language for revising the current ordinance. Amen. Along along lines of parking again, and I know we discussed this last time I was here, we really need to enforce our bike parking ordinance. We need to do it for a number of reasons. It's principally because our streets and sidewalks can still, and definitely our parks, can still be loaded with bicycles And we wouldn't tolerate, frankly, cars parking in Vina Del Mar Park. But when you get 20 or 30 bikes in there, I can guarantee you that it has an impact on the grass and the grounds and the vegetation and so on and so forth. It's also hard to explain to one group of people why they're paying $3 when someone else is locking their bike to the fence on the outside of the $3 parking. We managed through that this year, you know, preferably not next year. on the flip side of that, our free bike parking that we offer currently is relatively disorganized. It's sort of a hodgepodge of here and there. And that's less a complaint than a reality of this had to be put in place in a relatively short period of time at the shank of this season. But I think for next year what we have to say is outside of the immediate downtown, where we have space, where can we create an organized bike parking area and appropriate signage to it? I think it's the fair thing to do. I know it's going to take some resources to do it, but right now we sort of say go north and look, and there's some racks up there someplace, and that's not ideal directions for local, much less for a visitor. If you've been downtown, you've seen orange vest people and you've seen yellow vest people. And we really need to have an organized single entity. running the whole show down there. Not only because you need to get the same answer no matter what color vest person you speak to, but also because you can actually be much more efficient in your use of resources. I'll give you an example of that. At one and two o'clock in the afternoon, you need a lot of people parking bikes because that's typically where you have high volumes and you don't really have many people waiting in line for a ferry yet. At four and five o'clock, you have few people parking bikes and you have loads of people waiting in line. if you had people that were under single management, they would be allocated where the need is, which shifts over time. without doing what we do now, which is the Yellow Vestor staff for their peak time the Orange Vestler staff for their peak time So I think consolidating that would be the intelligent thing to do. Also along those lines, if you are a visitor to this town and you come down El Portel and you say, Thank you. Where do I get a ferry ticket? you'll be pointed 100 yards 70 yards in one direction. If you say, where do I park? you'd be paying for parking, pointed 70 yards in another direction. If you say, where do I get my boarding pass so I can queue for the ferry, you'd be pointed back to where you started. The kiosks that were used to pay for valet parking or another kiosk vendor could certainly be programmed so that someone can come in and get a ferry ticket. And as we'll talk about, a ferry queuing card or a peak boarding fee and pay for their parking. And I don't think that's unreasonable. And frankly, it would help us. Because here's what really happens. A group of four, sometimes six or eight people come down to El Pertel and stand in the middle One person says, I'll go get the tickets. And they stand and wait. And then they come back. And then another person says, well, I'll get in line for the ferry. And because it's not organized, we end up with more congestion that only amplifies the fact that our ferry service is not able to get the bikes out in the time frame that our visitors would like. to fund this including everything on the list from personnel to kiosks and so on and so forth. We've worked and I should mention the plan that we have in front of you today, the more detailed plan, we wrote in collaboration with Alicia, who's the non-voting member of the pedestrian bike committee because we thought it was really important to get their input into this. So our suggestion is to institute a $2 Peak bike boarding fee You may recall way back in the day, this was the starting point for how to generate revenue to cover some of the cost to Sausalito. THE FAMILY. come back full circle on this, we think that this is very doable, frankly being on the front lines at least dozens if not hundreds of hours. I can speak, I think, to some extent for the bike visitors they would die to pay $2. to have a better organized experience in this town. They already pay 20 bucks a head to get out of here because it's disorganized. This is not, in my opinion, going to take a huge pushback as long as there is value that's created. And again, not just value to the visitors, but value to us. If we get an extra two or 300 people out of here, in the middle of the afternoon. on the busy days, life would be not only nicer for them, but nicer for us. I think we have to immediately engage the ferry service and, in my opinion, the PUC, in improving the ferry service, either get more ferries in here or take the existing ferries and make them more efficient. It is in no way, let me flip it around, it's extremely common that ferries leave Sausalito and they're not full. They're not full because it takes too long to board the bikes. It takes too long to board the bikes because the ferries frankly aren't really designed for bikes. And very importantly, because no one on that ferry is grabbing those bikes, and parking them and moving them down the line. And the average person may be could park a bike efficiently. But these are lines. So it goes by definition at the speed of the slowest person in the line. And there's a hypertext link there that would take you to a video that I posted on YouTube and it's not. Thank you. If time permits, I'll show it to you, but I'll describe it to you and then we'll circle back if you're dying to see a video, but what it shows is people moving very efficiently down the ferry ramp. And I'm in no way suggesting we don't need a new ferry terminal. And I'm in no way suggesting we do need a new ferry terminal. I have no opinion on the subject. But the point is that the slowdown occurs at the door of the ferry because the bulkheads and the interiors of the ferry simply aren't designed for bikes. The solution to that is obviously you could get new ferries, but a near-term solution is to get some people on there grabbing those ferries and parking them. Now I will share with you at the beginning of the season I ask, because I commute a lot in the ferries, some of my friends who working the ferries, hey, what if a couple ambassadors just jumped on there and just ripped it? Just parked those bikes. Well, it's a great idea, but it's a union shop, so we can't do that. Which, okay. But. That's their issue. is we need more ferry capacity. Because as it backs up, it backs up unto us. It's kind of like Jonathan's sewer problem. It backs up and it backs up and we're the sewage treatment plant and it's all stuck here. We need to move this out of here either. more efficiency on the current ferries, or let's get another vendor in. And as some of you know, we've had vendors say they'll do just-in-time, take 50 bikes at a time. I don't think this is going to change unless we move now to engage at least the ferry service, and in my opinion, to go to the PUC. not by the way to go to the PUC and say we need more ferries. We say here's our problem, tell our current ferry THE END OF THE END OF THE vendors to solve it. Either that or open it up to others. Two last things. There's a lot of data that the ambassadors collected this year. You can, if you're morbidly bored, you could know on an hourly basis how many bike visitors came in for the last 100 days. It's very valuable for the Ambassador program going forward because it helps with staffing. It's extremely valuable, in my opinion, when you start talking about actual hard data on year-over-year growth of bike visitors, which is something we've struggled with at our committee. And as of next year, we're going to have more of that information. The last thing that we request, and these are all requests of council, hopefully direct staff to come up with a more concrete plan, is to send a letter to the Park Service and get a little pressure to get a hard date for the opening of Vista Point Trail. A Vista Point Trail is absolutely key to any possibility for bike staging in Fort Baker, which could reduce the number of bikes that come into Sausalito by order of magnitude 500 bikes, if done well. But as it is now... five days a week, majority of the bike visitors are rolling right down Alexander Avenue and it would be a Herculean task to get them to turn around and go into Fort Baker or worse yet try to find a place to park hundreds of bikes and run trailers in and out of Sausalito, something we begged for an RFP and got nothing from the bike committee. So a lot of accomplishments, good news on that front, and some very concrete tactical asks for next year, both to move toward fewer bikes coming in through staging and parking, to better manage the bikes that are here, to also free up our sidewalks for locals to park. when they, want to enjoy the, their town, and then to look at how we create a more efficient process and let these poor people out of our misery. Thank you. |
| 01:03:52.53 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Captain Rohrabacher, are you part? |
| 01:03:55.77 | Ed Fotch | Thank you. |
| 01:03:55.97 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:03:57.59 | Ed Fotch | you |
| 01:03:57.64 | Jill Hoffman | Anything to present or are we moving into questions? |
| 01:03:57.83 | Ed Fotch | Anything to present? |
| 01:03:58.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:03:59.14 | Ed Fotch | Yeah. |
| 01:04:03.85 | Jill Hoffman | Would you like to say anything or we move right into questions? |
| 01:04:11.95 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, let's do that. Let's do your report, and then we'll take our questions at that point. |
| 01:04:28.32 | John Rohrbacher | Grimlin three. |
| 01:04:34.78 | John Rohrbacher | Good evening, Vice Mayor, members of the council. I'm John Rohrbacher, captain of the police department. Before I present my brief financial report, I just want to say on behalf of the department how much we appreciate all the work done by the Sausalito Plus ambassadors. It made a significant difference in the experience for the visitors coming to Sausalito and actually helped us with not having to respond to quite so many complaints or calls for service to deal with the congestion. Alright. before the August break, The council had asked, I think, on at least two occasions to have some type of. of financial status reports and so I prepared one for tonight however just based on the timing of it, This report is only through August 31st. However, time marches on and there's more statements of revenue and expenses coming in. So it's really just a snapshot. So we tried to capture the initial startup costs with equipment, the rental of the kiosks, the revenue taken in, and so far through August, it shows that we're just below breaking even on revenues and expenses. If you see the report at your file, I can answer questions about those expenses if you have any, people from Sal Cuito Plus could answer in more detail. If you have any other questions from me about the report, I'm happy to answer them, or anything related to what we did related to congestion management. But we'll be providing a more detailed report, of course, at the close of our operations later after October. Thank you. |
| 01:06:18.50 | Jill Hoffman | I have a question just on the financial. Is that okay? |
| 01:06:21.42 | Jill Hoffman | We'll open up. |
| 01:06:22.21 | Jill Hoffman | That was fine. |
| 01:06:23.53 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:23.58 | Jill Hoffman | you |
| 01:06:23.85 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:23.91 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:23.95 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:23.97 | Jill Hoffman | And then... |
| 01:06:24.17 | Unknown | Now, |
| 01:06:24.51 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:24.66 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:24.69 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. We'll start off with, I just didn't know if you were asking. There is your whole your reports complete. So now we can open it up to questions. I didn't want to. Okay. Now. |
| 01:06:31.24 | Jill Hoffman | or |
| 01:06:36.71 | Jill Hoffman | Thanks. So it looks like from what I saw in the report and from the sort of the revenue rate, the revenue generating rate, it looks like we're going to, because we started so late in the season, I think it was June 21st, we were a little bit behind when we started collecting revenue. But now it looks like at the end of the season, we've caught up by about $8,000, it looks like every month, positive. And so it looks like by the end of September, by the end, we shut off Sassaloo Plus. We'll at least be at the break-even point, if not a little bit ahead. |
| 01:07:07.94 | John Rohrbacher | I think we're already actually at that point. I was looking at the September revenues and expenses, and it already makes up that difference. Okay. And as we continue to October, it's probably going to improve. |
| 01:07:07.97 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. THE CITY. Okay. |
| 01:07:14.02 | Unknown | Okay. Oh, great. |
| 01:07:16.89 | John Rohrbacher | even more but you're right we did have a late start in collecting money And, you know, we have a lot of first-year costs that factor in that will be able to be used again, you know, some of the same equipment next year. So some of that will come in the – explain in the final report. |
| 01:07:30.98 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, great. |
| 01:07:32.98 | Jill Hoffman | We will have the final report scheduled for November 17th. Thank you. |
| 01:07:37.79 | Adam Politzer | Thank you. |
| 01:07:37.81 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:07:37.83 | Adam Politzer | I don't know. |
| 01:07:38.13 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:07:38.62 | Adam Politzer | Yeah, I mean at this point tentatively in November and depending on which items move forward or back, it'll either be at the beginning of November or the end of November, so the 10th or the 17th. |
| 01:07:49.94 | Jill Hoffman | So with questions, why don't we see if there are any other questions of Captain Murbacher before we move on to other type questions. |
| 01:07:56.17 | Unknown | Yes, I have a question. So regarding, you mentioned police staff down at El Partel and Tracy. And if we look at the summer months, if we were to look at the scheduling and the hours and the number of times police were down there, did that time for police staff increase this past summer or decrease from last year? |
| 01:08:27.22 | John Rohrbacher | You know, actually, I just have to say sort of anecdotally, since I didn't prepare any, you know, stats like that, but I believe that we had far less, and I mean far less calls for service in the area of Upper Town Traceway because of the presence of the Saucyuta Plus ambassadors. And so that really prevented a lot of problems, rather than us having to respond after. Last summer, we were, There every single day. including, of course, the weekends, a lot of schedule readjustments to make that happen. And this year, we did not have to do that. |
| 01:08:59.35 | Unknown | I have a follow-up question. So you mentioned calls for service. Is that the only time you go down to spend time downtown with regards to the rental bikes? Is the call for service? Do you? OK. |
| 01:09:12.55 | John Rohrbacher | No, the patrol officers swing by all the time, the parking officers swing by all the time. They're always looking for anything that might look like it needs a little bit of attention. And of course, you know later in late August, then we brought on the extra parking enforcement officer part-time to help out through late or mid-September. |
| 01:09:32.02 | Unknown | We had an extra staff down there. Yes. Okay, so Would you given that extra staff did that I? Mean that's that's an extra body that we had this year over last year. Is that correct? |
| 01:09:35.35 | John Rohrbacher | Yes. |
| 01:09:47.07 | John Rohrbacher | It is an extra person, yes. |
| 01:09:48.68 | Unknown | Okay, thank you. |
| 01:09:52.12 | John Rohrbacher | Thank you. |
| 01:09:52.14 | Jill Hoffman | Any other questions of Captain Murbacher? you Okay, any other questions? Start off, we'd like to... Thank you. Thank you. No questions from council? Sure. Let's start off. I have more questions. All right, let's start off with the vice mayor. |
| 01:10:03.51 | Jill Hoffman | I'm not sure. |
| 01:10:04.02 | Unknown | at startups. |
| 01:10:04.56 | Unknown | We know we have balances. |
| 01:10:05.79 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:10:05.80 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 01:10:05.87 | Jill Hoffman | All right, let's start. Let's start off with the vice mayor. Thank you. I'll just start with an easy one. Ed, you talked about Alicia from the pedestrian and bike committee, but she's from the Marin County. The Marin County Bicycle Coalition? Yes. |
| 01:10:21.13 | Ed Fotch | Yes, if I didn't mention that, she's a non-voting member of the Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee, but she's with the Marin Bike Coalition. |
| 01:10:22.29 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:10:31.34 | Jill Hoffman | And do I have it right that that committee is usually the committee that advocates on behalf of bicyclists and— preserving the three ways for bicyclists to ride through town. |
| 01:10:42.24 | Ed Fotch | Yes, I don't know their formal mandate, but I believe informally that they represent the interests of bicyclists. And as Alicia points out, they try to represent the interests of not just their members and locals but anyone who is on a bicycle. |
| 01:10:56.19 | Jill Hoffman | great and so she and she helped you come up with these recommendations for the council |
| 01:11:00.26 | Ed Fotch | Yeah, she helped edit the document and was very much involved. I think we had probably six or seven REVs that we went through. And I'll paraphrase, you know, her focus is on understanding the challenges we have now in making things better. I think she understands that the status quo is really tough. And frankly, it's tough on their members too, if you look at their members who try to bike through town. |
| 01:11:00.90 | Jill Hoffman | Right. |
| 01:11:23.46 | Ed Fotch | It's a mess. and their members who try to use the ferry for commuting, including me, are very disadvantaged, particularly if you've got a business meeting in the afternoon. In fact, I hope this lady's watching. This lady came up to me, and she missed her ferry. She wasn't even on a bike. They took so long, and it was about a 3 o'clock ferry, and they just cut it off because the Golden Gate Ferry Service. had to get on and she was very distraught. She was missing her meeting and so on and so forth. So my point is that I think Alicia is trying to represent not just to make sure that things are fair for bike visitors, but also for locals who bike. And you'll see some of the things in here. Obviously, they love the fact that there's going to be more bike loops downtown. They think that better organized, free bike parking further north in town is a good trade for some of this stuff. Consolidating the tickets into one machine obviously makes sense. And you take all these things together, and it costs money, and she gets that. And so this is a bit of a quid pro quo issue. I would assume that if the city moves forward with that, that the Marin Bike Coalition will either take no position, i.e. not opposed, which is not ideal, but will take it. or would endorse the plan. Thanks. |
| 01:12:45.19 | Unknown | Yes, I have some questions. Thank you. Thank you. So my question, I guess, first regarding the bike loops. So what prompted your committee to remove the bike loops in the first place? Because it's my understanding they were installed with a grant, correct, and removed. And correct me if I'm wrong. I could be incorrect on that. |
| 01:13:13.30 | Ed Fotch | So to my knowledge, and Jonathan would know, there used to be a couple, but it could be three, bike loops right in the middle of the downtown, right at Princess and Bridgeway. And I don't know how they were funded. Their existence predates our committee. We recommended that they be removed because they were being jammed with tourist bikes, often locked six, seven, eight bikes and completely blocking the sidewalks. And we just, even with the ambassadors, we didn't have the horsepower to stop that from happening. And obviously you can't have police stationed next to it. And it was very difficult to figure out how to educate these tourists, some of whom have very limited English skills, Certain bikes can park there, but not other bikes can park there. And so we suggested for those, I think it was two, but it could have been three loops to be removed. And in retrospect, I can answer the question differently. We weren't smart enough then to come up with the cozy idea that we have before you today. |
| 01:14:15.00 | Unknown | So is the city being reimbursed for the expenses of taking those loops out and now putting them back in? I mean, from the parking fees, the bike parking fees, then I would imagine that that's going to pay for that. |
| 01:14:28.95 | Ed Fotch | I think that when dollars go into the city general fund, they're spent in a way that is far beyond my pay grade. So I don't know that the cost of removing these, putting these back in is particularly high. What I would say is I would widen the lens and say, if you follow that plan, in my opinion, you'll generate $500,000 next year. You can have all the bike loops you want. You can cut them down and put them back in every year. |
| 01:14:55.84 | Unknown | So I have a follow-up question for that, because you mentioned that there were two options we had, bike staging and bike parking. And so my question is that the last time this was discussed, and I'm not sure if you were here with that presentation or maybe it was a different presentation, but I had suggested free permits for residents and to have a color coding thing where a resident could put a permit sticker on their bike that could be funded by the bike rental parking fees. And then the loops could be color coded with signage so that theyage so that, you know, they could always be available, you know, for residents who are running errands downtown. So, I mean, have you have has the committee, the bike committee yet explored that possibility as as you know, one of the. you know, quivers you could use as a solution. |
| 01:15:59.77 | Ed Fotch | So, you know, I wouldn't rule out any reasonable idea, because we haven't addressed this plan of using them essentially for local parking, except during the peak time, and then covering them up to, say, go park in the lots when the visitors are in town. So that's our proposal for you today. Even if you look closely, you probably can't see on this picture, even with the loops as it is, there's suggested writing on there that says only two bikes per loop because even locals could park four or five across and then you have the sidewalk blocked. But to more specifically answer questions about permits, permits have their own infrastructure requirements that have a cost. They also take enforcement. And lastly, and probably most importantly from our committee standpoint, I have seen maybe not hundreds but dozens of times when a bike is locked to a post right underneath a no bike parking sign. So I personally am skeptical that the visitors will follow our rules when there's a bike loop sitting right where they want to be and they want to run in and get an ice cream or whatever. And I'm concerned that we won't have the staff to enforce it and we'll end up right back where we were. So our best idea right now is to put not just the bike loops back but more bike loops and then to use this cozy thing. We got this idea because you have canvas covers on the guardrails around your new ADA ramps and so we're sort of stealing that idea. So the complexity of what you suggested is slightly beyond our ability to see that that would be functional, but the city's free to take a shot at it. |
| 01:17:52.06 | Unknown | Thank you. The city's free to take a shot at it. Speaking of which, I saw bikes leaning against that gate or whatever it is, the ADA frame on the sidewalks. And with the COSY, I would imagine there would be potentially some enforcement affiliated with that. I guess, would you consider putting the resident permit issue on an agenda for the bicycle committee to explore that a little bit further? Absolutely. Thank you. I have more questions. |
| 01:18:19.25 | Jill Hoffman | Yep. |
| 01:18:19.48 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. I have more questions. Well, but, maybe you have any questions? I'd like to know, when do you anticipate that you would wind down the season for ambassadors and then any projection on when you would think it would start up again? |
| 01:18:37.47 | Ed Fotch | So in full disclosure, it's the first year, and we actually wound it down once. We decided we'll just have it run on the weekends, and then we started getting phone calls saying there's a whole heck of a lot of bikes down here, and after two days, the ambassadors were back seven days a week, partially because it's a bit of a supply and demand. And so one way to look at it is as soon as it's not paying for itself, stop doing it. So from a committee standpoint, our direction is run it as long as it's break-even or profitable because it generates data. And we'll have data through a point, and having more data is better than less data. and so if I had to guess I would say prior to the end of October and from the anecdotal reports from the ferry service and bike vendors and you know sort of locals and our expert, Herb, after Fleet Week, we expect things to fall off and maybe run it a couple weekends. But again, it's self-leveling We're not, you know, it's there to make money, but it's principally there. The real value of the service is great that it looks like it's, you know, break even. It's even greater than it looks like it'll be a profit center next year if we execute on this plan. We didn't start this at our committee, nor did you commission our committee to say, to generate an extra $100,000 a year was find a way to make things better and so this is funded a bunch of folks, and it's great that it creates summer jobs, but it's more important it creates summer jobs that mitigated some of our bike issues. And we think we can do much better the next year. So if I had to guess, I'd say the week after next, but it's a little bit of a play by ear. |
| 01:20:18.91 | Jill Hoffman | And I know we got a little bit of a late start, but fortunately we did get started this year because it's been a fantastic, I think you've all done a great job. But what were you anticipating we'd start for next season? |
| 01:20:29.81 | Ed Fotch | Yeah, apologies, I didn't answer the second half of your question. So order of magnitude the week before spring break. Spring break was big crowds. rivaling summer crowds. Not late July, August crowds, but definitely summer crowds. So I think you have to ramp up. around spring break and then there'll be a challenge again next year in terms of staffing because it's spring break You know, you've still got kids in schools. You don't have the college kids, and so there's a recruitment piece. There'll be training that needs to be done next year, but I think that we should be thinking in terms of for spring break, and we should be thinking in terms of in excess of $200,000. revenue for next year just from this not not from this $2 fee I think that's a another source of 200 plus thousand dollars revenue of course there's other expenses associated with if we go through with this plan |
| 01:21:10.24 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:21:23.32 | Ed Fotch | Thanks. |
| 01:21:23.98 | Jill Hoffman | questions. |
| 01:21:26.56 | Unknown | So for the summer months, was rental bike traffic up down Pretty much the same. |
| 01:21:35.62 | Ed Fotch | So as I mentioned, one of the things that's really valuable is that we have super hard data. hour by hour, we don't have it vendor by vendor, but we have it hour by hour and seven days a week. So. Unfortunately, we don't have historicals to project. We will next year. |
| 01:21:53.69 | Unknown | Well, the fairy, but the Golden Gate Ferry keeps those numbers. |
| 01:21:57.88 | Ed Fotch | They do, and they've provided some, and I don't mean to cast aspersions, but I sometimes am skeptical vis-a-vis the numbers that come from there. I find, frankly, more credible the information we get from the bike vendors themselves who have said that this is an up year. a substantial up year. |
| 01:22:20.76 | Unknown | An up year, but with respect to the summer months, it was an up year? Yes. Okay. I have a follow-up question. It's my understanding that the current system, instead of pre-selling the tickets at the point of purchase in San Francisco, people have to buy the ticket at El Portel and Tracy Way. And have you experienced a congestion, a backup, a bottleneck with that touch point there? |
| 01:22:25.00 | Ed Fotch | Yes. |
| 01:22:51.78 | Ed Fotch | Right, so the valet parking ticket. Just to be clear, you have to purchase the valet parking ticket. So you may recall we were, I would say, nearly desperately hoping the bike vendors would pre-sell the tickets. And some did, but most didn't. And, in fact, we got what my mother would call a snooty letter from the bike vendors explaining that not only weren't they going to, but they thought the whole program was lousy and no one was going to pay $3 for bike parking. So the fallback position was to use kiosks, and we were hoping not to have crowds, as you had suggested, might occur. The good news is that's an area that ran just spectacularly well. And I think part of the reason is because it's really rare if four bikes come in, and that's the average in the summertime, you know, sort of four to six. You get four bikes. a group of four or six, and only one person goes and buys the ticket. So you don't have six in the line. And they tend to come in in kind of a staggered way. And we also let people use the kiosk either on the way out of their bike parking after they've just parked the bike or when they come back to get the bike. So I'm pleased to say that that was one issue where we were concerned that there would be lines and queues and congestion. And it got busy at times, but really was never a particular problem. And let me add, from a financial standpoint, we were going to pre-sell the tickets for $2. and it was gonna be $3 on site. Thank God we didn't. in retrospect, because that's a chunk of cash we wouldn't have gotten that we did, tens of thousands of dollars that we got that we wouldn't otherwise have gotten. So it was serendipitous. |
| 01:24:36.30 | Unknown | So just to be clear, what you're saying is even though you have a system right now where people have to go and buy a ticket to park there, that that is not a cause for congestion. |
| 01:24:52.94 | Ed Fotch | No, in fact, I would take it a step further. Our kiosks are so darn good. that they ought to sell other things there, like the ferry ticket. And like the peak boarding fee, there ought to be one place you go to buy all this stuff as opposed to this hopscotch thing that we have right now. And the city should get the $2 for providing all this infrastructure and the free bike parking and the signage and the cozies and the personnel and so on and so forth. |
| 01:25:19.48 | Unknown | Okay, thank you. |
| 01:25:21.88 | Jill Hoffman | Any other questions? |
| 01:25:22.47 | Unknown | You know, just some clarification, Ed. When they come into El Portal and go down Tracy Way, |
| 01:25:22.52 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:25:22.54 | Jill Hoffman | No. |
| 01:25:22.76 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:25:30.50 | Unknown | They basically are putting their bicycles into the parking first and then going and are able to get their ticket. Is that correct? |
| 01:25:40.38 | Ed Fotch | Yeah, and that's, I should have mentioned, that's an extremely important point. They don't have to buy a ticket to get in. |
| 01:25:42.76 | Unknown | Point. |
| 01:25:46.10 | Ed Fotch | they pay on the way out. which as I understand it is similar to the art festival, but that's essential because that's how you avoid the cues. You let people park their bikes. In this case, you have valet people taking the bikes, pulling them in, setting them into space, helping people lock them. with the valet, What the ambassadors are doing for parking on Tracy Way is exactly what needs to occur on those ferries. Someone needs to grab those bikes, take them in, and give the sense of urgency, come on, we got a lot of people waiting here in line, and not just watch the struggles go on, which unfortunately is what we have at this point. There needs to be a sense of urgency, and there needs to be a sense of organization. And I think that that's something that will only occur if the city nudges this forward. Okay. |
| 01:26:37.41 | Jill Hoffman | Open it up to public comment. I actually only have one speaker card, so if anyone else would like to speak, Chris Robeson. And if anyone else would like to speak, please line up and |
| 01:26:49.31 | Chris Robson | Thank you. Hello, I'm Chris Robson and I'm an ambassador with the Sausalito Plus program. And I've been working since the beginning of June. I'm a successful filmmaker. I actually still am a freelancer, and whenever I do get a job come in, I hand the position over to some other ambassador. So I've been able to make some extra money during the season, and so have all the other ambassadors. I think it's a great program for younger children and mid-teens up through seniors like myself. It's been a great opportunity. I've actually enjoyed it very much. It's great to be able to work with the children, kids, college students that are able to practice their language skills on these international tourists coming in. I certainly do. I've been in Sausalito for 38 years now, and I feel like this program is enabling me to give something back to the city. I joined the program I think I might have been the first student to enroll because I saw it as a problem with the bikes, as one that needs to be dealt with. The... |
| 01:28:25.35 | Chris Robson | One of the most stressful parts of the job was during the end two weeks of July and the first two weeks of August, when I liken it to like prodding a hornet's nest, and El Portal became a hornet's nest of tourists. buzzing all over the place. It was amazing. The ambassador program, I feel, has improved over the four months that I've been working there. There's definitely improvement. We've made changes. As we see things necessary, we've made changes. Thanks to Ed and Deb. So one other thing I think I need to mention is the training. It's a very complex deal. We have a very detailed training manual which helps very much for new people coming in. So the other thing is that I would suggest that we really get this enforcement, bike parking, bikes being locked to poles and trees and everything definitely in place as soon as we can. That's my feeling. So anyway, I would ask you, the city Council, to make the changes, do whatever you can to get this thing as most efficient as possible. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:29:54.50 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Anyone else? Denise? |
| 01:30:03.52 | Denise Suto | Denise Suto, 411 Locust Street. I just wanted to say that it's an incredible program. I haven't been able to keep up with all of the committee meetings, but... I want to take a moment and say thank you because I can't imagine where we would be without Ed and Deb's work. I'm incredibly grateful because there aren't a lot of people who would spend the amount of time that you have and the thoughtfulness, the amount of the level of professionalism. Our time is precious and there are very few people who are willing to invest that amount of time and I hope that every single member of the city council will take the time. to acknowledge that and to thank that. It's really important. and to acknowledge that this has been done. in an honorable manner to benefit the city of Sausalito, and that we should be gracious in our appreciation of everything that they have done. And I'll say it again, I hope that every single member of city council will take the time to do that without hesitation. And it's such a benefit to our city for the students and for the children. There are more than 25 children. There are many children in our town. We have more students in our school district than the past decade. And I know that because I know the numbers. So I would be more than happy to educate someone about those numbers. And as well, I hope that people are encouraged by this to do other public works and to encourage that. And so thank you very, very much. |
| 01:31:52.49 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Anyone else? Sir? Well, it's public comment. No. |
| 01:31:57.90 | Ed Fotch | Thank you. Ed Fotch to Alexandria Avenue, member of the public. |
| 01:32:00.11 | Jill Hoffman | Well, |
| 01:32:02.00 | Ed Fotch | I'm sorry, just really quickly, huge omission. Tom Raleigh's here. He's the vice chairman of our committee, voice of reason, incredibly busy guy, shows up at all the meetings, flies in from Singapore, so on and so forth. So thank you, Tom, so much for all the effort. Thanks. |
| 01:32:19.45 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:32:19.49 | Bob Brock | So we're still on public comment. Yes, sir. My name is Bob Brock of 416 B Street. I'm here with my son, Max. And I'm a biker and come down that path a lot, but I'm also a driver. And I come over that bridge and into Sausalito maybe two or three times a week. And I have noticed a huge difference from the driving standpoint. of coming into town and seeing those wonderful ambassadors there, knowing that there's something happening here. I mean, I can imagine if I'm somebody's first time driving into town, you know, there's something happening and I automatically slow down coming down into town now. And I think my, my view of, of that chaos has been, um, um, helped by this amazing ambassador program. And I see its influence on the driving traffic as well as the biking traffic coming into town. Thank you. |
| 01:33:14.52 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Anyone else from the public like to speak on this matter? Hey, seeing none, close public comment, bring it up for council comment. We'd like to start. |
| 01:33:29.96 | Unknown | Well, I think I mentioned it that one of the meetings before, if it wasn't for Ed and Deb for stepping up, this program would have never got off the ground. So thank you very, very much. I really know what it's really like down there. So and I know what you go through. And I think this first year of charging has a lot of challenges to it. But nonetheless, I think if you look at the record and to me one of the most important records that we have is the safety record, and that's the most important. And if you really look, the amount of incidents, especially at Tracy Way and Al Portal and just in general in that downtown area, we're almost minimal. If you look at some other cities in Marin that don't even have any close to the amount of bikes we have, they have more accidents than we do. If you look at the records. So once again, thank you very much for making Sausalito a safer place. |
| 01:34:48.63 | Jill Hoffman | This has been a very challenging effort, and Denise well said. I think it is important for us to acknowledge the superb work that you guys have done because the ambassador program definitely made a difference, a positive difference. I think we have a lot of interest in recommendations here from the Bike and Peg Committee. I know this is going to be, I think we decided in November, isn't it, that this is going to come back. And I think one of the most, you know, among the many important things that Ed reported on, I think the urgency to plan for next year is probably the most important and something that I certainly want to be hearing about in November when this comes back. I'm now convinced more than anything else that this is a problem and a management challenge that's going to need multiple solutions. I must admit I've been horrified to figure out that the ferries often leave with half their bike capacity unmet leaving bikes behind I think as Ed's pointed out if that was improved itself that would relieve a lot of the congestion but I'm also convinced that The problem downtown is one of congestion, of which bicycles are the major culprit, but it's one of congestion generally. And the best way to do that is to have less bikes there. So therefore staging is also another component. So have the fairies get them out and stage them elsewhere. Then we'll have a reduced volume steady state that we're dealing with because in the end, We can't stretch downtown to be any bigger than it is. It can only accommodate a certain volume. So thank you for all your really great work. |
| 01:37:12.72 | Unknown | Yes. So, you know, in public comment, I want to respond to the comment that every single council member be gracious and thank the hard work. You know, I always wrap up my comments with a big thank you and a big appreciation for the hard work of the Bicycle Pedestrian Committee and the ambassadors. Please don't misconstrue my my questions during question time i will ask hard questions it's no secret that i still have questions and that i am not happy with the fact that we have congestion in our little town we have changes to the small-town character of our beautiful town that have not been that have not gone through the historic landmarks board you know we have we have big vinyl banners in my opinion they should have gone through the historic landmarks board there they're reconfigurations of kiosks and things popping up that have not gone through the historic landmarks board and and I I have to say it is my opinion that the congestion is worse it's not better I I am not happy with the direction that I I see us going with respect to the ambiance in downtown Sausalito. I would like to see a focus on solutions that look at managing the number of the bikes. For example, the resident permits. I'm happy that the Bike Pedestrian Committee has agreed to put that on their agenda just to explore it you know as a potential solution and I do acknowledge and I do thank you for your hard effort and your hard work I do appreciate it very much it's just that I'm I I see the congestion and and I I see a town that that every year just I just I don't it, and it just seems to get worse for me every year. So I continue to be concerned about safety. Again, thank you to everyone. I think it's a step-by-step process. and I hope that we can continue exploring all solutions that might be able to mitigate the number of the rental bikes that are coming in |
| 01:39:48.61 | Jill Hoffman | Well, let me just add, thank you to the Fonches. I mean, I don't know if people understand the hundreds of hours that they've donated to this town. And that's the one thing I love about Sausalito is that we have... a lot of extremely talented people who are or willing to donate their expertise to make this a better place. And we've certainly been the benefit of that from the FOCHAs this summer and also on the Bike and Ped Committee. Um, this you know the herculean effort it took to get this program off the ground and the fact that they were able to to to refocus the efforts and be nimble and be responsive to make this a success was Herculean effort. And the ability to turn this into – we may come out a little bit positive on the money side of this, and that would be fantastic. If we can break even for our first year with a late start, I think, you know, that's just a success. There's no other way to say say it I do as I said when we first started talking about this I view all of my responsibilities as a city council member to look at all revenue generating sources for this town and so I think that paying for biking is one of those things that we have the responsibility to manage effectively and I think that we started that this summer. And that was phase one. So phase one, in my mind, was management, getting some kind of management handle on the bikes. And I think that we did that successfully We were revenue generating. And, you know, the other two aspects of this, positive aspects, were the jobs creation. That was kind of an unforeseen thing. Thirty people in this town had pretty good jobs this summer, and they were from segments of our population that have difficulties getting jobs, seniors and kids. Because there's really very few other places for kids to have jobs in town. So... I see that as a huge success that we are a jobs generating operation for Saucy-O-Plus. Phase two I see is further management. Phase two is going to be next summer. So I see that as further management of the bikes, the physicalness of the bikes. So I think we have to get we have to get a handle on bikes that are not following the ordinances. So we need to get a third party in here, however we want to do it. I like cabling them in place. That seems to be reasonable. but we have to stop people from parking them wherever they want to outside of the the parking areas that we've designated and I see that as a larger free parking area further down And it drove me crazy when I would drive around town. I walked through town this summer, and I would see 20, 30, 40 bikes parked in the tree, you know, just tied up to trees, like in random places. And where the free parking was, they would be parked all over the place, not only in the spots for the bikes, but also, like, in the grass and laying on the ground. And, I mean, it was nuts. And I was driving down the street, and people were parking in car parking lots, like 10 bikes. No. That's, I hope that that's done and we don't see that again. Um... I just have a couple more minutes. If you haven't seen Ed's GoPro video, it's great. They showed it at the Bike and Ped Committee. You can see it there, or you can look at it on YouTube. I mean, it's clear. It's clear the fairies are doing nothing once the people get on the ramp. And so for them to The ferry services say, well, we can't do anything about it. We need more ferry service. We need wider ramps. No, how about, you know, you need to more effectively park the bikes on the ferry. And that the ferries are going out half full is ridiculous. There's no excuse for that. So they need to take a lesson from the ambassadors. If you go down that ambassador parking lot, those bikes are parked in an orderly manner. Every spot's taken, and the bikes are secure. So, you know, that's for the ferry to take care of. if they can't do it then we're going to have to look at other methods to remove bichemeteries. every spot's taken and the bikes are secure. So, you know, that's for the ferry to take care of. And if they can't do it, then we're going to have to look at other methods to remove bikes from town for the next summer. I see also is dialing back on the volume. So this summer was putting in place the revenue generating and management system of Sausalito Plus. But... Next season is also going to be about turning back the volume of bikes coming into town. Key to that is the Bay Vista Trail. as Ed said, coming off the bridge. So there needs to be a big sign at the top of the bridge that says, bikes this way, down the Bay Vista Trail, right into Fort Baker. And the bikes can spend time there if they want to. They can go to Discovery Museum. And hopefully, they'll still be the water taxi next year to take the bikes out of Fort Baker and over to San Francisco. And if they want to bike into Sausalio, that's fine. That brings me to one of my other hopes with the bike companies, that next summer they will self-impose a geographic limit on kids less than 12 driving down Alexander Avenue. That's the other thing that drives me crazy. When I see kids as young as five and six years old riding bikes down Alexander Avenue, that's ridiculous. And I'm looking in the camera. Anybody who's thinking about riding your bikes to San Francisco and bringing your family here, That is not an appropriate ride for a child under 12. especially one that's not used to these kinds of rides. And I'm saying that as a mother. Um, I'm also sensitive to the concerns of Councilwoman Pfeiffer when she says that we don't have, you know, why are we supporting someone else's business plan? And so that's also, you know, the bike company's business plan. They're imposing their business plan on us. And I don't see that we, you know, That's an unlimited volume that we have to manage here in town. Um, I think we're getting very close to the volumes that gets us to a safety concern. Our volumes were up this summer. We've done things to manage it. Hopefully, with our efforts, we can dial back on the volume next summer so that we don't have these types of concerns. And those are my comments. Thank you. |
| 01:45:41.28 | Jill Hoffman | Well, I want to echo all the positive comments of our council members and what a great job of bike and pet committees done and a wonderful presentation. Ed, I do want to. call out the pedestrian and bicycle advisory committee because the chair is Ed Fotch and we hear from him, but also Tom Riley, Patricia Pigman, Bob Page and John Cox. And also importantly at all these meetings which I have the privilege to sit in on, we have our public works director Jonathan Goldman, we have Captain Moerbacher, we the the bike and pet committee has opened it up to the Marine Bicycle Coalition, which really is important for getting things done, dealing with other agencies. The city manager spends a lot of time on this. We have, this is a real. full effort by many in working on this. This is one of our top priorities and we work on this all the time. I want to put a plug on the bicycle and pet committee meets on the third Mondays of the month and it's televised. We're not televised. I'm sorry. You could stream it on the computer so you can see what's going on here. I encourage people to come and make their public comments for that. I also want to put a plug in for the ambassadors and Deb Fotch running the ambassadors down there and all the ambassadors have done a fabulous job. Not only did they have done a great job on managing the traffic, but also just being ambassadors for Sausalito. It's a different approach to it and it's made it a different, that, Thank you. culture down there. And we certainly get a lot of the people that have become ambassadors who, uh, complained about the bicycles and now they're part of the solution not part of the problem so I think I really applaud all that I think It was really wonderful that it was close at the beginning, but we Uh, the, got it off the ground in May, I think. made a lot of progress this year. I think I echo what everyone said that traffic congestion would would be much worse without the ambassadors and, and all the work that's been done by by everyone. So I want to thank everyone included. And I also appreciate the 10 specific concrete things that you would like done. I think one of the most important part about this, this program is that we're, we're doing things that actually make a difference. We are finding out what can work and we're putting it in in we're implementing all those things. So I would say as I look at all of these, and of course I was at the bike and pet committee, they're generated, but I think I would suggest that we direct staff to begin and explore the implementation. Some of these things are going to be easier If you take number one, it's going to be easier. Other ones are more difficult, but I think we should have staff to start looking at what what it would take to implement all of them. And then when we come back at the next time we have a report, then we see we can look at where we are, what needs to be done, what could happen in the timeline on all of it. So that's what I suggest. |
| 01:48:38.88 | Unknown | So just to clarify, we're not signing off on these 10 points. We're just asking staff to explore a little bit more about what it would take to implement and the pros and cons of each. |
| 01:48:50.59 | Jill Hoffman | Well, yes, and what it would take to implement, then of course they would have to. |
| 01:48:50.60 | Unknown | Well, yes, and what it would take to implement, then of course they would have to. |
| 01:48:54.10 | Jill Hoffman | All of them. Some of them are ordinances. Yes, they would come back, and the full council would have to approve each one of them. |
| 01:49:01.57 | Unknown | Could I add the resident permit? concept. |
| 01:49:09.64 | Jill Hoffman | I think you've had the bike and pet committee. I think one of the most important parts of this is that this has been fully explored by the bike and pet committee with a lot of input from a lot of people. So I think, would this. |
| 01:49:09.71 | Unknown | I think you've had the bike and pet |
| 01:49:11.18 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:49:11.28 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:49:11.33 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:49:11.50 | Unknown | I think that's a good question. |
| 01:49:20.41 | Unknown | With this meaning that 10 points. Not what they have. So they've asked the rest of the past them and they will look at they will. Okay. All right. Okay. Just want to clarify. |
| 01:49:22.41 | Unknown | NOT. |
| 01:49:22.89 | Jill Hoffman | THE FAMILY. |
| 01:49:22.95 | Unknown | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 01:49:23.09 | Jill Hoffman | everything. So they've asked them and they will look at it. Alright. |
| 01:49:31.93 | Jill Hoffman | With that, do we have any, can we have an agreement from Council that we send staff back to work on all these? |
| 01:49:38.35 | Jill Hoffman | Sure, yeah, I think, and also Councilwoman Pfeiffer's question about the permits, I mean, they're going to have a bike and ped committee in between now and November when they come back, so if we could have some kind of response to that, I think, when we come back, I think it's fine. |
| 01:49:52.10 | Unknown | Thank you. I guess what I was hoping is that, you know, I know they've got it on their agenda, is that when staff comes back with information on these 10 points, that staff also comes back with, you know, the bike ped committees, you know, thoughts around the permit. |
| 01:50:06.58 | Jill Hoffman | Right. Well, and the bike and pet committee will be here as well. So they can report out on it. Okay, so we agree. I think we're done. We get unanimous support by the council. So we'll take a five-minute break. Thank you all. |
| 01:50:29.26 | Jill Hoffman | Welcome back. We're moving on to item six, public hearings. And this is a long one, a long title, hopefully a short item. Introduction and first reading, reading by title only, an ordinance of the city council. The city of Sausalito to revise the date. of the Sausalito downtown parking survey and shared parking model as referenced in Sausalito Municipal Code section 1040 110 G1. from September 1997 to February 2015, and thereafter updated per the Sausalito downtown parking model maintenance procedures. It's a long time. I hope this is shorter than that title. And we have associate planner Calvin Chan, please will present. |
| 01:51:12.12 | Unknown | Thank you, Mayor Theodore, some members of the council. The purpose of the public hearing this evening is for the City Council to consider a proposed zoning ordinance amendment that revises the date of the Sausalito Downtown Parking Survey. and shared parking model from the 1997 report prepared by Robert L. Harrison. transportation planning to the most recent report prepared in 2015 The Planning Commission held two public hearings on the proposed zoning ordinance amendment on May 27th and June 24th of this year. On June 24th, the Planning Commission, by unanimous vote, adopted Resolution 2015-13, which recommended to the City Council for adoption of the zoning ordinance amendment. |
| 01:51:59.39 | Unknown | In September 1997, the Sausalito Downtown Parking Survey and shared parking model was prepared by Robert L. Harrison Transportation Planning, and Bob Harrison is in the audience today. And they incorporated into a conditional use permit a finding for waiver or reduction of required parking for new or expanded land uses in the Central Commercial Zoning District. The model took inventory of the total parking supply in the Central Commercial Zoning District. This includes private and public parking with and without fees and street metered spaces. And also the inventory of the combined land uses in the Central Commercial Zoning District. The model shows that the parking demand varies by hour among the combined land uses, and the intent for the application of the model under this finding is that the same parking space can be used repeatedly to meet the parking demand in the downtown area. |
| 01:52:55.24 | Unknown | Sausalito Municipal Code section 10.40.110 identifies the number of off-street on-site parking spaces that are required for new or expanded land uses. Under subsection G, a conditional use permit may be requested for the waiver or reduction of required parking if any of five listed findings can be made. Thank you. Finding one allows a conditional use permit to be approved if a finding can be made that the Sausalito downtown parking survey and the shared parking model indicates that adequate parking exists in the central commercial or CC zoning district to support the new or expanded use. |
| 01:53:34.90 | Unknown | The model was prepared in 1997 and it's not a static document and requires regular updating in order to reflect the most current parking demand at any time an application is filed. for a cup or waiver reduction of parking requirements under this finding one provision until recently however the model was not updated and staff consulted with the original preparer of the model bob harrison and to coordinate an update of this model the 2015 update was completed in february of this year in order for the model to reflect the most current parking demand at any time staff proposes that they they we will maintain a log of land use changes via occupational use permits and update the model on an annual basis and upon receipt of any application for a project that requests a CUP under this finding. Any changes to the inventory of private and public parking spaces will be monitored under this similar schedule. The model maintenance procedures are incorporated as Attachment A in your proposed zoning ordinance amendments. |
| 01:54:42.47 | Unknown | With the Planning Commission's recommendation for City Council adoption of the proposed zoning ordinance amendment, the desire for a count of verification of summer parking demand based off of a counted survey, aside from the calibrated estimates provided in the 2015 model update, was expressed. Bob Harrison and his team have conducted such survey, and the verification has been provided as an addendum to the 2015 model update. The Sausalito downtown shared parking model was found to accurately estimate parking demand hour by hour for both weekday and weekend day. |
| 01:55:21.36 | Unknown | Here's the proposed amendment to finding one. Finding one currently reads, one, the Sausalito Downtown Parking Survey and shared parking model by Robert L. Harrison Transportation Planning, September 1997, indicates that adequate parking exists in the CC zoning district to support the new or expanded use. The proposed amendment is as follows. The modifications are shown in bold red text. The Sausalito Downtown Parking Survey and shared parking model by Robert L. Harrison Transportation Planning dated September 1997 and updated February 2015 and thereafter updated indicates that adequate parking exists in the CC district to support the new or expanded use. |
| 01:56:04.82 | Unknown | Staff has reviewed the general plan objectives and the policies and determined that the proposed zoning ordinance amendment is consistent with the intent of the general plan circulation and parking element to provide a safe and efficient transportation system for the movement of people and goods throughout the city. Furthermore, the survey and model align with the city's intent to minimize traffic congestion, to maintain an appropriate level of mobility, and to assure that future growth and changes do not result in an unacceptable deterioration in traffic service levels. |
| 01:56:38.36 | Unknown | Staff recommends the following, to conduct a public hearing this evening on the proposed zoning ordinance amendment, to revise the date of the Sausalito downtown parking survey and shared parking model from September 1997 to February 2015, and thereafter updated per the downtown parking model maintenance procedures, to introduce and read by title only the proposed zoning ordinance amendment, and to continue the second reading to the city council's next hearing on October 20th, 2015. And Bob Harrison, the original preparer of the model, and who conducted the update, is available if you have any specific questions regarding the document. |
| 01:57:17.95 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Kelvin. And I want to be clear. You said a lot. But all we're doing tonight, my understanding of this ordinance, is we're changing the reference from the survey from please 1997 to September 1997 and updated February 2015 and thereafter updated. That's all we're doing tonight. Is that correct? That is correct. Okay. Thank you. Council questions who would like to start? |
| 01:57:45.10 | Jill Hoffman | Maybe this is for the author of the model. I'd like a sort of snapshot overview of what was noticed as the difference between the data that went into the model in 1997 and the situation today. What do we actually see as any difference between now and then? |
| 01:58:15.72 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:58:25.77 | Bob Harrison | Good evening, I'm Bob Harrison. Some of you may know me from previous exposures over the years. I've been working in Marin County for over 40 years. And as you know, I was working in 1997 here in Sausalito for Planning Director Charlotte Flynn. I don't know if any of you knew Charlotte or not, she was terrific. To answer your question, I did provide a memo. I believe it's in your package. And the summary shows the. The counts from 97 to 97. from the fall of last year and from the summer of this year. The... the way it worked out is that your land use change is primarily a significant addition of restaurant square footage in the downtown area between 97 and today and a decrease in retail and you I suppose all the members of the council remember the village fair When I was working on 97, the Village Fair was still functioning. And in fact, there was a proposal to turn it into an office space. And we actually did an analysis of it as an office. Obviously, that didn't happen. But that was a loss of almost 20,000 square feet of retail, multi-story retail. Thank you. Generally not recommended, but anyway, that was there, and it was there for several years. In any event, the way it works out roughly is that on the weekday, and I'm calling Friday the weekday because it's the biggest of the weekdays, the main difference from 97 until current is in the evening parking demand. Parking peaks now on Friday in the evening demand. around 7 or 8 o'clock, and that's the restaurant parking primarily. on the weekend day, which was Saturday primarily, I focus on Saturday because it's slightly heavier than Sunday. the week the during the afternoon that the parking numbers remained roughly equivalent from 97 up until 2015. So the level of activity Um, In terms of parking... was roughly the same between the summer of 97 and the summer of 2015. Now again, however, the peak on Saturday was in the evening rather than in the afternoon, and again, it's the restaurant parking demand that causes the peak. I think that's an overview, if that's enough for you, just for a summary. |
| 02:00:41.65 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you very much. |
| 02:00:42.66 | Bob Harrison | Okay. |
| 02:00:43.49 | Jill Hoffman | And as a follow-on to that, on the restaurants, I noticed you made one different assumption. I think previously you had for each restaurant, and the capacity was that they would be 100 percent would be serviced by automobiles, and you went to an assumption of 95%, is that correct? |
| 02:01:00.03 | Bob Harrison | I think it went the other way, actually. I think the last, the last, the calibration for this summer, I believe, was 100% autos. Yeah, the other thing to keep in mind is there's several places to adjust the model. Maybe you're right. I'm trying to recall. It's either retail or restaurant. One of them is 95%, and I'm trying to remember which one was which. |
| 02:01:30.76 | Bob Harrison | Well, it... Well, no, you're right. Obviously, the general concept is, and frankly, it's all just the best estimate you can make based on the actual count of cars and see where the model calibrates out. There's some access that is not auto, obviously. In fact, there may be a lot more access that's not auto now than there was in 97 with the bicycles that you just discussed. In fact, as a little aside, I did a count over at the Valhalla on the main drag coming past the Valhalla. It is the only traffic count that I've ever done where the number of bicycles actually exceeded the number of automobiles. And that was a noontime count, I think, on a Saturday. Generally speaking, that just doesn't happen. And here, of course, in Sausalito, you broke the bank or whatever. You were able to make a difference we normally don't see. But anyway, the number... |
| 02:02:25.33 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:02:28.22 | Unknown | But anyway. |
| 02:02:33.08 | Bob Harrison | Frankly, in terms of the parking model, all we're concerned about is the number of parked cars. And there's some people in these restaurants and retail stores that didn't come in a car, obviously. It may be more than the 5% that I have assumed. And this is just part of the overall calibration process. There are several other steps in calibration, which if you're interested, I can go through. |
| 02:02:59.06 | Unknown | Well, there's no question that from 1997 to now, there is a shift. I think if you look at the numbers, you'll find out we have actually less automobiles coming into Sausalito now than we did then. in 97 because they're coming in not only by bicycle, But you have an estimated 250 to 275,000 people coming in by bus. |
| 02:03:28.80 | Bob Harrison | It could be. Your parking demand is still, on Saturday at least, is roughly the same. It could be the total number of people are up because of the other modes that are bringing them in. So that Sausalito is busier than it was in 97. I'm obviously just focused on the parking as part of this model. |
| 02:03:30.27 | Unknown | Thank you. It could be the total number. |
| 02:03:36.88 | Unknown | to the next one. |
| 02:03:36.91 | Unknown | of bringing them in. |
| 02:03:43.44 | Unknown | Yeah. Because I find that especially in the summertime, parking lot one is full by depending on the day, by 1 o'clock. During the week, it's filled by 1.15 on a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Usually, parking lot one is filled by 12.30. Parking lot two is filled by 12.45. And then you have the parking lot three. |
| 02:04:15.71 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. |
| 02:04:15.76 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:04:15.78 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. |
| 02:04:15.88 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:04:16.00 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. Yeah, and obviously the numbers show downtown parking lots were in the 95%, 96%, 97% occupied at all the times that we surveyed during the busy hours. And that really means that there's probably people who couldn't get in so that the demand for parking at that lot was probably greater than the number we actually counted. |
| 02:04:37.97 | Jill Hoffman | And the peak demand is most important because that's where we bump up against not have enough spaces. And I think your report says the peak demand as a percentage of supply is 2% greater Then experienced in 1997, so that's basically a 2% rise in the peak is... |
| 02:04:55.08 | Bob Harrison | The peak is. Where are you referring to perhaps? |
| 02:04:56.29 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. you |
| 02:04:56.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:04:57.86 | Jill Hoffman | I'm on, let's see, page 18 of 23 on part one. |
| 02:05:05.24 | Bob Harrison | is, |
| 02:05:05.49 | Jill Hoffman | Well, in general, I mean, |
| 02:05:07.08 | Bob Harrison | Well, you're right, Avi. I mean, the answer is yes, it is slightly greater. However, I caution with 2%. These numbers do vary by more than 2%. When I say the model is good for plus or minus 5%, that's considered a pretty good estimate, considering what we're dealing with. I mean, we're dealing with a very mixed use, variable issues of all types. And when the model can do that, |
| 02:05:10.64 | Jill Hoffman | Just slightly. |
| 02:05:30.87 | Bob Harrison | hour by hour throughout the day, for a very mixed use area, it's a pretty good tool. Now it's not perfect, and 2% is, you know, you could easily get a 2% variation day-to-day, you know, |
| 02:05:43.65 | Jill Hoffman | So you're basically saying it's basically flat from 97 to now. Yeah, on Saturday. On Saturday. |
| 02:05:47.75 | Bob Harrison | On Saturday. On Saturday. The Friday was the big difference because it was a Friday evening that jumped up. |
| 02:05:50.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:05:55.80 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. |
| 02:05:55.96 | Unknown | And yet also in the summertime, you have on Friday evening, you have jazz by the bank. And that will take a spike. We have an event that takes place every Friday night in the summertime. |
| 02:06:06.63 | Bob Harrison | That will help. That will definitely add. And it is low. |
| 02:06:08.08 | Unknown | And it is located right there, right by lobby. |
| 02:06:13.58 | Unknown | So, yeah, quick question. So in 97, were the hours that we charged in parking lot one, did it stop at 6 or did it go to 7? I don't know. |
| 02:06:27.15 | Bob Harrison | I don't know. I can't answer that question, but I remind you that this did not depend on cost. |
| 02:06:30.27 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 02:06:33.80 | Bob Harrison | I never took into account whether it was a fee or a free parking place. |
| 02:06:37.32 | Unknown | Yeah, I noticed that and so we don't have, I'm just thinking from an institutional memory standpoint, we don't have that anywhere. |
| 02:06:45.76 | Bob Harrison | You might have it in the file somewhere, but I don't have it, and I wasn't keeping track of the cost of any of the lots or the beaters or anything like that. |
| 02:06:54.65 | Unknown | Yeah, okay. Thank you. Questions? |
| 02:06:57.88 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. |
| 02:06:57.96 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:06:58.03 | Bob Harrison | Thank you. |
| 02:06:58.40 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:06:58.59 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:06:58.62 | Unknown | Mm-hmm. |
| 02:06:58.64 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. More questions? Okay, open it up to public comment. Anyone from the public? Michael? |
| 02:07:12.86 | Michael Racks | Hello, I'm Michael Racks, local architect, and I'm here with my associate Tuxedo. And I want to thank... Danny and Calvin and Adam for making this happen. Because about a year and a half ago, we were approached by a major property owner downtown who wanted to re-envision their property and change its use. And so the first thing I did was go to the zoning ordinance, uh, to look up the section and, uh, then went to the planning department to, uh, look for this report and, and see how we can utilize it. It took us a long time just to find it. Then when we did, it was clear it was so obsolete that it wasn't useful. It's taken us a year and a half to get this far. you And my client put their project on hold this entire time. And not everybody's that patient. I advise them that this will be done. The city said they'll get it done. So here we are. And so I'm here to support it. I think the data is interesting. It's definitely updated. We didn't know restaurants had such an impact. We always thought the lots filled up in the daytime in the summer, and now we're finding out it's Friday night. And maybe it is jazzed by the Bay. Maybe it's that singular event that's doing it, which might be a unique occasion. One thing I'd like to point out besides supporting that you adopt this amendment Um, the planning commission was concerned that it doesn't get stale again and we're back to not being able to implement our zoning ordinance and delaying people's desire to improve their property And So they adopted a resolution that included a maintenance program. And you'll see that it's attachment to in your staff report. And among the procedures says the staff will update the model on an annual basis. I wonder. How is the Planning Commission's resolution made into console action so we can ensure it happens? I'm afraid it's just going to be a resolution that gets stuck in a file somewhere on a shelf. And then we're going to be back a few years here again having a problem. Can anybody answer that question? Really love to know. Thank you. |
| 02:09:51.94 | Jill Hoffman | our city attorney. |
| 02:09:53.83 | Michael Racks | Thank you. |
| 02:09:54.07 | Jill Hoffman | And are we... You want to respond to that? And what was it? We don't know what the language of the resident |
| 02:10:00.82 | Michael Racks | Maybe you can ask staff after the close of public hearing. |
| 02:10:03.30 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, what... |
| 02:10:05.04 | Michael Racks | It's in the packet, so the Yeah. Public like me, I kind of hope, in fact, happens. Yeah. |
| 02:10:08.90 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. But what's important is that we have direction from the Planning Commission and such to direct staff to do this. That's the important part. |
| 02:10:16.06 | Michael Racks | Yeah, and I'm thinking if the city staff updates it every year, is there a fee? I mean, do you need to allocate money to do that? Do we need to hire Bob every year, and what's that cost? And if it's not part of the budget, what? I'm just raising a procedural question. Thank you. |
| 02:10:36.29 | Jill Hoffman | Anyone else from the public? All right, we'll close public comment, bring it back up here for council comments. Would you like to start? |
| 02:10:46.99 | Unknown | Yeah, it's interesting that the numbers in 1979 in comparison to now, the amount of restaurants that we have in this town is much, much greater. I think we'll find out that the amount of restaurants from that period of time will probably increase at least 35%. And that indicates the latest day, the latest demand, because they're going to dinner. So it's interesting that now, which is better because now we're utilizing these lots at a much greater amount of times. So that was my point. |
| 02:11:28.77 | Unknown | Yeah, I want to thank the consultant who worked on this. And I think it's nice to see the comparison tables between 97 and, you know, 2014. I'm assuming, too, we have the original plan still intact just to, if we ever wanted to go to the raw data and just see it as one entity. And correct me if that's not the case. And the other thing is I would like to also, perhaps this is not under this umbrella, but I'd also like to track The history of the policy changes we make with the parking downtown, specifically, I remember once the former finance director made the comment that a parking space averages $13 a day. And I guess the question I have is, is that all the parking spaces? Is there higher demand, you know, and some are more premium than others and we get you know higher higher revenue So and also I'd like to track that the hours that we make changes to in terms of when we expand the hours For for pricing I just like to you know the world of parking because we get so much revenue from it Just to have that historical those historical benchmarks |
| 02:13:04.18 | Jill Hoffman | This is a very simple action we're being asked to take tonight, which is to swap out one model for an updated model so the Planning Commission can make its appropriate findings. And that's great. I think we should make a commitment to update this model at periodically. and I would perhaps just simply ask the question, what is the industry standard of best practice for updating such a model? Annual seems to me a lot, but maybe it is industry standard. whatever it is that we encourage the Community Development Department to update this model. is that we encourage the Community Development Department to update this model on the frequency which is the best practice in the industry. |
| 02:14:02.03 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, I think it was very, you know, as Council Member Weiner says, I think it's very interesting, the numbers, that in the last eight years, you know, they're basically the same, the flat. And so I think it's very valuable as – Mr. X said with regard to people that want to build here and make use of the conditional use permit, I'm guessing they needed to confirm that the 1997 numbers were still the same and that was the impetus for the updated, for the study, which I think was a good thing. If we can do it, in a cost-deficient manner annually then yeah i mean we might want to have somebody come back and speak to that specifically yes mayor you have your hand up |
| 02:14:39.51 | Unknown | Thank you, Vice Mayor Hoffman. I think that your community development staff has already done that. I mean, part of the update of the model, and Danny or Calvin could speak to this more, was for staff to actually have an electronic access to the document so that annually and when projects come in that are utilizing this specific finding regarding the parking, the numbers can be updated, and that they're also gonna work with the Department of Public Works to track any changes in the parking supply, the supply of parking spaces in the area. So with the advent of the electronic access to this document, you're going to be able to see real time updates, which is important. In response to Mr. Rex's question, the Planning Commission did. adopt a resolution I believe that was really a response to their concern about how is how are we gonna as a Planning Commission utilize this to make these findings so staff was responsive and showed them how this was going to be implemented and updated |
| 02:15:34.05 | Unknown | MAKING A LITTLE BIT OF |
| 02:15:40.90 | Unknown | So, You know, that's really an internal staff level issue. But I think that it's important to understand that that's now going to be controlled by the Community Development Department. won't be needing to go back annually and you know and incur fees or expenses to update that information at least not as as I've been led on to believe we're going to implement it but Danny may have additional information for you on that |
| 02:16:05.96 | Unknown | I just wanted to add one thing is that when in Looking at updating annually, Thank you. We currently track all occupational use permits. So these are when any new businesses come in, they're required to come through the development services, I mean the community development office, and apply for that and indicate what land use they are, And that also is a prerequisite to getting a business license. So in our commercial downtown area, we have that already tracked. So what we would do on an annual basis is ensure that those land use changes are incorporated into this model, which we have a copy of. |
| 02:16:43.59 | Jill Hoffman | Great. |
| 02:16:44.20 | Unknown | . I have a follow up question and again it's Oh. Okay, I have a comment. I'll just make a comment then. And I'm not sure it goes back to the world of parking. And that is I'm interested in how... how many parking spaces we have have lost or or gained you know in in the past you know two decades you know i i'd like to i'd like to understand that i know we've removed parking in parking lot one for the bikes um you know i i just think it would be it would be interesting to to know that we've lost uh parking spaces to the parklet uh downtown um so anyway I'd like to get those benchmarks and I think it would be easy to look at all of the staff reports like in the last you know eight years and see the number of times we've removed parking you know I mean like with the taxis and everything |
| 02:17:49.37 | Unknown | It's just a comment. |
| 02:17:51.33 | Unknown | As far as parking lot one goes, we gave up four spaces. It's not bad. |
| 02:17:56.97 | Jill Hoffman | This is not part of this discussion. This is about to serve. And in terms of frequency, in terms of frequency, |
| 02:17:58.75 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:17:58.81 | Unknown | you |
| 02:17:58.87 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:18:00.46 | Unknown | And in terms of frequency Frequency I just defer to to staff I think it is very important for the Planning Commission to have the data they need to do their job and Perhaps staff could Decide on a like a you know a bar like a trigger if there's a certain percentage that really changes that it warrants an overhaul |
| 02:18:03.99 | Unknown | Right. |
| 02:18:25.99 | Unknown | an update. |
| 02:18:28.10 | Jill Hoffman | And I agree with, I mean, I think this is an important study, both for our land use planning and for tracking some of our business trends and parking trends. I think we've had the question answered in my mind in terms of how this gets updated. But again, staff, if there's, you know, the call for a major overhaul, and it's good news for us because then we don't have to incur the fees for all of that. So, and thank everyone for putting this together. It really is an important document. It's really an interesting read about. |
| 02:18:38.02 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:18:57.50 | Jill Hoffman | how things have changed and some of the trends. which Thank you. |
| 02:19:02.44 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:19:02.46 | Jill Hoffman | THE END OF |
| 02:19:02.81 | Unknown | one quick comment it it it it has really changed and what goes on in San Francisco has a great effect on us because if you notice when they had the outside lands and the Giants and all of these events parking lot one gets filled by 11 o'clock for that because of the great demand of what's taking place in San Francisco |
| 02:19:05.87 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:19:05.88 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:19:06.02 | Unknown | you |
| 02:19:28.51 | Jill Hoffman | Great. Would someone like to make a motion? |
| 02:19:30.62 | Jill Hoffman | I move to introduce and read by title only an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Sausalito to revise the date of the Sausalito downtown parking survey and shared parking model as referenced in Sausalito Municipal Code section 10.40.110.g.1 from September 1997 to February 2015 and thereafter updated per the Sausalito downtown parking model maintenance procedures. |
| 02:20:05.17 | Jill Hoffman | Second. Can we do this by acclamation? All in favor? Aye. So it passes 5-0. Okay. Thank you so much. Thanks for coming and staying late. |
| 02:20:09.30 | Unknown | I'm not sure. |
| 02:20:09.50 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 02:20:09.52 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 02:20:09.53 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 02:20:09.75 | Unknown | you Okay. |
| 02:20:14.60 | Jill Hoffman | that. Thank you. you you Yes. Well done. We move on to item seven, city manager reports. City manager information for council. Adam Pulitzer. |
| 02:20:29.75 | Adam Politzer | Thank you, City Council. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just a handful of quick items, and then obviously happy to take any questions from the Council. Four of us went to the League of California Cities conference this past week. Mayor Theodorus, Vice Mayor Hoffman, Lily, and myself. And I think it was an excellent conference both on the sessions that were offered and then also this the opportunity to meet and talk with other council members in the state of California and then also to visit and talk with the various vendors that provide services up and down the state in all areas of city government so I think I was very pleased that we were all able to go. I would recommend strongly that each year that council members join either Lily or I at those meetings when they're available. Just, again, very insightful and helpful. Reminder we've talked about this and we'll continue to do this and we'll put it in the currents but we are planning a public forum on the RBRA discussion on their proposed project and that meeting is scheduled for November 12th. Right now it's 6 p.m. at the Spinnaker. We're running a series of articles trying to introduce the THE DISCUSSION beforehand so that the public has a little bit more information than what they received at our first meeting that the council benefited from back in May or June, I think it was in May, and then after this RBRA forum, we'll bring the item back to council for further discussion and direction. The RBRA board themselves continue to have their monthly meeting where this discussion is shared, and so we recommend that the public continue to attend those meetings. And pay attention to the action of all the cities that are involved with the RBRA. which includes Belvedere, Tiburon, Mill Valley, the county of Marin, and the city of Sausalito. We're watching the events unfold on the East Coast with the various storms and the aftermath of those storms with the flooding. and really the attack on their infrastructure. And I want to remind the council and the community that our infrastructure projects, have to remain our top priority. As when I started back in 2007, and told the council back then that This is about back to the basics, fixing our roads, our storm drains, our sewers, dealing with our infrastructure and keeping it as a high priority. I'm happy to say that Public Works is working very hard, and the council looking at the budget and our community with their support continue to move forward. But we are expecting major rains this coming winter season. And as I shared at Debbie Pegliero's retirement event this past weekend, that it's cyclical. And we saw news stories back in 1978. 1983. where we had major flooding that came over Bridgeway downtown and flooded the storefronts, destroyed piers, had debris crashing into scomas and undines and the spinnaker that caused significant damage. And so these are real threats to our community and homeowners can do a lot to take care of their own property especially at this moment in time with making sure that they're Thank you. pruning their trees clearing their gutters you know battening down you know all of the loose items around their home as they prepare for the winter season Uh, can also report that we're all taking this very seriously in terms of service providers where the county of marin office of emergency services have scheduled a series of meetings that our public works director Police chief and fire chief are attending. They're taking that information of how do we work, regionally and collaboratively as a county. how do we work in our area in Southern Marin and then how do we respond. to significant challenges due to storms here locally if we're on our own, which obviously will always be the case in the peak of a storm. PG&E has also been hosting and holding meetings at the same caliber of regional levels down to the local levels and gearing up, obviously, for a big winter season. So we hope to be prepared today Thank you. But again, as you heard from Shelby Van Meter earlier this evening, It takes a team approach. We all have to be working on this. It can't be dependent on the city being the only person dealing with it. So going out and clearing the gutters as the leaves are falling now, and not waiting for public works or for Bay Cities to come and your neighborhood. go ahead and push those out into the street and out of the getter. and definitely out of the storm drains. And when the storms come, GO OUTSIDE AND kick a few leaves, it's fun. especially if you have kids and you have rain boots it's a blast for them And it's obviously a big benefit to your neighbors downstream where the water comes down the road. And if you don't have a place for the water to go, it finds its way to places that we do not want. So, you know, again, I can't stress the importance. We'll continue to run. articles in the Currents. We'll continue to have information posted on the website. and our public works police chief and fire chief would be more than happy to meet with neighborhood groups if they would like to come and share their advice and recommendations. Some fun stuff coming up at the end of the month. We seem to have lots of fun in this town, and recently with a chili cook-off. And the Halloween event comes at the end of this month, and obviously Um, It's nice to see that we have more families in town, and every year that is the sense. But as we know, Halloween here in Sausalito is a community event, and people of all ages come. some dressed and some not, some dressed up in costume. They're all dressed. We haven't yet had any nudists. but What? I don't think we're too far away from from those experiences, but so far we've had some very clever and fun costumes from all ages and again recommend that the community comes out comes through the parade, It starts down there at the police and fire building. at 6 o'clock. and ends up here at City Hall for the Haunted House in Trick or Treat Lane. and that the council participates at the council table and joins all the community groups. that I'm sure will also be out there handing out candies and that's what we're doing. toys and all types of other fun treats for the young and old in our community. I'll let the mayor and vice mayor talk a little bit more if they want to about our meeting with Senator McGuire on Friday Senator McGuire was recognized by the League of Cities and the North Bay Division for really stepping up and being available and responsive to our communities here in the North Bay Division we all know that he is working hard on Airbnb and keeping local control where it should be and same with some bills related to marijuana dispensaries and again keeping local control in the cities and away from Sacramento but we were very impressed with him we asked him to come and look at the congestion challenges that we face here in Sausalito from Vista Point not just Vista Point Trail but Vista Point where we have a lot of activity that backs up traffic on Golden Gate Bridge which then creates a dangerous situation on people getting on northbound there at Alexander Avenue onto the freeway, you have a short ramp. and you've got all these people that are speeding after they get past Vista Trail or Vista Point, because that's where the gap opens up, and it becomes very dangerous there. the tunnel underneath Highway 101 and Alexander Avenue and the Golden Gate Bridge also very narrow and we wanted him to see and he got to experience bike riding in front of us as we were driving through and a car coming And to just see how narrow that is and how unsafe it is. for bicyclists to ride back. let alone if any pedestrian tried to walk to that side of Fort Baker and onto the bridge. We took them down, obviously down to the ferry landing. Yeah, it was, we were pleased. It's unfortunate, but we were pleased that there was congestion because our fear, the original meeting was scheduled in late July. And obviously, If he would have been here in late July, he would have seen us at the peak of the congestion issues we have. But even on a Friday at roughly 4.30 in the afternoon, we had a queue of people. The ambassadors were working. We had a queue of taxi cabs and tour buses all down there and we had a bustling community and the parking lots were relatively full so we got to experience a little bit of what what we deal with on a regular basis and then we wanted him to see the corridor the challenges on the a gateway corridor between the ferry landing and Alexander Avenue. and just the, you know, the project that we're going to need state support on and potentially state funding. to help. make changes, physical changes on that corridor that as we've reported to the council many years ago, is roughly in the $7 million range. And I know that the Public Works Department and the Bike and Ped Committee are working with Parisi and Associates to look at that project. And that's where we had roughly $125,000 to $140,000 of funding available to study that corridor. We also know that the corridor from Ferry Landing to Gate 6 Road is another significant amount of money in the neighborhood of $13 million to make the improvements that were recommended on the Bridgeway Corridor for bike and pedestrian improvements from Gate 6 Road all the way to the ferry landing. So when you look at the combined total of just those two projects, you're looking at $20 million. So looking for the state to step in and help And as we've shared with the state and with the county and everyone that would listen, The gateway to Marin County and the rest of the North Bay outside of your vehicles are through Sausalito. And because of the tourist industry that has Um, continue to grow in Sausalito. All the buses are coming through Sausalito and then on their way to Muir Woods or on their way to Napa County. or Sonoma County to the wine countries or other locations north of Sausalito so we also think that these improvements will be a benefit regionally not just specifically for Sausalito so I think it was a good meeting with Senator McGuire gave him a lot of information to take away and we have some homework for our Public Works director and the Park Service and the Golden Gate Bridge to continue to work on to keep him informed and up to speed. In the parking report that Stacey Gregory, Sergeant Gregory, prepared, which was under consent, I wanted to make sure that it was clear that when the parking program has been complete, in terms of rolling out all of the components of it, including the resident cards, that they'll be coming back also in November to give you a full report of the details and hopefully everything by that moment in time, the parking meters, the resident cards, the pay station, all those things are wrapped up and we can give you a full report. But in there, it talks about the beta testing that's going on with 20 residents using the resident card, But I want to make sure the residents know that the blue pay stations that are there now, the old ones, continue to take your resident cards that you have on you. And as the beta testing wraps up, hopefully in the next week or two, will be issuing the new resident cards to the residents and it will again continue to give all of our residents free three hours of parking downtown in the parking lots. I'll end my report at this moment and happy to take any questions from the council. |
| 02:33:51.45 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Adam. Public comment? On the managers, proceed none. Okay, we move on to Councilmember Committee reports. We'd like to start. |
| 02:34:07.82 | Jill Hoffman | I have a brief update on one of the external committees. the ABAG delegate and we have the Marin ABAG delegates meet periodically so that the overall representative to ABAG, who is Pat Eklund from current mayor pro tem in Novato, represents basically along with one of the supervisors, Marin County. What has occupied us in the last number of months, and will actually occupy a lot more time moving forward, starting with a meeting this Thursday evening of the APAC delegates, is that there is a proposal that basically MTC defund the planning division within ABAC, which for some will go, hey, that's fine. Why do we need it anyway? ABAG is the government organization, regional government organization that's charged with administering the basically the allocation of the so-called RHNA numbers, the affordable housing numbers that the state mandates. ABAG has become a lot more responsive in the last number of years in listening to local communities. What is feared by pretty much every town in Marin, every city in Marin County at the moment, is that basically MTC will take complete control over the allocation of RENA numbers. And quite frankly, that has a recipe for complete disaster. The MTC is driving a totally different agenda than most of the jurisdictions that Marin County feels is comfortable for them. And there's a danger that if we're worried now that certain of housing regional planning guidance results, mandates, whatever you want to call it, has been linked to unreasonably to transportation. that's going to just get magnified by a huge amount. This is a very, very concerning development in my personal view, but it would be interesting to see how all of the Marin County delegates view this. This is definitely going to have to come back to Council. There's going to be definite need for Council to form an opinion as to whether MTC should be allowed to proceed with this, and there's going to be a huge fight brewing right now. |
| 02:37:40.16 | Jill Hoffman | And Mike, just following on on the city manager's report on our dealing with Senator McGuire, I think it's a good idea. We've spent time with our senator, which is really important to have our context at the state level. And he's very, he was, and we made him even more aware of some of the congestion problems we have. An important part of it is, is that he has influence over the state, including Caltrans, and funds. And when we had our bicycle and pet committee report, I think one of the key items was moving forward the Vista Point trail. And right now we have a gap on the funding on that. And we're looking to for help from Senator McGuire to help close that gap. The other thing is that the ferry landing working group, the group chaired by supervisor Kate Sears will be meeting. The second meeting is going to be held this Saturday, October 10th at 9 o'clock. The Edgewater Room, And that's it. Thank you. Any council questions on any of the reports? |
| 02:38:45.17 | Unknown | I have a question about the ferry because the last, it's my understanding, the last working group, was there public comment? |
| 02:38:53.04 | Jill Hoffman | No. And, |
| 02:38:53.07 | Unknown | No. Will there be public comment at this very... working |
| 02:38:56.58 | Jill Hoffman | No, not, not it's run by Kate, but I don't think so. It's, it's a working group. And I just think that's unfortunate. |
| 02:38:56.62 | Unknown | I'm sorry. Thank you. |
| 02:39:01.24 | Unknown | I just think that's unfortunate. I disagree with the approach and the process. |
| 02:39:04.70 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Okay. And anyone else have questions or comments? |
| 02:39:11.32 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, there is no provision, as my understanding, for public comment at the meeting, but it is open to the public. |
| 02:39:18.77 | Unknown | No, I understand it's open to the public, but the ability for the public to comment is very important. And I've made it clear that I have a problem with the whole working group approach that Supervisor Sears has taken and that the mayor has collaborated on. I just don't understand it. I don't agree with it. I don't think it's fully transparent. I don't understand it. I don't agree with it. I don't think it's fully transparent. I don't think it's inclusive. |
| 02:39:49.60 | Jill Hoffman | Well, I think it's worked very well. And actually it's been modeled by other things, including the Muir Woods issue, but we'll move on with that. Okay. So any, I think we'd public comment on committee reports. No? Okay, moving on to mayor appointments to the legislative committee. We the legislative I am on the legislative committee and previously Councilmember Leon was on it. So we need to fill it and I'm I'm recommending Vice Mayor Hoffman since she's an attorney. and other positive reasons for putting our on. That's not the only reason, that's enough reason. But, so I'd like to do that and I think We'll do that, point her to the legislative committee. Okay. Any council questions on it or comments? Public comment? Seeing none. Future agenda items. |
| 02:40:45.83 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:40:46.24 | Unknown | Yeah, well, speaking of Muir Woods, one of the things that I think residents are very sensitive about is the prospect of Sausalito turning into a transit hub. And Muir Woods has started running a shuttle, you know, to Muir Woods through Sausalito. There's actually, I guess, a Muir Woods bus stop now downtown which and I just I just think that that should have come before council you know in it and it It should have been discussed with Council, and Council should have been able to weigh in on that. So I'm not sure how this transit hub... you know, came about, but I'd like that title and whoever's responsible for it to come before us and talk about it, to have a dialogue with the public. The other topic I have is I'm seeing, and as I mentioned during the Bicycle Pedestrian Committee, you know, our downtown is just, I mean... geographically we're seeing structure I'm seeing structures and signage and banners and and things pop up that you know look kind of tacky with you know regards to the bikes and the tourists and everything and and I I would just like to introduce the HLB um you know or some degree of uh of review before these things happen. The third thing is the pedicab. I was... of review before these things happen. The third thing is the pedicab. I was downtown, and I saw these guys on these tour... They're like, they're pedicabs. They've got like a carriage in the back. And it's like, where did this come from? You know, we never discussed this. We never approved this. And, you know, one guy heads down a bridgeway and takes up half the road. You know, and now you've got a pedicab, which is going like an inch a mile. You know, the ninja commuter cyclists or the cyclists that are just zipping around it, and you've got the tourist traffic, and you've got the pedestrian. It's just a mess with these pedicabs. So I'd like that as an agenda to understand how that happened, and I think we need to weigh in on that. I don't like them. The NFL traveling trophy, I'd like to know when that's coming back for us to take a look at that and then also the city manager performance evaluation we talked about this Adam we talked about this earlier you know because we've done that before and and we talked about this |
| 02:43:31.95 | Unknown | And I think that's what we're going to do. When have we done it? |
| 02:43:36.35 | Unknown | Well, we talked about this herb, and the city manager answered that question when it had been done before. So I think, you know, it would be good to, you know, undertake that again. Well, it goes back to my interest in having performance objectives. I mean, when I worked, you know, in Silicon Valley, we had performance objectives, and I know other cities have them, and I think that that's something we should look at. |
| 02:44:06.37 | Jill Hoffman | Anyone else? Okay. Mr. Mayor. |
| 02:44:09.97 | Jill Hoffman | I am going to repeat what I repeated a month or two ago, that we're going to have for next year some very important, as always, decisions to make on the allocation of resources. We'll be going into next spring completely blind, and I think we need to insist that we have a robust strategic planning session of City Council and staff in order to be able to frame how we're going to move forward into the development of next year's to your resource allocation plan |
| 02:44:57.34 | Jill Hoffman | anyone else? make one announcement, I think on future agenda items, I believe it was listed, we had the Tourist Impact Plan listed As a future agenda item for October 20th, That has been moved to November 17th. So anyone looking forward to that, we will be hearing that on November 17th. Public comment? |
| 02:45:25.42 | Unknown | The reason I wanted to talk earlier is because, Michael, the Richardson Bay Maritime Association, which my father started along with Kaprilian Leonard, and Michael Rex is the head of it now, they have been looking at that Butler building down there by the VA for years and it's all designed of course and it's all figured out the parking of course because it's Michael and they want to make it into a waterfront museum that's volunteer staffed and they've got all kinds of stuff in a storage unit right now that's been there ever since we left our house. And... So that was what I wanted to bring up. We did go out and talk to them. But so that you guys know that that's something that is something that's wanted here in town. by an organization that's a nonprofit that's been around for a while and does things. So that's the Butler Building. It's the funny metal building on the water. You know, not a big deal, but it would be nice to get that. |
| 02:46:47.95 | Jill Hoffman | that. Thanks, Ellis. Okay. Any other reports of significance? Okay, with that, we're adjourned. |
| 02:46:56.07 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:46:56.66 | Jill Hoffman | Oh, one minute before. |
| 02:46:58.42 | Jill Hoffman | 41 minutes early. |
Unknown — Against: Criticized the council's handling of Measure F and park funding, questioned financial priorities like spending on parks for few children, and alleged illegal misuse of city resources for pro-Measure F promotional materials. ▶ 📄